The Gate Of The Feral Gods, Chapters 12-14

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Thank you very much to Michael for commissioning this episode!
This section is the one where we find out just what's going on with Chris, and it's so much worse than what I had expected. At least a personality change would have been due to a choice that he made, but instead he's been completely hijacked and it's fucking awful. And he's still alive, so we get to deal with this problem later! Fun!
Thanks so much to you all for listening, and I will see you soon with a new episode!
Wanna talk spoilers? Join the Discord! https://discord.gg/rEF2KfZxfV

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
This is an Unspoiled Network podcast. This is spoil Me
covering Dungeon Crawler Carl Book four Gates of the Pharaoh Gods,
chapters twelve through fourteen. In these chapters, so much happens,

(00:23):
but Chris turns up and then he turns down, or
rather gets thrown down. I try to do a little
pun there. Didn't really work out, but you get what
I'm saying. Welcome to spoil Me. Welcome to the show everyone.

(00:56):
I am Natasha. Thank you very much to Michael for
commissioning this episode. Michael is in the chats with me
today along with Sarah, fam and Rob and mss T.
Delighted to see you all. I am going to start
from the beginning. I am going to start from the beginning.

(01:17):
I'm really going to start from the beginning. I'm gonna
do it. Do you hear me? It's very hard for me. Okay, okay.
Chapter twelve, This is the message I had Henrich's show
to Commandant Cain. When is incapacitated and we are returning

(01:38):
him to you. He cast a resurrection spell on our
behalf and became gravely ill. A traveling healer has offered
to help him, but this healer now reports only a
potion you might have will revive your uncle. In a
show of good faith, this healer their party and I
will travel outside of the city walls in one hour
and will bring win to you there. This healer will
tell you how to save your uncle's life. I will

(01:58):
accompany them and offer myself as tribute. I hope and
pray we can negotiate a piece that will save our
town from your wrath. And of course it's not real, Henrich,
like he is not with them, And also Katcha is
she has to be simultaneously the body of wind and

(02:24):
the seat of the chariot. I just she's also Henrick.
Can we just talk about the hilarity of how Carl
was just like, I just don't really see the use
of her ability And this bitch is out here playing

(02:45):
multiple characters at one time. That is insane. Like I
thought Carl was Banana's already for not seeing it, and
I didn't even come cool close to like understanding fully
what her capacity was going to be. And now that

(03:06):
I'm seeing her do it, I'm just blown away, Like
that is fucking banana pants. I can't begin to express
my admiration. I genuinely can't. That is so impressive. It
must take such concentration and so much practice. And like you, guys, honestly,

(03:32):
I she is so clutch in this, like none of
this plan could have worked. Honestly. The fact that Carl
came up with this plane at all indicates that he
has an inkling that she can do this in the
first place, which, like I, wouldn't have been ready to presume.
So it is astonishing that she is between this and

(03:57):
her like creating that immediate counterweight to keep the chariot
from tipping. Last episode. She's just really being so helpful
and critical and in so many different ways. It makes
me feel really happy. It really look guys. Oh, Michael

(04:18):
in the chat says, part of the reason why I
appreciate the series is how Karl isn't the only competent person,
like in a lot of lit RPG series, agree, Rob says,
and doesn't immediately become the boyfriend of the other competent
person who then gets nerved as a result, which true,
and Michael says, in a lot of lit RPG, the
main character is the only smart person walking through a

(04:39):
world of dumbasses who only exists to try to have
sex with him or make him look smart. One hundred percent.
I will say that, and this is it's really this
is going to be really depressing for a second, guys,
and I apologize for that, but there's really no way
around it. I have I've come to understand in myself

(05:06):
one of the worst I'm getting emotional. I didn't expect
to get emotional for this. One of the most upsetting
things to me about learning more are the world we
live in, how it functions, and the people in charge

(05:26):
of the major factors in our lives. One of the
worst parts is finding out how utterly incompetent most of
them are. It's really hard. It's not just that they
are unintelligent people, it is that they truly don't fucking care.

(05:47):
That's the part that really hurts. And there was a
whole thing today that I will not get too into,
but suffice to say, a friend of mine's mom had
the cops called on her because she was upset at
a doctor's office that had lost her appointment recommended to

(06:08):
her a doctor that she then called who wasn't taking
new patients. And it was a whole thing where she
was like, she's a senior and she got a special
ride there through this program, so she was it was
a whole production for her to even get there and
for them to not have her appointment, but also they
give her the run around about who to talk to,
and when she calls them, they don't know why they

(06:30):
told her to call them, because they can't do that.
It was something that I think a lot of us
have run into in terms of just everyday shit that
shouldn't be this hard, especially with medical stuff, and every
step along the way is a person who doesn't give
a fuck. It's like your actual health, livelihood, life, life

(06:52):
can be on the line and it's in the hands
of people who can't fucking be bothered. And it makes
me so deeply sad, and I think that's part of
what I am really enjoying and like digging my teeth
into is in this. In other books I'm covering Kosig

(07:17):
and Sanga. I just finished the Hail Mary project for
the book club this weekend. It's people who care and
pay attention and know what they're doing. And I think
that it's only now that I am at my big
age seeing what I'm seeing that I really grasp that's
the fantasy it's not monsters, it's not magic. It's that

(07:45):
people know what they're doing and give a fuck. That's
the fantasy, and I hate that. I hate that so
fucking much. I really can't express how sad that makes
me in my heart, And honestly, I don't even know

(08:06):
what the solution is because like a lot of the
people that don't give a fuck, they are burnt out
and tired. Also, they live lives that are bouncing up
against the exact same structures and agencies that don't care.
They're victims too, you know. So it's so hard because
like the people on top are the ones that could do,

