Chapter 4: Dictionary of Masks
Taiwan Edition v2
Location: Mirror Realm · Emerald Isle Study (Parallel Universe No. 15) Time: MAR 1022–DEC 1022 Protagonist: Lin Zhao-ming
Half a year into the job, Lin Zhao-ming began noticing certain words.
Not because he didn't understand them. It was because he understood them perfectly, yet their actual meaning was completely divorced from their literal definition.
The first time was during a routine meeting.
Peter was discussing personnel allocation and used a phrase: "growth opportunity."
"This is an excellent growth opportunity. We hope you can take on more responsibility."
Lin Zhao-ming listened. Taking on more responsibility meant the work of three people was now being done by two. No extra headcount, no extra money, no extra time.
"Growth opportunity."
He remembered that.
The second time was an email.
A colleague had proposed a suggestion regarding a change in the testing workflow. The email was sent, and an answer arrived a few days later.
"Thank you for your sharing. We will comprehensively consider all relevant factors."
And then, nothing followed.
Lin Zhao-ming was CC'd, watching the whole thing unfold. The suggestion was reasonable, the data was complete, the logic was sound. But after "thank you for your sharing," there was only silence.
"Comprehensively consider."
He remembered that one too.
The third time was a company-wide announcement.
The subject line was, "Our People First Commitment." The body of the email detailed how the company valued every single colleague, how it invested in talent development, and how it was building an inclusive work environment.
Three weeks later, another email arrived. The subject line was, "Strategic Workforce Optimization."
"To align with our business development direction, we will be conducting strategic workforce optimizations. Affected colleagues will receive appropriate transitional arrangements."
Lin Zhao-ming read it three times.
"Strategic optimization." "Affected colleagues." "Transitional arrangements."
Every single word was meticulously correct. Put together, it was a layoff.
He began compiling a list in his head.
It wasn't intentional. It just happened naturally—every time he heard a phrase, he would file it away and cross-reference it with whatever happened next.
"Growth opportunity" = Doing more work, with no one thanking you for it. "Thank you for your sharing" = Nothing you say will have any impact whatsoever. "Strategic optimization" = Firing people. "Transitional arrangements" = Pack your desk and leave.
These weren't secrets. Everyone knew them. But no one would say them out loud.
If you said them out loud, you were simply "not positive enough."
In the middle of 2022, Lin Zhao-ming prepared a proposal.
About standardization.
This is how it started.
Aura Synthesis used several different systems: ALC was the primary database, JIRA was for project tracking, and then there were various test reports, specification sheets, and meeting minutes. The problem was—every single system used a different numbering scheme, different units of measurement, and completely different underlying logic.
The exact same energy core module was called "SEM-2201-A" in ALC, "MOD-22-001" in JIRA, and "TypeA_v2" in test reports. For parameters, ALC used one set of units, test reports used another, and spec sheets used yet another.
Lin Zhao-ming did the math: 90% of the time spent in every meeting was dedicated to translation. You state an ID number, I have to cross-reference it with another ID number, and then we both have to confirm we're actually talking about the same thing. You state a numerical value, I have to clarify the unit of measurement, and then manually convert it.
At his previous company, he had spent time writing an automated script to handle corresponding data points. One Excel formula, and the entire thing was resolved.
He thought he could do the same here.
The concept itself was exceedingly simple.
Energy cores have physical parameters—performance density, conversion coefficients, degradation rates. These are absolute values; they are the bedrock truths of physical reality.
And you can "standardize" these absolute values—converting them into percentages, relative efficiency metrics, and lifespan indices. These are relative values—abstracted parameters.
Once you have these standardized parameters, the system can automatically convert them no matter which product model or which energy core specification you apply them to. It takes a second.
But Aura Synthesis didn't possess this machinery.
They had taken the final, output-level results from a specific Mirror Screen terminal model—"how long it can operate"—and treated that result as the universal standard. It was exactly like treating "turn left and walk fifty steps" as absolute global coordinates. Consequently, every single time they switched to a new device model, all the engineers were forced to manually re-test and re-calculate every single number by hand.
