Dungeon Crawler Carl, Book 7. Faction Wars. Prologue plus Chapter one plus map. (Patreon)

If you just finished Eye of the Bedlam Bride, start here for book 7.

Hey folks. Sorry for the delay in getting this started, but end of book stuff always takes a lot of time. A couple of housekeeping things. We will be changing the chapter naming conventions from now on, as you can see. Also, I know you’re all excited about the lootbox chapter, and we didn’t quite get there with this one. Next time.

Also, this map is temporary until I can get a real artist to draw it.

Porthus.

The soother attorney yawned. Porthus grabbed his own left arm to keep it from shaking. He was still covered in blood. He was getting it all over the desk, over the chair. The attorney was here virtually, and he didn’t seem to notice. This was the second time Porthus had a meeting with this creature. His attorney. The alien hadn’t even once looked him in the eye.

This was a zero zone, and the enhancements to his strength were gone. It felt as if he couldn’t breathe, as if his own body was collapsing under his own weight. He kept mentally trying to click on a healing potion, before he remembered that such things didn’t exist here in the outreach guild.

Porthus couldn’t get the last moments of the tenth floor out of his mind. Go, Reena had screamed. Go. Run. He still didn’t know if she’d made it. There was plenty of time left. Her foot was stuck. She could’ve easily gotten away.

You could have just as easily climbed back down there and pulled her out.

“So, you have a decent number of choices,” the lawyer said. “The first offer is low floor undead. Fifteen seasons. High likelihood of death. You’ll be out fast if you survive, but we don’t recommend you take that one. Nobody ever takes that unless it’s the only thing they’re offered. Comes with a subsistence stipend upon release, though no guaranteed housing, which isn’t as scary as it might sound. Former crawlers can almost always find a place to live.”

His goddamned arm wouldn’t stop shaking. “Look, can I just go out there? I need to know if she made it. Do you know? I can’t pull up my messages.”

The soother looked down upon the elf, no emotion at all in his large, saucer-like eyes. Their eyes met, finally, for the briefest moment. There was nothing there. No sympathy. Nothing.

“You are more than welcome to leave, crawler, but for the 11th floor, I must warn you, the outreach guilds don’t open back up until just before the collapse. Surviving the 11th is no small feat, but if you find yourself here at this table again with no chance of descending to the 12th floor, the offered deals might not be nearly as generous as they are right now. You made it this far. Might as well look at your options.” He gave a noncommittal shrug and then plucked something up with his long, alien fingers and brought it to his mouth.

Snacks. He brought snacks with him.

Porthus didn’t even yet know the theme of the 11th floor. He couldn’t access his menus at all in this room. He couldn’t stop shaking. He could get a description of the 11th floor if he asked, but learning the description of the floor lowered the value of the deals. It usually added a season or two to each offer.

Besides, Porthus didn’t want to know. He was done.

The tenth had been a nightmare. A world where every physical, non-natural object had sapience. Some could speak. All were psychotic. A world where if one object consumed another, it grew in power. By the end, there had been behemoths roaming the barren floor, all searching for one last morsel, all wanting to get bigger. Porthus’s party had been twenty strong when they finished the ninth. Half had taken deals at the beginning. They couldn’t even find an outreach guild at the end, but that was okay, they had thought. One went straight to a guild upon the start of the 11th. The deals would be better. They just needed to survive long enough for the portals to open.

As far as Porthus was aware, he was the only one of his group who’d survived. Kimu was dead. Had been plucked right up as they climbed the back of the monster, searching for the moving exit. Porthus had watched him get ripped right in half.

But Reena? Strong, steady Reena? She’d been a schoolteacher before all this. Was about to retire. She’d been building a house in the eastern canopy with her husband.

Go. Run. She’d begged him.

He had to know if she was okay. It was driving him mad.

“City attendant for the Hunting grounds. 30 seasons. This is a good one. Keep your head down, and you’ll be fine. Double the stipend.”

“The hunters killed everyone,” Porthus said, looking back up. “They killed every single NPC in that city.”