(08:29):
and they not only don't care, but are also usually
really fucking dumb and got there for reasons not even
remotely tied to merit or capability. So yeah, y'all, anyway,
I'm sorry. This is so it makes me so sad,

(08:51):
Michael and all caps. I can't wait for the Hail
Mary coverage. You've ruined my week since that's all I'll
be thinking about now. It was so great, guys, Michael,
if you aren't in the discord, there's a books channel
and I did a sub thread for Hail Mary and
it's not like super deep or anything, because obviously I'm
waiting for the podcast, but it's just my impressions of
big moments as I was reading. I am really glad

(09:15):
that I didn't see the trailer first for the movie
that's coming up, because I everything came as a big surprise.
I was. I was not ready for any of it.
It's tough because those people a face some much shit
that they're desensitized. Exactly, Michael, Exactly, Yeah. I mean it's
sort of the same thing as like Madison, was that

(09:37):
her name and on the last floor, you know where
it's she is inflicting what she suffers onto the people
around her, and it's like, I don't want to excuse
that because part of this is just that you being
a bad, selfish person, but also you're about to get
smushed under the same boot as all of us, and

(09:59):
it's just you're too dense to see it. So anyway,
all that to say, reading about everybody being so good
at what they're doing, so solid and focused, even the
people who had been useless when things started pulling together,

(10:20):
I mean, it just it's not fair because they're literally
in life or death situations all the time. In this scenario.
So the context of this demands more than our usual
daily context does. But nevertheless, so they're they're going up

(10:49):
into the air on this balloon, and Leon is saying
it is good timing. We will have a spectacular view
of the death of the final settlement of Answer, which
I am assuming he's talking about the underground place that's

(11:10):
being flooded with water? Is that right? And Carl asks
the final settlement isn't that the guy buried in the tomb?
And the sniper says, Bactrians and Dromedarians were the slaves
who built the tomb. Answer came and subjugated them along
with the Glabers and forced them to their knees. The camels,

(11:33):
alleged great fighters were the first to fall. They were
complicit in the horror Answer and his people brought to
this world. They are filth and deserved to be destroyed.
That is so grim. These were the first people to
be enslaved. And he's like, so they're just as bad
as him. I mean, what are you talking about? That

(11:56):
will leave us with only one last task before we
can leave these lands? Have peace? What's that? The mad Mage,
he's the most dangerous of them all. He doesn't just
wish to steal the gate, he wishes to understand it,
to replicate it. He has grown mad in his pursuit
and we fear the damage he might do if he
has not stopped. And he's like, so does he have

(12:19):
the artifact? And they say only a third of it,
which later Carl has very intelligently come to the conclusion
that it is related to these stop watches, which makes
all the sense. But I don't think I would ever
have put together. I don't know. Maybe I would, but like,
I don't know. So this is when the sorry, I'm

(12:49):
like looking at the chat here, Rob says, some of
it feels like a societal reassignment. But it's also worth
barring mentioned that COVID infections have a significant imp on
brain function, including memory, and there's a lot of research
on the relation between memory and empathy, and none of
that helps. But it's just even more stupid complicated right
now than it was before. And not all of it
is just Gremlin's gonna gremlin fair rauh, But most of

(13:13):
what I'm talking about is also before COVID. The gauntlets
that I had to run through to get basic medical
care from people who constantly fucked up because they were
not paying attention or not believing me for some reason
when I said a thing, it was like, this predates

(13:35):
much of that. Sarahim says, I think they're talking about
the town since since a remnant of that guy's empire. Okay,
So then I'm confused because I thought the whole thing
was like, we're going to send back the guy Win
with you in promise, and we're sending Henrik with you

(14:01):
so that so that you won't bomb us. So they're
on the balloon and these guys are basically just straight
up telling Carl and Dona and everybody that like, oh yeah,
this is great. We're going to bomb them anyway for sure,
So you guys are going to get to have a
good view of it, and they just think that Carl

(14:24):
and Donat are going to watch it happen and not
do anything, even though the agreement that I thought was
all of this is in exchange for not being bombed.
Is that right? I think that I'm missing because like
there was a comment earlier that Leon made as well
in the previous chapters where I was like, it feels
like he's just saying that he's still going to kill them,

(14:49):
and that's like they're not They haven't even left yet,
so it just seems like they're really open about that
they're gonna double cross them and seem to not care
at all. Seraphim says, Yeah, they figure Carl and co
won't care because they're just travelers, okay, and just wanted
to get the fuck out before they blew up the town.

(15:11):
Oh okay, So that explains why he was saying it
in front of them late earlier too, Okay, Okay, So anyway,
long story Shore, I don't want to spend too much
time on this. They poke a hole, so to speak,
in the bottom of the basket, and it's a it's

(15:33):
obviously the whole spell that Donut has and drops all
of them through the bottom of the hole, saving our
own people, and one of them grabs onto the edge
and she uses her phantom paw to just shove him
in the head and push him out, which is a
wonderful moment. I'm so excited to see her use that

(15:57):
spell because it's the first time I've belief that we've
seen her use it ever. And there's a whole thing
later we'll talk about it, but yeah, I'm excited and
they are, you know, hitting back. Eventually, the other balloons
are starting to realize this one has been hijacked, YadA YadA,

(16:22):
and the balloon is still intact, but they're like traveling
toward the ground. And he has this, uh, these few
bottles of spells from Mordecai that are called Dolores doesn't splap.
And hilariously, I had just said in the last episode,

