The trail twisted before me, turning left and right through the Black Forest, but I couldn’t focus on my surroundings. Pain clawed at my chest, a sharp reminder of the grief I carried. My fingers brushed the raw skin, the sting anchoring me to the moment, even as my mind drifted. I shook my head—snap out of it. You’re here to get out of your head.

The leaves were changing—gold and orange breaking through the green. Sunlight filtered through the leaves, highlighting the dust motes in the air. Birds chirped all around, their sounds bouncing off the trees. It was peaceful, but it didn’t ease the vise crushing my chest.

I squeezed my eyes shut to stop the tears. Swallowing, I forced myself to focus on the sound of the gravel under my feet, the clean air filling my lungs, the woodsy smell, the birdsong, and the colors. But it didn’t help. It never helped. Every step was heavier than the last, dragging me back into memories I fought so hard to escape.

The wind whispered through the branches, cool fingers brushing my skin as a few fragile leaves drifted down, surrendering to the pull of gravity. My tears fell with them as I gritted my teeth. The forest was beautiful, but couldn’t pull me out of my head.

Each step pressed me deeper into the earth. I leaned on a tree, struggling to breathe as my chest tightened. The forest was quiet, except for the soft rustle of the wind, but it couldn’t drown out the weight inside me. Without her… no, don’t go there.

I pushed off the tree and kept walking, hoping the ache would stay buried where I left it. But grief never played by my rules. At 37 years old, my life was crumbling before my eyes. I didn’t belong—not in this world, nor in my own skin. I was always the one who stood out: too short, too strong, and my eyes unsettling enough to make strangers uncomfortable. But she… she had never flinched or cared about how people stared or whispered behind my back. She saw past all of it, saw me. Without her, the world had lost its warmth, a place where I no longer fit. Each step, each breath, only deepened the sense that I was drifting through someone else’s life, a stranger in my own skin, disconnected from humanity.

My boots crunched over the gravel as I walked, but my mind kept drifting back to the hospital. Just another building now, cold and empty. I kicked a loose stone off the path, watching it tumble into the underbrush. I’d stayed there so she could patch things up with her father after our marriage wrecked their relationship. But now? Now, it was just four walls filled with memories I didn’t want to revisit.

My steps slowed, and I ran a hand over my chest, the raw skin burning. I’d loved medicine, though, hadn’t I? Not the people—I never really trusted them—but the work. Fixing someone and seeing them walk out healthier because of me. That made sense. That made me valuable. I stopped to tighten the strap on my backpack, thinking of the paycheck. Maybe it was more important than it should’ve been, but growing up in foster care did that to you. You needed something solid, something you could count on.

But even that was slipping away. Every email I sent came back with a polite rejection, and whenever I got close, someone dropped my name like a poison pill. My father-in-law’s reach was longer than I ever imagined. His network stretched across the country, and he used it to cut me off, to ensure I had no place in the field I’d worked so hard to be part of.

Maybe a fresh start in Europe or Australia? I’d heard they needed doctors. Is this my chance to start fresh and find a new direction?

I suddenly felt something strange—a presence. It wasn’t sound or sight that called to me, but a subtle force—like a thread of invisible silk winding through the air, tugging me gently toward an unseen place just beyond the edges of my awareness. I froze mid-step, my breath catching as I scanned the surrounding forest. The sounds of the Black Forest filled the air—birds chirping, leaves rustling in the breeze—but nothing stood out. Nothing was around, just the dense trees and a few distant hikers further up the trail. Yet, the feeling was persistent, refusing to be ignored. It almost shouted at me to pay attention.

I closed my eyes and shook my head, but it was like a soft hum that wouldn’t fade, a connection to something at the edges of my perception. After a moment of standing still, debating with myself, I gave in. I couldn’t ignore it anymore. My feet moved before I consciously decided, pulling me off the trail. A glance over my shoulder showed I had walked farther from town than I’d realized, lost in my thoughts. But I wasn’t too far—still close enough to the trail to hear the faint voices of other hikers.

The feeling came from my right, deep in the woods. I hesitated, glancing at the dense underbrush. Not too thick, yet still challenging to navigate. I could push through. With one last look at the trail behind me, I stepped off it and into the trees.

Twenty minutes of navigating through tangled roots, bushes, and low-hanging branches brought me to an area that looked like any other part of the forest: tall trees, underbrush thick with ferns, and two large boulders on a slight incline. Yet, the sensation here was stronger, pulling and urging me to act. It was the place, but there was nothing there.