“Only the ones they found.”

“No. Not a chance,” Porthus said, remembering.

“Okay. Next offer is game guide. One hundred seasons, but that could be shortened depending on the progress of your crawlers. You’re given level 50, or half your current level, whichever is higher. This one is less desirable for some because you’re stuck here for so long, but it has the most potential for wealth upon exit. It’s relatively safe. I recommend you take this one. Unless you want to be a guard at the Rogue Club?”

Porthus was overcome with uncertainty. He thought of the book he’d found, and of the pride he felt when he added to it. Of the book’s promise that there would be someone else in a future season to write the third edition. And then the fourth. And then the fifth. He liked that idea, of helping people. He felt guilty for not writing more. Of not having done enough. But still, this deal was his best chance. It had a high chance of survival, despite the extra seasons. He would get out of here, build wealth, and one day, return. That was it. That was the plan.

Go. Run.

Still, he hesitated. If he took this deal, he wouldn’t know what had happened to her. Not for a very, very long time. But did it matter? The plan was for them all to take a deal. Even if he did know she’d survived, it was still possible he’d never see her again. That he’d never learn her outcome.

They separated you for this part. You had to do it alone. They didn’t warn you it would be like this.

Guilt washed over him.

I could have saved her. Why didn’t I pause?

He was scared. That was why. After all that work, all that planning, all the death, he’d panicked. He’d jumped straight into the exit when he’d had a chance, and he left his friend behind.

He swallowed.

“I’ll do it. I pick game guide.”

“Very well,” his attorney said. A new door appeared in the room. “You’ll have a few moments to pick some pre-collapse items to take with you, and you will be allowed to sift through your current inventory should you want to take anything in there as well. No weapons, of course. But any interesting trinkets or items of sentiment. A goodwill gesture as thanks for all your hard work. Go ahead. Go on now.”

But Porthus felt as if he couldn’t move. He felt so heavy. So godsdamned heavy. He lowered his head. I will fight. I will fight. I will fight.

Class: Rogue.

Race: High Elf.

Birth Race: Elf.

Top Level: 89

Dungeon Exit: Took deal upon the start of the 11th floor.

Worked as Game Guide. Survived his indentureship.

Author of the second edition of the Dungeon Anarchist’s Cookbook.

Current status: Missing. Wanted by Syndicate Security.

Chapter 1

Welcome, Crawler. Welcome to Faction Wars.

You are on the ninth floor.

Time to Level Collapse: 30 Days or 90 hours after a winner is declared, whichever is sooner.

Views: 231 septillion

Followers: 887 Quadrillion

Favorites: 420 Quadrillion

Leaderboard rank: 1

Bounty: 6,000,000 gold

Congrats, Crawler. You have received a Platinum Venison Box.

Remaining Crawlers: 32,429

Warning: Due to the previous floor’s ruleset regarding looted items from the memory simulation, multiple items have been removed from your inventory. See the inventory tab for a list of items lost.

You have received dungeon mail via Liaison action. The Gate of the Feral Gods is now available and will be waiting for you in a dungeon mailbox.

Warning: The Ceasefire expires in 60 hours. Upon expiration of the ceasefire, only members of defending team Retribution will be allowed to remain within the city of Larracos. This restriction will remain in effect until certain conditions are met. This restriction does not apply to the Shantytown ring.

10 teams remain.

Entering Larracos, City of Dreams.

Quest Update! The Bedlam Bride.

The quest is to get the creepy spider to the city. You’re in the city, you have the spider with you, sort of, but you haven’t won the quest yet? How is that so?

Did you know that in some cultures, fares for travel aren’t paid until the traveler safely arrives at their destination?

The spider is still sitting on the bus, so to speak. You just gotta open the doors and let her out, and you’ll win the simple prize. What’s the worst that could happen?

We appeared in a wet, stinking alleyway between two crumbling buildings. The blue dots of crawlers materialized all around us, appearing one by one as they zapped into existence in random places around the city.