(16:46):
I wonder if it makes you bounce like a friggin'
rubber ball, and it does, actually it makes you bounce.
It seems to hurt, but it doesn't actually cause damage.
And this woman who invented this actually did it while falling.
It was like a fall that was you know, the

(17:08):
kind of thing that doesn't actually exist in nature. How
high up and how much time she had as she fell,
And it says something about the event had become infamous
and resulted in multiple rule changes regarding the creation and
brewing of potions, which is always funny. The idea that like, oh,
you survived the thing that we didn't want you to survive,

(17:32):
so we're going to make sure next time nobody can
do this, which is so mean spirited, honestly, so anyway,
this whole thing is I mean, Carl has the nerve
to complain about this potion later to Mordecai, and I
was very glad that Mordechai kind of snapped at him

(17:53):
because Carl, I don't know, I'm sure it sucks, but like,
this is remarkable that you were able to be pretty
much totally okay almost immediately, you know, and let's see. Uh,
only then did I look to the smoke filled sky

(18:14):
before I could see a notification appeared. The notification sounded
oddly disappointed. I wasn't certain why quest complete squeeze out
the juice box. So if we're being technical here, you
won the quest. You saved Humptown from the bombardment. Congratulations.

(18:37):
If I was allowed to upgrade your prize, I would maybe,
I don't know. Actually, you know what, No, I wouldn't
fuck you reward. You've received a Platinum Quest box. And
we find out in a little bit the AI is

(19:00):
petulant because Carl was supposed to have an encounter with
these little gerbils in basically poke boals that get dropped,
and he doesn't encounter them, so he never stomps on them,

(19:20):
and so the AI doesn't get to whack off the
way that it had been looking forward to doing. And
this is really something and it's so funny. I mean,
every time something just like comes out of my mouth,
it's like in a lot of things that I cover,

(19:42):
it's like I'm kind of tapped into where the author
was when they were writing it a little bit, but
I'm not quite seeing it. And just last episode I
was like, maybe you should just lay back and run
your feet up and down the wall and run your
fingers through your hair, like maybe you should. Is it
really that bad? And then this moment happens and it's

(20:06):
asking is it really that bad? But it's like a
very different context because it's one thing if you do nothing,
bad happens, and if you do something you get a bonus,
and it's quite another thing I am being blackmailed into
doing it or else bad things happen to not only

(20:26):
me but also my friends extremely different energy. So now
we are in a very ugly place of Carl being
manipulated by the AI in a much more overt way
than before, and I hate this for him, I really do.

(20:49):
Like it's it's just so unlimited the damage that the
AI could do if it felt like it, you know,
And I know technically it's not unlimited that they're probably
like parameters, but you know what I'm saying, Like within
those parameters, there's a lot that can fuck a guy over.

(21:13):
So this whole thing just feels so it just feels
so incredibly on a knife's edge in a way that
has me kind of maybe you want to go even
further than you do, Carl, to make up for it,
because it almost feels like now you have to buy

(21:34):
more goodwill, you know. Michael says Carl doesn't seem the type.
But if he ever thought in his head a woman
should just feel flattered by the attention of an unwanted man,
he's learning why it's a fraught situation for the woman.
Sarah from says in the AI seems very good at
finding loopholes exactly, and Michael says, we've heard of the

(21:55):
game runners threatening to accelerate Crawler's experiences if they don't comply.
Now we know what that looks like. Look, we kind
of already knew what that looked like because of the
fucking rage elemental when they if they peed in the
halls like that was it was I already like could
see what that meant. But this is so much more personal.

(22:18):
This isn't like a rule violation. This is you aren't
giving the AI spank material, you know, and yeah, fraud situation.
It's not like this is what we talk about when
we say power imbalance in like a workplace or something.

(22:39):
Anybody can try and claim that a woman is an
adult capable of consent, But if she is in a
position where she can lose her job and her livelihood
and her health insurance that covers herself potentially, you know, family,
and it's all like up in the air based on

(23:04):
the whims of the man in charge, that consent isn't
the same anymore, you know. It's part of what makes
it look like looking back at the way reacted to
things when we were a lot less educated as a
society about all of this. Like when you think about
the criticisms and mockery lobbed at Monica Lewinsky and he

(23:30):
was the fucking president of the United States, you know
what I'm saying, Like, I'm not trying to say I
know the dynamic of what things were really like between them,
and that she felt necessarily pressured, I don't know, but
it certainly isn't her that we should be fucking mocking,
And yet she was the butt of the joke every

(23:53):
step of the way. And it wasn't just about the sex.
It was also about the fact that she was fat.
And I put that in quotes because she wasn't, but
because the nineties were unhinged, we said she was. So. Anyway,
it's this whole thing is uncomfortable, and I'm really curious
where it's going to go. But once before we even

(24:16):
get to that, I'm kind of mixing things up here. First,
we've got to talk about the the chap between Carl
and Katcha, about the what do you call it? Watches?
Let's see, I want to get up there and take
it the old fashioned way. Why I pulled the fake

(24:37):
pocket watch from my inventory and tossed it to her.
Henrik has one, Commandant Caine has one, and I'm pretty
sure there's a third, and the mad Dune mage guy
has it. If that's the case, I think all three
of the watches come together somehow to make that artifact.
You don't even know what it does. I know it's
a celestial equivalent item and it shouldn't be available this early.

(24:58):
They don't put this stuff in here to be ignored.
I want it, and I like that it's just genuinely
it's the principle of the thing. It's something with power.
It's been mentioned enough like it just it's a foregone
conclusion for him, whereas for her, she's like, can we
just do our assignment though, and get that done and live?

