Dungeon Crawler Carl, Chapters 13-20

Oh and Dan came, Hi Dan again. Yeah. So this section, guys, is riddled with some wild stuff. I had a good time with this, and it feels like we are definitely heading in the direction I was expecting. I am going to point these things out as we go. But there's a constant through line that repeats that I think probably

a lot of you are picking up on also. And it starts because I like, actually went back and I re listened to the beginning of the book with my husband the other day because I thought he would really enjoy it. And we've just gotten up to the part where we read the boss battle, but he hasn't actually gone inside yet, and so I'm kind of like, we'll see how he acts that. But something that Mordecai says is like, this is my last show, and after this one, I'm free to do what i want. After this, I'll

be a fully fledged citizen. So I'm just going to put that there to reference a little bit later. Let's begin with chapter thirteen. So we start off with Carl and Donut heading towards the body of this other crawler. And it was a real fun moment because in the audiobook Lutible Corpse Crawler, Rebecca Rebecca W Level three killed by crawler Frank Q, and I love the line. I felt as if I was slack because that was almost

exactly the reaction that I also had. It was sort of remarkable, actually, because I shouldn't be prepared for people to turn on each other, but I really thought that would take longer. I really thought that we would have our people turning on each other once we got past a certain point and there were fewer of us and we began to see each other as competing for resources in a more real way. I never thought it would happen this soon, and I should. I should have known better.

I really should. And then to like re emphasize their cops. As we find out later, I mean, if you don't already know how I feel about police in our country, I don't like want to get into a whole thing, but I think that they are sociopathic trash who think they are better than the rest of the population and are on power trips and our bullies and our low key just like a tool of fascism, not even low key,

it's high high key, fucking totally. So for the first people to turn on other human beings to be cops, it feels like absolutely correct, just dead on pun into it. So let us get into this because Dona, of course, at first tries to be like, I'm not to scare

this guy. And there's an interesting moment here where Carl is trying to find Frank on his map, or not really Frank specifically, because I don't think you can do that unless they're in your party, but you can see blue dots and he's trying to see if they're any near him, And even as he's look he's wondering, is it possible for them to hide from me? Like I don't really know how this completely works, and they may be there, and I just can't tell, which is unnerving him.

Christ another thing to worry about. A crazy asshole with a gun. I was suddenly, inexplicably reminded of that day, the last day I ever saw my father. You're a bully. You're a bully, and nobody likes you. It's why mom left. I was expecting him to get angry to hit me, but he never hit me, not once. The man just laughed and laughed, and that was enough. I don't need you to like me, but you will respect me. The memory came quickly out of nowhere. I didn't know why.

Nobody had died that day, Nobody had been hurt at all, not physically. So the fact that this happened right after a crazy asshole with a gun leads me to believe. Because there's a point earlier where he mentions how his mother used to lock him in the basement to keep him away from his father and his dad's friends because

they would drink and start to really act up. And my interpretation of this association is that his dad got drunk and had a gun and was fucking around and thought it was really funny and was trying to like establish dominance somehow in a moment and this is this kind of got to me a little bit. Guys, I'm gonna admit because my father was a similar type. I don't I don't want to call him a bully, because a bully is somebody who really enjoys this, and I

don't think that my dad really did. But he was definitely the type of person who never actually, like physically lashed out, but would make it clear that he was having to strain himself, and so there was always a threat of violence in the air. And eventually once he did lose it. But I got myself behind a door and he broke the door in half. I don't know what he would have done if I hadn't gotten behind that door. And it was like the I don't need you to like me, but I will respect me in

a vacuum. I actually think that's fair, you know. I don't think it's a great approach, but I could see why you would take it. But there are people who really seem to think that being liked means that you

are somehow weak or compromising yourself. And I'm just really kind of fascinated at Carl's reaction to this moment, being this memory in combination with his mother trying to protect him from his father, who he admits here never actually did hit him, because there is something about the threat being there even when the action isn't there that is so much. It's so manipulative. It's a really different kind of threat and mental fuckery that I think a lot

of men think. Because they're not hitting, it's not as bad. It's like excusable. Actually, maybe it points out what a good guy they are because they haven't raised their hand to you, and so all the other shit they're pulling is nothing because it's not like they hit you. And because the bar for men is on the fucking floor beyond the bar for men is a tavern in hades, they really often will believe that as long as I am not beating the shit out of you, I deserve

a fucking cookie. So I'm just gonna be sitting here waiting for more info on his father and what that guy was like, because I feel like that's going to be informing some things probably, So anyway, the uh. There's a moment here where Dona is insisting that the woman was killed by a cocker spaniel with a gun, and he has to point out that like that she isn't able to even fire a gun because of her being a quadruped, and some imbecile with a gun doesn't scare me,

and they shouldn't carry scare you either. So he tries to say, this guy doesn't scare me either, and then it made me irrationally angry. In fact, I think you're right. I want to find him if we can. Let's stick to the neighborhood. We'll hunt down the remaining red dots. Then we'll go back to the safe room and watch the premiere. You're not scared of that guy, really, no, not at all. Well, then you're crazy. I don't like you being crazy. I'm scared of him. We need to

stay away from him. What if he'said one of those murder hoboes you hear so much about. Just two seconds ago you said, and I quote some in this cell with a gun doesn't scare me. Yeah, that's when I thought you were being a pussy. I didn't realize you were getting all Charles Bronson death wish on me. So that was interesting. Her just trying to, like, you know, get him psyched up because she doesn't understanding like the

headspace that he's in. And it's funny because initially I think he was sort of just overwhelmed at how awful this is a woman being killed by another person. But the memory of his father comes back to him, and it seems like he is definitely feeling away about this man that is motivated by personal experience. So we go to chapter fourteen and we get the premiere of Dungeon

