Arthur Paladin doesn’t fit in. Not at home with the ultra-strict grandmother who raised him after his mother died and his dad disappeared. And not at school where the teachers think he’s trouble and the other kids think he’s a freak. Every night he peers into the sky with his telescope, sketches spaceships, and dreams about learning amazing things, the sort of things you need to know to save the world.

Then Arthur finds out his grandmother may send him to military school, which leads to a fight with his “perfect” cousin, which leads to the mysterious plate over his heart getting broken, which leads to … his whole world turning upside down.

Shadow creatures appear out of nowhere to kill him. An angelic being from another dimension begs for his help. He takes refuge in a house that looks like an English cottage on the outside but is actually a mansion on the inside. Packed with shadow creatures, the manse immediately soars away from Earth and across the universe. Arthur is trapped, and he’s only got Morgan Apple to help him. Morgan Apple, a girl who apparently sits beside him every day just to call him a moron.

That’s when life gets really weird for Arthur. That’s when he gets an energy sword and a raygun and finds out he’s the next Multiversal Paladin.