(25:20):
Which I understand her perspective very much, I really do,
But I also can't help but sympathize with Carls like
it's a combination of almost a it's part of his
whole shtick about not following the rules. It's also just curiosity.

(25:42):
And you know, there's been a sense for a lot
of this that things aren't what they seem to be,
that the game isn't functioning the way it normally does.
And I think he's more preoccupied with that than other
people seem to be, or maybe has more information about that. Anyway.
This is when Zev chimes in. She calls donut Crawler donut,

(26:10):
which I really enjoy these sorts of moments in writing
where the thing that's changed isn't an overtly sinister thing,
but it is different enough to signal to you, as
the reader Oh no, something's changed, something's really different, and

(26:31):
just the way a person addresses another person, and especially
in a context like this where Zev is not consciously
making a different choice, because we know that there's been
some sort of altercation between her and Dona, and she's
trying to make a point because she's pissed off, you know,
like somebody going from calling you by your first name

(26:52):
to calling you miss blank. You know, it's obviously been
enforced upon her from the outside. It's just really sad
because not only is Dona keenly aware of this change,
but as Carl points out later, she isn't able to

(27:12):
talk about it out loud because of the nature of
what happened to Zev. And so you know, even their
chat is visible to people who pay So I don't
think it's actually safe there either. It's possible talking to

(27:33):
Mordecai about it. That is, I think protected chat still,
but I don't know anyway, Carl, the audience is noting
you're being short with the other crawlers. By short, I
mean extra angry. You might wish to tone that down
a bit. Yeah, yeah, Look, I there is a reason

(28:01):
why there are times when I look back at the
way I handled things, and I'm just like, wow, I
was a real bitch. But at the time I was
just so fucking frustrated with people who didn't like they
weren't on their shit, So I sympathize. Katcha. Your numbers
are rising steadily. Good job, Donut. People want more mango action.

(28:23):
You're keeping him cooped up too much. Plus you haven't
used your new spells yet except once. When you get
new loot, people expect you to use it. And yeah.
The whole convo ends with her telling Dona it's not
necessary to contact her and get out there and kill

(28:44):
kill kill, which is really it's really, it's really sad. Anyway, Holly,
new achievement, cannon Ball. You fell from a great height
and survived. You know who else who fell from a
you know what? Never mind, fuck you received a silver
Skydiver's box. Not that you deserve it, you little punk.

(29:07):
And then live ammal Ball, which is the thing that
the Gerbil is in. Later on, and we begin to understand. Yeah,
and I stepped down on the screw the squirming Gerbil.
This is not so funny anymore, Katchia said, looking over
the mass of Gerbil corpses. The bewildered camels moved back

(29:31):
to the walls and the anti aircraft guns. Though it
appeared all of the remaining airplanes had made emergency landings.
All that was left was a handful of balloons, and
most of those were making their way up and over
the bowl, leaving the area. It was never funny, I replied.
It was a little funny, she said, But the AI

(29:51):
is not even trying to be fair anymore. That wasn't
just a temper tantrum. That was the equivalent of a
psycho ex boyfriend going nuts and trying to murder you
and your entire family because of something you did. I
didn't even know you did. And there was a moment
earlier where he's just yelling up at the AI, Hey, sorry,
I don't know what I did, but I didn't mean

(30:11):
to and done. UT's like, oh my god, do you
remember that time when Bee made you sleep on my
couch and you didn't know why she was mad? And
I love that he does recall this, And all he
really remembers is that he finished fallout because he was
on the couch all the time, which I thought was very,
very on brand. And it turns out B wasn't actually

(30:33):
mad at him. She just did this because apparently she
read somewhere that this can make men feel so insecure
that they propose, which I just really want to know
why you would want a proposal when a guy only
did it because he thinks you're mad at him. Like,
it's just all of that is so toxic, everything everything

(30:56):
surrounding it is so fucked up. B was a monster,
so he gets a good boy a whole reward. Makeup
sex is the best sex box. His achievement is you're

(31:16):
the reason why daddy drinks and what he gets. I'm
trying to find the spot where he opens it because
it's a little bit later. Let's see. All three of
us received the same Skydiver's box, and they received three
potions of half splat and Mordecai is like, those really

(31:39):
aren't that great. You'll be at five percent health when
you hit the ground. And then makeup sex is the
best sex and it's a sheet of paper and a
quill pen. Odd Mordecai said. They aren't rare, but they're pricey.
They're used by scholar and arcanist class who focus on

(32:00):
scroll production. You'll never have the proper skills to use
this beyond a rudimentary level. If you can figure out
how to write some basic scrolls, maybe you can make
some money. I can use it, but I'm much better
at potions. Besides, I can buy a writing tablet and
be much more efficient. Your best bet is to just
sell the set. And then the last is the Platinum
Quest Box. Five thousand gold coins, twenty healing scrolls, and

(32:24):
a little black rock platinum sharpening stone. Warning. This item
has a short shelf life. Apply this to any spiked
offensive weapon to receive the following buffs plus two times
current level percent damage attack to or damage to all attacks,
plus one to all current stat buffs. Does not add

(32:46):
new buffs if they do not exist. It also makes
the weapon look extra oily and mean looking. In other words,
the weapons appearance may change, but only a little. So
he does this, and then lastly, the Platinum Box Kotcha
Opens is a coffee shop author kit. Alcoholism and crippling

(33:08):
self doubt not included. And I am assuming that everything
written here is coming from Matt Denhaman's self doubt and
like low key self loathing, it just feels very much
like he is calling himself out and it's very funny
to me. Let's see. Uh oh no, this is this