Crawler World Earth. So first of all, these beings can like go virtually into the scene and experience it in a way, which is apparently not like super popular, but it is an option. Many viewers didn't like the VR versions, so they watched using a method where they had a bird's eye view and they could zoom in and out and angles and switch angles at a whim. We didn't

have any of that. The show streamed on the center of the three televisions over the fast food counter, and there were there four just over four million when we start. This is not a good way to watch the show, Tally announced. As the title appeared on the screen, the screen jerked around like I was watching someone play a

game on Twitch. The view kept randomly zooming in and out, sometimes focusing on nothing in particular, sometimes lights flash for no reason, And I thought that this was sort of interesting, the idea that, like the view that for whom it matters most, the players, that they are not granted a view of what's really happening. I feel like this is a metaphor that, you know, there's sometimes lights flash for

no reason, zooming in on nothing in particular. It's feeling a little bit like we're trying to disorient you on purpose so that you don't know or sympathize with, or have like a plan, you know what I mean. Just Also, there is an orange hued four eyed lizard like creature, so it turns out that they are very alien like. I was sort of thinking that maybe the creatures would make themselves look like the creatures within the game to sort of be a cohesive theme for the overall like

look of this season of the show. But it turns out that it is not how they're doing this. So there's the Squim Conglomerate Battle for the planet aarrol thousands of furry gorilla like creatures screaming and rushing into a battle against a group of similar creatures. Later, it showed a single heavily armored gorilla stick a spear into the throat of a smaller, gray colored gorilla riding a massive

pig thing. The word winner appeared on the screen. The winning gorilla fell to his knees and appeared to start sobbing before the screen cut away. A round metal two but that looked like a barrel appeared on the screen for fifteen seconds straight. There was no sound. Tally said it was a commercial, which that's wild, But it's interesting to see these other creatures and the way their fight is done, because apparently there's like, you know, different ways

that they will set these up. So that one was more of a colosseum and the oh my god, I'm sorry, guys, I'm losing track of where the spot is here it is. Next came a view of Earth. Music swelled, and they show all of these, like, first of all, diagrams of humans, and it's so weird, he says, a discussion of human anatomy with an enorm inordinate amount of time spent discussing discussing male testicles and female ovaries. And I was just like,

you could just say testicles and ovaries. That was a weird. Why would you? Next came a long line of shots of Earth focusing mostly on urban areas. And it's interesting when he says, I still couldn't understand most of what the commentator was saying. I was sort of like, are the testicles and overaries going to turn out to be? Like? Is that going to be a hint that something else is going on here? And he just couldn't understand well

enough to tell. And of course this is when they do the thing that also white people do about like Africa, where they'll show all of the worst parts of a place, and you know, I have no doubt that Sarah McLaughlin music is probably playing over this entire montage, but you know, they were cherry picking the shittier parts of the planet, and they even chose scenes from disaster movies. And I

love how incredibly gullible Doughnut is. This is definitely it's kind of funny that she has this real like power in her own charisma and ability to talk people into stuff, but also apparently has like no ability to protect her herself from that regarding others. And so yeah, she's like, I didn't really, I didn't realize Earth sucks so bad, Oh my god, And he's like, that's not how it is, not his was the world is gone. They're making it look like they're the good guys saving us from ourselves.

So then we see some of the other people coming in, thousands of people and there are like trampling one another to get inside because like, obviously it was the middle of the night for him, and so most of the people in his area were inside and asleep. But on the other side of the world, it's gonna have been the middle of the day, so more people are probably

going to be outside. Also, in different climates, people are going to be you know, they won't have a roof over their head necessarily, and let's see and they okay, yeah, there's different groups of people that they show and of course eventually when things end, Dona is really offended because they weren't featured, and she felt like their boss battle was so awesome and intense that they definitely deserved to show up. And I think that she just overestimates how

intense their battle was. You know, it's not a cinematic, frankly, to have like one dude also beating the shit out of like an old fat lady while a cat just watches. You've got ten people all shooting at once at a pile of mouths and eyeballs. That's a lot more interesting to watch, probably, But you know, Dona always thinks that she is the most fascinating thing in the room, so it's fine. I'm sorry if you can hear my dog drinking water like a maniac. So let me get another announcement. Uh.

You'll be getting these announcements after each episode. A couple quick patch notes the firefinger spell should be safe to cast. Now. We fix the hallway bathroom bug, so if you open the door and someone else enters there, they will no longer explode. Sorry about that reminder, hallway bathrooms are personal spaces and can't be shared. We also fix the unlimited toilet paper bug. Now you're only getting one roll per floor,

so if you waste it, you're on your own. One roll per floor when the floors can last for days and days. I don't feel like that's adequate, especially with the situation that people are going to be in eating God knows what you want to be prepared for more than that, in my opinion. We have a long list of fixes with a new inventory system for right now. The two big ones we've already patched are that you can no longer transport mobs to your inventory in order

to kill them. Also, any momentum and item might have while it entered the inventory will no longer be preserved. It's now safe to extract items you put into inventory while moving at a high rate of speed. Remember this inventory system is a privilege and it's not meant to be used as a weapon. While we love and admire your creativity, any unintentional exploits will be patched, So if you find something that has an unintended feature, don't get

too comfortable using it. And then she talks about how they're starting a new thing where if people go downstairs to the next floor too early, they will be put in stasis and they will be kept there until after other people get to go down. So even if you've got to the stairs first, technically you aren't going down until after the other people have art, So you aren't

helping yourself at all. And not only that, the whole like the way that it all emphasizes viewership and patrons, you are going to lose a lot of support if you go into stasis, because people are going to lose interest in you. I really love this for a particular personal reason so I don't know how many people listening to this are also online creators. If you are, you are going to get exactly what I'm talking about instantly.

But there is something that has happened over the past three years, I would say, really that has changed utterly the way that being an online creator works. I was making over one thousand dollars a month more than I am now in twenty twenty one, and a lot of that was due to the pandemic making it so that people had a lot of extra income that they weren't using on going out and stuff, and so they were

throwing it at projects that were getting them through. But also we hadn't had this kick of inflation that we have had that has made so many people have to buckle down. And there's another thing that has happened, the change in how algorithms work, which has made it so that if you are a creator and a certain type

of video explodes that you make. Let's say you're somebody who paints and you normally do a variety of types of painting and for whatever reason, this one video that you posted of painting a D and D miniature goes viral. Normally you have a wide variety of different videos that you post, but this one thing goes viral and that starts to be all anybody asks for. And when you don't post anything about like that's similar, your views drop and then your income drops. So what do you do?