What should have been a one-second systemic conversion had devolved into a daily, agonizing arithmetic exercise powered entirely by human labor.
He wrote out a proposal.
It wasn't complex. Establish a three-tier architecture:
The bottom layer: fundamental physical standards—the genuine limits of the energy core, in absolute values.
The middle layer: standardized abstraction parameters—abstracting the hardware characteristics to divorce them from being tied to any single product.
The top layer: terminal output—automatically generating specifications for every distinct product model based on the previous two layers.
With this architecture, every product gets a unique ID, and all other systems link back to it. Whenever you need to look something up, one ID is all it takes. Swap out a new product, plug in the conversion parameters, and the numbers are spat out automatically.
He sent it to the boss.
Waited a few days.
The boss scheduled a one-on-one.
"I read your proposal," the boss said.
Lin Zhao-ming waited.
"These things... they aren't that simple."
"I know it can't be done in a single day. But if we start from a small place—"
"You aren't familiar with our workflows," the boss said. His tone was perfectly flat. "There's a lot of history here, a lot of reasons why things are the way they are. It's not as straightforward as it looks."
"I understand that. But the problem itself is real—every single meeting, the vast majority of our time is spent just converting data—"
"You need to proactively communicate with the other departments more."
Lin Zhao-ming stopped.
"This proposal. Have you talked to anyone else about it? Have you tried to understand their concerns?"
"I... I spoke to a few people."
"Speaking to someone isn't communication," the boss said. "Communication requires building relationships, understanding the other party's position, finding consensus. This approach of yours... it's too aggressive."
Lin Zhao-ming sat there.
"I'm not saying your idea is bad," the boss said. "But this isn't your old company. You have to learn how to operate in this specific environment."
The call ended.
Lin Zhao-ming sat in his study, staring at the black screen.
"You need to proactively communicate more."
He understood the literal meaning of the sentence. What he didn't understand was: He proposed a technical solution to a technical problem—why was the response, "You have a communication problem"?
Did he genuinely fail to explain it clearly enough? Did he genuinely just not understand the culture here?
He thought about it for a very long time.
Eventually, he decided: Maybe it truly was a communication issue. Next time, he would try approaching it from a different angle.
A few months later, something happened.
A project had been in development for an entire year. It was an energy core performance comparison—taking two energy core modules of identical specifications and evaluating which was superior.
On the day of the presentation, Lin Zhao-ming was WFH, participating via video.
The person responsible for the presentation spoke for an entire hour. He effusively praised System A's energy core as "black magic" because its performance vastly outstripped System B's. The data was utterly comprehensive, the charts were gorgeous, the terminology was flawless—Synergy, Alignment, Optimization—every single buzzword deployed with lethal precision.
As Lin Zhao-ming listened, something felt wrong.
He unmuted his microphone.
"Are the actual loads on System A and System B fundamentally different?"
Silence.
"Is System A a lightweight chassis, and System B a heavy-duty chassis?"
The presenter paused. "Yes... but the energy core specifications are identical—"
"If the loads are different, the consumption rates are different. The reference points aren't aligned; this comparison is completely invalid at its foundational level."
An even longer silence.
Someone cleared their throat. The meeting continued, but no one was truly listening to the presentation anymore.
Lin Zhao-ming muted his microphone and sat back in his study.
He didn't feel like he had done anything particularly extraordinary. He had simply pointed out a middle-school physics baseline—controlling variables.
But then he started thinking: This project took an entire year. How many people had it passed through?
The Line Manager had seen it. The Department Head had approved it. The Director had signed off on it. Possibly even higher tiers of management.
Dozens of people. Alumni of elite universities, MBA holders. Every single one of them had clicked "Approve."
And not a single one had noticed that the "reference points aren't aligned."
Why?
He didn't know the answer to that.
But he began noticing one thing: The approval processes here didn't seem to be about approving content.
They were about approving format. Approving workflow. Approving whether "the rules were followed."
As for whether the content itself was actually correct—that didn't seem to be the point.
