127: Chapter 128 He built a survival tower, not a man-eating tower.

[White Tower Old Project Chief Designer]

[Name: Lin Shoushan]

[Remarks: He did not enter the White Tower by mistake]

[He is the person who built the White Tower with his own hands]

The sound of the nameplate hitting the ground was very soft.

Yet it was like a giant boulder crashing into everyone's hearts.

Chen Ye stood with his mouth agape, unable to utter a single word for a long time.

Zhou Heng's hand holding the spear also paused for a moment.

Shen Tingxue did not look at the nameplate.

She looked at Lin Jin first.

Because the six black chairs in the sky had not withdrawn their gaze just because the truth was revealed.

On the contrary, a pale finger reaching out from behind the Sixth Seat [continuation] was gently tapping that identity plate.

As if waiting for Lin Jin to acknowledge it.

The father built the White Tower.

The son should take over the White Tower.

[Chief Designer bloodline inheritance chain establishing]

[Design responsibility can be transferred to a direct professional adapter]

[Candidate Lin Jin, possesses maintenance authority]

A black thread wriggled out from the nameplate, crawling along the ground toward Lin Jin.

Chen Ye snapped back to his senses and slammed his shield down.

"The son paying for the father's debts again?"

The shield landed, flattening the black thread, but it did not break.

It split around both sides of the shield and continued crawling forward.

The 002 in Teacher Xu Wenzhou's arms suddenly vibrated.

The ancient maintenance echo spoke once more.

Only this time, it no longer pretended to be calm.

"Take it!"

"Lin Shoushan is the designer of the White Tower! If you inherit his design authority and then get 002, you can directly shut down the White Tower!"

Teacher Xu Wenzhou held onto the wrench with a death grip, the veins on his arms bulging.

"Shut up!"

The ancient echo sneered.

"Don't you want to save people?"

"Shut down the White Tower, and Su Yan, He Zhibai, Luo Wensheng, Ye Guizhou, and even Lin Shoushan can all be freed."

"All it takes is for Lin Jin to acknowledge one thing."

"The Lin family is responsible for the White Tower."

Lin Jin stared at the nameplate on the ground, not reaching for it.

"You said earlier that you were the first entrance Maintenance Worker."

"Why is Lin Shoushan's identity hidden inside the nameplate now?"

The ancient voice paused.

"He is the designer."

"I am the Maintenance Worker."

"There is no conflict."

"Then why did you hide his nameplate inside 002?"

Lin Jin continued to ask.

The rusty red glow in the warehouse faltered slightly.

The ancient voice did not answer.

Lin Jin squatted down. Without touching the nameplate, he simply let the Hand of Rules cover it.

Prompts flashed before his eyes.

[Target: White Tower Old Project Chief Designer Nameplate]

[Authenticity: Name is real, position is real]

[Malfunction: Scope of duties was subsequently expanded]

[Original Duties: White Tower first floor structural design, rule contamination isolation, trapped personnel evacuation passage]

[Added Duties: Cost General Ledger, position substitution, sample reception, bloodline inheritance]

[Added Time: After project termination]

Lin Jin's gaze suddenly turned cold.

The name was real.

The designer identity was also real.

But the design content had been altered.

It was like someone taking an architect's signature, digging an execution ground beneath a long-completed rescue station, and then claiming he was responsible for the entire building.

Seeing the change in Lin Jin's expression, Shen Tingxue immediately asked:

"What did you find?"

"My dad built the White Tower."

Lin Jin stared at the nameplate.

"But he only designed the first floor."

Chen Ye was stunned.

"But the first floor eats people too."

"The *current* first floor eats people."

Lin Jin raised his head.

"The original first floor might not have been like this."

The black thread had already crawled to the edge of his shoe.

Lin Jin did not retreat.

He raised the rusty wrench and pressed it directly onto a corner of the nameplate.

"Read original design scope."

The nameplate instantly let out a piercing hum.

The six black chairs lowered simultaneously.

[Chief Designer archives cannot be reverse-audited by candidates]

"Can't be audited?"

Lin Jin twisted his left hand.

"Then there's definitely something fishy going on."

Crack!

The layer of rust behind the nameplate was prying open by the wrench.

An extremely thin blue metal film slid out from the interlayer.

It wasn't archives.

It was a miniature blueprint.

As the blueprint unfolded, the walls of the entire F-class training capsule were covered in blue light.