The pull grew more insistent, pulling me forward. Moving slowly, I made my way toward the larger of the two boulders. As I moved around it, the sensation became weaker, like a string losing tension. I paused, frowning, and moved around the rock. The further I walked, the weaker the feeling became.

I walked a few steps back, and the sensation flared again. My brow furrowed in confusion. There was something here, but what?

Curious, I returned in front of the boulders, and the feeling intensified. The same thing happened when I walked around the left-hand boulder—the feeling got weaker and then returned when I retraced my steps.

What the hell am I doing?

I took a deep breath and turned to leave, but the feeling got stronger—like an urgent call. It stopped me in my tracks. I looked at the boulders again and did one last test—I walked between them. It felt like I walked through an invisible barrier, a force field that tickled my skin. The surrounding air felt charged, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. I froze, trying to make sense of the sensation.

I screamed and collapsed to my knees, the world tilting as a ball of fire detonated in my skull. My head shattered—no, exploded—while my brain roasted alive inside the burning shell of my skull. I couldn’t draw in a breath. My vision swam, spots dancing in and out of focus, and my hands, my entire body, trembled uncontrollably. The fire wasn’t contained. The fire raged, devouring every part of me, as if it had doused my very soul in flame. And then... it deepened, each flicker of agony sharper than the last, burning through me like a living thing intent on my destruction.

A searing line of flame snaked down from my head to my diaphragm, and a second ball of fire exploded—this one worse, much worse. The pain was sharper, more focused. I couldn’t even muster the strength to scream. Every bit of energy I had went into one desperate task: staying alive. But it didn’t stop. Another line of fire snaked lower, trailing to my abdomen before exploding in another eruption of lava.

Please let me die. That would be better—anything would be better. But the fire only grew hotter, more relentless, pushing outward like it wanted to consume every inch of me.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Lines of fire shot down my arms and legs, each one punctuated by explosions of searing agony, as if my blood itself had turned to liquid flames. Lines of fire ignited in every finger, every toe. My entire being had become nothing but fire. I wasn’t just in pain anymore—I was pain. An inferno. A living embodiment of agony.

I blacked out.

I came to in the fetal position, hugging my midriff, with a potent scent of earth in my nose. Anticipating the return of pain, I lay still, bracing myself for the fire to rush through me once more. But the pain was gone. Completely gone. My body felt… good. Too good. No fire, no tension. The aches I had carried for years—gone. Slowly, I stretched, half-expecting something to snap or hurt, but nothing. I felt… whole. The thought hit me harder than a truck—was this real? I hadn’t felt whole in years. Slowly, I shifted, sliding off my backpack and rolling onto my back. My breath came out in a soft sigh as I stretched. I relished the absence of pain, the unfamiliar lightness all over me. It was like having a new body.

I quit my job to take care of my wife in her final days, too afraid to sleep in case she needed me. After she was gone, insomnia and nightmares took over, keeping me awake. I tried staying in our home, but every corner, every object, dragged me deeper into memories, amplifying the grief until it swallowed me whole. Old, buried memories from my childhood clawed their way back, adding layers to the pain. I was drowning, exhausted, with no way out. Sleep became a luxury I could no longer afford.

Now, I felt completely rejuvenated. It felt like all the sleepless nights, the physical and emotional weight of the past year, had been wiped away. I felt… good. Like I’d slept for days.

I opened my eyes, and it was night, but not dark. Above me, an enormous moon hung low in the sky. Its pale light bathed everything around me in a soft, silvery tone, making the world seem otherworldly.

Wow!

I looked left and saw a smaller moon.

Wait, what?

My eyes shut instinctively, trying to block out the impossibility above me. That was when I noticed something blinking—a red light pulsing in the corner of my vision, like a warning signal.

I opened my eyes—two moons. Closed them—blinking light. Shaking my head didn’t help. Still two moons and a blinking light. What was going on? I wasn’t wearing any tech or gear that could explain it, but there it was, blinking away in the dark behind my eyelids.

Okay, I’ve lost it!

I opened my eyes again, and the two moons were still there, but now I noticed the red light, even with my eyes open, pulsing just at the edge of my vision. I reached out, trying to touch it, but my fingers grasped at nothing but air. The light didn’t shift or react. It stayed where it was, only moving when I moved my head—always in the same spot in my vision, like it was attached to me somehow.

I focused on it, trying to connect mentally to whatever it was. Words appeared before my eyes almost immediately, like a virtual display coming to life.

Innate ability detected [Gate Traveler]

Huh?!

The text disappeared, and a new text appeared.