You start to do what the algorithm is pointing out people want, and doing mostly D and D miniatures, even though that's not really the point of what you were trying to do. It's not something you particularly enjoy. And not only do you have to do the thing just to get the views, but you also have to make sure that you're always posting, otherwise you fall off people's

feed entirely. If people don't post for like, you know, a week at a time, the algorithm starts to deprioritize their posts totally, and it gets really really difficult for creators because they want to post a satisfying video, but they also have to make sure that their project gives them enough footage that they can make several videos out

of it in order to cover that between time. So all of this to say that you have to be so careful how much you dole out, how well edited that is, and how satisfying it is to keep people wanting to watch you, and you don't get to do just what you are moved by anymore. You don't get to create based on what you are good at or what you enjoy. You have to create based on what the algorithm decides to show people. And it changes completely

your relationship to your own work. It changes your relationship to your fans too, because people who have chosen to follow you don't necessarily see your work because once they follow you, you get buried. So it's like you stop having that relationship with people that recurringly show up in your comments, and it starts to be lots of strangers who are seeing your work for the very first time because this reeal went viral and it just popped up in there for you on TikTok, or it popped up

in the real section on a Facebook. And this means that you don't get to foster the kinds of one on one relationships with fans that leads to them deciding to financially support you, whether it's buying your work or becoming a patron, a patreon or whatever. So it takes a lot of the like personal connection out of it.

It takes a lot of the joy out of it for creators, and it makes it so that if you are not constantly creating and constantly posting, you disappear and nobody cares about you, or if they do care about you, it takes a while for them to realize why they're not seeing you anymore, and then they have to like opt into that, even though they already followed you, which most of them thought was them opting in. It doesn't

work like that anymore. Now you have to click see first, or you know, any number of other ways that you can handle it. So it's really difficult because if you don't try to appease the algorithm, then your work begins to slide further and further under the radar. And I had I think, like thirty five hundred likes on Facebook, and I was getting an average of thirty five views per post. I was like, it was like one percent,

half a percent. It was insane. They wanted to charge me to show my posts when that was supposed to be the point of their whole platform, And I just gave up on it, and eventually they deleted my Facebook page. I restarted it, but now I'm sort of feeling like there's no point because if they're not going to show anything anyway, then why am I going to waste my time trying to specialize in a platform like appeasing that platform when it's just such a vanishingly small number of

people that are even going to see it. Well, I have basically almost entirely stopped using Facebook. I've post on there automatically from things, but I am not there creating for that, like platform and social media in general, I have sort of given up on I post so that people will see updates on stuff, but I am not really very engaged, which I know is like the antithesis of what people think our methods should be as online creators.

But it's not valuable to me anymore because it doesn't show anybody or you know, Like, So what works now for me is to be in my discord or to post things like on the free level on Patreon to inform people, encourage people to come to Patreon and become a free level fan, because for those who don't know, you don't have to be pay to become a fan

on Patreon, Patreon, dot com, slash and spoiled. You can sign up for free and I will post like updates there so that if you were missing all the updates on Facebook or Twitter or Instagram, on Patreon, you're guaranteed to get those updates because you have specifically opted in and they don't mess with the algorithm. So anyway, all this to say, I really love that. Like the angle that this is all taking is so different with the

Hunger Games. The way that they play it in that is very much based on like a Survivor TV show model, where you are like there's zooming in on you personally. There's a sort of like process beforehand where you're interviewed and people get to know you, and it's a small group, and there's like a type of it's out of your hands quality that you can appeal to the camera, but a lot of that stuff isn't necessarily within your control.

And then here it's like it is a little bit more in your control, but it man's things of you that are unreasonable or unhealthy. So like you can't descend to the next floor without incurring a penalty of losing followers and going into stasis and then losing your lead. But what if you're really injured and you have to or what if you're cornered and the floor is right there,

and that's the only way out. They want you to stay active and in danger for as long as you can to generate interest, regardless of what is best for you, just so that you can hopefully have somebody send you a fucking can of soup in the next floor. Like that's exactly what it feels like all the time to be an online creator, and it's like so exhausting, you guys.

I am really lucky with the kind of support that I have on Patreon because it is a lot more stable than what many people have, but it still has flu Like I said, I'm making one thousand dollars less

per month now than I was. That has caused me to have to make a lot of big adjustments in my life and have a lot of anxiety that I wasn't having a few years ago, and file for bankruptcy and you know, like there's just what when your income is up to the whims of people who are like just using their disposable income, it can be really tough. And it's sort of funny because like, I'm not really that much more at the whim of anybody than a

lot of people in the workforce. I like everybody is at will in the United States, you could be fired for any reason. So there's an illusion of security to having a different kind of job, but really when you come down to it, it's not any more secure, like not really. So anyway, this like whole thing is just really it's very it's like obviously dialing things up to eleven, but it's really feeling very familiar in a way that

is so depressing. And I could see this whole system being even more like punitive and targeted, and it would still feel very real to me because like there's you know, the whole thing with like oh well, Larrence listening, but they're not always listening, so you just have to be careful. The way. This is also a thing with algorithms. People were like not able to talk about Palestine. If they posted the word Palestine, all of their shit was getting

shadow band. So that was when it turned into people just posting the watermelon emoji because those are the Palestinian flag colors, and that was like the way to get around your shit just getting completely taken because basically it was either the algorithm being like we don't want people talking about Palestine flat out because we're Zionists, or political shit makes people sad and depressed and disengages with the platform, and we don't want that. So it was just sort

of like the certain language that you used. You had to be careful because they might not notice it, but if they do, it's going to really affect everything that you post from there on, and then you have to work from practically scratch to get your views back. Yeah, and sorry, Michael Is in the chat. Mordecai referred to it earlier when you talked about how warn't changed things so people weren't starving to death pooping on screen because

that isn't interesting to watch. Got to keep it entertaining. You can be fired for any reason, but your health insurance is dependent on your job, so you can't walk away easily. Exactly exactly, So I'm so sorry, guys. I'm like half an hour in and I've gotten like barely into this. I'm so sorry. But eventually we get to a spot where we're fighting slimes, which was very fun for me as somebody who had just recently been talking

about playing Stardi Valley. So those are not great for him because he has a lot of exposed skin, so he can't fight those, and they have to turn around. I love that we are using the text chat and Donut has gone full boomer and is posting in there constantly, even though they can actually just talk to each other, and she's also doing it in all caps all the time, and he has to be like, can you please fucking stop? And eventually they go into Goblin territory. And this is

such a like. The whole way that this works is so different from what I was expecting. So first of all, Donut's charisma is so insane that even though Carl initially is like pissing them off to the point that they're ready to attack him, despite him having this Goblin pass, she is able to immediately get everybody to chill and work with them, and he meets Shamanka level seven a fancy way of saying female shaman. Goblin Shamans are the leader class, second only to war chieftain or more rarely,

Goblin warlord. They are without humor and are said, as part of their training to have to pick two of the following three actions in order to graduate Shamanka University. They have to fuck, cook, and or eat their own parents. Most don't pick cook, yikes. So Donut comes in and basically it starts being like, oh, sweetie, the piercings, really is this because they need to eat your parents? Like?

