Speaker 1: This is an Unspoiled Network podcast. This is spoil Me
covering Dungeon Crawler, Carl Book seven, This Inevitable Ruin Chapter
eighty six, and epilogue. In these chapters we get lots
of surprises. Kansia's getting to leave, which I just didn't
see coming. We're getting the gods released into the real world.
How does that work? Oh my god? And uh, you know,
also just the routine of moving to the next floor
until next time. I'm going to be bereft. Welcome to
spoil Me, Welcome to the show everyone. I am Natasha.
Thank you very much to Michael for commissioning this episode.
Michael's here in the chat and says the Rist moment
was a what the fuck thing for me too. Yeah.
I obviously need to be careful about my pacing because there,
while this section isn't like necessarily overly long, it is
packed and there's like implications that are outside of what
the text is that I think will probably take me
a while to completely talk through. So I'm going to
start at the beginning, but that definitely has my attention.
So let's start off talking about caught. Because we were
told that there was the option for Katia to choose
to be pregnant, and Carl pretty much hand waved that
she wasn't going to choose that, and uh, you guys,
this is not the first time. Okay, So, anybody who
has listened to my coverage of Cradle, do you all
remember how when we are in the pov of a
certain someone who I will not name, and they just
offhandedly think that they're never going back to such a
place again. Do you all remember how I just believed them,
and so as the reveal happens of who they are,
I was just not getting it because I so completely
took their word for it. Does anybody anybody o there
know what I'm talking about? If not, it's fine, you won't
find out what I'm talking about if you start the
Cradle series for like, you know, eight books, I think,
but once you get there, I think you'll know exactly
what I'm talking about. And I just felt like such
a stooge. And here it's like a similar thing where
Carl simply said, oh, she's not going to want to
be pregnant, like meta, I think is what he said
something like that, and I just fucking took his word
for it, which why would I do that? Why should
I do that? Why did I think that? He like,
I don't. Things change, that's all, you know? Things change?
And I really was just like a babe in the
woods with this reveal, because I truly did not think
this was at all going to be and I should
have realized that, like the way everybody was behaving. I
even said at one point, why is everyone so anxious
about saying goodbye to her? I understand that you're like
not gonna see her for a while, but you will
see her again. And then I just pretty much put
it down to, like, all right, well, that's me like
really hoping that's true. And maybe they aren't as sanguine
as I am about eventually getting to see her again,
and they don't want to take that for granted, and
so for them, that's that's the issue, you know what
I'm saying. And I just should have seen it. I
really should have seen it. So what we do here,
which I think is just like a really great idea.
We get Samantha. She's like just distracting Embrace and allowing
him to quote question her. And I was right about because,
like I had said something in the vein of maybe
they should just let him have her because I don't
think she would get hurt, and it turns out that's true.
He like literally chucks her into a volcano, and I
don't know that she hit the actual lover or anything.
Maybe that would be that would do it. But he's
able to put her through quite a lot and it
does not kill her, so she gets retrieved, and it's
just a really it's a really great way of first
of all, dealing with the Embrass problem and maybe honestly,
even though I don't know that this is a thing
distracting Samantha because I feel like she could possibly have
fucked things up a little bit. And also Embrace turns
out is like very emotional, so this doesn't turn into
the kind of situation that I thought it might, because
he just winds up sort of breaking down and being
really sad about the death of his son. And it's all.
It's just a lot of surprises. But also kind of
made me like Embress more, even though I you know,
I don't like Embress, but was it just kind of
made me warm toward him pun intended just a tad.
Michael says, I think it was more that they weren't
thinking it was an actual, real possibility before the final
plan coalesced. Sarahim says, well, there was no point in
taking that option while Jinx was in control, since she
had final say in what Kotsya got. Oh that's right,
I forgot about that, Okay. I still feel like Carl
said something about how that's not what Katya would want,
but I personally like wouldn't have expected her to want
that because of the entire situation in general, Like, it's
the sort of thing where the fact that she does
in the end makes sense and it's not like on
this it's it is not surprising. I get it, But
I also kind of thought maybe there is too much
trauma surrounding having children for her to want to pick that.
You know what I'm saying, Michael says, Natasha is going
to skip over development in our Favorite Enemies to Lover's moment.
Pony confesses, Michael, you're stepping on my shit. I'm sorry
that I phrased it that way, but I'm going to
get to that. I don't know who you think I am,
but sorry, please, So yeah, yeah, this entire thing with
uh with Samantha just in the background yelling to Carl
that his God is a little bitch and YadA, YadA, YadA.
I just found really really funny. And eventually he is
able to call her back and it's no problem. Like
there's a point when he's trying to explain to her
and initially like, you know, tell him the truth about
such and such, but and he like kind of the
way he phrases some things. She's like, but I thought
you said to lie. And he's like, not about that,
about the other thing, you know what I mean. And
I did have a moment of like, does she know
what he means? But it turns out yes, it's just
she's being a little difficult here. Honestly, that's it. So
let's see. Uh, I will ask you if he's touching you,
you will answer, and you will tell the truth. Got it?
