Welcome, Crawler. Welcome to the Eleventh floor

Time to Level Collapse: 3 hours, 15 minutes.

Views, Followers, Favorites: Do you really care about this anymore? It’s everybody. Literally everybody.

Leaderboard Rank: Per this season’s rule set, the leaderboard is suspended once less than 30 crawlers remain on the battlefield. It hurts the feelings of those not on the list.

Your Final Ranking: 2

Bounty: The bounty system is no longer active.

Remaining Crawlers: 23

Entering Parade Float Staging Area.

Warning: The safe room rules of this area have changed. This area is now considered a safe room.

I landed back in our garage, still reeling from my short, bizarre meeting with Quasar. He’d been harried and refused to tell me what was going on. He showed me the paperwork showing the one and only offered deal. It was basically freedom after a single season.

But then he’d said he wouldn’t trust it, but he would understand if I took it. He also said he’d just received notification that there wouldn’t be an offered exit at the end of the eleventh, but there would be at the start of the twelfth. And then he added, “I wouldn’t trust that, either.”

He’d been visibly shaking, distracted. I’d asked him what was going on, but he refused to answer. I told him I wasn’t going to take a deal, and he’d fled the meeting. The whole exchange had taken maybe three minutes, and it left me deeply concerned for his well-being.

But then I saw that number, and I sobered.

Twenty-three crawlers. We were entering the eleventh floor with twenty-three crawlers.

Holy shit. So many had died on the previous floor.

I still didn’t have a player-killer skull. I was pretty sure I was the only one left who didn’t.

Donut suddenly appeared, zapping into existence next to me.

“Carl, Carl!” she cried, running in circles. “Your psychotic wife tried to make me take a deal! She said the deal was so good that she was accepting it for me, and I said no, and she said she had accepted it anyway and all this stuff popped up, but then she got some notification that made her scared, and she went away. The whole thing took, like, two seconds! It was really weird!” She paused, panting. “Oh, thank goodness. You’re not a dog anymore.”

I scratched my junk. I still had an overwhelming urge to lick myself. I’d made sure the Eye of the Bedlam Bride had returned to its proper place. It had.

She gasped. “Number three? I ended as number three on the leaderboard? It doesn’t even say who number one is! Carl, was it you?”

“No. I was number two.”

“What? Who is it? Do you think it’s Prepotente? This isn’t fair!”

She gasped again.

Donut: MORDECAI! HELP ME PICK A CLASS!

Mordecai: Okay, Donut. Welcome to the eleventh floor. I don’t think I’m going to be much help to you guys. At least not physically. But I can still talk via chat.

Donut: WHY? WHAT DID YOU TURN INTO?

Mordecai: I’m an animistic spirit.

Donut: A what? They made you a racist? Really, Mordecai. I don’t think the dungeon chooses how you feel about things.

Mordecai: Animistic, Donut. Not anti-Semitic. I have a non-corporeal form that occupies physical objects. It’s not the first time I’ve been one of these things. Now, let’s take a look at your classes.

The garage had gotten huge. The truck sat there, looking as if it had already been perfectly repaired, not that we’d received much damage in that final heat. The next slot over sat the One Fine Pig APV, and after that, Onikuma the bear snuffled on the ground. And after that stood Old Shuck, the large black wolf dog thing that had been the mount to the Jugglers. His ears were pinned to his head, tail between his legs, shivering.

And then I saw the two gremlins. Hedy and another one I didn’t know. The other one was rubbing the giant dog’s leg while he talked to Hedy. She saw me staring and waved.

Imani: Everybody, check in. Elle and I are here.

Prepotente: I am here with Jurgen.

Florin: I am with Lucia.

More messages came in, but I was struck with how many weren’t here.

Twenty-three crawlers. I sighed.

So many had died, but by this point, thousands had taken deals. And hundreds were at the Pineapple Cabaret working on their escape.

At least the tenth floor was done. What a goddamned shit show that had been.