Larracos. We had made it. The first thing I did was wave away the quest notification and search for the number of remaining crawlers. It’d gone down by over 1,300 people. Damnit. That was how many people had died in the time since we’d been pulled up into the sky and floor collapse. We’d been gone for just about four days. Most of those were probably people who hadn’t survived getting pulled into the sky.

But we were alive. Holy shit. It had worked.

Imani wasn’t with us, and I had a moment of panic, but she immediately jumped into my chat.

Imani: Carl, are you guys okay?

Carl: We are. We’re here.

Imani: Thank god. When we started to spin there at the last minute...

Carl: Give me a few minutes to figure out where we are, and we’ll find a saferoom.

Donut sat next to me, sputtering. She’d landed face-first into a pile of mud, and she was completely covered. It had a familiar stink to it. The ocean from the fifth floor. We were in an area that had recently been drained. Very recently drained. The X of a corpse lay nearby, deeper in the alleyway. A concierge shark.

My book of voodoo started spamming notifications each time a new crawler came relatively close. I muted the notifications for now.

I looked up between the two buildings to see a crystal-clear, blue sky. I couldn’t see anything else from our current position. I couldn’t even tell how deep into the city we were, but if this part had recently been flooded, then we were likely in one of the lowest levels of the funnel-shaped city.

The buildings were made of stone blocks, and their walls were chipped and pitted. Even before the flooding, I had the sense this was a poor area of town. A wooden door sat against one of the nondescript buildings, but this deep in the alley, I couldn’t tell what sort of building this was. The door itself appeared to be bulging, possibly a result of recent water damage. A dozen meters to our left stood the exit to the alleyway, leading to some sort of street. Just past that, a broken railing. A pair of dwarves rushed by in the distance, not pausing at the mouth of the alley.

There were blue dots everywhere on my map, but none in this alleyway.

I had a few chats waiting for me from before I’d appeared.

Florin: I got your note about Lucia. It looks like you made it, mate. I hope I didn’t miss anything too exciting at the end of the last floor.

I grunted as I moved to the next one. It was from Quasar, my attorney.

Quasar: Hey, buddy. I’m negotiating with the liaisons, which really means I’m negotiating with the AI, trying to get a face-to-face meeting. We’ll see if that happens. It’s been a class-9 shit cyclone out here these last four days you’ve been gone. Lots and lots and lots of legal movement in the inner system, and in your system, that parking lot above the planet has devolved into a mini warzone. Warships threatening to blow things up. Syndicate security intervening. Most of this stuff is good, from your point of view at least. But some of it is going to itch like an infected ass tattoo, especially on the legal front. I’ll leave the Faction Wars stuff alone for your adjutant to explain, but remember that contract with Sensation Entertainment, Incorporated? The one for the Vengeance of the Daughter storyline? Yeah. So, even though the main character is dead and gone, that guarantee of a third season we negotiated is about to haunt the fuck out of us. Sensation Entertainment just got purchased by a subsidiary of the Dream, and things are moving. They’re demanding their third season. It’s a fluid situation, but I will keep you updated. For now, just stay the fuck away from any elites you may happen to see. Nothing is official yet. Either way, Signet won’t be coming back, which means whatever happens, it’s gonna be something stupid. The problem is, the new showrunners won’t be caring about that anymore. They’re going to try to use your contractual obligation to ass fuck you. I’m trying to stop it on my end, but I don’t think I’ll be successful. Plus, the AI gives zero shits about what the courts say anyway. If it thinks it’s going to be funny, it’s going to let it happen. Just keep your head down and listen to what Judge Victory tells you. She’s a smart one.

“Fucking hell,” I muttered.

“Carl,” Donut said, still sputtering. She looked as if she’d been swimming in mud. “You said this city was supposed to be pretty! But did you see all those notifications? Did you see that quest update?” She gasped. “It’s telling me to pick a card to keep! I have to pick a new class, too! I only have thirty seconds to pick a card! We’re going with Lazarus, right?”

A sudden pang ripped across my midsection. It was like a stomach cramp, but much more burning. It came out of nowhere. My Emberus ring flashed and started to get warm. I tried not to let the pain show in my voice as I said,  “Yes. Pick the card and then have Mordecai help you with the new class.”

