Need some portal fantasy writing prompts? Not to worry, I got you covered!
Portal fantasy stories are fun to read and even more fun to write. Not to mention, they’re incredibly popular (think Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland or the Narnia series).
In a portal fantasy, the characters are usually ordinary humans who travel through a doorway of some sort into a new fantastical world. Mind that this doorway doesn’t have to be an actual door—it can be a magic mirror, an old standing stone, or a talisman.
Below are 12 portal fantasy writing prompts.
Portal fantasy writing prompts
1. Your character is someone who researches ancient cultures. While they’re deep in the jungle on an archeological assignment, they accidentally step into a portal to another world—exactly like the one they’ve been researching, except that everyone here is still alive and magic is flourishing. The problem is: your character can’t go home.
2. Your character’s father was killed in an accident, and strange things have started to happen ever since. One day, they go to a tavern for a drink, which turns out to be some magical potion that allows them to see the magical world that has been hidden in plain sight all along. And now they can no longer unsee it. They have to figure out how their father was tied to this magical world, how they now fit in there, and whether or not their father’s death was actually an accident.
3. Your character loves books. But never in a million years did they think that strange section in the library was a portal to another realm, one that is tarnished by war. And it just so happens that your character appears in the thick of it, and somehow the people in this new world seem to recognize them.
4. Your character longs for a different life. And lo and behold, there comes a person who promises them just that! How can they refuse? But the journey to this new world appears far from ideal, mainly because the fae who live there decide to keep them in their realm forever.
5. Playing games with friends is something your character can’t get enough of. But when they find a new board game, they get sucked into it. The only way to get out? Play and hope they win.
6. All their lives, your character thought they were normal. Apparently, nothing was further from the truth. One of their parents was an actual god, and now they have to deal with other gods and demigods going after them after being transported by these new enemies into the world of the gods. The problem? Your character seemingly inherited none of the godly powers of their parent.
7. You would think being able to portal to other places and worlds was fun. Not so much when each time your character jumps, they lose their place in time in the world they were in. Gone was the job they started, friends they made, relationships they had. But if they don’t jump once every five years, bad things happen.
8. What if your protagonist could create their own portal? All their lives, they’ve longed to escape to a fantasy world. And now they find out they can, if only they believe strongly enough in the existence of this world, they can create a portal to travel there.
9. Your character owns a shop that holds a portal to the mystical and magical underworld. The rules are clear: do not allow regular humans to discover the portal. But what happens if your character falls desperately in love with an ordinary human? They can’t hide who they truly are forever…
10. One day, your character comes into the possession of a mysterious box. They only know that opening the box means opening a portal to another realm. The flip side is that once opened, the being of that other realm can venture freely into the character’s realm as well. And not all these creatures have good intentions…
11. One day, a tattoo suddenly appears on your character’s body. They have no idea why or how, but nothing out of the ordinary seems to happen. Until one day, it starts to burn, and a mysterious person shows up to tell them they need to come back to their realm to save it from a destructive force of dragons. However, your character had no idea other realms existed, nor do they have any idea how to fight a dragon.
12. Nobody knows, but dreams are actually portals into other dimensions. Your character, however, is about to find out. Unlucky for them, they only seem to have nightmares.
Have these prompts kickstarted your imagination?
Try out some of these prompts and see how they feel. Is a story already brewing from your fingers? Then stick with the prompt and try to outline the story more.
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