What is going on? Is this a daddy issue? And gets this character the Goblin, to break down, and the way that she starts talking, I started to realize, like, oh, these beings don't want to be here either. The whole way that this is like set up. I kind of thought, obviously, we already know that Mordecai doesn't want to be here, but it feels like there is a family sort of tie between these people, as if they are actually related to each other, and not all of them individually playing

parts like they're in a play. I can't leave the chieftain. He's terrible, soft even but he's still leader of my clan, my family. Even if I could go with you, I wouldn't be able to leave this floor. If we climb down the stairs, we die. You get halfway down and your body just dissolves. I've seen it myself. I know where on the first floor there are smart mobs like us,

and there are not so smart mobs. The floor collapses, but it is only you who dies when this happens for us, we go to sleep until the next dungeon opens. We will open our eyes and it will be the same as it has been, just another day. But one of these days, one of these days, we will wake up and we will be deeper. That's what they tell us. Kill the crawlers get better at killing, and you get to go deeper, and one day, eventually we will be so deep that the crawlers will never come and we

will finally have peace. We will have peace and a place to live and breed and have our little ones run free and not worry about killing for survival. So hi, that's never going to happen. This is all Everybody has their little fairy tale about how eventually, if they just work hard enough, they'll get to the place where they

don't have to worry anymore. It's the lie that we are all sold in the US, especially like I think there are other places where maybe this is something that can happen for you, and that's I'm so jealous, I can't even speak on it. But in the United States, you are never safe unless you reach a point of such incredible wealth that it's almost unthinkable for like the vast majority of us. When we talk about the one percent,

it's like very literal. So you know, you can be somebody who is fairly comfortable and then guess what you get sick. You get the certain kind of sick, the wrong kind. I'm so sorry, but your savings gone. It's a wrap for you house. Good luck. I hope you already owned it by the time you got sick. Like there's just people really do seem to think if they reach a certain point that they are out of the

reach of happenstance and circumstances like affecting them. And it's just a lie because everybody wants to believe that they have more control than they do, and that the people out there who are doing poorly are only doing poorly because of their own mistakes and not because the entire system is rigged from the start to fuck you. And it is so this entire like this this narrative that everybody is functioning within that eventually you get to a point.

It's like he's been told if you get to level eighteen and nobody's ever gotten past thirteen, you know, like that's the metaphor. Man, it's so unlikely that nobody has ever done it, and yet we still act like it's a goal that is reachable and that we should throw others under the bus to achieve it, because that is what winds up happening later, is they decide that they're

going to loot the place. It's so devastating, you guys, because like, when we get to that point, I really thought, man, he could just fucking take all their shit right now. That would be so fucked up. And then they literally do it, and it was like me sitting there kind of going, I guess you gotta do what you have to do. But I was thinking about how when I play video games, I often don't have the heart to do this sort of thing because I can't bear being

this shitty. And it's like you can justify it to yourself by being like, well, it's the game. But like after she spoke like that, for me, they became a real like they became a real community. And so later when it's like, oh my god, there were children in there that we blew up, honestly, I feel like you should have felt like this already because whether or not that children were in there, you took all of their possessions that were worth anything. That's still affecting these children.

They are still getting totally screwed by what you're choosing to do. But the truth is, it's not even about your choice. It's about the fact that you guys were pitted against each other from the beginning, which is the responsibility of the group that is in charge of this game. So you are seeing one another as the enemy here. And if you just didn't and decided that you were going to somehow manage to work together, this could maybe

go a different way. But the thing is, if you can't leave the floor with that evapora reading into like the atoms of yourself, how much can you really do? What kind of change can you possibly affect? So it's just this fucking loop, you know. So let's see, I'm

trying to find the spot here. He decides that he is going to trade some stuff for a some sort of contraption that he can ride, and eventually the only thing that they are prepared to trade for that they get very excited about is the meth from the bad Lama, which they know instantly as they taste it that it's made in the dungeon. I don't know how they can tell, but they do. And when they like, set this deal that you give us the thing, and we'll tell you

where we got it. And so once they tell them, that's when all of them go hariring off after the bad lamas saying I fucking knew it. I knew they were holding out on us because apparently they've been over there before and for some reason, and the Lumbas just didn't want to do business with them somehow. This I'm trying to find here. It is two wheels, solid and black,

made of some unknown material. The seat appeared to be an alligator's skull with white fur lining the top, giving the impression the skull was wearing an Andy warhol wig. The engine sat in the middle of the chest is thumbing a thumping. A hopper extended from the engine, opening up near the handlebars. I would have to periodically toss a lump of coal in there. What about the water? And how do I turn it off? It's a permacube, won't run out until you die of old age. You

don't turn it off. Just let it run out of coal. Toss in a lump and it'll start on its own after a minute. We don't use the lesser demons to run our steam engines like some do. This is just as good, and the baby will outlast you. He slapped the side of the bike and the handlebars fell off. I really do enjoy this, so he is able to lift it and put it in his inventory, and it has to ask about the pressure, et cetera, et cetera.