I moved to my health menu. My first instinct was this had something to do with the tattoo on my chest, but the moment I saw the notification, I realized I was incorrect.

I thought I’d have more time. Most of these diseases and debuffs and countdowns didn’t count time between floors.

I focused on the top issue.

Soul Poisoning.

The effects of this condition are being partially blocked by your Pauper’s ring of the Steadfast Emberus.

This condition is worsening.

This condition causes jolts of pain.

This condition has additional effects that will soon be revealed if you don’t do something about it.

You are suffering from a very minor case of stop-carrying-stored-souls-on-your-back. Seriously. Do you know why soul crystals explode when they get overloaded? Do you remember that whole thing on the previous floor when too many souls flowed through Sheol? And you’re just walking around, giving a piggyback ride to a bunch of corrupted souls stuck in something made out of fabric? Yeah, good luck with that. You better smush something soon, dumbass.

I hadn’t used up the soul energy from the Scavenger’s Daughter back patch. I’d been warned over and over not to let it accumulate for too long, but the chaos at the end of the previous floor had caused me to forget. I needed to disperse it now. I searched the map for a mob, but I didn’t see anything. Even if I did find a monster, I realized, I wouldn’t be able to hurt it. At least not in the city. For the next 60 hours, saferoom rules applied. I could still cast spells and blow things up, just like with a regular saferoom, but the moment I tried it against someone alive within city limits, I’d get frozen by the AI.

I reexamined my map. It was hundreds of blue dots, with more arriving by the moment, along with a multitude of white dots, signifying NPCs. The white dots all had an angled line through them, which was new. I assumed it had something to do with faction wars.

I didn’t see any enemy combatants, who’d be indicated with purple dots. Or elites, thank god.

Mordecai: Donut, give me your class options.

Donut: THESE CHOICES ARE GREAT! I CAN BE A CONSECRATED ENCHANTRESS. DOESN’T THAT SOUND DELICIOUS? IT COMES WITH A SASH! OMG, MORDECAI, THEY’RE ADDING ACCESSORIES TO MY CHOICES NOW!

Mordecai: You absolutely need to avoid any deity-themed classes this floor. There are going to be god-themed quests, and gods, flying all over the place, and you don’t want to get roped into any more than absolutely necessary.

Donut: WELL, I’M CERTAINLY NOT GOING TO PICK THE HALLOWEEN AFICIONADO. I MEAN, REALLY. MY PERSONALITY IS MUCH TOO SPARKLY AND OPTIMISTIC FOR ME TO BE A GOTH. IT DOES COME WITH BLACK LIPSTICK. AND A BOXCUTTER FOR SOME REASON.

She gasped as she spied a new one.

Donut: MORDECAI, MORDECAI LOOK AT THIS ONE! IT’S PERFECT!

She gasped again.

Donut: IT COMES WITH A HAT! OMG! AND SOMETHING ELSE! WHAT’S A GHILLIE SUIT?

They continued to chat as I worked the problem with the soul poisoning. I needed to use my Daughter’s Kiss skill, and I needed to do it now. The last time I’d unleashed my soul power, I’d partially collapsed a mountain of dirt. I needed to be careful.

I moved deeper into the alleyway, my bare feet sloshing in the mud. I examined the long, jet-black, and very dead shark curled up in the corner. It didn’t look as if it’d been dead for long.

Concierge Shark. Level 41. Killed by suffocation when the Semeru Warden finally decided to open the drain.

With both arms, I lifted the dense, slippery creature. I could barely hold onto it. Not because it was too heavy, but because it wanted to slosh out of my hands. I tossed it up into the air, forming my fist as I did so. I activated Daughter’s Kiss, and I punched the dead shark as hard as I could.

Bam!

I flew back into the mud, hitting the ground and sliding. Donut yowled as she, too, was blown back, sliding through the mud as the shark vaporized. Red, stinky mist filled the alley. It sounded as if a small hob-lobber had detonated.