At the time, he didn't know.
It wasn't a communication problem.
Standardization touches things. If data was aligned, if numbering was unified, if records were cleanly traceable—a lot of things would float to the surface. The immense blocks of time countless people spent on "translation" would suddenly vanish. And the "value" of those people would vanish right along with it.
And that presentation, surviving dozens of approvers without a single person spotting the flaw—that wasn't an accident. Because the purpose of the approval process was never to actually find flaws in the first place.
But he wouldn't begin to faintly sense these things until 2023. And he wouldn't truly understand them until 2024.
In 2022, he simply thought: Maybe the problem was me. Maybe my communication style was wrong. Maybe I just didn't try hard enough to understand their culture.
During that same period, another incident occurred.
After the QCC issue, Lin Zhao-ming worked on a few projects and produced some concrete results. Nothing earth-shattering—just everyday things. He tracked down a bug, wrote a script to accelerate testing, and organized a document to clarify a workflow.
Once, during a routine meeting, the boss mentioned, "This project was executed quite nicely."
Lin Zhao-ming thought the boss was talking about him.
But the boss didn't name him. He just said "team effort," and then went out of his way to mention someone else who "coordinated it very well."
That person was Cindy.
After the meeting, Lin Zhao-ming went to the boss.
"That project you just mentioned, I wanted to confirm—"
"Right, great job on it," the boss said.
"I just wanted to say—there are several components in there that were actually handled by—"
"I know," the boss said. "You did a lot. Your behind-the-scenes contributions are very important."
"But—"
"You can't be so calculating about these things," the boss said. His tone remained perfectly friendly. "You can't just slap an endless list of names onto a project. The work you achieved, a lot of people are aware of it."
"And what if they are?" Lin Zhao-ming almost spat it out. But he didn't.
"These things are your accumulated capital," the boss said. "In the long run, this will benefit you."
The call ended.
Lin Zhao-ming sat in his study.
"Your behind-the-scenes contributions are very important." "You can't be so calculating." "These things are your accumulated capital."
Every single sentence was correct. Every single sentence sounded thoroughly pleasant.
But added together, the meaning was absolute: You did the work, the credit isn't yours, and you shouldn't ask questions.
He began to understand a fundamental reality.
There was an entire language here. The literal words were one meaning, the actual application was another. Everyone could speak it, and everyone could understand it. But absolutely no one would ever lay it out on the table to discuss.
"Growth opportunity." "Thank you for your sharing." "You need to proactively communicate more." "You can't be so calculating."
He began to learn it. Not because he wanted to learn it, but because if he didn't, he would have no idea what was happening around him.
Once, he went into ALC to look for some data.
It was a test report for an old project. He needed to cross-reference three documents to recover the data from that time.
Document one: Test report. Conclusion: "Pass." Document two: Meeting minutes. Conclusion: "Pending issues require follow-up." Document three: JIRA ticket. Status: "Resolved," but the resolution field stated "Deferred to next phase."
Three documents. All discussing the precise same issue. Three completely different conclusions.
Pass. Pending. Deferred.
Which one was the truth?
He went and asked J.
"These three documents. Which one is accurate?"
J took one glance. "They're all accurate."
"But the conclusions are completely different—"
"The test report discusses the testing phase. The meeting minutes discuss the discussion that happened at that specific time. The JIRA ticket outlines the action items. They represent different things."
"But if I just want to know what actually happened to the issue in the end—"
"Then you have to read all the documents, and come to your own judgment."
Lin Zhao-ming sat there entirely still.
"Or," J said, "you could just ask the person who was in charge of it at the time."
"The person in charge at the time resigned."
"Well then..." J smiled slightly. "It just depends on how you interpret it, doesn't it?"
Lin Zhao-ming went back to his study, and sat for a very long time.
Three documents. Three versions. Not a single one of them was fake—every single one was a genuine, truthful recording of a specific moment's state. But added together, you could never derive a clear answer.
And the person responsible had left. The memory had scattered. All that remained were fragments.
He began to realize: The data in this place possessed an incredibly bizarre quality.
