Imperial gate system

The Imperial Gate System was developed after Xeid obtained classified information from Numinous before his betrayal of the Mind.

Among the information he stole was knowledge of the principles behind Numinous portal technology. Xeid later used that knowledge to create a modified transportation system suitable for his Empire.

Unlike Numinous portals, Imperial Gates do not provide direct instantaneous transportation from virtually any connected location to another.

Instead, the Empire constructed a vast network of enormous ring-shaped gates positioned throughout star systems. Together, these gates form an interstellar transportation map.

When a destination is selected, an algorithm calculates the shortest available route through the network.

For example, reaching Earth's system from a distant System 167889 might require passage through seventeen different gates:

System 167889 → Gate 1 → Gate 2 → Gate 3 → ... → Gate 17 → Solar System

Travelers must still physically travel between gates along the calculated route. Because of this, Imperial travel is not instantaneous. A journey that would normally require thousands of years might instead take only several hours.

The fundamental distinction is therefore simple:

Numinous Portals: direct, effectively instantaneous transportation using Numinous as the intermediary.

Imperial Gates: a network derived from stolen Numinous technology that drastically shortens interstellar journeys, but still requires travel through a sequence of physical gates.