I'm sure all of this is going to come back to bite him at some point, but I'm not gonna worry about it right now. And the fucking like Lorelei has gotten high on this meth and is trying to like hook up with Carl, Donut says as amusing as I find it to watch Karl disappoint yet another woman, which is so incredibly devastating because we know that she was like around and maybe is telling me exact truth. And I don't know how he is able to shake that off so easily because I would be very, very

distracted by that line. So did we just start a metha war between the goblins and the Lamas? Yes, we did, just like I planned. It went pretty well, don't you think, just like I planned? Get the fook out of here, Donut. I would love to believe you, girly, but we all know that you are full of shit, So it's fine. So this this is when he says, we need to

loot everything and then we kill the chieftain. So what they do is put a bunch of like bombs, basically using this fun powder as they call it, on a cart that they roll into the boss room, and just as he rolls it in a huge, ugly goblin. My word, he was sitting down reading a book. Blow it, Blow it good. I jammed the button. There sure were a lot of babies in there too, Doughnut said, in the last moment before the blast. Were there really babies in there,

like goblin babies? Oh? Yes, there were a bunch of them. I only saw them for but a moment, but they were quite cute. Some of them were wearing little oversized jackets like baby Yoda. Adorable. I think you hit that one with the cart. There were old ones and pregnant ones too. Did you see your level? We're both level eight. Now you're welcome. And he is just like absolutely losing it over this. He gets all of these achievements and he's like, I do not want to click on those.

I don't even want to know, and Donut is like, I don't get it. They're fucking goblins. Why wouldn't you want to kill them? And she says, what kind of vile monster sticks babies in the boss room? M you know who? You know who? The workshop had been completely obliterated. All that was left was blackened rubble, and it looks like there is no like loot here because of how bad the damage is. We probably should have taken all of the coal from that pile, not just half of it.

We're not getting to that dead boss now. I was relieved. I wanted that map, but not as much as I didn't want to go in there. I didn't want to see the dead babies and other goblins. I felt sick thinking about it. So then chapter nineteen, New achievement, You monster, and I love this. I know you would probably telling you about this is all the children mobs who die within this dungeon don't actually perish. They're transferred to a holding area where they're safe and treated nicely and gently

until they can be reunited with their loving parents. Feel better. Good reward these past twenty seconds when your conscience started to ease, That was your reward. It was also a lie. That baby is dead, and it's dead because of you. You're totally going to hell, you've also received a bronze Assholes Box new Achievement War Criminal. You have killed more

than twenty non combatants in a single attack. Ooh grim. Yeah, there's so much here that I was like, as soon like, as soon as he starts being like, they don't actually die, I was like, the fuck they don't. Don't you start. I didn't even think that the AI was going to tell him that it wasn't a lie. I just assumed it was a lie. And then when it's like reward that twenty seconds where you felt and I was like, oh, okay,

they are just going to say it okay. So they continue fighting these weird Ravioli things, and then they find another safe room and there's three million, five hundred thousand and ninety four left, so it's like dropped by four hundred and ten thousand people since or yeah, since the last time they checked. So there are cookies and doughnut eats. One and gets a plus nine to eight being parted with her. I received the other point two experience. So this is a little clue that I didn't pick up

on later on. I knew it was significant when he pointed it out, but I didn't get why, and then when he explains it, I was like, oh, duh, okay, yeah. So they have about six hours until the next episode, and he is getting some skill upgrades regarding handling explosives and getting more information when he picks things up, and

I love that. Eventually, Donut gets an award that involves a tattoo, and she's just like, this is a disqualifying mark, and I'm like, girl, there is nothing to qualify for anymore. She really just seems to think that this is like an interlude and she's going back to her own life, Sweetie and Desperado pass. Holding a Desperado Pass negates the ability to obtain a Vanquisher pass. That was it. It didn't explain anything about what the hell that meant and

enchanted Fay scale quadruped crupper of the fleet. Is that a fucking mouthful by the gods? Plus two to dexterity. It was my turn. I also received a ton of crap potions dyning in my lighter, smoke bombs, a couple more scrolls of confusing fog. I received no pants or shoes. I got the exact same items from the two asshole boxes, though my tattoo appeared on my goddamn neck. I couldn't even see it, but it burned as it was magically applied. It's a dagger dripping blood. Donut said, my word, it is?

It is it ghastly And I have to mention that, like he receives no pants or shoes, and this is sort of reminding me again of the algorithm thing for earlier, where it's like you don't necessarily pick a thing, but it becomes like what you're known for, because that's how it goes viral. I wouldn't be surprised if Dungeon Crawler Carl, like the whole series, he just hasn't got pants because now he's the no pants guy. That's what people know

him for. Like not that they they haven't started that part at where people are watching him obviously, but like I think that is how it's going to go for him, and it's going to be bad for his brand at a certain point to get shoes or to get pants or something. And that's exactly what it's like. You fall into something in the algorithm, and this is what you

do now. This is your life now, even though you had no interest and didn't want it, it's what people were like connecting with for some reason that day, and now this is there's just no going back on it. So they go and take a nap. She's purring up against him and he gets woken by the next episode day two, and I love this donut has to go take a pee, so she leaves, and then as she comes running back in, she says, he's in the bathroom, the women's bathroom. The killer, the guy who killed Rebecca.

W How surely I would have noticed it the moment I woke up. I'd gotten used to keeping one eye on the map. I was always looking out for others. Crawler Frank Q. That was him, all right, come on, I said. I pushed my way toward the side hallway. We met in the hall, the man stepping out of the restroom, smiling apologetically. We came to a stop just a few feet away from one another. And description of him sounds like a fucking cop. The he had three skulls.

I knew exactly what the skulls were going to indicate before I focused on them. Crawler killer times three. I suddenly felt very cold. Sorry, I didn't mean to startle your cat. He had an authoritative voice. It's definitely a cop or some sort of law enforcement. They taught you to speak that way in training. This is a cat right. I thought if I slept in the bathroom, nobody could sneak up on me. I didn't realize the bathrooms in the safe areas were different than the ones out in

the hallways. As soon as he said that, I was like, one, you are a liar, and two, if you think people can sneak up on you in here, then you don't know how the safe room works. And that proves to be true later on, which brings up another interesting issue that I want to talk about in a little bit. But yeah, he like, I thought it worked like the ones out in the hallway. So clearly that's how he has been like jumping people, I think is by hiding

out in the bathroom. So Carl was right to worry about whether or not being able to see a blue spot meant that there was anybody there or not, Like, that's not necessarily going to be something that is a guaranteed way to tell. Let's see, if that was true, then we'd have been asleep when we'd arrived. So he uses his messenger to ask Donut and the thing that he has figured out how to do is use that messenger between party members without actually having to move his