(33:35):
is his I'm sorry I said that this was but
he is looking at this wall. Kotcha opens her platinum box,
so my bad, this is not hers. This is what
he is looking at the paper in inkwell while she
is opening her thing. This is a magical sheet of
paper you'll find. Now you have a second tab on
your scratch pad in your interface, you can write something

(33:57):
on this paper and it will appear in the scratch pad,
and vice versa. If the proper spell and glyphs are
accurately copied on to this paper, you can present the
sheet at a market kiosk and a scroll will appear
for sale, or if you have a printing press, you
can make your own scrolls or even your own tone
if you think you have the chops. And Carl has
a moment of just like, wait, second tab, but I

(34:18):
already have a second is this replacing that? And then
he goes and looks and he has three tabs and
he's like, oh thank god. So Mordecai like is just
essentially I mean, you can do this, but it's going
to take a lot of time. However, there was a
dude who did this and when he wrote two hundred

(34:39):
scripts of the same spell, he actually learned the spell,
so it did wind up working out for him, and
noted that could be real, real helpful. And Carl tests
it out and draws a little cat drawing, and Doughnut

(35:00):
looked at the cat art with distaste. Am I a
joke to you? Carl? I laughed as I deleted the
image in the scratch pad and it faded away from
the paper. And it turns out the ink isn't bottomless,
and that bumps me out. It didn't even occur to
me that was going to be an issue. So yeah,
maybe writing two hundred scrolls isn't going to be possible.

(35:23):
It's just that amount of ink. But I don't know.
And I really like this moment because the wave that
Doughnut reacts to him drawing her portrait really makes you
think that she's having a certain reaction. With this next segment,
she opens her box with that like product in it

(35:43):
that she's supposed to interact with, and it's a donut
animatronic doll that moves around and says catch phrases, and
you know, because she reacted how she did to Carl, Like,
if it hadn't been for that moment with her and Carl,
I would have been like, oh my god, she's gonna
love this. But having him draw this silly drawing and

(36:09):
it be very much, you know, a cartoon, and her
reacting this way had me thinking that because this doll
is extremely shitty, which is the impression I get, that
she's going to be upset, but instead she says, this
is the greatest day of my life since I won
Grand Champion Best in Show, and it's very funny. Honestly,

(36:36):
I really liked this bit. Her reaction was a surprise,
even though it kind of shouldn't have been a surprise
because of how the whole thing was set up And
then Mango attacks the doll and when he breaks it,
it literally catches on fire, which, considering that this is

(36:57):
being marketed as a toy for children, is awesome, and
the cleaner bot has to use some extinguisher foam to
put the fire out. So, considering that this was a
test to see about showcasing their product on Dungeon Crawler World,

(37:18):
I feel like that went really, really poorly. Her reaction
to it was good, but as soon as it gets destroyed.
She's later saying, I can't have somebody who makes such
a shoddy product like wrapping my merch for me. I
feel that this is bad and I'm wondering if there
are going to be any problems because of it. So

(37:44):
let's see. This is when Chris comes upon Carl in
the street. This was so well done, you guys, because
the way that he just drips and drabs little hints,
it's obvious from the start something's wrong with Chris. We've

(38:06):
known from the bits of news and rumor we've been
getting something's wrong, but it's different to see him in person,
behaving how he is and as this is happening, well,
while he's talking to Carl, Juice Box is trying to

(38:33):
get Carl out of the street, away from Chris, and
she gets frustrated and is like, did I do I
have to just blurt it out? But I was sort
of like, girl, I get that you were trying to help,
but Carl wanted to find out what was happening here,
even if it was going to be dangerous for him.
Like I understood her frustration, but also it was inevitable

(38:58):
that he was going to ignore you. And also Katcha
receives a silver emergency Benefactor box which is from Princess Formidable,
and Mordecai says that probably cost her a sizeable chunk
of her net worth. So instantly I'm like, oh boy, okay,

(39:23):
something really big is happening. But I'm not understanding because
as much as we know something's up with Chris, I
still wasn't feeling threatened by him. I was just like,
you know, the fact that he killed Frank for me
felt like it was out of loyalty to Carl or

(39:43):
something like. I was taking this all still as a
sort of absolutist attitude that he hadn't had before about
who deserved to live and die and why. And I
was not seeing Chris as a threat. So even as
this is all happening, I'm having a hard time believing

(40:07):
that it's Chris that's the problem. A part of me
really thought it's gonna be another enemy that's going to
jump out from somewhere else, and like, technically that's kind
of exactly what it was, but not the way I
was imagining, which was that Chris is the distraction to
get things set up so somebody can hit you from
the side. It's Chris is the is the disguise. So yeah,

(40:34):
this is so awful. Why haven't you spoken to anybody?
Imani is really worried about you and your brother. Surely
you know what happened. Chris waved a big rocky hand.
I take damage if I use the chat features, so
I do not waste time or energy using it. What

(40:56):
that doesn't make sense. It's part of the system interface
with being an igneous. I can't pull things in and
out of inventory or go into my health pie chart
either without losing health. I got it in exchange for
having a very high constitution. I've never heard of that.
That can't be normal. We'll talk to Mordecai, our manager.