A White Tower completely different from the current one appeared before everyone's eyes.

It did not tower into the clouds.

There were no layers of trials.

And certainly no General Ledger Room.

It only had one floor.

The tower body was semi-circular, like a giant protective dome inverted over the ground.

In the center, there was no ledger, nor was there an observation seat.

Instead, there was a wide evacuation passage.

On the side of the blueprint were handwritten annotations from Lin Shoushan's youth.

[White Tower Emergency Isolation Station]

[Purpose: Contain personnel within rule-contaminated areas who temporarily cannot be recognized by reality rules]

[Principle One: Retain names first, then determine status]

[Principle Two: Minors must not serve as stabilizing anchors]

[Principle Three: No profession shall be split and utilized simply due to 'functional suitability']

[Principle Four: Those who fail to evacuate shall enter the waiting area, and this must not be written down as voluntary abandonment]

Looking at the fourth rule, Chen Ye felt a lump in his throat.

"These rules..."

They've all been inverted and used by the current White Tower.

Erasing names first.

Dismantling people by function.

Turning minors into stabilizing anchors.

Writing off failed evacuations as voluntary abandonment.

The current White Tower hasn't just deviated from the original design.

It has completely flipped every single protective principle of the original design into a man-eating rule.

Shen Tingxue walked up to the blueprint.

Beside the evacuation passage, she saw an ice-blue mark.

[Low-Temperature Testimony Exit]

"So the Ice Key wasn't originally the observer position key."

Her voice was heavy.

"It was the testimony validator for the evacuation passage."

Lin Jin nodded.

"The one Shen Qingshuang held was a key meant for saving people."

"Lu Chengyuan modified it into an observer position authority item."

Zhou Heng looked at the other side of the blueprint.

A lightning-shaped circuit was marked there.

[Barrier Breaking Buffer Path]

"This section is similar in structure to my buffering thunder nails."

"It's not just similar."

Lin Jin zoomed in on the blueprint.

"The arc-routing barrier breaking you use now was originally part of the White Tower's evacuation system."

Zhou Heng's expression shifted slightly.

The Zhou Family had always claimed this ability was an exclusive inheritance of the White Tower's Barrier Breaker Position.

Yet originally, it was merely a buffering technology designed to avoid harming evacuating personnel.

Chen Ye pointed at a shield-shaped structure near the entrance of the blueprint.

"What about this?"

[Mobile Protection Judgment Node]

[Can provide risk pre-judgment outside the entrance]

Chen Ye froze.

Previously, in order to prove that "he was absent from the scene but his protection was not absent," they had been forced by the White Tower to go to such lengths.

Yet in Lin Shoushan's original design from twenty years ago, the Protection Role was already permitted to make judgments while standing outside the tower.

It wasn't that the White Tower didn't know.

It had simply deleted the correct answer on purpose, forcing those who came after to pay a price for doing the right thing.

"What a bunch of bastards."

Chen Ye cursed under his breath.

In the sky, the six seats vibrated simultaneously.

The First Seat [Record] issued a cold prompt.

[Old design has been abolished]

[Current White Tower structure has a higher priority of effect]

The Second Seat [Ruling] lit up immediately after.

[The Chief Designer did not prevent subsequent reconstruction]

[By default, he is deemed to have accepted the project's continuation]

Lin Jin abruptly looked up.

"Did not prevent?"

He pressed the blood-stained nut thrown by his father onto the blueprint.

The voice preserved inside the nut immediately rang out.

"I do not agree to hand over the maintenance responsibilities!"

"Don't try to save me here!"

"Go back and repair the tool completely!"

The voice was hoarse, yet crystal clear.

Right after, Lin Jin also took out the 0001 iron plate.

The death certificate, return Records, and real-world entrance maintenance testimony manifested simultaneously.

"Three years ago, he pursued into the Second Floor."

"Twenty years ago, he left behind the protective principles."

"Now he is locked at the entrance, repairing the very things you ruined."

Lin Jin looked at the six seats.

"You call this not preventing?"

The pale finger behind the Sixth Seat curled slightly.

The black thread suddenly surged violently. No longer trying to connect with Lin Jin, it turned toward the blue blueprint instead.

It wanted to destroy the original blueprint.

"Protect the blueprint!"

Chen Ye shoved his shield forward, blocking the first beam of black light.

Zhou Heng let go of his Thunder Spear, which curved and pinned down the second beam.

