We stepped through the glowing doorway from the gravity room, and immediately the air felt… off. Subtle vibrations tickled my bones, and every step echoed unnaturally, lingering longer than it should. The shadows along the walls seemed sluggish, lagging slightly behind our movements, then suddenly rushing ahead.
"This one…" I murmured, looking around. "It's… different. Time feels… wrong."
She nodded, eyes scanning the room. "It's bending time. Every second could stretch or collapse. We'll have to pay attention to more than just what we see or feel—we have to notice when time itself changes."
The floor ahead shifted subtly, though we could barely perceive it. One step felt like half a second, the next lingered too long, as if minutes passed in an instant. My key pulsed warmly, then dimmed, syncing to these strange temporal shifts.
A faint whisper echoed through the room:
"Time is a lesson… and a trap."
I froze. The voice wasn't malicious, but it carried weight—warning and challenge at once.
The shadows moved differently here. Instead of curling or stretching, they lagged behind us, sometimes anticipating our next step, sometimes hesitating, forming barriers just moments before we reached them. The mirrors along the walls reflected not just our current selves, but moments from the past few seconds—or sometimes what seemed like hours ahead.
"Step carefully," she warned. "It's testing our perception of time. One wrong move and we could lose track completely."
I realized the key wasn't just guiding us—it was helping us sync with the anomaly. I focused on the pulse, letting it dictate my breathing and footsteps. My companion mirrored me, and together we began to move in harmony with the room.
Seconds stretched into long, heavy beats. Shadows seemed to dance out of sync, sometimes rushing forward, sometimes lagging behind. The mirrors reflected flashes of possible futures, showing consequences of moves we hadn't yet made.
A sudden surge made the room slow dramatically. Every motion felt like wading through thick syrup. I stumbled slightly, but my companion grabbed my hand, steadying me. The key glowed warmly, guiding us forward.
"Follow it… trust the rhythm," she whispered. "Time here… isn't constant. It's a tool, not a prison."
We advanced step by step, adjusting to the anomaly's pulse. Some moments lingered, stretching seconds into what felt like minutes. Other moments flashed by in a heartbeat. Shadows and mirrors reacted in tandem, testing attention, perception, and reflexes.
Finally, we reached a faintly glowing doorway at the far end. The room pulsed once, then stilled. The shadows returned to normal curling along the walls. Time felt linear again, though the echoes of seconds stretched and compressed still lingered faintly in my chest.
I exhaled, heart racing. "Every anomaly… just keeps escalating. And this one… tested patience, awareness, and instinct."
She smiled faintly, brushing a strand of hair from her face. "Every lesson builds on the last. But something tells me… the next anomaly will challenge everything we've learned so far."
The hallway beyond the door was calm, though faint temporal echoes lingered—a subtle reminder that the anomalies were always observing, always teaching, always bending reality in ways we couldn't fully grasp.
Somewhere deeper in the building, the next anomaly awaited. More intricate, more dangerous, and ready to push us even further.