New Achievement! Sushi Smoothie!

Yeah, I just made this achievement up on the fly. But, holy shit! You annihilated that thing! It was really gross, too! You could probably start a business making confetti out of corpses with that skill!

Next time use your foot.

Reward: You’ve receive a sushi making kit!

“Carl! Warn me if you’re going to do that!” Donut sputtered even more. She was mixed in with all the dirt and mud and zombie and demon gore from the end of the previous floor.

I groaned, sitting up. I’d taken a sliver of damage from that. I shook my head, trying to clear the cobwebs. I needed to make certain I didn’t allow it to build up and linger like that ever again.

I reached up and touched the Shi Maria tattoo on my chest. Nothing happened, other than the description popping up again.

Tattoo. The Eye of the Bedlam Bride.

She’d talked to me, in my mind, just before the last floor had ended. She was like one of those golems Signet had. I didn’t like that, especially now with this new development from Sensation Entertainment. That whole message gave me an ominous feeling.

This tattoo was yet another thing I needed to take care of right away.

Elle: Hey guys, what’d I miss? I just had to go through class selection again. There were only a few of us in the warehouse this time. I picked wind. I went from Tundra Princess to Hailstorm Queen. Remember that Graupel spell? Once the timer on it resets, it’s going to pack even more of a punch than last time.

Donut: YOU’RE A QUEEN? THAT’S GREAT!

Elle: Yeah. This is probably as far as it’s gonna get. I can add the final element if I ever make it to the 12th floor, but I’m betting this whole shitshow self-destructs before we even get close.

A new wall of text assaulted me.

Welcome, Warlord. You have successfully onboarded into Faction Wars.

Your territory is spot number three. It is marked on your map.

You have multiple action item rule changes to review.

You are currently in neutral territory.

You have one important message in the Warlord Chat.

Warning: Your army is at suboptimal force levels.

Current army size: 58 soldiers.

You have recruits who have not yet been approved. They are waiting at headquarters to be sworn in by an officer.

Warning: You have no officers in your army! See the Warlord tab to assign officers.

Warning: Protection enhancements will be disabled for all sponsors in 60 hours.

Extra Warning: That last warning doesn’t apply to you. I just gave it to be a dick. You can still die for the next 60 hours. You’re still a crawler, after all. Seriously, don’t be a little bitch and die before all this even kicks off. I’m having too much fun here.

Shit, I thought. This was already getting complicated. We needed to act quickly. The moment the ceasefire ended, and we were kicked out of Larracos, any crawler not already “recruited” was vulnerable to conscription. We had to quickly spread the word that if people didn’t voluntarily join the Princess Posse army, they could be forced to fight for one of the other teams.

Warning: The Bone Clan has announced a formal truce with The Operatic Collective.

The Blood Sultanate has joined the truce.

The Prism Kingdom has joined the truce.

The Dream has joined the truce.

The Lemig Sortion has joined the truce.

The Madness has joined the truce.

The Reavers have joined the truce.

The eight teams within this truce have been named “The Bloc.”

The Bloc has declared war against Team Retribution.

The Bloc has declared war against the Princess Posse. That’s you!

You are in active war with the Bloc. Ceasefire still remains in effect for 60 hours.

You have a pending truce offer from Team Retribution.

“Carl, who is Team Retribution? Is that the NPC team?” Donut was now sitting there in the mud, swiping away with her paw, diving deep into the warlord menus. She gasped and then frowned. “It says we have to physically touch someone to make them an officer! That’s not fair! I was going to make Katia a general!”

“Yes,” I said. “I’m pretty sure Team Retribution are the NPCs. It says they’re the ‘defending’ team. They don’t have a spot on the map, so I think the city is their spot. But before we accept the truce...”

Warlord Donut has accepted the truce offer from Team Retribution.

You are in an allied city. If you remain allied with Team Retribution, you will no longer be removed from Larracos at the end of the Ceasefire.

See the Truce tab for more details.

On the map, all the white dots with the angled slashes through them flashed and now had a green, glowing outline.

