A Horus in Strange Lands (Horizon Zero Dawn SI) Chapter 31

{Silver, how are things looking on your end?}

[Sensors say that I am roughly one thousand light-years from the Kharaki system, ready and waiting to receive the payload. But seriously, we need more of these Far-Jump cores. They make life so much more convenient.]

{Noted. Seth?}

[All systems are green. Quantum wavefront is holding despite the extreme gravitational distortion of the gate. However, I am picking up some anomalies that could cause a waveform collapse resulting in the probe scattering across Hyperspace. However, the predictions put the chance of something like that happening at less than one percent. I believe we are ready for the test.]

{Then, let’s begin. Improved Dimensional Gate prototype test is Go.}

[Acknowledged. Informing The Kushan Resource Collectors to steer clear of local space.]

At Seth’s words, I nodded to him in the virtual space, allowing him to disappear back to real space and warn the Kushan to stay away from the Dimension Gate that we built at the edge of the Kharaki system.

When Vast Silver brought back the Third Hyperspace Core, the one that the Vaygr were supposed to find more than a century from now, we immediately got to work on studying the core in a way that we could not with the Kushan’s core.

After thorough investigation, disassembly, reassembly, studying its constituent parts, and material science, we came to a single conclusion.

The Progenitors technology was all kinds of bullshit.

On the material science of things, they were fairly mundane, even inferior, to our biometal. But things started to escalate when we got into their understanding of Quantum Physics, higher dimensional science, Hyperspace Physics, Biology, and various other fields that went into making the Three Hyperspace Cores.

On a basic level, the Ancient Hyperspace Cores are upscaled versions of the short-jump Hyperspace cores that are currently in use across the galaxy. However, the thing that separated these things from regular cores in the sheer depth of Hyperspace that they could access.

Essentially, Hyperspace is a higher dimensional plane of existence where the general concepts of space, time, and distance from real space break down completely. However, it is not a singular place of existence but one that has infinite ‘layers’ that provide depth to this realm.

The ‘higher’ someone can ‘ascend’ in these infinite layers of Hyperspace, like going deeper into an ocean, the more they can break the laws of physics in the real world and the more esoteric their technology can get using the new type of physical laws and existences they can uncover in such layers.

To put the difference in words, a normal Hyperspace Core is only able to access the ‘first’ layer of Hyperspace, maybe even the second and third based on how advanced it is, while the Ancient Cores are able to access something like the ‘tenth’ layer or beyond. This is what allows them to jump distances that would be impossible for normal drives.

Aside from this long-jump capability, accessing such a high level of Hyperspace also gives rise to exotic technology and ‘abilities’ that simply cannot be explained using three-dimensional science.

This led to the construction of the Cores themselves which proved to be a headache and a half for us to understand, so much so that we had to push our overclocking to the limit and make every second in the outside world count somewhere between a decade and a century in virtual space even to make any sense of the damned thing.

The shell is regular Progenitor Hyperalloy which is of no interest to us since as mentioned before, our biometal is superior to it in every way possible. On the inside, it has similar components as the short-jump cores so they were also of not much consequence to us. What really caught our attention is the Hyperspace navigation systems, the programming language itself which is extremely alien to us in both its function, writing, and the sheer efficiency with which it works, the Hyperspace sensors that appear to be an extremely superior form of Quantum entanglement system, and finally, the most important thing, the set of codes that connect this core to the other two cores, completing the Trinity and allowing the dreadnought known as Sajuuk to open the Gate Network of Hyperspace Gates.

Aside from this, there are also anomalous systems that, on further study, show that these cores were specifically made to be used by the so-called ‘Unbound’ or as they would be known in the future, ‘Navigators’.

The systems are designed in such a way that when an organic mind is connected to the Core and fully integrated into it, the Core would allow the organic mind to slowly adapt to the Hyperspace sensors within it over time, before giving the organic mind full access to the full suite of Hyperspace functions, its depth levels, which would then lead to the development of ‘abilities’ for the organic mind, such as the ability to directly weaponize Hyperspace travel, long-range communications between fellow Navigators through the fabric of Hyperspace, and even the ability to ‘see’ real space in a way that is only possible for a higher-dimensional being.

