Massive Skyrim Online

Chapter 1

In a small room, a freckled, blond teenager sits on a low bed in a corner next to some windows. Blue-white light drifted through the blinds, barely illuminating the musty room. A ceiling fan swung around as its chipped wooden blades twirled faster, circulating dust throughout the room. On a nightstand next to the bed was a digital clock (2:59 p.m., 5/21/26), a vase with sunflowers, and a picture of the teen's family: a tall blond man with glasses in a lab coat, a choppy brown hair lady in a business suit, the teen himself with a big smile on his face, and an elementary girl with a big grin, exposing her two buck teeth. On the wall above the nightstand hung a makeshift calendar with May 21st circled-Massive Skyrim Online released!

The teenager stared calmly at the device in his hand-a neuroperception scanner (dubbed " the gaming headband") hooked up to two internet cables in the wall-and sighed with a small smile. Slowly, he slid the gaming headband over his head with the tinted black glass shielding his eyes and laid down on the bed.

He took three more deep breaths and then laid still for a moment. With a sudden pulse throughout his body, he commanded, "Link start!"

Rapidly, his surroundings began to dissolve into a blur of rainbow colors. He heard the digital system processor entering information from his brain into the game. Instead of laying down, he stood on a black void. The smell of dust and breakfast left his nose as he breathed in an entirely new scent: nothing.

After a half a minute of standing in the black space, the scene changed into the white digital world of empty space. In the air above him, credits went by: BetaStudios and VirtualEntertainment.

"Hello," a female voice echoed all around him. "I am M. Soa, Massive Skyrim Online's Assistant. If you have any questions at any time, please say 'help,' then ask your question. Is this your first time playing?"

"Yes," said the teenager.

"Character Creation Menu," said Soa. "Please tell me your name."

"Justin."

Suddenly, multiple non-player character (NPC) avatars appeared around him, ranging from a blond human to a cat race to several elves and more. "Please select your race."

Justin walked straight ahead of him towards the Nord with full iron, heavy armor. As he approached, a summary of the race appeared to the upper-right of him:

―Nord

-Powers: battlecry, resistance to frost

"Nords are a race that were led to Skyrim by Ysgramor. They are tall, fair-haired and pale skinned humans from Atmora who are known for their incredible resistance to cold and even magical frost. They are enthusiastic warriors, and act as soldiers, mercenaries, merchants and blacksmiths all over Tamriel. Eager to augment their martial skills beyond the traditional methods of Skyrim, they excel in all manner of warfare. Above all else in Nord culture is the quest for honor and glory, and a great emphasis is placed on family values. They thrive in the cold, reminiscent of their native Atmora, and are known as militant people by their neighbors. Nords are also naturally superior at sea, and have benefited from nautical trade since their first migrations across the sea from Atmora. They captain and crew the merchant fleets of many regions, and may be found all along Tamriel's coasts. They issue a battle cry to make their enemies flee for a short time. Nords comprise the majority of the Stormcloaks, as well as the majority of the population of Skyrim" (ElderScrollsWiki).

As he touched the avatar, all the other ones disappeared. "Would you like to use your real image?" Soa asked.

"Yes, please."

"Lift your arms and please hold still."

Justin held his arms up like a scarecrow. Several green grids appeared all over his body for an instant, then disappeared.

Then, all around him, the several perk trees of the game appeared. "Select only three," the system voice said. "Your first one will be your master class. The second will be your expert class. The third will be your adept class. I highly recommend you have at least one fighting skill.

This is new, Justin thought to himself. "Help."

"How may I help you?" Sao asked.

"What is this?" he asked.

"You are currently in the Perk Section of the Character Creation Menu. Here, each player may only select three trees. The first one selected will be your master skill in which you can unlock all of its perks and advance to legendary perks. The second one selected will be your expert skill, in which you can only unlock perks up to level 80. The third one selected will be your adept skill, in which you can only unlock perks up to level 50. Would you like to hear more?"

Legendary perks?

He turned and looked among all the skills. He shrugged off asking about the legendary perks and looked around. Then, after a minute of careful thinking, he chose his three: block (master), heavy armor (expert), and one-handed (adept).

The trees disappeared. Then a digital list of the game's location names appeared in front of him. "Please select your server."

Justin didn't need to scroll down. He selected the one with recommended next to it-Helgen.

"Connecting to Helgen... connection successful."

Then everything around him went black.

"This is awesome!" said a plump male wood elf.