I thought you told me to lie. No, you know
what I mean? Got it. She'd wrapped several of the
streamers around her head, and I really love and Prepotente
mentions that like the God is grabbing her. He's like
the streamers were a nice touch. I don't know that
that was Carl's idea. I kind of feel Katcha took
it upon herself to do that. I think that's funnier.
And Prepotente is entering the stairwell ahead of them and
he says good luck to you all, and Carl says
thank you, Prepotente. He does not call him pony, which
I think is like because we had Ellie call him
pony a few pages back, so there are still people
out there doing that. And he didn't yell at Ellie
about it from what I recall, So I'm not sure
if it's like just Carl doing that he had an
issue with, or if he just doesn't feel like arguing
with absolutely everybody all of the time, or what. But
I appreciated the fact that Carl called him what he
has been asked to be called. And he says, see
you on the next floor, and Prepotente says, I love you,
and there's a pause in the narrator. Again, it's not
in the text, but it's in the narration. I love
you too, buddy, and this is you, guys. I had
really been mystified at the fact that Carl did not
seem to like Miriam dom and Prepotente, and I stand
by that so much, because like, look at this, look
at look at this weirdness. I love thish Miriam, you
are missed. So none of us believed that Lucy mr
was actually taking a deal, and as a result, Florine
would not take one either. That's the whole thing. Everybody
who is like, you know, leaving and taking deals and
what all they're going to do. I'm really interested if
we're going to find out about any of the particular
deals specifics, or if they're going to be people that
like said they were going to take a deal and
then the deals they were presented with were really bad
and so they wound up not taking them and come
back into the dungeon. I don't know, Uh, you're gonna
stop buying? Gave me a kiss on both cheeks. Oswaldo
and his team when in Brittany said she was contemplating
a deal but was afraid and would probably be back.
I stood on my eye on her r E the
possession thing. Don't know if that's anything, but I feel
like that goddess isn't lying, you know, so, but it's weird, like,
you know, her being like I think I'll take a deal,
but I might be too afraid and come back. Does
feel like Brittany has been kind of a wishy, washy person.
So that feels in character to me. If she is
possessed and she takes a deal, now that things are
the way they are, where shit can happen outside the
dungeon too, will her possession fuck that up and make
it so that, like, even when she leaves, she's possessed
And this is something that affects everyone. And in the
same Vein Victory mentions that if Louis were to leave
the dungeon, what's going on with his like body that
he has taken won't work either, But it does seem
like the AI is allowing a lot of splash over
punintended in Louie's case, So I don't know if there's
like maybe potentially a possibility that body would still work
as well. I don't know. And let's see, Uh Tuba
and Selvie, the party members from of the Dead Borku left.
They both said they were taking a deal. Neither had
told me the why or how. Burke who considered me
as the one who'd killed her father, and I feared
I'd never know. I am curious about that. You know,
there's uh, there's going to be things that are just
somebody being kind of irrational. There going to be things
where Karl had such a huge effect on a huge
area and a huge number of people, that consequences happened
that he literally never knew about. It could be one
or the other, it could be both. And then as
he thinks, that's the problem with such chaos, you lose
so much around the edges. The moment, I thought that
I heard a distant laughing, deep deep in the back
of my mind, and it terrified me because it came
from within the river, the river I had hoped would
leave with the destruction of the ring. The laughter sounded
distinctly like that of Eiris, the goddess of chaos. Yeah,
she's enjoying herself and uh probably knows what's coming and
is just extremely excited about this little jaunt into the
regular world that she's about to get. So fucking jamal.
By the way, guys, so he's been giving more legs.
Carl suggests that he goes stay in the safe room,
and he's like, yeah, and then if you or Donut dies,
I get smashed because I'm in there. No, I'm not
doing that. Louie comes over and says that Juice Box
gave him divorce papers. I'm real curious how this is
gonna go, because like, I can't help but feel as
if maybe Juice Box gave him the papers unsigned and
he has to like initiate things, and I'm wondering if
he will. There's something about the fact that Louis is
in this very different body that almost makes me wonder
if there's going to be some commiseration from like a
shape shifter that might bring them together somehow. And I
know that it's really not the same thing, but a
you know, at this same time, even if something isn't
exactly the same situation, it can sometimes give you a
lot more empathy for another person's, you know, issues they're
dealing with. So I don't know, it might be that
this is like and I wonder too, because you know,
is the niad body that he's in a female body?
