The Gate Traveler

Lyura sat in an outdoor cafe in the Piazza San Marco in Venice, sipping a delicious marocchino and savoring a decadent chocolate cake. The summer day was perfect, and the Piazza looked absolutely breathtaking.

She enjoyed all these things, but inside, she was still fuming. Each sip of the rich marocchino and every bite of the decadent chocolate cake only seemed to fuel her anger. The picturesque view of the Piazza San Marco, with its elegant architecture and the gentle hum of happy tourists, did little to calm the storm brewing within her.

Lyura’s thoughts kept returning to her mother, and the rage bubbled up anew each time. She wanted to Gate-hop home right that instant, to burst into her mother’s house with the force of a tempest. She envisioned grabbing her mother by the shoulders, shaking her until her teeth rattled, screaming in her face with all the pent-up fury that had been building inside her.

“How could you do this to me?” she imagined herself yelling. “How could you let me grow up in that filthy, backward town without a hint of the magic and wonders that existed beyond those stones? Why did you keep me trapped in ignorance while you traveled the worlds, experiencing things I could only dream of?”

She wanted answers. She wanted to know why her mother had hidden this incredible truth from her for so long. The betrayal stung deeply, a wound that festered with every passing day. Lyura’s mother had always seemed like a beacon of reason in a world drowning in superstition, yet she had kept this enormous secret.

The need for an explanation gnawed at her relentlessly. She felt like a caged animal, desperate to break free and confront the person who had built the bars around her. The injustice of it all was maddening. Lyura’s life could have been so different, filled with adventure and knowledge, instead of the narrow, dirt-streaked existence she had known.

As she sat in the cafe, surrounded by the beauty and sophistication of Venice, the contrast to her past life was stark and jarring. She constantly felt the anger that simmered just beneath the surface, which tainted every moment of joy in her current world and served as a constant reminder of what had been stolen from her.

The thought of her mother’s calm, knowing face made her blood boil. She could see her mother’s serene expression, the one she wore when she thought she was doing what was best. But Lyura didn’t need her mother’s misguided protection; she needed the truth.

Lyura grew up in a backward, unintegrated world in a small, dirty town that seemed frozen in time. The streets were unpaved and filled with mud and filth, creating a constant odor of decay and neglect. The houses, built with rough-hewn wood and stone, were cramped and poorly maintained, with thatched roofs that barely kept out the rain. There were no proper sanitation systems; people dumped their waste in open ditches that lined the roads, attracting swarms of flies and rats.

The residents only washed in the river from late spring to early autumn when the water was warm enough to bear. For the rest of the year, they remained dirty and stinky, their clothes stiff with grime and their skin coated in layers of sweat and dirt. It wasn’t uncommon to see children with matted hair and adults with sores on their skin, untreated and festering. Personal hygiene was a luxury few could afford or even considered necessary.

Superstition ruled their lives. The townspeople immediately viewed every male stranger who entered the town with suspicion, believing them to be dangerous bandits there to steal and pillage. Women travelers fared no better; they were seen as evil witches who sought to enchant and corrupt, blamed for any misfortune that befell the town. It was a place where fear and ignorance dictated interactions, and trust was a rare commodity.

Whenever something good or bad happened, the townsfolk blamed the spirits of the forest, rain, sky, or land. If a child fell ill, they said it was the wrath of the river spirit. If a bountiful harvest came, they left offerings at the edge of the forest, believing the tree spirits had blessed them. They would place little bowls of milk or bread on their windowsills, hoping to appease these unseen forces, muttering prayers and incantations passed down through generations. Each home in the town performed its own rituals at night, filling the air with whispered chants and the flicker of candles to keep the spirits at bay.

Her mother told her never to believe in those superstitions, urging her to see the world through the lens of reason and logic. Yet it was all around her, inescapable and pervasive. Every corner of their town bore the marks of these ancient beliefs, from the talismans hung over doorways to the carved idols placed at the crossroads. Despite her mother’s teachings, superstitions permeated their daily life, shaping their actions and decisions in profound ways.

Her family loved her, but the other children were jealous of her. They called her a ‘spoiled princess’ because she was always cleaner, had nicer clothes, her family was the richest in town, and she was the only one who knew how to read and write.

Every early autumn, her mother would leave to buy stock for their store and return in late spring with lovely things that even nobles came from afar to buy.

When Lyura turned seventeen, her mother said it was time for her to find work and mentioned connections with a good noble family that needed a governess. She also warned her and her father that the family planned to sail overseas, and it was unknown when they would return.

Lyura refused at first, but her mother insisted. She said that if Lyura didn’t like the work, she could always return but insisted she go with her on the annual buying trip to meet the family.

Instead of traveling on the road, her mother led her into a forest, and when they reached two enormous stones, she took her through them. Lyura experienced the most incredible pain she had ever felt, and when she came to, there was a blinking light in front of her eyes. Her mother instructed her to touch it with her mind, and she got a message about being a Gate Traveler.

Her mother taught her how to view her information and access details about her class and skills. Then, she took her through a three-Gate chain to a world called Gaia, showing her how to sell in pawn shops and buy great things for their store. On Gaia, those things were called ‘Mass Produced’ and came from a place called China.

During their journey between Gates, her mother told her about being a Traveler and the different worlds she visited. She taught her spells, trained her in archery and short sword fighting, and showed her how to camp in the wilderness, build fire, and hunt. Her teachings included how to engage with individuals in magical worlds and understand technological worlds. She shared how she came to their world, fell in love with her father, and stayed.

She took her back through the Gates and showed her how to sell the things they bought to earn many coins until they reached home. They traveled for two and a half months, but five months had passed at home. Her mother told her always to remember the time jumps between worlds and that if she traveled long, she might return to find her father had died.

Lyura spent another month at home with her father before leaving to travel. When they visited Gaia for the first time, Lyura fell in love with television, so she returned to Gaia. For three months, she watched television, went to movies, and learned about this world. She understood the money system and traveling vehicles, but still found the ‘internet’ and electronic devices very confusing.

She traveled all around Europe, eating new and exciting food, seeing beautiful architecture, visiting the theater and opera, appreciating the abundance of books and music, and enjoying every moment.

But she still fumed at her mother every moment of every day. How could she allow her to grow up in that backward “dump”—to use a local term—without magic and, most of all, without TELEVISION!!