Chrysalis

“Hold, dammit!” Brilliant roared.

“I’m not sure it can take it,” Assistant cried out. “It’s going to overflow!”

“It needs more power! Give it everything you’ve got!”

“We can’t do any more, the matrix will collapse!”

“A little further,” Brilliant urged as the mana surged and frothed. Dimensional boundaries were cascading around them and she could peer into them all, flashing images of twisting reality that bent and warped themselves around her.

They were so close!

“It’s gone! Run!” Assistant shrieked, and Brilliant was vaguely aware of her followers ducking for cover or diving into the blast cages. She herself didn’t move, of course, transfixed as she was by the beauty she beheld in front of her.

“So beautiful,” she whispered.

A moment later, she was spear tackled and knocked from her observation platform.

“Experimant! What are you doing?!” she yelled.

your life, again,” the ant replied, flicking her antennae with irritation. “It’s a little difficult to make use of your insights if you die in

at pains to make,

find me,” she boasted, “I see it coming a full

back to the ground. Then the explosion finally happened, the haywire mana discharging as purple lightning

muttered. “Forgot

up her merry band began to emerge from the reinforced concrete bunkers someone had decided to install in their research chamber. She strongly suspected Assistant was the

done, everyone,” Brilliant rushed around the team, giving everyone an enthusiastic tap with an antenna. “Fantastic experiment, another rousing success!

she finally emerged, still hugging the floor as the last few sparks danced across the walls. “It

“How many times do I have to teach you? Only a truly successful test will end with a multiple manifold-collapse. We were able to peer deeper

on those who didn’t share her clarity of vision, she raced to the enchanted array embedded into the floor beneath the great stone edifice she had dubbed the rift-arch. Reinforced behind thick layers of hardened ice and embedded within a holding structure of living stone, the array was a sophisticated piece of enchanting, the only one of its kind within the Colony. Smithant

look at the readings! One-two-three… sixteen identifiable threads. Our spatial pathway

“which means any ant who travelled through it would be liquified. Not quite the result we are aiming

We are making great strides. Great strides. You don’t discover the secrets of

not sure my brain

Experimant huffed, clearly frustrated, her antennae swinging low. “If we only want to

line of her carapace, but it

a dimension. If you punch a h-hole

looking to find a destination in three dimensional space, but rather find our way