hands to quote type. So this is what we find out later, something that Frank has not figured out how to do. I never saw your dot on the mini map. You don't see the icons of sleeping crawlers. Have you ever met someone outside your party sleeping in a safe room? Their bodies become translucent if you touch them, your hand moves right through them. And as soon as you said that, I was like, and why would you know that? Because

you tried to touch people who were asleep. That's interesting and not great, Like there was just a lot he says here, and then he immediately are you from Seattle? Like that's all within the one paragraph, with the transition into a whole new subject. And I think it's because he is realizing maybe if you over explain it and you you may give yourself away distract them with another thing, like the whole way that he answering questions, it's all

highly suspect. My alarm bells were going off like crazy here, so he says, it's not what it looks like with Rebecca. I didn't have a choice. I can explain it wasn't just her. There were five of them. My partner got one, I got three, and you would not believe the thing that killed the fifth guy. Can you please put down your cat? Put me down? That's not what he meant. Donnu chill. That cracked me up. So they go into the other room allegedly to watch the show. But everything

is very, very tense, so clean. The claim that Frank is making is that him and this woman worked for Customs Enforcement, which means he works for ICE. If you work for ICE, if you're listening to this, quit, If you don't want to quit, stop listening to the podcast. I don't want you. Like if you were for that organization, I don't know how you live with yourself. Like it's as simple as that. And there was this like warehouse of workers, and then when everything collapsed, it disappeared, and

there were people who had been outside. Frank and his partner identified themselves, and everyone just started shooting at each other. Oh right, A bunch of immigrants who were working in a warehouse all had guns on them, Like, what are you fucking talking about? Like it just the story makes no sense. Five of the others for reasons, he said he couldn't fathom followed them in. He went on to recount a firefight in the hallway. It's the most far fetched,

convoluted shit. It's absolutely goofy, and Dona is eating it up, like the way that she She's literally crying and talking about how like, I'm so sorry about your partner. He shrugged. I appreciate that he went up and grabbed a as soon as like, he says, I appreciate that with a shrug. I'm sort of like, I feel like you would be more emotional. And then he just goes and eats after telling this terrible story, like his whole attitude is wrong. Everything is wrong. He ate it and the plus nine

point eight XP notification dinged over his head. Again. I knew that meant something, but I wasn't getting what it just I was picking it up from other things that he was full of shit. Since you guys eluded the ones you killed, I don't suppose you have any pants that might fit me in that bag of years. Sure, if you don't mind wearing the clothes of a dead man. So I love this. Carl is explaining via text to Donut while they're talking to this guy. His suspicions and

that he is full of shit. I think there's somebody else in here waiting to jump us. So he gives Carl some pants. It's very clear from the jump that they're going to be too small. But the point isn't for him to give away something Carl can use. The point is to distract Carl while he changes so that this guy can jump him. So he thinks Carl meanwhile is using this as his ploy to get them to do their attack, so that they can defend themselves and

will not defend themselves, let the room defend them. So and he tells Donut, We're like, they're gonna jump us, and when they do, I don't want you to fight back at all, Like you've just got to trust me on this. And I remembered it being mentioned that, like you can't do shit to each other in the safe room, like that was explicitly something Mordecai told them. So these guys don't know that. And I saw the blue dot appear in the bathroom hallway just as the woman emerged

from around the corner. At the same moment, Donut leaped into the air with a panic yowl. As Frank pulled his weapon from his inva Andy and fired at the cat. The cat the woman pistol aimed directly at my head also fired. Donut landed on the table with the cookies. Carl, Carl, help, I'm here. We gotta go. We have less than two minutes, and we go to him talking to Mordecai. Monsters can't get into safe areas. What if I leave the door open? Won't they wander in? Oh, they'll wander in. Always close

the door. If it's a mob, it'll teleport away the moment it attacks you. But they'll trash the place too. What if Donut doesn't turn into a monster, but she also doesn't recognize me. She sometimes bites people she doesn't recognize. Will she teleport away? No, it's different for crawlers. There's no violence and no stealing in the safe rooms. It's a strict, ironclad rule. You get three strikes. First time, you freeze in place for about one hundred seconds, while

you get an automated lecture playing on playing nice. The second time it's for an hour. The third time you're stripped of all your gear and teleported into a mob. Nest I really want them to try this three times. I think they won't, but I would love it if they just like didn't get the fucking picture, you know. I mean, there's nothing to be gained by trying again if you get frozen once. I don't see them doing

in another time. But maybe they will. I and so like Dona is just like I don't understand how you knew. And he doesn't have time to explain to her about the whole thing with Mordecai. But yeah, so before he rushed outside, it took a precious second to examine the attributes of Maggie My, a white woman with close cropped brown hair, metallic pants and boots, a leather jacket similar to my own, though hers had both their sleeves. Maggie my level nine race human class not yet assigned. She

had five skulls next to her name. Between her and Frank, they'd killed eight people eight. They both had the ability to go completely stealth. I doubted they had been sleeping in the bathroom. They'd likely heard that explosion from earlier and tracked us to the safe room. We left a wake of dead rotstickers, a literal path of destruction. Frank had said people turned translucent when they slept. Was that true. It wasn't true for Donut, but she was in my party.

Maybe that they meant they had to sneak up on us and kill us in our sleep, but when they realized they couldn't, they'd gone to the bathroom to wait. We jumped outside and I plodded a path to the closest main artery. Why are we running? We can take them? I don't know if we can, I said. They both have guns. He's level eight, same as us, and she's nine. Getting to nine is heart, so she probably has a lot of skills. Besides, I really don't want to have one of those skull markers by my name. Even if

they have it coming everyone else. We won't know that. We'll never get anyone to talk to us. But if we don't stop them, they'll hurt somebody else. I stopped dead in the hallway. I looked at the cat. It was a very undonut like thing to say, but worse, it was the truth. So he is like really struggling with this because he's right about the skulls next to his name. I think that there would be a lot of people that eventually are going to have that because

they just couldn't help but defend themselves. So there might be some more like leeway later on, but I think early in the game it's probably a bad thing. And yet like they'll still try and get you because now you've seen their faces, you can warn other people about them if you make alliances, and if you see them, they're not going to get the drop on you again, like they kind of have to find you. Now I feel like maybe not really have to, but like they would have it out for you. It would be how