It wasn't falsification. It wasn't concealment. It was... deliberate blurring.
Every single document was real. But real documents added together did not equal the truth.
And this blurriness seemed to be actively maintained.
It wasn't that someone was intentionally sabotaging it. It was... no one had the incentive to actually clean it up of their own volition. Because if it were cleaned up, what exactly would happen?
He didn't know. He just felt it: Something was wrong.
At the end of the year, there was a company-wide update.
The CEO sent out a very long email outlining the company's trajectory.
"We remain committed to our People First philosophy." "We will continue to invest in our talent." "Together, we will navigate the challenges ahead."
Lin Zhao-ming read it all.
Within the exact same week, HR sent out a secondary email.
"As part of our ongoing organizational review, the following positions have been identified for strategic realignment."
He counted the headcount. Fifteen people.
Lin Zhao-ming sat in his study and ran the math.
This company was not the company he thought it was.
Not because there were bad people. Not because there was some grand conspiracy. It was simply because what was spoken here and what was executed here were dual, parallel tracks. And everyone knew there were two tracks, yet everyone enthusiastically pantomimed not knowing.
"People First" and "strategic realignment" could appear in the very same week. No one felt there was any inherent conflict.
Or, someone did feel there was a conflict, but no one chose to say anything about it.
Because if you spoke up, you were "not mature enough." "Failed to grasp business realities." "Needed to be more strategic."
What could he do?
He ran the numbers.
If he forced a collision—if he questioned the language, if he pointed out the raging contradictions—what would happen?
Nothing would happen. Because every sentence they used was "correct." You couldn't mathematically prove them false. All you could say was that your "interpretation was different." And suddenly, you became the problem.
He didn't want to be the problem.
At least, not right now.
"Keep your head down, do the work steadily, and wait until you see clearly."
He told himself.
It wasn't a compromise. It wasn't surrender. It was—pure observation.
He needed to see exactly how this system operated. He needed to know which tectonic plates were safe, and which plates were lethal. He needed to find his own square on the board.
And then, when the time came, he would decide what to do.
During this period, Cindy would occasionally message him privately on Teams. Not official business—no ticket numbers, no deadlines, just casual chatting.
Asking him if he had gotten used to living on Emerald Isle. Asking if his wife was also employed in Emerald Isle. Asking if they rented or bought their house. Asking what his exact position was at the American company before coming here.
He answered everything. He thought it was normal—someone asks you a question, you give them an answer. Cindy herself would offer up information: how hard renting was, how many times she had forcefully relocated, how obscenely property prices had inflated in Emerald City. But what her husband did for a living, how much money he made, or the household's actual expenditure—she never mentioned a single word about any of that.
Lin Zhao-ming failed to notice. He just felt Cindy was quite talkative, fairly proactive. In a completely WFH team, people willing to initiate conversation were rare. He thought it was a good thing.
That night, his wife stopped in his study doorway.
"Still busy?"
"Just looking over some things," Lin Zhao-ming said.
"Company stuff?"
"Yeah."
She stood there, watching him. "You seem to be looking over company stuff every single day."
"There are some things I need to figure out."
"Like what?"
Lin Zhao-ming thought for a second.
"The words here," he said. "The way people talk... sometimes I don't understand it. It's not that I don't understand the literal words, it's that I don't understand the real meaning."
"Then ask."
"I did," he replied. "But the answers don't match the questions."
She looked at him and didn't press the subject any further.
"Get some sleep soon," she said.
"I will."
She walked away.
Lin Zhao-ming stared at the screen and read for a little while longer.
At the time, he thought that learning their language would make things a little better.
He didn't realize that once he learned it, he would simply see an endless expanse of even more things.
And seeing more things does not mean you possess the power to alter a single one of them.
In 2022, he still thought it was a communication gap.
In 2023, he started to realize it probably wasn't.
In 2024, he finally understood: It never was to begin with.
But that was all for later.
JUICY POINT:
"Every single word they speak is meticulously correct in the dictionary. But they are the only ones reading that specific edition of the dictionary."