He stepped back, breathing hard. He hadn't just opened a door; he’d rewritten the map.
The air in the Testing Chamber smelled of ozone and shattered physics. Elias stood before the , a rectangular frame that looked like a standard doorway until he flipped the toggle. Frame Portals on Steroids
Most portals were windows—you looked through them to see another place. This was different. As he slid the frame three inches to the left, the room didn't just show a new vista; it . He stepped back, breathing hard
Elias smiled. This wasn't just transportation; it was a . He tilted the frame 45 degrees toward the floor. Through the glass, the floor wasn't wood—it was the sky, ten thousand feet up. He didn't fall. Instead, he reached through and "grabbed" a passing cloud. As he pulled the cloud back through the frame, it condensed into a glowing, pressurized canister of pure oxygen. Then came the Breach. Elias stood before the , a rectangular frame
Every time he pulled, the room grew smaller. The ceiling dipped. The walls bruised. He realized the terrifying truth of the "Steroid" effect: the frame wasn't moving him to a new place—it was .
With a final, desperate shove, Elias flipped the frame flat against the ground. The loop closed. The room snapped back to its original dimensions with a thunderous crack , leaving nothing behind but a perfectly square hole in the floor that led, infinitely, into itself.
The frame began to vibrate, its edges glowing a violent violet. Elias had pushed the too far. He saw himself standing on the other side, but his "other" was holding the frame from the opposite end. They were playing a tug-of-war with the fabric of existence.