I would interpret them. I would also be doing this just as a means of like giving myself some time room to breathe. So he takes out a smoke bomb, lights the wick and then adds it to the rats inventory that he just killed, and then he goes to

pull it out and see and it remains lit. So basically what he is doing is booby trapping the rat because he knows that if they come across it and it hasn't already been looted, they'll probably just loot it automatically, because that's sort of what you do when you're playing one of these games, is you just loot everything you kill, and especially if you've got like an unlimited inventory, which skyrom you do not have, which sucks balls, but this method,

I'm really curious, like how long it's going to take before it goes off, because if they pull it out and it's lit, it says emits a stinking cloud of billowing multicolor smoke that lasts for three minutes before dispersing. I don't know if like there's nothing about how long it actually takes to go off. Discharge imminent thirty four

out of one hundred. Oh okay, so thirty four seconds left, right, that's what that means out of one hundred, Like it takes one hundred from when you light it and there's only thirty four remaining I'm assuming, which I kind of want him to take it out and let it go

until it's five and then put it back. I really feel like we want it as close as possible because I can't help but think that Frank and Meg are suspicious types and that if they see you guys went through here and you didn't loot this corpse, they're going to feel like something is up and they'll throw this and they won't be injured by it. Oh sorry, they're saying durability, I think not time Rob says to build. Oh, okay,

so then that wouldn't matter, all right. Well, I stand by the fact that I wanted him to like hold this until the very last second and then put it in. But and he's also really unclear on whether or not this is going to do to give him that skull next to his name after all, because this is a very passive way to kill them, but it's still sort of what he's intending. Is the game going to recognize that or not? And I also like, what if it only kills one of them, then they're going to have

to know it was you. And I thought they had to come after you before, but I feel like after that they really have like a grudge. So I get doing it this way, and I don't think it's a bad idea, but I'm just really not sure if it's enough, you know, I don't know. And so this is when Dona asks him, how did you know he was lying? His whole story was bullshit. That Rebecca woman was a level three. He said they'd gotten into the firefight right away,

but that couldn't be true. She had that Apple coret in her inventory that meant she'd gone to a tutorial guild and gotten her inventory turned on and then he ate that cookie and I saw he received nine point eight experience instead of ten, which meant he was in a party with someone someone alive. Also, he had his arm draped over the chair and I could see he was twitching his finger. He was typing into the chat. He hadn't figured out how to just use it with

his brain. So I really loved the mention too of Rebecca and her level, because I didn't remember that, but that also would have been a clear giveaway. And just like the fact too that the woman was Asian, and so he decides that he's going to go into this whole thing with her having been like an immigrant working in a factory. Like it's just such a fucking racist

approach to the story and everything. Just you know, I'm really really kind of eager to see them again, just because I want them to be taken care of, and I have a feeling that we're going to be dealing with them for a minute. I hate it. Uh, how is it that you're James Bond when it comes to strangers, But miss Beatrice could date three different guys at once, and you had no idea three different guys. Well, you were one of them. So two I guess. Then again,

it's three if you count Angel's owner. This account is cheating when it's with another woman. There's so many human nuances I don't understand. I love it. His girlfriend was throwing it at everybody and he fucking had no idea. Oh Carl, sweetie, I really hope that you got a SDD checked recently because that shit yoicks. You were always watching those videos on your iPad with the two women rolling around and cleaning each other. Yeah, that's they were doing.

Oh god. So I have a couple of announcements. First off, we want to assure everyone we have quashed all the bugs with the new toilets. Both the exploding issue and the unfortunate section issue with some of the units have been resolved. There's absolutely no need to be afraid of them. Those of you who have been using the hallway to relieve yourselves please stop. We don't want to have to

start using punitive measures. A couple additional patch notes, We've already added support for the languages that we're missing from our library. So those of you who are hearing this and finally understanding what we're saying, for the first time. Welcome. You'll figure the rest out, I'm sure. Also with the languages, we have implemented full cross support for native speech, so now men are and speakers will understand English speakers and

so forth. The Pharaoh rabies d buff is now curable with a health potion or a spell, and the contagion is no longer airborne. Sorry about that. New Zealand, we have removed the blender Fiend mobs. The mob's difficulty level appear to be too high. Their collective gets stronger each time they blend, and after working their way through a group of fifteen thousand crawlers in a single day, we've been forced to take actions to prevent a premature extinction.

Event rest assured they will be reintroduced on a lower floor. The street Preacher neighborhood boss has been upgraded to a burrow boss. In addition, we have tweaked the strength levels of a few different other mobs, too many to mention here, so just be aware of that. One last note, a lot of crawlers are heading into the stairways prematurely. Again, it's your choice, but it's probably best for you to get as much experience as you can, and just so you know for later, we won't feature you on the

recap episode if viewers can't tunnel into your feed. So if you hit the stairs three or forties before a collapse, you are going to miss out. That's it for now. Keep up the good work and kill kill, Kill. So this is something that I really want to address. We're at the end of the chapter here, they get on the bike and they start to drive away. But I think it's really purposeful that this author decides everybody's tutorial time was like maybe pretty different from one another's, and

people are working with a different amount of knowledge. Mordecai has given our people enough that they know they cannot be attacked in the safe room, and so they can almost use it as a weapon against people who don't know that. If you are given a tutorial and somebody doesn't include information or you don't think to ask, this is actually what it can be like playing a real video game, because there are so many things that they

don't give you instructions on how to use. You have to figure it out, or you can go to Reddit, or you can go to the wiki for the game, or you can there's tons of resources out there for finding the answers, but not everybody plays that way or knows that they're that information is out there. If there are people who like aren't as tech savvy, it doesn't occur to them. So there are so many ways that you can like have advantages over other players without actually

intending to. It wasn't like you were trying to put them at a disadvantage. But you went to a wiki and you read up on a whole history of a certain thing and how it gets used later, and so now you know, if I get so much of this thing, I should keep it because I need that for like

a really important potion. And they take forever to gather later, so I don't want to give them away when somebody else doesn't know that, And so they give theirs away because they're worth a lot of money, so they sell them, and then later on those things are like crucial and now they have to fucking find them again, and it's like a total pain in the ass and hours of play to go back into the game to do that.