“Goddamnit, Donut. We need to talk before we do stuff like that! You don’t even know what you’re doing yet!”

“Relax, Carl. I’ve been reading the help section of the warlord tab.”

“Wait, really?” I asked. “When did you get the time?”

“I don’t use the restroom nearly as much as you do, Carl. Honestly, I think you need to see a doctor. I think you might have IBS. Now let me do this.”

Warlord Donut of the Princess Posse has named the truce “The Good Guys.”

Warlord Ferdinand of Team Retribution has renamed the truce “Ferdinand and his Bird.”

“Hey!” Donut said. “Carl, it won’t let me change it back!”

“Don’t worry,” I muttered as I also delved through my menus. “I think I know Juice Box well enough to know she’s probably going to murder Gravy Boat at any minute.”

“He does appear to have a bit of an annoying personality,” Donut said. She made a change, and my own dot on the map suddenly had a pink border. Donut’s blue dot also had a pink outline. None of the  other, nearby dots had the circle around them.

“Don’t pick pink,” I said. “It’ll be hard to see if they’re all mixed in together.”

“It was the only choice,” Donut said. She started to say something else but paused as the announcement started.

Cascadia’s voice boomed over an unseen loudspeaker. I cocked my head to the side. She seemed... off. She was as chipper as I ever heard her, which wasn’t unusual. But she seemed maybe a little too chipper. I think she’s drunk. Or stoned out of her mind.

Hello, Crawlers!

Welcome, welcome to the ninth floor!

Only current crawlers can hear this message. There’s a separate announcement going out to all the other individual teams and those ungrateful NPC upstarts, plus we’ll have a wide message go out to all the participants once the festivities begin!

First off, I must say wow. A whole lot of you have made it this far, and I can’t tell you enough how excited people are to see how all this is going to play out.

This is Faction Wars. I’m sure by now, you’ve heard how this works. Because of some recent developments, a few things have changed, so please pay attention. It’s still pretty straightforward and simple, but I am required to tell you what’s going on, no matter what I think. But hey, someone told me you guys have an expression that’s quite appropriate in this situation. “The show must go on.”

There was an unusually long pause, yet the speaker hadn’t turned off. I heard the familiar bubbling noise I could sometimes hear in Zev’s messages. It was like Cascadia was just sitting there, finger on the button, breathing heavily into the microphone. I had a sudden memory of Cascadia the last time I’d seen her, during the preproduction meeting. She’d been on the verge of a breakdown. And a lot had happened since then.

Anyway, there are ten teams total. Nine attacking teams and one defending team, the NPCs, who have decided to call themselves Team Retribution. They are headquartered in Larracos. Everyone else is spread out like a pie with Larracos in the center.

The basic goal of Faction Wars is simple. Be the last army standing. Normally, you crawlers don’t really need to know much about this stuff. This floor is no different than the Hunting Grounds or the Over City. Once the ceasefire ends, you are teleported out of the city if you haven’t left already. You just need to survive. You can join in on the action if you like. Each of the factions will have recruiters throughout town, and you can freely enlist in any army you would like during the ceasefire, assuming they’ll have you. Volunteers are oftentimes treated with respect and given plenty of equipment and loot and are considered valuable members of the team. Sometimes, well-regarded volunteers will find themselves remembered and rewarded with employment after their time in the dungeon is complete, should they survive. You might want to keep that in mind.

If you don’t want to join in on the fun, that’s okay, too. You’re more than welcome to attempt to flee out into the woods beyond the plains of Larracos. I should warn you. Each team is quite adept at finding and hunting down wayward crawlers, and they have the ability to compel you to join their army as conscripts.

Either way, the battles will commence in sixty hours. At this point, only members of Team Retribution, unaffiliated NPCs, and allies of Team Retribution will be allowed to stay within the city. All the other teams will be kicked out. The battles will begin. This next part is a change, so pay attention. The city will remain inaccessible to the nine attacking teams until either three attacking teams remain, or one single alliance remains.

