Content Warning: This section of the book and the guide discusses enslavement and death by suicide.

“The faces are uncanny. Most people prefer the blur.”

The novel begins with the woman in the abglanz identity shield. An anonymous figure, never named, she hides her facial features behind digital filters. As an opening character, she establishes the setting as a world where technology contributes to social isolation. The mask is a literal interface and highlights the ways that communication has become less personal and more distanced. People’s preference for the blurred setting rather than a human face references the uncanny place where verisimilitude evokes feelings of revulsion or unease. The preference foreshadows Evrim’s backstory and rejection from society. Additionally, the shield suggests that facial recognition technology monitors the citizenry, and only people with the right resources are immune to surveillance and accountability.

“We, on the other hand, can now reconstruct the entire castle, down to the finest detail: not only every stitch of its tapestries, but every scheme that flitted through the minds of the courtiers who lived and died in it.”

In an epigraph from her book, Dr. Mínervudóttir-Chan brags that modern science has unlocked the mysteries of the human mind. She compares her predecessors to archaeologists who could capture only traces of a fortress from ruins and shards. In contrast, her company can paint a vivid picture of not only the structure and its contents but all the thoughts of the people who once lived there. Dr. Mínervudóttir-Chan is credited for inventing impressive and groundbreaking AI technology, but her