(41:17):
We'll see if we can figure out what's going on,
and if there's a way to fix it. I'll message
your money too. We'll all figure it out together. Your
friends and family are worried about you. My family is dead.
It doesn't matter. Family and friends make you weak. Having
someone to care over and protect makes you vulnerable. You
taught me that. I taught you how Jesus. If he

(41:41):
didn't have the name floating over him, I'd never guess
this was the same guy, we are wasting time. You
haven't taken the castle yet? Is it still aloft? Where
is the cat? We will go hunt it down together.
This was the moment where I went, uh, oh, where
is the cat? That felt like even less like Chris

(42:07):
than a personality change. He's not referring to her by name,
He's calling her the cat, which feels much more like
he's seeing Carl and his cat as like a pair
that need to be dealt with, Like there was something
about just that wording. That was when I started to

(42:29):
be like, oh shit, he's saying we'll go do this together.
I don't buy it. I don't buy it. Dona is
in the safe room. Come on, we'll go in together
and talk. I don't like safe rooms. And this is
when he's like, I think he's about to attack me

(42:49):
to Amani and she says he can fire lava out
of his body, be careful, try not to hurt him.
And then he asks Carl asks about killing Frank, and
Chris just says you heard about that, huh. And this
is when Juice Box comes out and she says, well,
you said you'd save the town. I guess you did.

(43:11):
We lost some camels, but not nearly as many as
I feared. The spit and Swallow is still in one piece.
We can all go in there and talk about Kutzel Colotlas.
You can bring these two guys. We can all party afterward.
Chris shook his large head. I really wish you hadn't

(43:32):
said that two, I asked, confused. It's funny, Chris said,
after a moment. When I first got here to this floor,
I thought for sure I was dead. But it was easy,
you know, to take out the submarine. I don't think
that flying castle will be so hard either. I see
all those airplanes parked over there. There are hot air

(43:53):
balloons now sitting in the desert. I'm starting to think
this whole floor is easier than it should be. And
he starts backing up. But the more hope Carl starts
backing up, to be clear, But the more hope I have,
the more conflicted I get. Seeing you, I think I
finally made up my mind. I keep going back and forth,

(44:14):
but all of a sudden, I'm resolved. I don't want
to get out of here anymore. Isn't that funny. It's
like I have a choice now, I can choose to
not live like this, and let's see Brandon left a
message for you. Let's go sit down and talk about it.

(44:35):
I actually have two daughters, Chris said. You only know
about the one, but there's another. She's older from my
first marriage. She was home, so she died in the
collapse our game guide. When we first got in here,
he told us all about it. He said she might
come back. People who die in the collapse aren't really dead,

(44:55):
but they're put in storage. Only you can't save them.
I think about that a lot them out sometimes, but
it's never for good. They can be changed. They forced
you to kill them on the deeper floors. He told
me about a crawler that was forced to face his
own face down his whole family. He killed himself instead.

(45:16):
I wasn't aware you had any children, Chris, and your
game guid's a woman. Her name is Mistress Tiatha. I
can't kill anybody else in my family, Carl, I can't.
It hit me then, all at once I cursed myself
for not seeing it. This wasn't Chris, this was Maggie.

(45:37):
And I was glad that Carl was putting this together,
because when he said I can't kill any more of
my family, I thought he was confessing to having murdered Brandon,
that Brandon writes this note thinks he's going to die
because these things are beginning to you know, But that actually,
in the end he was killed by Chris. So Carl's

(45:57):
brain is working a lot more efficiently in this moment
than mine. For sure. Uh, you're a changeling or a doppelganger, no,
Juice Box said, she ain't no changeling. She's worse. No, Maggie,
Chris agreed. She suddenly had a round spiked ball in

(46:19):
her hand. I was waiting for the cat to come out,
but she's too much of a coward. I guess they
promised me if I did it this way, they wouldn't.
The crossbow bolt slammed into Maggie's head and she dropped,
crashing heavily to the street. The ball in her hand
hit the ground and started to roll away. I dived
for it, dislodging myself from Juice Box's grip. It wasn't

(46:41):
a bomb. I didn't know what it was, but I
instinctively grabbed it and tossed it into my inventory before
it could do anything. And it turns out that what
Katcha got in her emergency box were ten bolts of
petrified rock class instead of kill rock class, which means,

(47:03):
in my opinion, like, as soon as I hear this,
he can be saved. Chris can be saved somehow, and
that is what they are being given the opportunity to do.
We don't actually have the means to do that now,
but it's possible. I just got a message from Chris.

(47:24):
It's not him, no, it is He's petrified. He's going
to lose consciousness again when his body makes up. He's
being controlled. I'm friends with a guy named Chris, I said,
is this really him? He's right, this is juice box.
He's right there. Don't kill him. There's also someone else
in there, an infiltrator. That's who you need to kill.

(47:45):
What the hell is an infiltrator? Oh fuck, Mordecai said,
shoot him again. Mordecai said, Katcha complied, we got a problem.
I've told you about these guys before. There are multiple
types of brain worms. The intellect hunters on the most common,
but they can only take over corpses and the bodies
start to rot. The valts a are similar, but they
secrete a liquid that keeps the body alive. They're distant.

(48:08):
Cousins are a race called the scream but they're better
known by a different name, the Infiltrators. They are parasites
and they take full control of bodies living bodies. A
person is infected and it takes a few days for
the annexation to complete. They don't even know they have
the parasite. After a few days, the worm completely takes over.

(48:29):
Once the switch occurs, the parasite gains power and the
host is locked out of their own body. The worm
controls them. The host can do nothing but watch as
they are moved like a puppet. So he's been awake
this whole time, watching all this happen, but he's completely powerless.
That's right, She's in his brain. His body is her armor.