Is that correct? I feel like I remember that because
that's why Samantha chose it. So he's in a female body,
but he's still Louis, And it just makes me think of,
you know the concept of like externally, the genitals you
have have nothing to do with the gender you are,
and I wonder about that as an ongoing potential message
as well. I don't know. Sorry, Oh, that's right. He's
not in the body. He just replaced his lungs and
heart with the organs. That's right, that's right. I keep
forgetting how that went because he keeps saying like they
use the body and YadA YadA, and so it's making
me conflate that. But yeah, so, I uh just really
I don't know. I wonder. I wonder if he's gonna
sign them, because like, I really weirdly want them to
work out. And I think a lot of that is
just about Juice Box and how knowing how she feels
so genuinely about him, which I had sort of suspected
that she really cared. And also Louis just seems to
have this really profound sense of worthlessness, and maybe being
told why she feels how she feels might help. I
don't know if she's ever told him. So, Okay, Batista, guys,
this whole thing, Oh my god. I loved it so
much because what it turns out Batista is doing is
finishing up on the uh the like cyborg parts for Katya.
There's so much happening here. So this is what I
think Katya was yelling, like, I really need before I
can leave, and uh, I understand that exactly, Like who
knows how much this shit would cost if she were
to leave the dungeon and then had to find somebody
to make this stuff for her. And I appreciate Bautista
taking these moments to ensure this gets done. I sure
hope that he's competent enough at it that they work properly.
And this is the thing that's like really rough, which
is when Kotsha gets transformed back into a human right
before making her wish, they see that she's like a
torso with like half an arm. It's bad. She's lost
so many limbs, it's crazy. And I had suspected there
have been a few different incidents where something happened and
it was clear she took serious damage and was really
quiet after certain combat, and I was like, that feels
like something's going on with her that she's not talking about.
And yeah, she has been hiding. I mean, I had suspected,
but I don't think even I would have guessed just
how bad it was. So I'm again jumping ahead here
because we're not really there yet. But yeah, I just
wanted to address that because, like Bautista disappearing, you know, guys,
I've been worried about him. I really really have. And
there comes a point at the end of this where
I felt very reassured. I hope he's telling the truth.
I think so, but I really did have, like, uh
my antenna up with him, still do with Lena that's
not dealt with. Turns out she's not even talking to
her teammate, so, uh, what's his name is? Schweg? He
goes down to the next floor without her and isn't
sure if he's gonna take a deal or not when
Carl asks, she's the only teammate left and she doesn't
even want to talk to him, like, I wonder if
she blames him for her brother's death as well. It's possible,
but I don't know. I mean, I might not want
to stay in the game when the only person that
I felt at all close to is clearly like a
little bit psychotic and determined to go do their own
fucking thing. So uh, let's see, Oh right, here comes
the thing with victory. So Carl says, you're not going
to the eighteenth floor with the rest of the adjutants
after this, and she says no. With the unfortunate death
of my underage nieces and nephews up in orbit, I
once again became eligible for political office. Not allowed to
be in office if you have underage leaders in your family.
It's an old, stupid rule, but a rule nonetheless. Anyway,
as people weren't certain of former Prime Minister Fopsi's relationship
to the Dream, he was passed over for the newly
vacated position of syndicate Prime Minister. As a result, I
am now acting Prime Minister Victory. There will be a
real vote in a few months, but in the meantime,
I'm it they wanted someone stuck here with the rest
of us so I could truly focus on the crisis.
And Carl says well, and Rosetta says, well, shit. And
it's described as sounding strangely irritated at the news, which
I think is likely because she gave this assignment to
someone and didn't realize this outcome was going to happen.
So she's kind of put this into motion because she
was didn't realize that. So that's funny. Honestly, if I'm
going to have a prime minister, though, you could do
a lat fucking worse than Victory. Somebody who is smart
somebody who actually gives a shit about law and the rules.
Somebody who is like Evidently, I don't want to say moral,
because I really don't know about that. Honestly, being lawful
and being moral aren't at all the same. But I
feel that you could reason with her. I don't know.
I just think that like, she potentially is someone that
we could work with, and I am very interested. It's
very funny, though, because Carl steps forward and puts his
hand on her shoulder, she was still protected. If I
tried to punch her, my arm would go straight through.
I wish you good luck in your new job, Madam
Prime Minister. As much as I've loathed the idea of
killing another few thousand schmucks who'd gotten railroaded into coming
down here for the krawl, as much as I actually
liked victory, I wouldn't hesitate, not even for a moment,
to kill the goddamn Prime Minister of the syndicate. She snorted,
She knew it too. This is one of those moments,
y'all where I appreciate the reality check from Carl, because
I will really get swayed by liking somebody personally, You
know what, I'm saying I think he has the right idea.
I think that this kind of being like focused on
the objective is necessary in some ways. But I also
do kind of think it's possible that she could be
somebody you could work with somehow. I'd rather her in
that position than someone else, you know. But I don't know.
