Hyperspace

A ship exiting hyperspace

Hyperspace, also known as Greyspace, The Afterlight, Whitespace, Newspace, Warp Space, the Storm Realm, Lightspace, The Tidal Realm, Infinity, The Fall, The Lightning Tunnels, and The Sea of Clouds, is a realm of altered physics superimposed over Realspace, the source of tachyonic energy, and the realm accessed by Light Drives and its variants for faster-than-light travel.

## Workings

Hyperspace appears to be a realm of stormy light grey clouds, accompanied by white lightning-like streaks. If one ventures deeper into hyperspace, its color may turn shades of blue, ranging from light blue in entrance and exit points to dark blue in maelstroms and tidal fields. Hyperlanes, otherwise known as viable hyperspace where it is safe for ships to travel, appear to be tunnels within this sea of clouds. If a ship were to enter hyperspace at an uncharted point in space with no known hyperlanes around, they risk being destroyed by flying directly into the clouds, which are very turbulent, and quickly rip apart whatever flies into them, with the only known craft to survive doing so in the modern age being the Uux-armored Negative Reality Driver. Hyperlanes and open areas of hyperspace are abundant, both natural and artificially created. Within hyperspace, many laws of physics are heavily altered, thus allowing for ships to exceed the speed of light several dozen times over. Within hyperspace, reflections of objects in Realspace, known as pullfields, are obstacles that must be avoided, as they will violently pull ships out of hyperspace or simply annihilate them. Large maelstroms and "tidal" fields create inaccessible areas in hyperspace. Negative Energy can be used to carve new lanes into hyperspace, as can hyperdrills, although hyperdrills cannot get through maelstroms, tidal fields, or artificial blockades. Some maelstroms are known to contain openings, which usually lead to dead ends, although these openings can hold large deposits of Dark Energy leaks, and are usually located away from hyperlanes. Hyperlanes are known to bend and move as the objects they connect drift through space, sometimes being cut off. While crafts are able to exceed light speed several million times in hyperspace, there is still a maximum speed. If that speed is exceeded by any object, said object will be disintegrated into pure energy, irreversibly destroying it. Hyperspace is also known to cause time dilations for anything which goes through it, although this can be averted through use of relativity shields and other abilities. Hyperspace anomalies are also known to sometimes permeate into realspace, and can briefly boost ships across galactic distances, as seen with the S.L. Jyist, although with the effects of time dilation and damage to the craft in question. It is known that these anomalies seem to function similarly to wormholes, and thus negate pullfields and other realspace dangers, although the wormhole itself is turbulent. Space-time anomalies in realspace can also damage hyperspace, making lanes become turbulent or blocking them off, and is often the cause of opening up wormholes. Forms of sub-hyperspace exist, which allow for instantaneous intergalactic communications through hyperspace communicators. These sub-hyperspace layers cannot be physically accessed, but signals, non-physical entities, and energy can pass through it. Objects traveling through hyperspace seem to be surrounded by "hyper bubbles," which is an effect that would make the object appear as a single beam of energy when in hyperspace. This aspect of hyperspace makes most ships pass by each other in hyperspace completely unaware of each other, unable to see or physically contact each other. However, hyperspace-faring crafts, especially sufficiently large crafts, can expand and add other crafts into their hyper bubble, allowing entire fleets to travel through a single bubble. Due to this aspect of hyperspace, destructive hyper rams are extremely rare, and mostly intentionally done.

## Accessing Hyperspace

Accessing hyperspace requires a form of a Light Drive, whether it be a standard Light Drive or an alternative form, such as a Portal Drive or Space Stone Drive. Tachyonic energy, raw hyperfuel made up of particles moving faster than the speed of light, leaks from hyperspace into Realspace, often in the form of solar energy reacting with planetary cores, supernovas forming Novanium, quantities of Quasar Diamond, and other energy-absorbent substances. Therefore, naturally tachyon-charged substances can be found across space, and then used as fuel for Light Drives. Although ships can be manually piloted throughout long and straight hyperlanes using the LDCI, most ships use autopilot systems, especially for more complex and dangerous routes. Hyperspace is incredibly difficult to map out from within, and thus, Hyperspace Relays are used to direct hyperdrills from Realspace.

## Background

Hyperspace was initially accessed by Titanian astronauts during the time before the Old Titanian Empire. At that time, only a few natural hyperlanes existed. During the time of the Old Titanian Empire, Negative Reality Drivers carved out new lanes, unaffected by maelstroms or tidal fields. Once the Great Titanian Civil War began, and the Reality Drivers were scrapped, hyperdrills were invented to create new lanes, although they were slower, not as efficient, and could not break the same amount of obstacles, or even create long fields. As hyperspace had the ability to bypass defenses, artificial hyperspace blockade devices, mainly pullfield and gravity well generators, were created to stop enemies from utilizing certain hyperlanes. Although hyperspace is an incredibly hostile dimension considered uninhabitable, rumors spread of strange, massive entities residing in the maelstroms. Communication relays were sent into hyperspace to enable faster-than-light travel across galactic distances, another staple of super empires and large bodies.