Youkai Technology (Maelstrom)

Technologies

Gap Demon

The main FTL drive unit of the Youkai is known as the Gap Demon. Developed to excel in the distortions of Deliverance sector, this device projects a small "strange universe" or gap around the host and uses it as an intercessor in a particularly advanced form of colocation. It is universally regarded as a surpassingly powerful form of superluminal travel, combining all of the most desireable qualities, albeit with one unusual side effect.

Relative to reality, practical effects of gap are quite similar to relativistic sublight travel writ fast; very little subjective time is experienced by the travellers, but the speed of travel relative to the rest of the universe is finite (though it is quite fast by any standard). Objects enter and leave the gap through roughly eye-shaped tears in space-time. The objects or energies to be included must be defined prior to activation, which doesn't take long but does mean foreign objects attempting to intrude upon the gap face destructive exclusion.

Travel by gap cannot be described in terms of dimensional space and things within the gap are causally disconnected except through points of entry and exit. Therefore, Youkai ships are unaffected by so-called slow zones and the process of travel cannot be disrupted except (theoretically) during the formation of the gap or its openings. Jamming or suboptimal dimensional weather can decrease the speed and stealth with which gap openings form, as does the size of the object.

The gap demon's principle of operation is destructive, non-perfect teleportation, the latter quality of which is the primary drawback of the gap demon. Ordinary nuclear or degeneracy matters decay rapidly into their "strange" counterpart while within the gap, meaning gap demon equipped vessels can never be used to transport ordinary cargo (unless one intends transmutation to begin with). Life forms transported via gap become youkai at the end of the trip.

Sealed Space

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