Book Description

THE ONLY WAY OUT IS AWAKE. Eighteen-year-old Rafa Cruz has aged out of foster care and is living on the streets. He’s a busker and a petty thief. By a strange quirk of fate, a smartphone that he has stolen wins him a slot as one of the few beta-testers of a revolutionary technology called “SKYE”. OmniSys, the world’s largest technology company, has discovered a way to combine lucid dreaming with the experience of RPG. They select five young adults from across the globe to take part in the trial run of SKYE: a backpacker, a veterinary student, a fitness motivator, a brittle bone disease survivor and… Rafa, a pickpocket. The Astralblazers, as they’re fondly dubbed by the press, will journey through the highly unpredictable environment of their collective dream to meet a mystical character known as Atom the God of Creation. The Astralblazers must learn to harness their imaginations and innate mana, which take the guise of guardian spirits called Anima. Along the way, they’ll encounter unicorns, dragons, Orcs, Goblins and a host of other fantastic beings. With each monster battle they face, they earn XP, stats and equipment, becoming powerful and hardened survivors. The game designer, however, has been keeping secrets from the Astralblazers. One of their teammates, in the waking world, has suffered hemorrhaging in the limbic region of her brain. If her character dies inside SKYE, the other players will become trapped in the game.