I don't know. I was a little startled. I won't
lie at how like he says he wouldn't even hesitate,
because I kind of feel like he would. But if
he says he wouldn't, I tend to believe him. I
feel like Carl really, for the most part, has decent
self awareness and knows himself, and even when he doesn't,
if somebody points the thing out, he tends to like
actually take in their criticism, you know, instead of just
discounting it out of hand. So yeah, anyway, sorry, system
message Alithia has entered the realm, and the temporary effect
is all damage you strike against female opponents is quartered
all female members of your party strike with a melee
power of five hundred percent, which is unbalanced. Well, so
we get the goddess showing up looking beautiful and serene
and kind, and YadA YadA, and it's swunshing jinx, and
she of course has to like completely ruin this by
first starting off by calling them idiotic pricks. And where's it?
She sees, Victor, how many cocks did you have to
suck to get that job? I'm sure it's just an
unfortunate coincidence. Your underage nephew was blown out of orbit.
Now that idiot the Maestro is king and your prime
Minister will don't get used to it. With all the
death and chaos your little team has caused, it's not
gonna matter who's in charge. They'll have your head on
a pike in no time. And it turns out like
the Sister Formidable is straight up miss missing, Like we
don't know what happened to her. We had heard that
she was swimming, and I think it seems that she
has survived, but evidently is not up in the orbit
making trouble again. She hasn't hailed her people to come
pick her up. I think so. Yeah, this is when
Daniel comes in with the uh cybernetic stuff, and I
love the fact that he says to Katcya, I'm sorry
I made you doubt me. I really like that because
there's a lot of ways that you could phrase that,
and there's a lot of things that you could you know,
I I I just think that's a really nice, succinct
way of putting it. Is like, hey, I know I
was being an asshole and it made you think that,
like I was low key not on your side, and
that fucking sucks that I ever made you feel that way,
And I really am sorry, and uh yeah, I just
appreciated this a lot. So this is how this is
when we begin the thing with Dona and huan Shin.
She uses laundry day and pulls the uh or the
soul armor of the goddess right off her, and that
causes the goddess to like still be in the room
but not moving, frozen and till Katya makes the choice
that she makes. Meanwhile, while she and Jinks is in
a circle trapped where she can't use like her magical
artifacts or anything, and Donah is explaining to her, she
got that she's the one who received the kneepads from Katchya,
which that's a surprise. I did not, you know, everybody
has been sort of assuming that Katya would give them
to Carl, but evidently not. I wonder if Donut will
save them and keep using them like forever, or if
it was really just for this one particular job. So
let's see the bricks is continue to shake with rage.
Stay the hell away from me. I am a god.
I will end you, and Donut just like comes right
up against her. Kwan Shehin, who pulled herself to her feet,
was again on the ground. Sparks flew in the air.
All cats have it, naturally, it's called claw. I was
at level four before, but now I'm approaching fifteen. But
again that wasn't necessary. I'm just showing off a little.
And she pulls out this mount for a weapon, and
it's got a crossbow on it. And this is what
we call Mordecai out for because he can't actually inflict
the damage himself, but they can give him the opportunity
to make the arrow they will use, and that won't
count against him. So she says, I have a mutual
friend waiting outside. He'd loved to come say hello real quick.
And he comes out and he says, my brother died
because of you, and because of Odette, and because of Choco,
but mostly because of you. Some of my mother's ashes
are built into the tip of this bolt. It's a
funeral rite in my culture to make a weapon with
the ashes of those you lost. My mother died before
the Crawl came to my world, and I'm grateful for
the opportunity to allow her to avenge her son. And
I was so pleased that Doughnut actually mentions that she
shit in his mother's ashes, because when he mentioned her ashes,
I was like, oh God, I remembered that, you know,
and what she has the fucking nerve. I am here
to save you. This was a problem you created, and
I gave you a solution. It's not just the audacity,
it's the insult of her thinking that they are going
to like actually be stupid enough to see it that way,
in this very misrepresented light. It's just come now, ma'am.
You know. So let's see. She says, we don't need
to go through this, but we want to. We want
to show those of you on the twelfth floor what's coming.
You're strong, but we're getting stronger every day. And you
know what, we don't need to kill the gods and
goddesses to win, no, honey, we just need to kill
you and they do. Indeed, let's see, Donut gives him
permission to loop. He takes swanshing Jings's body, which what
are we doing with that? And then we have the
message from Samantha that is just like he's starting to
really lose a shit, dude. So Carl recognizes that we
have really got to speed things along here, and Katya
says goodbye to everybody. Still at this point, we don't
know what she's choosing, you know, so I'm still kind
of thinking like, it'll be fine, guys, relax, But yeah,
she asks to be made pregnant, and the Goddess is like,
are you sure. I like the fact too, that when
the Goddess awakes, she sees Katya and is like, oh,
you're one of mine, Like the fact that what happened
to Katcha was in the real world and outside of
the dungeon. It doesn't matter. This goddess is like, still,
it's set up in a way that it is relevant anyway.
And there's something about that that you could see as
like weirdly invasive and not cool, but there's another part
of me that kind of likes it, you know. And
she also is able to see up to the surface
and says something like I can sense them. Why wasn't
I able to say before. But I can't get I
can't reach them, and I'm super curious because it will
be enabled shortly that she will be able to reach them.
