Every adventurer eventually passes beyond the city gates, where servers receive the requests that keep the kingdom running. Editor’s Note: This article originally appeared on RandomThoughtsInTraffic.com as an introduction to the boundary between browser code and server-side development. For this StackNScroll edition, I have revised and expanded the discussion to more carefully trace the request lifecycle and explore routing, validation, HTTP responses, middleware, persistence, and the server’s role as an authority boundary. These additions connect this week’s Beyond the City Gates theme to a practical learning objective: understanding not merely how to create a server, but why certain responsibilities must move beyond the browser as an application grows. The result…