And then, aside from all of this fucking pseudo-magic technology, to add insult to injury and rubbing in their technological prowess in the faces of everyone that came after then, these damned cores directly harness energy from Hyperspace itself in a way that we theorize to me similar to Zero-Point Energy theories from back on Earth.

In simple terms, unlimited energy.

Fucking Progenitor Bullshit.

Shaking my head to get rid of those thoughts, I turned back towards real space where the Kushan had already evacuated the vicinity of the Dimensional gate that was the size of an Interceptor unit.

The one good thing that came out of all that mind-bending study of the Cores, is the understanding of Hyperspace itself and the Quantum entanglement communication systems.

With those understandings, we modified our designs for the Dimensional Gate and renewed our thirst to make this thing work, even if the reason why we wanted it to work had changed from our initial purpose.

The original designs of the Dimensional Gate involved the usage of gravitational anomalies to tear open the fabric of reality, a brute force method of overcoming the limits of real space.

What we have done now, is change the system by incorporating our understanding of hyperspace into it.

Now, the Gate will first generate a Quantum Waveform and establish a Tunneling Event, but instead of tunneling into the initial layers, the tunnel would be aimed to ‘ascend’ as far as possible in Hyperspace, and theoretically, break through its bounds.

The primary goal of this experiment is to see if we can achieve something that is as close to a wormhole as possible, allowing us instant travel across vast swathes of space. Our target is at least a few thousand light years of range.

And even if this experiment fails in the primary goal, we would still learn much about what exists in such a high layer of Hyperspace, giving us precious data with which we can experiment.

To ensure that the probes that we send on this expedition are not lost as the ones that were sent through before we fell into this universe, we incorporated the Quantum Entanglement communications that we reverse-engineered from the Progenitor technology.

Of course, we also took precautions to install various failsafe systems in the probe and the gate itself to prevent anything from the ‘other side’ from getting through to real space.

There is no way I am going to allow a repeat performance of the Naggarok and the Beast.

[Everything is ready. Let’s begin.]

I did not reply to Seth’s words. Instead, I sent the activation signal for the Dimensional gate and watched cautiously as the Gravitational manipulation systems that we installed into it based on the technology traded from the Bentusi spun up.

Within seconds, the fabric of space at the center of the gate started to distort heavily before it collapsed on itself, forming a familiar kaleidoscope of colors. However, just as quickly as it formed, it disappeared as a stable, multi-colored Quantum Wavefront formed within the Gate’s structure, indicating the success of this part of the experiment.

{Quantum Wavefront confirmed. Sensors indicate a stable connection into Hyperspace. Phase-1 success, proceeding with Phase-2. Sent, send the payload.}

[Acknowledged. Proceeding with Phase-2]

Seth launched the probe which swiftly disappeared into the portal, momentarily losing contact with us.

However, we expected this momentary blackout in communications since it would take time for the probe to breach the barriers of reality and into the higher levels of Hyperspace.

Barely five seconds later, the communications were reestablished, but then, it disappeared again.

My confusion did not last for long before we were contacted by Vast Silver whose tone held an emotion that I couldn’t identify.

[…Um, Guys? You got to see this.]

{What happened? Was the probe damaged during transit?}

[..I guess you could say that? Look, just see this, alright?]

With nervousness dominating my mind, I ‘flew’ through the Quantum communications network, arrived at Vast Silver’s location, and realized the reason for his confusion and uncertainty.

Externally, the probe did not look any different from how it did when we sent it through. Even the internals were all intact.

But the peculiar thing that caught our interest and dread was the readings were getting from the probe.

Specifically, the Organic life signs we were getting from the probe despite the lack of any kind of bio-matter being picked up by our systems.

{…Well, Fuck.}