“You should sing something from Creedence Clearwater Revival. It’s Elle’s late husband’s favorite band,” Linus called from under the table. “She had several of their albums in her room at Meadow Lark.”

“Shut the hell up,” Elle snapped, sounding genuinely angry for the first time.

“That’s the wrong decade anyway,” Louis added. “You should do a Misfits song. Or something by Anthrax.”

This started a whole conversation about songs from the 80s.

I moved to the opposite end of the table, leaving them to their conversation. I was happy, if just for a moment, for everyone to pretend this was a regular outing at a regular bar.

Prepotente slid down to my end of the table and sat across from me. He was looking down at his drink. He let out a strange little bleat.

“You doing okay, buddy?” I asked.

“I find myself having a conundrum. I am in need of advice.”

Donut, who’d been in the midst of the music discussion, was suddenly right there.

Donut put a paw on his hand. “You can ask us anything. Right, Carl?”

“Yeah, sure,” I said.

Prepotente looked down at the paw for a long moment before he retracted his hand and then pulled something from his inventory. He placed it on the table.

It was a glowing, familiar little item.

An enhanced pet biscuit. The same item that both Prepotente and Donut—and Bianca—had taken to turn from regular animals to how they now were. According to Mordecai, if a pet took one of these, there were over a hundred different possibilities of what could happen. Some good and some bad.

I didn’t know the details, but Miriam Dom had entered the dungeon with a whole herd of goats, and she had received several of these pet biscuits, but they’d stopped using them after there was a bad a result. One of the goats had killed several of the others. Prepotente still had multiple regular goats in pet carriers in his inventory, but it wasn’t clear exactly how many. Miriam told me ten, but Prepotente was deliberately evasive when we asked him about it.

“I received this one in a celestial box,” he said. “There were three of them. They are different than the run-of-the-mill enhanced pet biscuit. Each one is slightly different. One is called ‘Nothing Special Party Companion,’ one is just called ‘Nothing Special,’ and there’s this one.”

I tentatively picked the crumbly little treat up. I remembered the first time I’d held one of these, the description had been pretty short. That wasn’t the case this time.

Enriched Pet Biscuit. “The Paramour.”

This is a unique item.

Okay, so we all know by now what enhanced pet biscuits do.

While extremely valuable, enhanced pet biscuits are items that leave the result up to chance, and when you feed your pet one, there’s a very real risk you’ll be saying goodbye to your furry friend forever. Or they’ll be saying goodbye to you.

Princess Donut is the lucky result of a pet biscuit that gave her the “Enhanced Growth” benefit. Prepotente is one that received the “Smarty-Pants” benefit. Both of these are results under the Party Companion subtree of the result list with Donut under tree path one and Prepotente under tree path two. Bianca received the “Hellspawn Familiar” benefit, which is under the Pet subtree. These are all considered good results.

This is an Enriched Pet Biscuit. This leaves nothing to chance. These are highly refined pet biscuits with a known result.

This biscuit imparts the “Paramour” benefit. This is a subset of the Party Companion tree. It will have the following effects on any pet or animal-class mob who consumes it:

Non-sapient pets will have their Intelligence and Wisdom* stat raised to at least 3 and then additionally enhanced to be commensurate with their original form.

Their level will be reset to level 1.

Dungeon-born pets will be given a crawler number and assigned crawler status.

The former pet will be required to find a safe room and choose a class if this is consumed after the third floor begins.

The pet will be given a subtree two-B transformation. This will result in a physical transformation to an oxygen-breathing, upright form. The resulting height will be within 1 and 2.5 meters with a mass proportional with their new form. Winged creatures will retain wings but will no longer have the ability to naturally fly. Blah, blah, blah. You know, basically a cat girl. A mascot. A furry depending on what their original form was. This is what happened to Prepotente, while Donut, who was under subtree one, remained wholly a cat.

The pet will be given the Paramour benefit. They will receive a permanent, incurable* charm that will make them fall hopelessly in love with the entity who fed them the biscuit.

“Oh wow,” I said, sliding the biscuit over to Donut, whose eyes went huge when she read it.

“What do the other two do?” Donut asked.

“The ‘Nothing Special’ one is under the pet subtree. This will transform a creature into a dungeon pet, allowing it to gain levels and skills and spells and utilize upgrades. It will revert them to juvenile form. It’s the most basic of all the pet biscuits. The ‘Nothing Special Party Companion’ is similar to the Paramour benefit, but it is under the first subtree of the party companion, meaning they will stay in their existing form. It is the same thing that happened to you, minus the enhanced growth. And the anatomy won’t change at all, meaning they won’t gain the ability to talk.”

“And minus the mind-control-sex-slave part,” Donut said. She slid the biscuit back toward Prepotente.

“What sort of advice do you need?” I asked, leaning back in my chair, afraid of his answer.

“So . . .” Prepotente said. “Her name is Ragazzaccia, and before the dungeon began, she was⁠—”

“Absolutely not,” Donut said. “You will not be turning anyone into a sex slave, Prepotente. How is this even a conversation? My goodness.”

Prepotente wrung his hands. “But with the other two biscuits, she would remain in regular goat form, and it would be weird. She was my girlfriend before the dungeon started, so it’s not like . . .” He trailed off, looking down at the table. “I’m so lonely.”

Donut sighed. “Prepotente, darling, I know you miss your friends. But you can’t do it this way. It’s not right. Even if it didn’t have the sex-slave benefit⁠—”

“It is not called that. It is called Paramour.”

“Even if it didn’t have the sex-slave benefit, think about what you’d be doing. She’d become a crawler, meaning she’d be stuck with us, and it says she’ll be level 1! She won’t be allowed to stay in a pet carrier or in your safe room. She’ll get hurt. I would never allow Mongo to take such a thing. Not now that we’re so far into the dungeon. It’s just too dangerous.”

He sat there, not saying anything. “You’re right, of course,” he said. “It is too late. I . . . I don’t have anybody to ask these things. Sometimes I imagine my mother and me having these conversations. But sometimes I don’t know. Your benefit came with an enhanced memory that allowed you to remember all those conversations and television shows, and you know how people are supposed to act. I don’t have that. Mother was teaching me, but . . .”

“Please listen to me,” Donut said. “Nobody will like you if you use that pet biscuit on anything. Can you imagine if that’s what had happened to me? Do you really think I could be a proper girlfriend for Carl? It’s a crime against nature. Don’t use it. Ever. Ever, ever, ever. It’s a terrible idea. Right, Carl?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m still caught up on that one biscuit that makes it so your pet doesn’t talk. Do you think it’s too late for me to give it to Donut?”

“That’s not funny, Carl. This is serious. The next time you have a question, you can always ask me. I am an expert when it comes to things like this. If you wish, I can compile a list of rules to live by to help you get by. Rule number one will be ‘Don’t use magic to make someone fall in love with you.’ It’s creepy.”

“But you have that Love Vampire skill. That makes mobs literally fall in love with and die for you. Your entire build is charisma and charm based.”

“That’s different. Rule number two is to stop arguing with me. Now, listen. We will talk every day, and you can ask me any questions you have. Do you understand?”

“Yes. Of course. Of course. Thank you, Donut.”

Jurgen finally returned to the table, his arm full of drinks. “What did I miss?”