I'm so interested in what she's actually going to do,
Like Katchya, if she goes, if she leaves the dungeon
and goes to the surface, will this goddess like be
around for her beyond this moment. I don't know anyway. Uh,
you can't get their donuts said, but Katcha can and
she can protect them for you. And I love that
is wisdom. Champion of necka bit harbinger of doom. H yeah, donuts,
you will be made human once again, and you must
choose a father for the child. The father must be
human as well. The goddess looked at me, eyes lazing.
I see who you wish for it to be, but
it cannot be so standing next to me, Bautista stiffened.
So yeah, I am really really unsure here. It's like
the fact that Bautista's a tiger is the thing, right
like essensibly, but she would have probably picked Carl anyway.
I think I think right like she would have tried
even if Bautista were human. I feel I feel a
real like weirdness about the fact that the goddess says,
I sense who you wish it to be, Like she's
reading her mind and kind of putting her on front
street a little bit like maybe Katcha wasn't going to
actually say Carl out loud, but that's what she feels,
and this Gooddess was just blowing up her whole spot.
But anyway, so yeah, and I was confused for a
minute about why it cannot be so, but yeah, Michael
is in the chat. Oh no, sorry, sarahm and saying
Carl is a primal, which must be the reason. But
there was a moment for me of like, is it
because of like she and Maria being inside him or whatever,
But like, technically he's not human either either. So she
goes for Louis and he says, yeah, all right, like
I suppose why not. So she becomes pregnant and it's
a boy, we find out spoilers, but this is when
we see her entire right arm was gone all the
way wight to the shoulder, her left leg was gone,
her right leg was gone up to the knee. She
was missing an ear as well, Like Holy shit. So
we are able to get all of these cybernetic parts
that are you know, grafted on to her, so to speak.
And Alithia impregnates her no problem, you know, with just
tapping three fingers on her stomach, and evidently she's gonna
be able to save all this stuff when she goes
to surface. I sure hope that's true, that it works
the way we expect. And she just vanishes, and I
have no doubt that we'll like check in with her
at some point. I'm really curious what it's all going
to be like. So at this point, Samantha yells, he's
not touching me anymore, bring me back, and Carl does
indeed pull her back. There's a thing on the table
remained a pair of items. One was Catcha's card from
the previous floor, the one depicting Annie the skull headed
bird doughnut took it. The second was a bra with
my own face on one cup and the words time
to pay the Daddy tax on the other. And Ellie says,
what the fuck Carl, And I'm like, why are you
yelling at him? Ellie? He didn't fucking make that. You
know how this works, Get the hell out of here,
but I can't imagine. But he's to already being jealous,
Like if they fuck and he takes her top off
and she's got this bra on, I have to assume
that that is really gonna kind of fuck the vibe up,
you know anyway, so uh oh. This is the moment
where Samantha finds out that Louis is getting and divorce
and of course starts to get quite aggressive with him,
and then Batista comes up and says, I know you
think I was going to do something horrible or jealous.
I want you to know I almost did. I keep
losing family, Carl. It makes me scared, and it makes
me angry, and I know I am not considered human anymore,
and that is my great shame, especially today. But I
would never do anything to hurt a brother like you,
and that rang true to me. You know, I really
believe him. I hope I'm right, and I love the
fact that he admits he almost did do those things.
It's not this is not a moment of him posturing
and being like you thought the worst of me, and
I would never This is a very human, vulnerable moment
of like, yeah, I almost gave in because I am jealous,
and I'll admit that and cop to it to the
guy I'm jealous of, which is not an easy thing
to do, you know. I just that earns a lot
of respect from me. So he says, I looked at
the Kimars figure you have. He's one of the brothers
of Shale. He has a summoning time of the remainder
of the floor. Be careful with him. Is the summoning
time the remainder of the floor. Is that how long
he is with you? Or is that how long it
takes for him to appear. Samantha recognizes his name and
she says, he uh, Kimars. He was one of my
best friends. I met him when and she says, huh,
that's weird. Why couldn't I remember that he's the one
who gave me the potion that would put my baby
in me when I couldn't get pregnant. We were friends.
He'd give me advice on who to date, who to see,
and who to She floated off, muttering his mother. I
will kill his mother. So I feel like when she
says who to date, who to see, and who to kill,
is more than likely that third one. But I am
really curious again, about what's going on with Samantha. I
love the fact that, like Carl is so committed to
keeping her with them, and the idea of like leaving
her with Embres and getting into the stairwell, leaving her behind,
it's just not even gonna happen, you know. He's just like,
we'd never see her again. I don't want to do that,
And I was just like, I appreciate you, sir. I
know what Ellie said about, like, are what's the upside
of Samantha? But like, honestly, there are a fair amount
of upsides. She has been helpful in weird ways, and
I just like her and I do feel for her.
