ohhhhh… by mistakenly understanding the “yellow yard” as a “YELLOW LAWN RING”, Karkat is in fact positioning the crossing of the yard as the irreversible crossing of an event horizon!
a comparison which becomes all the more obvious with Jade’s comparison of the yard to “the yellow brick road”, manifested by the golden path toward the wizard’s house, contained within the inescapable horizon of a black hole. the spiral as a symbol for an inescapable pull!!
god, duh, and that’s why Jade and John experience three years within the span of three nanoseconds; it’s gravitational time dilation!!!
(the image of a house encapsulated by a black hole, as a symbol for reality, continues to be alive and well Beyond Canon, too!)