Donut: THESE ARE ALL OVER-THE-TOP. SOUL-STRUCK FLESH RIPPER SOUNDS REALLY SCARY, BUT IT ISN’T REALLY GROUNDED. I NEED SOMETHING THE POSSE WILL CONNECT WITH. ALL THE ONES IN THE SECOND TAB ARE THE SAME AS LAST TIME. THAT’S NO FUN.

She gasped.

Donut: MORDECAI! LOOK AT THIS! COMEBACK KID! IT SAYS IT COMES WITH A MOVIE DEAL IF I GET OUT OF THE DUNGEON. IT’S A BARD AND MAGE COMBO!

Mordecai: I see it. Let me read it.

I moved to the truck. The Donut pedal system remained installed in the driver’s seat.

“Dr. Metcalf,” I called as I moved into the back, “are you still with us?”

“I’m here, Carl,” she responded. But when she talked, she simply talked. It didn’t pop up in my interface like an AI notification.

I opened one of the cabinets containing pots and pans.

Warning: Your vehicle’s rule set from the 10th floor is no longer active. Consumables will no longer be magically refreshed. All damage must be manually repaired.

“Good,” I said out loud. I moved to the freezer, and I removed all the frozen bags of French fries and tater tots. I also removed the buns from the cabinets, as they had potatoes in the ingredients list. I waited a moment, and they didn’t return.

I felt a quick pang of guilt, suddenly thinking of the beer car bomb.

Mordecai: Okay, so it’s pretty good. Basically, you get all the skills of all your previous iterations but leveled up significantly. The catch is, you get the negative effects as well.

Carl: Absolutely not. Her Glass Cannon class alone makes this a bad idea. Wouldn’t that jack her constitution?

Mordecai: Maybe. I’d have to research it, and we don’t have time. How about this one? Elite Gurkha Warrior. Warrior-melee focus with a Perpetual Tank subclass.

Donut: THAT SOUNDS LIKE A TYPE OF PICKLE.

“The Gurkhas were some of the most badass warriors in history,” I said out loud to Donut. “They’re from Nepal.”

Mordecai: It comes with extra skills for all pets and hired mercenaries. Mongo would get a pretty impressive upgrade for his claws. Your melee skills would take a big boost, and your Cockroach skill would be boosted to level 15.

Carl: She’s going to pick that one.

Donut: YOU’RE JUST LIKE YOUR WIFE. I DECIDE, NOT YOU. ESPECIALLY IF YOU’RE INSISTING ON LEAVING THE PARTY.

Mordecai: You might not need to if you pick this class.

Donut looked at me with a hopeful expression.

I sighed. That reminded me. I needed to sew that patch onto my jacket.

Carl: I’m still leaving the party.

She harrumphed.

Donut: OKAY, I’M CHOOSING THE PICKLE CLASS ANYWAY, EVEN IF CARL IS BEING STUBBORN.

I stepped from the truck, and I pulled Rend from my inventory.

I’d grabbed him and Penny just before the previous race and shoved them into pet carriers. Rend appeared, grunted, and tried to push past me to get into the back of the truck. Donut was still in the chat with Mordecai, but she also released Mongo, who let out a screech and started jumping all around Rend, who giggled with excitement. Both acted like they hadn’t seen each other in months.

And then they both noticed the bear and the dog, who were now watching them.

Mongo let out a growl.

“It’s okay,” I said. “They’re friends.”

Mongo let out his happy oh-boy-new-friends shriek, and he started bounding toward them.

“Be careful!” Donut called. “Hedy, new gremlin guy! Make sure the stupid dog doesn’t hurt Mongo!”

“Okay,” I said. “We’re here. Now what?”

The announcement came. It wasn’t Cascadia, or Zev, or Damien. Or the AI.

It was Chaco.

Oh, hey, crawlers. Your boy Chaco here.

Mordecai: What the fuck?