At the fact that she has been by so many
people that she ruins everything. I feel like the fact
that they still want to be her friends might be
kind of a novel thing for her, you know. So
they head down into the next stairwell and Mordecai he's
like he's out there drinking and they have to tell
him to go back into the safe room and he says,
thank you Donut for setting that up. Uh, And yeah,
I wonder if that helped it all, because sometimes it
can and sometimes it doesn't do much you know. So
there were only two people left on the floor. One
was Embras, who filled the world with fire. The second
was Justice Light, who'd used a spell to hide his presence.
When Juice Box jumped into the nothing, he had told
her he was going with her. He lied he needed
to be on this side of the veil to activate
the trap. Juice Box would be fine if her short
time and then nothing didn't drive her mad. I'm sorry,
but you can't just say those two things right next
to each other. Like this was a moment for me
of maybe juice Bux was right not to trust crawlers,
you know. I don't know, man, that's just fucked up
to me. He's doing what he's gotta do. I guess,
but like, yikes, like he told her, if she managed
to survive this next part, she would be reborn as
the ultimate weapon to end this madness. I just the
fact that he set her up and made her think
he was going to and then he didn't. Ah, I
don't know, Justice, this is so fucked up. Part of
him felt that all his friends left in the dungeon
could possibly suffer because of what he was about to do.
Porthos knew the plan. The Apothecary knew the plan. He
truly believed the survivors were up to the challenge, but
everything was about to get much more complicated. Most people
were about to take deals. Most of the former Carlers
were now on their way back to orbit. He took
solace in that he took one last look around the
elaborate system of traps he'd never needed. And this reminds
me of the thing that Donut had said earlier about
how like you can't just tease people with something, and
she mentions the Christmas gift and that it's just a
couple of romance novels, Karl, and you're building it all
up and people are just going to be disappointed. And
I just couldn't help but laugh because I think like,
at this point, it has been told to us what
the presents are, But what I am more interested in
now is like what it is that Carl is waiting for?
And I almost feel like, is he waiting until he's
out of the dungeon, or is he waiting until he's
like at rock bottom and he really needs a lift,
or what is going on there? You know? So the
items that fell were a Bju ferry trap along with
the thousands of threads that connected the fairies to the
twelfth floor, and a demon trap along with the thousands
of evicted demons, with the power to open a portal
back to Shale, if only they could find something to
latch onto. What happened next was exactly what Justice Light
had intended. He never got to see the next messages.
Four separate planes, all jumbled and confused, folded and moved
together together as the unbreakable lines of the Biju ferries tightened,
creating a flower pattern, before the darkness in the center
of it all broke apart as the fire engulfed him,
finally giving rest to a soul that had been so
tired for such a very long time, Justice Light cawed
into the air. The Beiju trap has been deactivated. All
Biju have been freed. The demon trap has deactivated. All
captured evictive demons had been freed. The Nothing has been broken.
The Nothing is currently draining into the halls of the Ascendency.
The Nothing is currently draining into Shiol. The Nothing is
currently draining into Scolopendra's lair. Scolopendra stirs. It is advised
all current guests at the Scolopendra Club. Evacuate immediately planet
wide message Oh, I'm sorry, there's nowhere for you to go.
Be advised. The sixteenth floor, supposedly entitled Agony of Mirrors,
is actually a giant empty room with a single miss
rror in it, a non magical mirror plucked from an
abandoned Motel sixth location in Boise, Idaho. As the sixteenth
floor is currently outside the Scolopendra layers, any guest who
wished to evacuate the Scolopendra Club should immediately proceed to
this location, where you will be safe from any impending attacks. Unfortunately,
the seventeenth floor, called the Backstage Death Maze, is currently
built and running. You will have to proceed through this
level should you want to get to the sixteenth good
luck system message Scolopendra has awakened. My my, my, I
can't say that I even understand a lot of the
implications of this. You know what I'm saying, Lake, Ah,
my god. You will have to proceed the step through
the seventeenth floor should you want to get to the
sixteenth I don't understand how that works either. What does
that mean? How come for what? Why? Why are we
going in that direction because they're on the eighteenth right, Okay,
I think that's right, guys, I get confused. It's a
lot to keep trying. There's a lot. So we're just
about to have a bunch of preachers from the Nothing, fairies,
demons and potentially gods as well, just fucking around. What
how and why exactly? Why does Justice Light want to
do this so bad? He just wants to say fuck
you to everybody, Like, as he mentions, it's going to
screw people in the the dungeon still quite a bit.
And he's like, I think they're up to it, and
I'm like, I mean probably, but like why, what's why?
And maybe as things go forward, I'll understand a little
bit better his thinking here and I'll see that it's like,
you know, I'll understand why he felt it outweighed that
effect perhaps. But yeah, So this is just so. The
permanent portal into the Nothing was made from the now broken,
blood soaked winding box from the Gate of the Feral Gods,
the same portal Juice Box had just used to flee
the ninth floor, So that's what he had gotten hold
of in order to make all of this happen. So
then we go into the epilogue and it's York and
what's going on with him in orbit on the ship.