Shen Tingxue plunged her Ice Key into the center of the blueprint. Frost spread along every design line, freezing the entire blueprint into a sheet of transparent ice.

But the third beam of black light came from inside 002.

The ancient maintenance echo controlled the wrench, slashing violently toward the blueprint.

Teacher Xu Wenzhou gripped 002 tightly with both hands, but his body was dragged forward.

"Lin Jin!"

"It's not trying to slash the blueprint!"

"It's trying to sever the Chief Designer position!"

Lin Jin reacted instantly.

Once the "Chief Designer" position was severed by 002, Lin Shoushan's connection to the original blueprint would also be broken.

At that point, the six seats would be able to claim—

The blueprint exists.

But no one can prove who designed it.

The evidence would once again become ownerless.

"Zhou Heng, strike to Teacher Xu's right!"

Zhou Heng did not hesitate. His Thunder Spear abruptly changed direction.

The tip of the spear did not touch Teacher Xu Wenzhou, but instead struck a patch of air half a step to his right.

Boom!

A blurry figure hidden behind Teacher Xu Wenzhou was blown out by the lightning.

It wasn't an old man.

It had no face, and no body.

It was merely a maintenance uniform pieced together from black text.

On its chest was written:

[002 Execution Instructions]

The so-called first Maintenance Worker's echo was not a person at all.

It was merely an execution module within the tool.

It read the tone, memories, and work Records of successive users, piecing together the image of an "old Maintenance Worker" to induce the candidate to trust it.

Chen Ye's voice was hoarse from screaming.

"An instruction manual dares to pose as our ancestor?"

Teacher Xu Wenzhou gritted his teeth and slammed 002 down toward the ground with both hands.

"Get out of my body!"

The black text was forcibly shaken out.

002 lost control and crashed heavily onto the ground.

Yet Lin Jin did not go to pick it up.

Instead, he raised his foot and kicked the wrench into the academy sealing array beneath Qin Shanhe's feet.

"Seal the tool first."

Qin Shanhe brought his palm down.

Although the shattered Deans Seal had not yet recovered, he still mobilized the academy array runes established jointly by instructors and students to lock 002 down layer by layer.

"Even without the Dean's Seat, I am still Qin Shanhe."

The array runes closed.

002 finally fell silent.

In the sky, the six seats also stopped pressing down.

They did not leave.

They simply stared quietly at the blue blueprint, as if assessing how many more secrets had been exposed.

Lin Jin walked to the very bottom of the blueprint.

There was a white area there that had clearly been pasted on afterward.

Shen Tingxue used her Ice Key to pry open the edge.

The white paper fell away.

Revealing a White Tower reconstruction Record underneath.

[Original Project: White Tower Emergency Isolation Station]

[Reconstruction Project: White Tower Profession continuation Project]

[Additional Structure: Second Floor - Cost General Ledger Room]

[Reconstruction Principle: Those who cannot evacuate shall be converted into sustainable functions]

[Approving Entity: Rule Maintenance Seat Sixth Seat - continuation]

[Construction Lead: White Tower Chief Designer Lin Shoushan]

Just as Chen Ye's expression changed, Lin Jin was already looking at the last line.

The Hand of Rules descended.

[Name is real]

[Identity Form: Position Proxy Shell]

[This construction lead is not Lin Shoushan himself]

Lin Jin's heart sank bit by bit.

His father was real.

But inside the White Tower, there was another entity using Lin Shoushan's name.

That entity inherited the Chief Designer authority, but did not inherit Lin Shoushan's protective principles.

Just like Lu Chengyuan.

Dead people had Director Proxy Shells.

Designers also had Position Proxy Shells.

At the very bottom of the reconstruction Record, a real-time status slowly emerged.

[Chief Designer Position Proxy Shell: Still running]

[Current Location: White Tower Second Floor - Cost General Ledger Room]

[Current Task: Waiting for Lin Jin to enter]

Immediately after, a real-time video feed from the Second Floor covered the blueprint.

In the center of the grayish-white ledger pages, a man who looked exactly like Lin Shoushan slowly raised his head.

He wore a clean Chief Designer uniform and held a 100% complete rule correction wrench in his hand.

The man looked at Lin Jin through the projection, wearing his father's customary smile.

"Son."

"The one on the basement level is already broken beyond repair."

"Come home."

"Dad will teach you how to rebuild this world from scratch."