No Class or Profession detected

“What do you mean, no profession detected?” I shouted at the text box. “I’m a doctor, dammit! I heal people!”

New Class unlocked

Gate Traveler

Would you like to take the Class [Gate Traveler]?

Y/N

I’m definitely losing my mind, I thought, but what the hell—since I had nothing to lose, I mentally tapped YES. Almost instantly, an immense pressure built in my head, like a balloon about to explode from too much water. Before I could react, everything went black.

When I came to this time, it was light. I squinted and rubbed my eyes, trying to get my bearings. I closed my eyes again and breathed. Opening them for the second time, the light still hurt.

Morning?

I sat up slowly and looked at the sky. One sun. Good—no more shocks. The relief was short-lived as I began checking myself over, expecting… something. But physically, I felt the same: no aches, no pain, just a strange sense of calm.

Yet, deep inside, something was different. There was this… awareness, like I’d tapped into a part of myself that had always been there, waiting to be unlocked. It hummed gently, a quiet energy spreading through me, making me whole. For as long as I could remember, I’d carried around this hollow space inside me like I was missing a piece of myself. It ate me up and made me feel inferior, useless, empty, and broken. I’d tried to fill it in so many ways. I studied to be a doctor to help people and fill the emptiness with benevolence. It didn’t help. I read, listened to music, and even resorted to smoking pot, hoping it would ease that emptiness. But nothing ever worked. I was a hollow shell—missing an integral part of me.

I’d always assumed it was because of my past—growing up without a father, losing my mom when I was young, and bouncing around foster homes that never wanted me. But now I realized that emptiness wasn’t about family. It was about this. Whatever this thing was, it had been the missing piece all along. The hollowness that plagued me for years disappeared, replaced by a solid and comforting presence, as if I had finally found my anchor to the world.

I sat there, savoring the sensation of being whole for the first time in my life. The world around me was quieter, brighter, and somehow… more connected to me. I finally fit in. I belonged. The red blinking light appeared again at the corner of my eye, pulling me from my thoughts. With a mental nudge, I tapped it, and a new text scrolled across my vision:

Class: Gate Traveler Level 0

Gates to the next level (1/1)

Level up

+1 to all stats, +5 free points, +1 ability point

Class: Gate Traveler Level 1

Stat Points: 5

Ability Points: 1

Gates to the next level (0/3)

I stared at the text, trying to process what it meant. My mouth hung open, and words tumbled around in my head, but none made sense. Gate Traveler? I opened my mouth again, but nothing came out. What did it even mean?

My stomach growled, and my mouth was dry. I rummaged through my backpack, relieved to find everything still there: two granola bars, a bottle of water, a book, my dead phone, and a jacket. No matter how many times I pressed the button, the phone wouldn’t power on. Dead as a doornail. With a sigh, I focused on what I could control, eating one of the granola bars and washing it down with the water. The simple act of eating grounded me and pulled me out of the mental spiral.

As I sat there, my mind drifted back to what the text had said—Gate Traveler. It had to be connected to the stones I’d passed through. I glanced over my shoulder. Two massive boulders with flat tops stood behind me, like tree stumps made of stone. A shiver ran down my spine as the strange pull that had led me here popped back into my mind. The feeling was still present. It was fainter now, but still there, like an invisible connection to the stones. But this time, there wasn’t a pull or urgency—just a quiet sense of “it’s here.”

Can I go back?

Standing, I hesitated for a moment before reaching out to touch the nearest stone. It was cool beneath my fingers, rough but somehow familiar. Like before, text appeared in front of my eyes:

Traveler’s Gate #468217258

Destination: Earth/Gaia/Terra

Status: Unintegrated

Mana level: 3

Technology level: Low

Threat level: Humans–moderate. Other beings–very high.

I dropped on my butt, staring at the text as my mind spun. A portal? To another world? No, back to Earth. My thoughts raced, jumping from one revelation to the next.

Mana level? What the hell was that?

Technology level low? Why low? Did that mean this place had a lower technology level than Earth? Or was Earth the one with the lower tech compared to here? Or somewhere else entirely?

Then the last line hit me—other beings. My chest tightened, my heart pounding in my ears. Aliens. I could barely wrap my head around it. Aliens were real? My breathing quickened, panic crept in, and threatened to overwhelm me.

No. Not now. I’m not going to lose it.

Before I could spiral into hyperventilation, my legs moved on instinct. I jumped to my feet, heart pounding, grabbed my backpack, and ran straight back through the Gate. Whatever this place was, I wasn’t ready for it. Not yet.