He's writing poetry, very dissatisfied with a lot of it,
and he is experiencing a really profound depression that is
almost making it feel like why am I even alive?
Like there's just a nothingness to him, and he keeps
asking himself like why don't I feel more? And it's
him who killed all of those young orcs on that
ship that enabled Victory to become prime minister. But he
like the thing that he's judging himself about with that
is that it really not only was it not difficult
for him, but that he was actually looking forward to
doing it and understands that's fucked up, but he can't
get himself to really feel that it's fucked up, and
it bothers him, which I don't know if y'all have
ever been in this position yourselves, where there's something that
you're like, I can see the reaction I'm having to
this isn't normal, you know, but it is a really
strange feeling to be sort of outside yourself, going why
am I being a real weirdo? Right now, and not
responding the way I believe a rational or empathetic person
would respond. And it turns out that sometimes he'll like
read these aloud and just put it on the broadcast
for everybody, and a lot of people have him blocked
by now, which I do think is sort of hilarious.
Let's see, the small yacht he destroyed had simply been vaporized.
He kept trying to rearrange it in his mind, desperately
attempting to frame it in a way where he felt something.
He mourned his own lack of emotion, his own crawl
seemed like such a distant memory. His entire hive had
entered the dungeon, and he recalled the anger he'd felt
at how they had been picked off one by one,
and not just at that, but the realization that he'd
never really fit in and because of his own individuality,
he never was part of a team, despite being part
of a hive, and because he was all alone, his
flailings against the bureaucratic alien machines that had subjugated him
and his hive were impotent. The stronger he grew as
a crawler, the weaker he felt, and the weaker he felt,
the angrier he became, and then somewhere around the ninth floor,
a numbness spread. He knew this was something locked deep
in his tenadera DNA. His warrior ants had been specifically
bred to be without emotion. This was before they'd become civilized.
This lack of emotion would be required of any soldier
whose duty it was to crack into an enemy hive
and kill all the children within. And I thought that
was really interesting, the fact that this is something that's
like not necessarily just a product of trauma, because that's
definitely what I was assuming from the beginning of the
chapter or epilogues, that he's just been through too much,
you know. But evidently it's not that simple. Let's see,
the newsfeeds had mentioned the fortunate death of the children
caught in the crossfire, but there was so much more
happening all at once that barely registered a blip. Was
that it that this wasn't enough to break through the
bindings that had grown around his heart like thorns. The
news was focused on bigger stories, the new Prime Minister,
the crash of the Dream Cruiser into the surface of
Earth over the continent of Australia, and I was like,
a word, what what the mass suicide of one of
the nebular colonies, which Victory did mention, I've forgotten to
talk about that. Sorry, trying to stay I'm trying to
stay focused, guys, but I am going to occasionally just
slide right over things, especially when they're like political things.
But mostly at the moment, the talk was of the
mantis system that had simply gone boom. This particular news
actually filled York with a strange, empty sense of satisfaction.
The larger mantids hated his race, the Tenadera, and not
nearly let's see, sorry, most mantids openly spoke of exterminating
him in his kind as they could cross breed, and
they feared what would happen should the tendonara mix en
mass And he says they got what they deserve, but
is just like, first of all, I don't really even
think that's true. And he's also just like, how the
fuck did that happen? They're like, I probably should be
worried about this. A message came across his screen. You
have soldiers to load. They have arrived at the onboarding facility.
Docking procedure incoming, and let's see. Oh right, this is
when Boomer calls him up and they go back and
forth a little bit in an exchange that is sort
of like a routine for them. By now, let's see
on the news feed, a breaking news banner appeared, followed
by the image of Porthos sitting behind a desk. York
knew this video was actually shot a while ago because
he'd been there when Rosetta directed it, but it was
timed to be released just now. On the screen, Porthos
was announcing the formation of a new militant group, warning
they would now be moving against all syndicate, governmental properties
and systems across the known universe, and it ends with
just basically like stop the crawler. Else a Boomer is saying,
set aside four of the Kronos suits and a landing skiff,
we have a pregnant veteran on the surface who needs
back up, and for the rest of us, it's time
to bring the war out of the dungeon. Better warm
up the lasers. At that moment, York did indeed feel
something finally after all this time. And then we go
to the Outreach Guild and it's we're back with Carl
meeting with Quasar, who I've missed. I do really enjoy
him and Quasar. Long story short says that there's a
few offers for Carl for deals, but they're really really bad.
There's only one that's even like worth considering, and he
knows that Carl is not going to take it. And
you guys, there comes this point here where he's talking
about Donut, and you know, Quasar is not able to
tell Carl what Donut did until Carl makes his own choice, which,
of course, there wasn't even a moment where I thought
Donut would take a deal. Let's see, I'm trying to
find this bit where he uh, there was an audible ping.