Seven other players besides Justin were sitting in the starting wagon, steadily rolling towards Helgen. They were the third cart in the four-cart prisoner 'train' of Stormcloacks and criminals. Most of the players like Justin stayed quiet, but they were also thinking the same thing the wood elf was-virtual reality was beautiful.

Justin could feel the gentle breeze caress his face as he closed his eyes and breathed in the scent of the wilderness: the bark of the evergreen trees, the dirt being kicked up from the road in front of him, and the light scent of the mountain flowers on the side of the road. Justin looked up towards the sun, partially blocked by the bright green leaves of the forest trees.

There was no doubt in his mind. This was way better than reality. Well, his reality, anyway.

Even if he was in filthy ragged trousers and tied up.

All eight of the players filled a single wagon, sitting four by four across from each other. Justin and a redguard woman sat on the rear end, almost on the edge of the wagon. Although he was sure they were programmed not to fall off, he still squirmed away from its open back.

The plump wood elf took in his surroundings with awe one last time, then sat down and looked among the players. "If any of you guys who are new want to survive this, stick with me. I've played this on legendary over and over. In fact, how many of you guys are new?"

Nobody said anything at first. Most of them, including Justin, only kept their heads down and stayed silent. Then the only one who actually responded was a bald female Argonian who sat to the left of Justin. "I'm not new, but I heard there were a lot of changes, as in new additions to the game. Did anybody hear anything different?"

"Oooh, so that explains the character creation," said a bluish female orc next to the redguard on the edge. "When it asked for three perk trees, I was like 'what the fuck?' Yeah, I heard that new additions would be like new quests, new locations, and more legendary stuff. I saw a leak on the forums that you can learn to be many more races besides vampire lord and werewolf. I think one of them was a mermaid?"

The plump elf smiled. "I like the sound of that. Anyways, we should all team up. Who knows what else changed. 'United we stand, divided we fall,' right?"

The majority nodded in agreement. The only one who didn't was Justin, who quietly kept his head low. He was already too busy analyzing everyone around him and doing some long term planning for the game. He doubted any of them realized Ulfric Stormcloak wasn't in any of the wagons around them.

Eventually, they arrived at Helgen.

As they rode on through the town, nothing seemed to have had changed at first look: the train took the same route throw the city, the same NPCs were looking at them, and the imperial captain had the same authoritative dialogue for the prisoners. But there was a notable difference...

"Hey, where's Hadvar?" one of the players asked.

All the players looked around, but none of them saw the imperial escort anywhere. They soon also realized that neither Ralof of Riverwood, General Tullius, or Lokir of Rorikstead was among the prisoners, either.

Justin looked around at all the building one last time. If those NPCs weren't with them, then the escape procedure must've been changed. For all he knew, Alduin might not even attack the keep for a distraction. He had to figure out another escape route in Helgen besides either the town barracks or the keep.

"Step towards the block when I call your name. One at a time!" Instead of Hadvar reading from the list, the captain herself held it up. "I'llKickYourAss39!"

The plump elf smirked as he wove through the players. "I go by either Ikya or 39 for future reference."

Just before he made his way out of the crowd, Ikya stubbed a toe into the ground and pitifully tripped. All the players except Justin laughed as he hurried back onto his feet and went to the block with a reddish face. Justin observed this and took careful note of everything.

"Justin!"

Justin moved through the prisoners with ease as a few others stole glances at him. As he stood and waited for the rest of the prisoners to be called, he reviewed what he learned: the three keeps closest to the execution scaffold each had a soldier armed at the very top. The farthest of the three had no guards at its doors while both the others had one. The game now allowed complex, realistic movements like stumbling, tripping, and, no doubt, falling.

He now had two plans in his head. They both now depended on one factor-if Alduin shows up or not.

When the last prisoner was finally called, the captain went next to a priestess who was next to the executioner. "Read them their last rights."

The priestess held up her arms. "As we commend your souls to Aetherius, blessings of the Eight Divines upon you, for you are the salt and earth of Nirn, our beloved..."

All the players tensed in anticipation of the redheaded stormcloack interrupting her, but he wasn't among them. They all looked at each other as the priestess continued to give them their rights.

The priestess went on for quite some time about the hell of Sovngarde and how the many ways Nirn loved them all. But it was in the middle of her speech that all the players sighed with relief while all the NPCs looked up in confusion. As the priestess was preaching, an echoing bone-chilling roar echoed off the nearby mountain, off the walls of the keep, and into everyone's ears.

Everyone looked to see a massive black figure plummet down from the sky.

And the game begins...