Spatial Hybrid is a new technological marvel built on gravitational manipulation. Held in a gravitationally condensed state, the SHELL rides as a backpack-sized piece of equipment. Let it expand and the same enclave unfolds into a full-scale interdimensional vehicle.

Equip it with different ability-granting modules and anchor it at a Gravity Well. From there its Link Layer projects those effects across the world out to a set boundary; step past that limit and the tether drops, and the buffs cut out with it. Take fatal damage inside the boundary and the SHELL snaps you back down the Link Layer to itself, safely. That Black Hole Shift is your respawn.

Forgo anchoring your SHELL and wear it deep into the field. Its module effects now travel with you, always active. In this state, if a rogue Operative (an AI adversary) kills you, they can haul your SHELL to a Well and deploy it themselves. Respawning now sets you inside an invasion of your own SHELL. Win and keep everything. Everything you carry is at stake if you lose.

An Arc Dimension exists within a specific range of frequency, and the ADELLINE is what grounds you there. The Encapsulator seals you off from a reality that would otherwise stretch you in every direction on a molecular level; the Neural Engine wires that seal into your nervous system, turning stimuli you were never meant to perceive into a read-out you can act on and a body you can still trust. Everything you see, feel, and survive out there is the suit standing between you and the dimension.

The Link Layer is your end of a tether back to the SHELL, and your recharge, your equipped effects, and your display all cross it. Inside the boundary the ADELLINE runs at full possibility and the dimension is something you can fight; step past the line and the link goes quiet, leaving you with your weapon and whatever is already in your hands. Take fatal damage and the suit interlopes you home. A miniature black hole tears open and pulls you through the link safely back to your SHELL.

Pods are the modules that ride on your SHELL's exterior array, the ability-granting effects your Link Layer projects. Find them out in the field, sometimes on the SHELLs of other Operatives. Reverse-engineer any Pod you're carrying to learn its blueprint permanently, then fabricate from that blueprint for a cost in resources. Gather those resources to fill your Field Cache, and bank the haul by returning to your SHELL. Rare SSRs (Short Signal Relays) let you extract resources straight from the field.

Your build is which Pods you commit to, and that build is a route. A traversal Pod walks you off a ledge that stops an unequipped Operative dead. The same drop is a wall for one Arbiter and a shortcut for the next. Some builds turn the dimension's hostility into an asset, converting incoming damage into energy or shrugging off hazards that end other runs. Others decide how you fight, or whether you fight at all: silence your footsteps and slip through what a louder build would have to kill. Commit before you drop, because your Pods decide which version of the dimension you're playing.

Arc Dimensions are full of Fascinations: entities that can manipulate stimuli not found inside the Prime Dimension. A mineral that fills the heads of anyone nearby with the thought of boiling oil. A hostile red orb ringed by a swarm of solid prisms that leave the landscape bristling with sharp, breathing glass. Some ignore you. Some don't. And the ground never holds still, because every Black Hole Shift tears at the fabric of the dimension. Every warp home, yours or an enemy's, drags the place further from where it started. The longer a mission goes, the less it resembles the world you dropped into.