The chamber hissed as the seals locked into place, faint steam curling from the vents. Ryu wiped his palms against his coat, though the sweat just smeared. His pulse raced. He hadn't eaten in nearly a day, hadn't showered in longer, but none of that mattered. Not when he stood on the brink of rewriting the laws of reality.
His lab was a disaster. Loose bolts littered the floor like caltrops. Cables looped across the room in tangled veins, humming with stray current. The sharp, bitter tang of solder hung in the air, mixed with the earthy staleness of cold coffee.
He shoved a stack of papers aside—equations scrawled so densely they looked like madness—and set the first test in motion.
Magnets.
He lined up the rods within the containment chamber, surrounding the faint violet structure that pulsed faintly at the center. For several heartbeats, nothing happened.
Then—
The strands shifted.
It was subtle at first, a tiny quiver, like spider silk in a breeze. Then they began to tug, bending toward the magnets as though answering an unseen call.
The chamber thrummed. Needles danced wildly across his instruments. A charge.
His eyes widened. "Yes…"
But the readings didn't stabilize. Each strand flickered at a different rhythm, their charges rising and falling like discordant notes in a symphony.
Ryu scribbled furiously in his notebook. Variable charges. Independent frequencies. Synchronization impossible? Or perhaps unnecessary…
The glow spread outward, wrapping the magnets in an aura of faint light. The strands bent and curved until they formed a rough sphere. Ryu cross-checked the numbers against the mana field generator buzzing beside him.
His jaw dropped.
The radius matched perfectly. The size of the sphere was directly proportional to the mana field applied.
He let out a sharp laugh, short and incredulous. "Elegant. Ridiculous. Impossible. Perfect."
The violet lattice hummed on, its rhythm steady, as if taunting him with endless possibilities.
But possibilities demanded sacrifice.
Three-quarters of his last paycheck—money he should have used for rent, food, survival—had gone into the new machine: a secondhand Magic Field Fluctuator. The casing was dented, the paint flaking, but the core worked. It had to.
He tightened the last bolt, flipped the switch.
The room filled with light.
The chamber glowed as the fluctuator cycled through frequencies, shifting the magical field in jagged waves. The lattice responded instantly, compressing tighter and tighter, its glow condensing like a star collapsing into itself.
The chamber rattled violently. A low vibration spread through the floor, climbing up Ryu's legs, into his bones.
"Come on… hold… hold…"
The bond shrank, its light sharpening into a dense knot. His monitors screamed, alarms flashing red. For a second, he thought the glass might shatter.
Then—stability.
Ryu exhaled in a shaky rush. He staggered back, hair plastered to his forehead. His notes sprawled across the desk in a frenzy of ink: Fluctuation → density increase. Inverse relation to size. Proportional stability curve.
Beautiful. Terrifying. Addictive.
But the real miracle came by accident.
Two wires lay on the desk—remnants of an old project. One end still carried a faint current, the other was dead.
As the bond pulsed within the chamber, the wires shifted. Ryu frowned.
Then the current jumped.
Air lit up with a crack like thunder. White-blue lightning arced forward, claws of energy tearing across three meters of empty space. The bolt struck the lattice, which answered with a violent burst of violet electricity.
The second wire lit up instantly.
Ryu stumbled back, shielding his face as the room exploded with crackles and sparks. His instruments screamed, glass dials shattering from the surge. The smell of ozone hit him—sharp, metallic, like burning air. His hair stood on end. His teeth buzzed as if charged.
"Holy—"
The chamber shook. For a second, he thought it would rupture, spilling whatever eldritch storm lived inside across the lab. His chest tightened as if he could already feel his skin peeling away.
But then, silence.
The chamber stabilized. The wires glowed faintly, humming with residual charge.
Ryu crept forward, pulse hammering in his ears.
The second wire, once dead, now carried a steady current. Not white, not blue.
Purple.
The glow seeped along the copper like liquid light, feeding into the console.
Ryu's holographic projector flickered on. The image formed instantly, clearer than ever before. No distortion. No static. Perfect.
He stared in disbelief as the device hummed steadily. Minutes passed. Then an hour. Then three. The projection never wavered.
The only source of power was the violet bond.
Ryu pressed his hands over his mouth to smother the manic laugh bubbling up. His chest shook. His eyes burned.
"It's power…" His voice trembled. "Endless… clean… absolute power…"
His mind spun faster than Brainstorm itself. He saw cities lit not by mana or oil, but by violet energy. He saw ships powered forever, machines humming without fuel, his name burned into history in letters of fire.
But then—
A whisper slid through his skull like a knife.
Get your things stolen by Vexar again.
Ryu froze. His breath caught.
He spun, half expecting to see the smug bastard standing behind him, stealing his light all over again. But the lab was empty. Just the wires, the glow, the scent of ozone and smoke.
The voice hadn't been real. It had been his own. His own doubt, sharpened by memory.
He saw it again—the stage lights, the crowd cheering, Vexar soaking in the applause as Ryu's inventions were paraded under another man's name. The deafening roar of approval while he was left in the shadows, screaming into silence.
His hands curled into fists so tight his nails drew blood.
"Not this time."
He slammed his fist against the console, the projector flickering under the impact.
"No publishing. No papers. Nothing they can take. I'll build something so advanced, so incomprehensible, no parasite can claim it. Not Vexar. Not anyone."
The lattice pulsed in answer, as though mocking him with its alien heartbeat.
He leaned forward, sweat dripping into his eyes, and whispered to it like a prayer. "You're mine. And through you… I'll take it all back."
Ryu froze, staring at the chamber as the violet fire arced between the wires. It wasn't a fluke anymore. It was real—something alive, something fundamental.
His pulse thundered in his ears. The sight of it felt dangerous, like staring straight into the heart of a storm. And yet he couldn't look away.
His lips curled into a grin, sharp and hungry. "This isn't theory anymore. This is power."
He dragged Brainstorm back online, thought-splinters racing outward, his mind fracturing into a dozen directions. Equations tangled with diagrams, designs overlapping like ghosts. He wasn't just watching the phenomenon now—he was already building with it, shaping futures in his head.
The lattice pulsed brighter, the purple glow sketching wild shadows across his face. He leaned closer, breath fogging the glass.
"This changes everything."
The wires hissed, alive with violet current, and Ryu reached for the controls with trembling fingers. His ruined life had just cracked open. The world had just handed him a second sun to play with.
And he intended to burn it into something no one—not even Vexar—could ever steal