So what I keep thinking about is just how much this is like life, because we don't all get the same kinds of tutoring when we are young. We don't all have parents who have the same levels of knowledge. We don't all have parents who have the time to be as involved with us as others are. We don't have parents who for me, Like, my father didn't speak English and that was a huge hindrance for me. My

mother had never graduated high school. I was in a situation growing up where my parents were trying to do the best for me because they knew their situations were bad, but they didn't know what they didn't know. So they were doing their best, but there was a lot that they missed because they just weren't given that themselves as children, and weren't. My mom had me when she was seventeen years old, she got pregnant, so I like was born to a fucking child and she did her fucking best,

God bless her. But like, it's a totally different way of growing up if you have parents who are settled and have stable jobs and have their own like stable parents growing up, it's a totally different experience, and it's really mimicking that in some ways. Everybody comes in here in a different way. He came in from the cold with almost no clothing on, so he's at this weird disadvantage just because of how the weather happened to be

that night. And then there are other people who are in a crowd and they get trampled just circumstantially because of how many people were out at the same time. And then this whole thing about all of the patches. I don't know whether or not players who are killed because of a fuck up in the coating if they can bring them back, because they clearly can do a

lot with transforming you in this game. But I'm assuming this early on that you're not getting brought back if you are killed because of one of their fuck ups. That just sucks for you. And yet again, another thing they try and give you the illusion that you have control in the game. We're giving you tools, we're giving you instructions, you have this many goals, you know, like all of this stuff. We're telling you how to play.

But then there's a million weird, fucked up problems in the code itself that they are aware of, and they're letting people play and just die anyway. They're fixing them, but like people are dying in the meantime and it's not like they're getting a second chance. It just sucks for them. That's just their bad luck and they you know, again, that's how it goes. We are told that we have the tools and control to do, but then life just

fucking hits you sometimes. You know. I am like my husband, he got COVID and is like his whole brain chemistry changed and he is like a different person now than he was and he's learning to cope and his energy levels are finally improving. But it's been like three years since got it and he's just starting to feel slightly better.

That was not something he had control over because we had a pandemic and we didn't fucking do anything about it, not really, And you know, like this shit just happens the whole like, oh, well, we've made it so that you can now like cure yourselves of this rabies thing. Sorry it's not airborne anymore. I'm just saying all of this is a really, really good metaphor, and I wonder

how many people reading this really get it. Like I'm not trying to be condescending when I say that I'm but my concern is so much of the time, you guys, know, there will be properties that have the most in my opinion, overt narratives of like this is clearly an analogy for this and this is a metaphor for this thing, and then people will just not get it at all, even though they loved the series, bring up how it's like this thing that's happening in current events, and they're like, what,

oh my god, why do you have to bring politics into this game, into this movie. And it's like, that's literally what it's about. What do you mean? So I am very very interested in like seeing if there are people out there who love this series and then get like mad about the woke mob coming in. But obviously for me, this is like my entire jam. This is what I love, So I'm into it. So oh sorry. Rob says, I wonder if Natasha ever listens to her own takes once she's caught up on a series. No,

I have not. I never have, because if she doesn't, she ought to. It's so fun to have knowledge of what happens, and she is so clever. Oh thanks. Rom. Michael says they could absolutely make the game non lethal and still be fun to watch. People love watching Twitch streamers, and the viewing interface here is way better, but it is easier and provides more drama to let them die? Why spend more money. True Dance says the critique of

capitalism is kind of the main theme of Dungeon Crawler. Carl, Yeah, I'm getting this sense, and Michael says, I don't think this is an accident by Matt. I'm pretty sure he put as much thought into the politics that can be interpreted from reading the series as you are getting out of it. Yeah, I really like this can't And again, the way that everybody he talks to when he's like, hey, so are like when do you get out of here? Or like how does this work? And there's always sort

of like eventually, I'll you know. He talks to Tilly at one point, and I feel like I kind of like skipped over that. But Tilly also describes how he wasn't a player in the game, that that's not how it is for everybody. Sometimes there are people who are like told that we won't mind your planet if you come with us and work for us, and so that's what he did. I'm trying to find the Oh, yeah,

I don't like this. Last season's version of the game, they break the people into groups, tell them their loved ones will be safe if they kill others. Then everyone kills each other. They are safe, but they are not safe. Is better dead? Squim SAPs the planet dry. It leaves planet moves on, no more atmosphere. People live after the big fight, but they don't live, not really born. At least gives people a chance. Tally's people had a chance, and sometimes they come and offer to take people in

exchange for not mining world. They came and I went, this was very long ago. He says, this is very long ago. Mordecai said, like, that was a really, really really long time ago. At one point, it seems pretty clear to me that whatever agreement they're signing up for, it's not like the timing of it isn't human time, which just is very troubling. I don't care about that. So Dan says, are you listening to the audiobook or the audio drama version? Oh, the audiobook for sure. The

audio drama. I don't really love audio dramas. I totally understand their appeal, but they often feel just kind of goofy to me, you know, But this does seem like a good series to do that with. So if it were free for me to like, maybe they have a sample of it on audible. I don't listened to it just for the fun. Oh, Michael says, the audio drama is a lot more expensive, and I don't recommend it to anyone until they actually get into the series. They

are goofy, but that's part of the fun. Well, and with this, I think maybe the goofy would work for it. But there was one that I listened to a while ago that was meant to be kind of like a serious procedural detective thing, and it really just didn't fit like the tone of what they were trying to do. But this I think it might work anyway. Oh my god, I'm so far over time. I really have to rep bump.

But I'm really enjoying this book so far, looking forward to listening to more of it with my husband also. And it was lovely to have y'all in the chat with me. Appreciate you all, Dan, Michael and Rob. Lovely to have you. And if you're listening and you're enjoying the coverage, I appreciate you. And don't like think about

going over to patreon dot com slash unspoiled. You don't have to pay any money, but you can become a free patron, like I was saying, earlier and support me that way, and just like you know, it's helpful for me. It's just something you can do for creators across the board now, is just get on there sort of like feed by going and being a free Patreon member if they offer that, and it's just a way that they can get eyes on their work without having to depend

on a algorithm to hopefully show you things. So just to thought, all right, everybody, thank you again and until next time to the loom motherfuckers. That was an unspoiled network pat