Okay, so I have just been voluntold by the AI to be the Grand Master of the parade. I’m, like, really confused about what’s happening. I just know what I’ve been told. You should now have a timer in your interface, and it’ll start counting down at the end of this message. You will have ninety minutes to build your parade float procession. You may have more than one float. You may make your procession as long as you wish. There are twenty-three of you left, and when this message ends, your garage will be combined with those of one or two more teams. There will be five parade float groups. Each group is given a different theme.

The parade route is three kilometers long. You will be flanked by spectators along the route. They will not be able to attack you.

“What the hell?” I muttered.

There will be a narrative element to the parade. Near the end of the route, you will pass the judging stands, and if you have any performance, this is where it should commence. Soon thereafter, the progression ends at an arena. This arena represents the crawl itself, and that’s when you’ll be able to finally fight.

You will enter the arena, and it will be populated with monsters you previously killed on the tenth level or their stand-ins, along with a floor boss. You defeat the floor boss, and the stairwell opens.

Simple. I guess. Yeah, I don’t really understand it, either. So I guess I’ll see you guys in ninety minutes.

The speaker blared a bit of feedback, but we could still hear Chaco for a few seconds.

“Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, I’m gonna fucking die. I’m gonna die.”

Mordecai: I hope you do, you coward murderer.

A moment passed, and then the entire room flashed. It was suddenly much bigger. There was another flash. Then three vehicles appeared in the room: an ice-cream truck, one of those trucks with stairs from the airport, and a battered Toyota Tundra. And at the end of the line stood multiple gremlins, a small group of mostly human engineers, and Sweety the giant tapir. Prepotente and Jurgen were there as well.

The three extra vehicles were all from Prepotente looting garages.

Bianca let out a roar at the intrusion. Onikuma the bear roared back, and Bianca started chittering ominously. Mongo let out a screech and started rushing toward the newcomers, Rend following and giggling.

“Carl, I am in charge of designing the parade float,” Donut whispered as we walked to meet the other crawlers. “Don’t let Prepotente design anything. Also, I know we’re running low on time, but I need to get my spell book of the floor prize. I got robbed when we skipped the seventh floor, and I’m not going to let that happen again.”

Y-y-you have been assigned float procession five. You have received your theme for the parade. Your theme is “Vengeance.” You have ninety minutes to complete your float procession. You may use anything in the garage, inventory, or safe room.

Make it pretty. This is a celebration, after all.

“Vengeance?” Donut asked, scoffing. “How do we design a vengeance theme? What does that even mean? Hmmm. I guess that’s like revenge, right? It’s too bad we don’t have Katia or Juice box. I could have them do a Blair, and you could play Nate. But I don’t know how I’d put it on a parade float.”

“What?” I asked. “Who?”

“After Chuck sold Blair to his uncle Jack for a hotel, Blair slept with Nate as revenge. It was one of the most pivotal moments in the history of television, Carl.”

“I don’t think the aliens will care about something that happened on Gilmore Girls.”

“Oh my god, Carl. Gilmore Girls? Really?”

“That’s the show with the hotel, right? Anyway, revenge and vengeance aren’t the same thing.”

Donut scoffed a second time. “What’s the difference?”

Zev: Well, I think it’s a fantastic idea. And just as an FYI, both Gilmore and Gossip have been taking the net by storm over the past few weeks. Odette’s husband of all people was the first to buy the rights to every show Donut has ever mentioned. It’s probably the only thing keeping the orcs solvent right now.

Donut: OMG, HI, ZEV! HOW ARE YOU?

Zev: Terrified, but I’m okay. I’m messaging with a question from Orren. He’s blocked from sending messages for some reason. He wants to know if Carl made his choices yet because we didn’t see you make a choice.

Carl: It says I can wait to make them, so I’m waiting.

Zev: Okay. Weird. Thanks, Carl.