(48:54):
This is a literal nightmare. Some of the worst parts
of nightmares is wanting to scream but you can't make
any noise, or wanting to run and you can't. Not
having control over the way your body moves and works
is a literal nightmare that many of us have. And
imagine living with this and this person being specifically attuned

(49:17):
to killing somebody that is a friend of yours. And
again there is something that can be done, but it
is not possible at this present time because there's a
potion that can be made, but the ingredients are either
not something that Mordecai can access on this floor, or
just stuff that he doesn't currently have, and these bolts

(49:40):
only keep him down for like one minute at a time,
I think ninety seconds or maybe so. Then he gets
a message from Ellie IMMANI is refusing to send you
this message, so I will. It's from Chris. I'm copy
and pasting his exact words. Karl, Donna please kill me.

(50:01):
It's okay. I give you permission. You'll be helping me. Hey, Chris,
go fuck yourself. I said, we're going to figure this out.
Then I told Ellie what I said. Ellie, I told
him the same thing. But if we can't figure out
a solution, I don't think you have a choice. If
it was me stuck in there, i'd want you to
pull the plug too. And I really liked that. I

(50:24):
don't know if this is necessarily on purpose, but her
phrasing it as pull the plug when she was somebody
who was elderly and probably faced this exact thing, either
personally having to make that choice about somebody else, or
maybe having to like write up her own desires because
she was aging. It just felt like that wording was

(50:46):
particularly appropriate for somebody who was older, you know. And
Carl keeps suggesting things, and of course there's a million
reasons why what he suggested saying won't work. This was
so funny. I turned to Juice Box. You touched him?

(51:08):
Can you turn into one of those worms? Go in
there and take out the one in his head? No,
they're too small, and I wouldn't do it even if
I could. That's a pretty fucked up thing to ask. Look,
juice Box, it is. But also get over it. This
is a very terrible situation, you know, Ellie, He says,
This woman is overwhelmed with anger and despair, and every

(51:31):
moment I share with her is worse than the last.
You took the orb from her, but she can still
hurt you. And this is when he looks at the
properties celestial grenade. If the wielder of the grenade has
pledged themselves to a specific deity, this grenade will summon
their god for sixty seconds. In addition, the wielder will

(51:54):
receive a sixty second divine intervention aura. If the wielder
does not worship a deal. This grenade will summon a
random god. They will not receive the divine intervention. Buff
And it's pretty much a given for me that this
was going to be Growl that, you know, this whole

(52:14):
thing was being set up yet again by fucking what's
his niece? What's his name? What's his niece? Let's see
you humiliated Prince Maistra and his family over and over.
They have to kill you to save face. If you
die before they get a chance to, it's probably just
as bad. Well, they're terrible at it, Doughnuts said, I mean, really,

(52:37):
if they can't even manage to kill one human who
doesn't wear pants, how can anyone expect them to control
an intergalactic empire? No offense, Carl And I feel like
that's going to be made into a sound bite. I
feel like that's really that sentence is really gonna that's
going viral. Ellie, he started talking, but he got cut off.

(53:00):
It says his messaging privileges have been suspended for thirty minutes.
He says it's not Grol. She worships another god called Algos.
That's who the grenade would have summoned. Maggie's first sponsor
is Prince Maestro and his second is Crown Prince Stalwart.
His brother I have the same two sponsors. They gave
her a scroll that let her choose a god to worship.

(53:23):
I received a box with a picture on it of Algos,
and that's how she knew who to pick. She got
the grenade when we hit this floor, we got approached
by this weird guy in a safe room and he
told us that was the whole message. And Mordecai says
to Carl via chat, this sounds like somebody did a
back door like a bribe somehow that was not actually

(53:48):
allowed by the game, which does happen, but we can't
say it out loud. I'm thinking Maggie's race can't worship Groul,
so they had to find another god to do their
dirty work. Plus they didn't want to rely on Prince
Maestro again. He'd probably just screw it up and further
embarrass the family. Can you imagine being like so bad

(54:10):
at this that they won't even let you be involved
in it anymore. Algos is the god of pain. He
would kill everyone in town in seconds. He's a good
god to choose if you want your target to suffer.
This maestro guy is letting you live rent free in
his head. Donna said, it's quite pitiful. I'm starting to

(54:31):
think he really is in love with you again viral.
I mean these sound bites they don't I mean, you know,
I know that that it's possible, because she's very aware
of social media, that she's saying all of these things
on purpose because they are perfect, you know. But I

(54:53):
like to think that she just happens to be so
unconsciously good at this that it's by accident. And let's see,
I never liked my brother either. He always thought he
was better than the rest of us. Your brother sold
for over ten thousand dollars, I said, Donut made a

(55:14):
spitting noise. I don't remember seeing him win any championships.
I really enjoy the fact that there's like a friggin
rivalry going on. I'm going to flip him over, break
open the back of his head, and dig Maggie out
with my bare hand. Carl, that is not going to work.
You'll kill him. You're not getting in there anyway. Mordecai said,

(55:37):
his head is solid rock. The parasite is in his brain,
not riding it like a backpack, and he messages Immani
that he is sorry, and she doesn't respond at all.
So finally he's like, all right, I guess I am
going to have to do this, and decides to first

(55:59):
deliver the message to Chris from his brother and does this.
Everyone get back. Be careful, Mordecai said. Once he dies,
the infiltrator will still be alive. She'll burrow out of
his head. She'll try to get into someone else. Not
the way I'm going to kill him, I said. The

(56:20):
small group all took several steps back. It was just
me and Donut standing over the prone form of Chris.
Karl Dona asked from my shoulder, what don't be mad
at me? A large hole opened up in the street,
revealing a shimmering force field that separated this quadrant from
the next. The form of Chris plummeted down through the

(56:41):
hole and disappeared, landing loudly into the dark chamber below.
There was a splash. I only fell about a foot
landing on the shimmering air. I stood upon the force
field like it was glass, looking down upon it with surprise.
You bes step out of the hole of your feet
will get chopped off. When I turned the spell off,
Donut said, Daddy wouldn't like that very much. And I