Only individual teams, not alliances, will be allowed to take the throne room. Once a team has taken the throne room and held it for six hours straight, the defending team is eliminated, and the victor is converted to the defending team. The war is won when only one team remains.

A defending team who controls the throne room will have access to the city defense system.

“What the hell does that mean?” I asked. That was also something new.

Teams may be eliminated if all officers are killed, or if the throne room is taken and held for a period of six hours. Soldiers of an eliminated team are traditionally given the option to join the new team or be slaughtered.

There are 293 stairwell chambers seeded throughout the city of Larracos, and their locations are already marked on your maps. The stairwells, however, will not open until Faction Wars is either won, or there are 30 hours left to floor collapse, whichever happens first.

That’s it for now. More rules will be clarified later, should it be necessary. I would say enjoy Larracos while you can, but you guys already trashed the place before you even got here. Also, if you find yourselves bored, the playing field’s size was greatly expanded recently, and new mobs have been seeded in the outer reaches of the forests. So there’s plenty of training to be had.

Now get out there and kill, kill, kill.

“She didn’t even mention that people could join the Princess Posse!” Donut said.

“Yeah, we really need to assign some recruiters. We have a lot to do.”

You have a trade request from Team Retribution.

I sighed. This was a lot. I altered the way warlord notifications appeared, and I moved to the Warlord Chat menu. We needed to get to work right away, but we had to get our bearings first.

I wanted to see what the one message in our chat was. This was a special chat where all officers could talk. Officers and our adjutant.

Baroness Victory: Warlords, I suggest one of you proceed immediately to the flag room to oversee the final stronghold preparations and deal with the influx of new recruits while the other remains in Larracos and attempts to enlist your fellow crawlers. Time is short.

Baroness Victory was our adjutant. She was an orc, and aunt to Prince Maestro and Crown Prince Stalwart. Also, the sister of their late mother. She worked as some sort of judge outside the dungeon. The flag room was within our stronghold, adjacent to the throne room, which was outside of the city.

Donut desperately tried to wipe the mud off her face. “Carl, we need to go to the saferoom. I have a celestial sponsor box to open, plus I just received a Former Child Actor accessory kit in the saferoom mailbox, and I need to open it right away.” She looked me up and down with distaste. “And you need to figure out your hair situation. I will not have you bald, Carl. We’ll have to do something about your missing eyebrows, too. You look both alert and angry at the same time, and it just won’t do. You’re going to upset Mongo.”

“Wait, what did you pick for a class? I missed it.” I examined her now.

“Whoa, what the fuck, Donut?”

She did a little hop of excitement. “Great, isn’t it? It’s a long-range sniper and assassin class. It doesn’t come with many new spells, but the range on all my existing spells is quadrupled, and my dexterity is much higher. The odds of one of my spells inflicting an instakill is higher, too! Oh, oh, I can go invisible at will, and to top it off, I kept most of my spells from the last floor! But best of all, it comes with a hat! And a ghoulie suit! I don’t know what that means, but I see a saferoom around the corner, and I must insist we get there straight away so I can collect my accessories. But isn’t the name of the class absolute perfection? It’s downright terrifying, and I love it. Deathbed Hellcat. I just love this for me right now.”

“That’s pretty badass, all right,” I said. “And it’s ghillie suit. Not ghoulie.”

She gasped. “So you know what that is? Mordecai had no idea. It sounds absolutely menacing and divine.”

I laughed. “I do know what that is. We’ll keep it as a surprise.”

~~

....And we're off. A couple notes. I actually haven't decided yet which card Donut is going to keep. Lazarus is a placeholder for now, and it may end up being that card. Unfortunately, the decision is actually based on something out of my control, which is something really weird to say but will make significantly more sense once the audiobook is complete. Speaking of audio... tentative date. September 1st. Jeff is recording now.

The next chapter has been a bear to write because it's a lot of loot, plus Quan's cloak, plus a bunch of other stuff, and I want to make certain it's all correct. We have six books worth of build-up all crashing together at once, but it's going to be glorious. Thank you everyone for your support.