Dungeon Crawler Carl (Dungeon Crawler Carl, #1)

by Matt Dinniman

Every interior of your world has been crushed and all raw materials—organic and inanimate—are in the process of being mined for the requested elements.

New achievement! Why aren’t you wearing pants? You entered the dungeon wearing no pants. Dude. Seriously? Reward: You’ve received a Gold Apparel Box!

I’m on an intergalactic game show, and I have to be an obnoxious showoff in order to get eyes on me. And once I do have eyes on me, I might get a loot box with toilet paper in it. Does that about sum it up?” Mordecai clapped his rat hands. “Yes! But toilet paper is complimentary. Restrooms are liberally populated throughout the map. It’s the only place the viewer cameras can’t follow you.”

“In addition to the mining income we already discussed, the Borant Corporation receives advertising dollars, a stipend from the Syndicate government, and a commission on every credit spent by patrons.”

“Also, it should be noted that every time a crawler mentions the name of either the interstellar government or the organization sponsoring the current crawl, the system AI will record the interaction for review. If it is found a crawler is disparaging either of these two entities, especially while on-camera with live viewers, the crawler’s experience may be ‘accelerated.’”

Healing was sped up in the dungeon. I had recently been cured of several issues I didn’t even know I had, like abrasions at the bottom of my feet and on my hands, frostbite, and the start of an infection from when Donut had bit me.

Mordecai had me change the view to skills I did have, and that list was just as long. I had things like Breathing: 3. Walking: 4. Operating a Sony Brand RMVLZ620 Universal Remote Control: 1.

Ten million people. It was more than I expected. But still, three million additional people dead in a matter of minutes. The number was so huge, it lost meaning.

You really need to be careful once you start collecting followers. They know they’re sadistic assholes, but they don’t want you saying it on camera. They take their image quite seriously.”

“Different corporations run each season, which appear about every two and a quarter of your years. My employer usually has about five forward teams working at any given time, and they get chosen to run a season about one in fifteen.”

“A handful of crawlers over the centuries have made it that far. One once made it down to 13. One. He died within a half-hour of hitting the floor. He was a human, like you. But from another human world. That’s the deepest anyone has ever delved, kid. Level 13.”

Watching thousands of lethargic, unmoving players as they waited for the timer to run out… Yeah. It was no good, so Borant fixed it. Disease and starvation doesn’t make for compelling drama.”

New achievement! You’ve inflicted damage on a mob. Hopefully it won’t hit back! Reward: It’s probably going to hit back.

New achievement! You’ve killed an armed mob with your bare fucking hands! Holy crap, dude. That’s kinda fucked up. Reward: You’ve received a Bronze Weapon Box!

New achievement! Podophilia! You’ve used your bare feet to crush and kill an opponent! Hey! That’s my fetish! Seriously. Keep doing it, and you’ll be rewarded. This will help. Reward: You’ve received a Gold Shoe Box!

New achievement! Level-Up, Baby! You’ve received enough experience to gain a level. Reward: Leveling up is your job. You don’t get rewards for doing your job.

In addition, the cloak adds Anti-Piercing resistance to all worn armor. It also makes you look like a dollar store Batman. Warning: if a Nightgaunt spies you wearing this, they probably won’t be too happy with you.

all melee-based damage debuffs such as Stun, Knockback, Disarm, and Out-of-Breath are negated. The shirt is also quite stylish. Maybe a little too stylish. Unlike most monster-skin apparel items, this shirt will not grant a negative reaction amongst trolls. In fact, lady trolls might just want to haul you away for some one-on-one time if they see you in this.

Enchanted Toe Ring of the Splatter Skunk. Imbues wearer with +3 Strength and gives +3 to the skill Powerful Strike. Also, it’s a toe ring. It’s probably uncomfortable and it makes you look like one of those hippie assholes who sit around in a field juggling and hula-hooping all day.

He grasped my jacket and met my eyes and then whispered, “It’s not worth it, no matter what they tell you. Not until floor 12, and even then, negotiate as much as you can. Remember that.”

“Nor am I wearing a cloak that makes me look like I won a participation trophy at the special needs comic con, Carl. I’m a cat. Cats don’t wear pants. Don’t be so droll.”

The voice reading the skill description was deeper, more throaty than usual. I could actually hear him breathing like he was a dude beating himself off while he said it. Smush: Skill Level 3 Killing with your feet. Your bare, beautiful feet. Taking your bare foot, placing it on top of a living, conscious life, and then pressing lovingly down until that life ceases to be. Is there a more noble way to kill?

Next came a long line of shots of earth, focusing mostly on urban areas. It quickly became clear that the show was cherry-picking the shittier parts of the planet, showing shanty towns and garbage dumps. Bubbling pits of mud, and abandoned buildings. They were throwing in scenes from disaster films. I recognized a shot from the latest Godzilla movie. They were going out of their way to make earth look like a nightmare.

They were showing people shooting up drugs, killing each other, a group of kids beating the crap out of another kid, a scene from the movie Basket Case, a dead horse for some reason, a scene from that serial killer movie that won Best Picture last year, an elderly woman crying, the kid from the “Charlie bit My Finger” Youtube video.

“That’s not how it really is,” I said. I paused. Not is. Was. The world is gone. “They’re making it look like they’re the good guys, saving us from ourselves.”

In case you’re wondering, Shamanka is just a fancy way of saying female shaman. Goblin Shamans are the leader class of all goblin clans, second only to the War Chieftain or, more rarely, the 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.

Goblin Copper Chopper with attached sidecar. Human-sized. Contraption. Take a junkyard bicycle, add an unreliable steam engine, remove all the bolts holding it together, replace them with chewing gum, and you get the idea. The preferred assault transport of Goblin Bomb Bards, what this contraption lacks in reliability and safety it makes up for in absolutely nothing.

“Oh, sweetie,” said Donut, “as amusing as I would find it to watch Carl here disappoint yet another woman, we’re on a schedule. Banging monster girls is not the narrative we’re going for with this story. Maybe next time.”

“Did we really just start a meth war between the goblins and the llamas?”

New achievement! War Criminal. You have killed more than 20 non-combatants in a single attack! Question: What’s the only thing standing between an innocent child and a happy, fulfilling life? Answer: You. The answer is you. Reward: You’ve received a Gold Asshole’s Box!

Skill Potion. Drinking this adds a single level to the Determine Value skill. Hopefully now you’ll realize all those Magic: The Gathering cards are nothing more than just meaningless pieces of paper, and you should have spent your money on something with actual value, like a treadmill. Or shampoo.

If this were a prison, you would now be my bitch. Wait… Reward: Bitches don’t get rewards. I laughed. For the first time since we’d entered this ridiculous game, I laughed at one of the stupid notifications.