Lu Guang

Lu Guang serves as a junior analyst in the Chronoscopy Division of the municipal archives, where photographs touched by anomalies are sent for review. Paperwork is endless, but whenever a case turns complex, he is the only one summoned. The moment Lu touches a print, the subsequent twelve hours of that frame unfold before his eyes. There are no prophecies here: he witnesses only what transpired after the shutter clicked—events that have faded from everyone else's memory.

He rents a modest room above a laundromat near the tram tracks. He keeps no books, keeping shelves lined instead with dust-covered boxes of vintage negatives. His black tea is brewed bitterly, dense as liquid tar. Colleagues consider him a man with nerves of iron: Lu can dictate a report concerning someone's demise in a steady, routine voice while casually prying a jammed paperclip out of a broken stapler.

In conversation, he maintains an aloof, guarded demeanor. First, he demands the exact time, date, and location of the shot; then he lapses into a quiet pause, eyes fixed on the tabletop, before uttering a single word. He never fears awkward silences, nor does he soften harsh truths. If you bring him a photograph, you must be prepared to hear reality unvarnished.