(57:03):
just love that she took it upon herself to do this.
It's just buying them a little bit more time. And granted,
you know, Maggie still being out there is dangerous, but
that like hand grenade thing has been taken away from her,
and now they know that she's in there, and so

(57:26):
they are in less danger. I do feel really bad
for Chris because he thought that this was finally going
to be over. So I really really hate that. But
also I am a big fan of just putting it
off for a little bit, you know. And the reason

(57:46):
that she gives for doing this. You're not a killer, Karl,
not a person killer. You get all weird about killing NPCs.
How do you think it's going to affect you to
kill one of your friends. I'm not going to let
it happen. I can't have you being all MOPI. And
he says, you know, he was asking for our help.
What you did was a mistake. And she says, look

(58:08):
at the map. He's not getting out of that room.
And if they do get out, we'll be prepared. Katya
has the fine crawler skill, she'll see them sneaking up
on us and then says maybe, And I was like,
just don't have that, maybe just be confident about it.
It's fine. I found it very convincing. I took a
deep angry breath. I was angry with Donut, but I
was also angry with myself for being so desperately relieved, which, yeah,

(58:33):
I really get that. And he's looking at the map
and asks Mordecai can he get out, like because of
his race, and Mordecai is like maybe, but it does
seem like that's going to be pretty difficult for them.
Let's see. While we talked, Donut was giving a running

(58:56):
commentary IMMANI thank you, Donut. Once you defeat all four castles,
you can go back and capacitate them again, bring them
through the portal, and then your game guide can make
a potion to save Chris. I took a deep breath.
That was a very dangerous idea. It was a dumb idea.
Katcha only had three of the paralyzed bolts left, which

(59:17):
meant we'd have three minutes to get them to the stairwall.
That simply wasn't going to happen. Maggie had just tried
to unleash the god of pain on me. She was
too dangerous to let free. We were being used like
pawns in a royal pissing match between a brother and sister,
who in turn were being exploited by the whole system,
while the entire universe laughed their asses off at us. All. Yes,

(59:42):
being in the spotlight was good, but we needed to
break ourselves free from this skull empire bullshit. It would
catch up to us sooner rather than later. Mordecai I said,
we have to find a way to separate him from
the warm before the floor ends. Go to the market,
see if you can find those potion supplies. Now, I'll
put the word out and see if anybody has what
we need. So he goes into his interface and he

(01:00:09):
makes some changes. Here he finds the needle, and it
says I found the needle that indicated current stream watchers.
I cycled through a few views and settled on one
that didn't show actual numbers, but ticked the needle up
when more than average were watching. I placed it in
the corner right above my air speed and elevation tickers. Also,

(01:00:29):
Mordecai I was wrong before about something. I want you
to take some money and buy Donut that environmental upgrade,
the one that shows a running commentary of our social
media comments. Donut yay, Mordecai. You know it'll be heavily
moderated by the AI, right, That's okay, The more information
the better. I'm so glad because that was my immediate

(01:00:51):
thought was how potentially advantageous that could be. And I
was surprised Carl didn't seem to see the use of it.
So sure the AI mods it, but if the AI
is happy with you, then the AI might decide not
to mod certain things, particularly you know. So personally, I

(01:01:14):
am a big, big fan of this idea, and I'm
very excited to see what happens here because like, look
it could I know that there are This is so funny.
Michael in the chat says, no, never read the comments,
don't and then says Carl probably read YouTube comments before,

(01:01:35):
and like, yeah, comments can be. It's so funny, guys.
It's so different depending on what part of the Internet
you're on. I have gone into comments sections that are
so sweet and supportive and kind and generous and just
very compassionate and people sharing experiences and commiserating, and then

(01:01:57):
there are times where I go into comments and every
is like a soulless demon and You're going, where are
the people? So it really, you know, it does you
never know there is a potential for, like, what if
there are a bunch of people commenting on some idiosyncratic
behavior of one of them that starts to make them

(01:02:18):
so self conscious about it that they begin to get distracted.
You know, that kind of thing can happen. It depends
on how often you tune in, and it depends on
what is moded out and what isn't. And it's just
like there's also the potential to like watch it and

(01:02:39):
see that people are totally misinterpreting the reasons for something,
or in Carl's case, perhaps seeing that a lot of
folks have bought into the version of him that has
been edited into the highlights, you know, and that would
be upsetting. But anyway, I just I think this is
a great idea, and I'm glad that he is finally

(01:03:02):
seeing the use of it because I saw the use
right away, but I just kind of figured if he
was deciding not to use it, it just wasn't happening.
I didn't even consider him eventually changing his mind, and
I'm relieved. So we shall see how that goes. Let's
sit down right now and talk. I pointed to Juice Box.

(01:03:23):
But we gotta make it quick. We're going out to
take that last castle once it gets dark. We still
need to sleep, Carl Doughnuts said, we can sleep when
we're dead, and that is the end of the chapter.
So yeah, very busy section. But I really really enjoyed this.
All right, guys, thank you all again so much for

(01:03:46):
hanging out. Thank you Michael for commissioning this, and I
will be seeing you guys Thursday with the next episode.
Michael says, I'll be counting the hours until the Project
hail Mary coverage Dungeon Crawler. Carl too, but Project hail
Mary is my foot focus now. I uh yeah, I
am really looking forward to talking about it. I really am.

(01:04:07):
All right, everybody till next time to the Loom motherfuckers.

(01:04:40):
That was an Unspoiled Network podcast.