Carl's Doomsday Scenario (Dungeon Crawler Carl, #2)

by Matt Dinniman

Now, if you’ve never had a flaming, skull-faced bear on roller skates barreling at you full speed, you don’t know what you’re missing.

But this was a different, oddly specific aroma that had been indelibly imprinted on me as a four-year-old, a scent I’d sometimes remember as the path I could’ve taken, the world I could’ve lived had my dad not found us and taken us back. It was a scent I’d been chasing all of my adult life.

It’s funny how that happens sometimes. We associate smells with memories, and when that memory is triggered, we are momentarily pulled away, no matter the current circumstances.

If they ask, tell them I know what I’m doing. Zev: Do you? Carl: Fuck no. I’m making this shit up as I go along.

That attitude, that we had to wear a mask, even toward our family, it was one I could never understand.

when they entered, they were transported to a different instance of the guild.

It doesn’t take much to make him happy, Bea had said to her mom. It was true. I wondered what level we had to get to before they’d allow us to settle in a town like this.

You initiated a boss battle, and it somehow ended with neither of you dead. What a disappointment you are. What a goddamned smear. Reward: Pussies don’t get prizes.

“I see you’re adventurers,” GumGum said, leaning in. “I really need your help.” “No. Fuck off,” Mordecai said. “Not tonight.”

the contents of a refrigerator at a restaurant that sold 99 cent tilapia, cracked open after an extended period with no power.

“Maybe we should have tested them first,” she said. “That’s what they’re gonna put on my tombstone.”

An eerie silence punctuated the night, broken occasionally by horrific, unearthly screams that seemed to come from everywhere.