I thought maybe you'd also rep Donut, I said, after
a moment he represented her before for some of the
contract stuff. He shrugged. I was hoping. So that's why
I wore this tie. I argued it because he's got
a Mango tide. By the way, but they assigned her
another lawyer. Her name is Princess Chandra Esquire. Apparently her
and Donut already had their meeting, and now that officially
declined her offers, I can tell you she declined as well.
I'm hearing there were some serious fireworks during their meeting,
and not the good kind. We need to have a
serious talk about her Dona's lawyer. I mean, I grunted,
why is she another cat girl? No worse, buddy, she's
your new wife. And that's the end of that section.
So no explanations, no ideas on my end. All I
can think is that Karl made some deal and didn't
read the fine print. And that's the best I can
come up with. And I have no idea. I got nothing.
And then the last thing we do is we go
over to a character name is named Xander who runs
the equivalent of like a gas station, and he is
in a spot where a lot of the crawler merch
does quite well, but now that everything has gone completely
off the rails, he's got a bunch of stuff that
he's going to need to unload somehow. And it's very
funny because there's like an Uzi Jesus toy that can speak,
and so he like confides in it as if he's
praying almost uh, and he explains about the fact that, like,
I have this huge rent that I have to pay
that I'm not going to be able to make the payments,
YadA YadA, And of course, like personally, I have very
limited sympathy for somebody who is making money off of
the merch from the crawl, but I can also recognize
that's like, you know, yeah, like if you're not high
up enough in the system to a point, you've got
to fucking live. And so if this is something that's
like a money make for him, it doesn't seem like
he's out here living it up. It seems like he's
just trying to get by. I also can sympathize there.
So I'm kind of, uh, you know, what do you
call it. I'm kind of back and forth on him.
So he's UZI Jesus scratched himself in the head with
his plastic gun. It went off of the pop and
he put his hand to his temple. Dad, damn it.
I'm so sorry, but the dad, damn it is such
a bad joke, y'all. I'm gonna get indentured, Xander said, miserably.
Do not kow tao, never kow tao. Raoul called, I
got it. You can start a church robot. UZI Jesus announced,
you'd be balling if you did it right. And this
is when he gets interrupted by somebody being like, what
is this? And he turns and there is a woman
standing here that can which confuses him because usually somebody
pulls in there's a little alarm and he knows they're there,
but she just appears out of nowhere, and at first
is just like, that is an amazing costume. And then
he's like, or wait, or is it? And she says,
are you asking Heiress Goddess of Chaos if she's wearing
a costume? And he just says yeah. She burst into laughter.
I'll show you a costume. She snapped her fingers and
all the tentacles on Xander's face turned rigid. Each one
started spewing a different liquid. Some of that liquid burned.
Holy Mary, Mother of Me, robot Uzzi, Jesus said again,
a very terrible joke. And I just want to know
why the gods have to be so like unfriendly. You know,
you could have just made it spray chocolate, you know,
or a lovely perfume or any just anything, but no, no,
we gotta be like this really honestly. And I will say, like,
I'm here at the kindle and I swiped to the
next page and the logo for Squirtles Waystation is horrifying.
I really hate it. I uh, whoever did this go
to jail? And what's becoming a really sucky trend. This
is part of the uh note at the end from
Matt Denneman. My best friend, Freddy the Labrador died during
the final days of writing this book, you guys, Freddy
was there sitting by my feet while I wrote the
vast majority of what you've read so far. Freddy began
and ended each day with a furiously wagging tail, even
when age made that difficult for him. He was my
constant companion since he was a He was with me
through some really dark times, lending his strength, and I
am proud to have been there with him when he
wagged his last wag. Even in his last moments, he
was checking on me to make certain I was okay.
We don't deserve dogs. The world is a little less
dirty and a little less amazing with him gone. And
there's a picture of him, and he is a precious angel.
He looks a lot like pip You guys. It really
got me because like I know, Pippin's turning forward this year,
you know, and they just it goes fast, and I
am really really dreading, but I'm just trying to enjoy
it while I got it. So yeah, this just I
wanted to mention it because it's just I found it very,
very touching, and I hope Matt gets himself a what
do they call it, a bridge dog. I think doesn't
work because you're supposed to get a bridge dog before
the first dog dies. But I know a lot of
people can be very touchy about adopting again right after
the death of a pet. But I really do think
for the most like for the majority of people I've
heard from, even though they didn't want to do it,
when they did it, it helped a lot. Usually it
was like their partner went and did it despite them
insisting like no, I'm not ready, and they realized like,
oh I actually was and needed this, and I'm glad
that my partner did not listen to me. So anyway,
just something I think about as well. You know, now
I've got two dogs, and it's just it's double the
joy but also potentially double the pain at some point.
So anyway, guys, I got to wrap up. Thank you
guys again so much for hanging out with me. I
am super excited to start parade of horribles. Very excited
and thank you Michael for commissioning this one. Until next
time did a loom motherfuckers that was an unspoiled network
pat