Old Shuck, the black dog, was now straining, trying to get at Bianca, wagging his tail. I hadn’t realized until just that moment that the biological mounts were stuck in place in their spots.

“Carl, did Zev just say Odette’s husband is an orc?”

“He’s not an orc,” Rosetta said, suddenly appearing in the garage. “He’s a Crest. He’s one of those rich investor trillionaire guys that’s rarely in the news but always has his thumb in everything. He’s the only reason the orc economy doesn’t collapse in on itself.”

“That’s what Zev just said!”

“His name is Harry Tisch. He lives in the Skull Empire system because we wanted to arrest him for tax fraud, but Rust used his council veto to drop the extradition request. The orcs always extend safe harbor to financial criminals in exchange for investment funds. So 33% of everything he earns goes to the orcs. But in recent years, he’s been slowly, slowly turning it around on the orcs and has been ingraining himself even deeper into their empire, buying lots and lots of stock. He’s very smart when it comes to investments. That’s how he met Odette in the first place. He bought her warrant.”

“Wait,” Donut said. “So when you, uh, looted, that money from King Rust, you were stealing from Odette?”

“No,” Rosetta said. “They keep everything separate. Odette is not a fan of the Skull Empire. If anything, my reclamation action gave her husband the ability to capture more stock because the survivors will have to unload assets to make up for the loss. I’ve studied their finances for years, and I still don’t understand it all. All I know is that his tendrils are everywhere. And I know Odette herself has very little to do with it, at least on the surface. She has her own empire going.” And then she added, “That’s the problem with hitting the elites financially. Every time you hurt one, all it does is make another richer. That won’t stop until the baskets overflow with their godsdamned heads.”

Elle: Who did you get stuck with? We have those three Chinese guys whose names I can’t pronounce. We’re spot number three, and our theme is “Betrayal.”

Donut: WE HAVE VENGEANCE, AND CARL SAYS THAT ISN’T THE SAME THING AS REVENGE. WE’RE WITH PREPOTENTE AND JURGEN. I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT WE’RE GOING TO DO. I WISH WE HAD BETRAYAL. THAT ONE IS EASY.

Florin: We’re in spot number one. Our theme is “Resolution.” I’m not even sure what that means. We have Ajib’s crew with us.

It turned out, the five float themes were Resolution, Decision, Betrayal, Destruction, and Vengeance.

“I’m glad we didn’t get Decision,” Donut said. “I think that’s the worst one. What’re they gonna do? Put up a giant menu? Or maybe like a voting ballot? Hmm. Wouldn’t want to get too political. They really should’ve given you the Destruction one, honestly. You could just detonate a bomb onstage. Carl, do you know what any of this is about? These are not normal themes. I just assumed these were going to be floats like they do on Thanksgiving.” She gasped. “A balloon! Don’t we have that airplane Florin stole during Faction Wars? We were going to give it to Louis!”

“Actually,” I said, “we do. Louis transferred ownership of the hangar to Imani, but the plane itself is owned by Florin, I think. I’ll message him the idea. It’s a troop transport.”

“Carl, Donut,” Prepotente said as he and Jurgen approached. Behind him, Mongo was sniffing at Bianca’s butt as she bristled. Rend returned to Onikuma the bear and was running in circles around him. “I do not know what is happening with this level, but I do have some ideas for our parade progression. Obviously, we will be joining battle as soon as this first portion of the parade ends, but with Carl’s plan, there will be gods fighting in this arena, and we do not know the size of this place. Therefore, they may arrive huge. I suggest we quickly design⁠—”

“We need papier-mâché!” Donut suddenly exclaimed, waving her paws. “You! Gremlins, engineer guys, come here this instant! Raise your hand if you know how to make an origami flower!”

A gremlin from Prepotente’s garage named Ricken raised his hand tentatively.

“We do not have time for papier-mâché,” Prepotente said. “Donut, if you want flowers, don’t you have several druid spells? Certainly, you can make real ones bloom.”

Donut gasped.