Skylair Online

Episode 3

Three hours later, Leo found himself looking at a screen floating in front of him with the prompt ‘Enter Username’ in front of him.

He entered his username and password using a floating keyboard and the screen changed to one asking if he wanted to play the tutorial.

He said yes and the world began to change around him. He found himself on a platform looking out on a grassland with a large mountain set right in the centre. Behind him was a large rock wall that stretched upwards for what seemed like forever. In his hands was a sword and shield.

“Greetings, great hero,” a disembodied female voice said, “Welcome to the plains of Aberron. Skylair is a game of intense five verses five combat. Atop the mountain in front of you is the Titan Kirazan. The first team to defeat him wins the game. Be warned though, he is mighty and you will need strategy and teamwork to bring him down.”

Leo gave his sword a testing swing and found that it was really light and easy to control. Around him came four flashes and the spots were filled with four other people. The people didn’t have faces and each wielded a different weapon. One had an axe, one a bow, one a rocket launcher and one had a staff.

As one they began jogging towards the south side of the mountain.

“To help you defeat the Titan and the enemy team are shrines scattered about the map. Follow your teammates to the Soul Shrine.”

Leo began running to catch up with the others and found himself moving with incredible speed, the world blurring around him so much so he felt dizzy. He quickly scrambled to stop and his thrashing leg stubbed his toe on the end of his bed.

He winced and resumed his pursuit of the others a little more carefully this time. He caught up to them and followed them to a small standing stone circle with an altar in the middle of it. Floating above the altar was a glowing green orb.

As they approached the female voice resumed her instruction, “To claim the blessing of the Soul Shrine you must touch the orb above the altar. Doing so will reduce the cooldown time of your teams abilities. However, you cannot claim a blessing if an enemy hero is in the shrine.”

They crossed the threshold of the shrine and a figure wearing red armour appeared.

“Defeat the enemy hero and claim the blessing.”

His team rushed into action. The guy with the axe ran in and swung it at the red clad enemy and the two with ranged weapons firing projectiles. The explosions from the grenade launcher didn’t seem to affect the axe wielder so Leo decided they probably only damaged enemies.

The staff wielder held his staff aloft and a soft glow surrounded all of them, at the bottom of Leo’s vision a sentence in orange text appeared.

‘Defence Up 0:30’

Then it began counting down through 0:29, 0:28, etc.

Leo stepped towards the battle and brought his sword down on the enemy hero in what he hoped was an approximation of a battle worthy attack. As his sword hit the enemy, it shattered into pieces.

Leo looked about to see if that was it but there was no one else visible. It was only the tutorial he presumed.

He walked over and touched the orb on the altar and it began glowing. Five seconds passed then it disappeared. More orange text appeared just at the bottom of his vision, ‘Soul Shrine 3:00’.

“Well done hero, now, follow your team to the Skylair, the home of the Titan Kirazan and claim victory. Be warned though, while enemy heroes are in the Skylair, the Titan cannot be damaged but he can still damage you. Defeat the enemies present then defeat the Titan to claim victory.”

As the voice finished her instruction the other members of his team began running up the mountain. Although it looked imposing from the ground, they scaled it in about thirty seconds. At the summit was what looked like a large throne room domed with a golden ceiling held up by four intricately stylised pillars and stood in the centre was a 15 metre tall giant with a white beard and wearing a toga.

On the other side of the Skylair was five enemy heroes who were all running at them.

His team charged as well and they clashed almost directly underneath the Titan, swords ringing as steel met steel.

Leo found himself facing off against a faceless man wielding a sword and shield as well. The red hero swung with vicious speed and Leo only just managed to get his shield up in time. They exchanged blows but neither could land a hit.

Then one of the explosions from the grenade launcher landed too close to the Titan. The monstrosity roared, drew back its hand and unleashed a torrent of lightning down on them.

Stunned for a moment at the brightness of the attack, he found himself stabbed with a sword through the chest. His vision flashed red and he turned back to the enemy hero. He swung his shield at him, knocking down his guard and finally landed a blow. The enemy shattered into pieces and Leo breathed a sigh of relief.

Now with a numbers advantage, Leo quickly swept along the line of enemy heroes, shattering each of them in turn.

“Well done, now, use your skill ‘Power s***h’ on the Titan by saying the skill’s name.”

The Titan roared and sent down another blast of lightning, hitting Leo and knocking him backwards. His vision flashed red again and he wondered how much it would take to shatter him as well.

He rolled to his feet and, rather self-consciously said, “Power s***h!”

His sword glowed purple and her ran at the Titan, slicing into its leg.

The sword discharged its energy and the Titan howled, shattering into a thousand tiny, sparkly pieces that rained down around them.

“Well done hero, you will now be returned to the lobby,” the voice said and the mountaintop melted away.