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June 18 - July 20, 2025
Drek. Level 6. Everybody loves babies, right? What kind of asshole doesn’t love babies? How about demonic, ravenous, berserking babies who travel in packs of at least 50? It’s rumored these lil’ rascals can devour a full-sized elephant down to the bone in less than five seconds. And you’re a lot smaller than an elephant.
One of the babies chomped onto my foot, which wouldn’t do anything because of my… …I cried out in excruciating pain as I fell back into car 15. Katia slammed the door shut. The baby remained attached to my foot, gnawing furiously on the meat of my sole. I pulled myself up and slammed my foot down. The level-6 monster exploded like a tomato soup-filled balloon. I spread my toes to make sure they were all there, and I cast Heal on myself. What a disaster that would’ve been.
Carl: Don’t slip on the blood! It’s easy to trip on their heads. Believe me. Katia: I’m going to be sick. Oh my god, Carl. I’ve never seen anything like this. Donut: YOU BETTER GET USED TO IT.
Carl kills babies, Carl kills babies
Mole men and mole women actually just call themselves “Men” and “Women,” and quite frankly, it’s exhausting. These losers spend most of their days and nights reading. What a bunch of nerds.
They are hunted ruthlessly by the tunnel trolls, who like to capture and lick them. Not because they impart any sort of hallucinogenic effect. It’s just that tunnel trolls are weird-ass fuckers.
New Achievement! Cuck Aquaman! You got fucked by a fish. You’ve done something so spectacularly controversial, courts and lawyers had to get involved. The end result was *my* decision being overturned. Reward: You’ve received a Platinum It’s Not My Fault You Fish-Headed Assholes Don’t Properly Program Your Quests Box.
Talon Strike Birds have ugly feet. Disgusting feet, really. Still, there’s something sensual about the sight of a hawk swooping down upon its prey, talons out, and slashing. It’s so sudden, so unexpected, so explosively violent. Such violence. Sweet, sweet violence.
A crystal tiara fit for royalty. Made in honor of all the lost children of the world. Because nothing helps soothe the tears of grieving parents like watching someone else dress up all fancy.
“Okay, get in bed, Carl. You too, Mongo. We’re all tired.” “You know I have my own room now, right?” “Don’t be silly, Carl. I can’t sleep without you, and you know it. Now get into bed.” I grumbled, but the moment I lay down, it felt as if I was encased in a warm hug. Donut jumped onto my shoulder, curling up near my neck. Then Mongo hopped onto my legs, and I didn’t feel the weight of him. I fell asleep in seconds.
🥹🥹🥹
The dwarf took a long pull of his drink. “I take care of the train, and I am in charge of all the employees. That’s what I’m supposed to do. But the engineer doesn’t listen to me, the janitors try to eat me, and the porters are in their own little world. So what I do, miss talking cat, is I sit here and drink until we reach the end of the line. Then I do it again.”
Literal Fire Ants. Level 1. This is a trap monster. Like regular fire ants, but with more enthusiasm. Plus they hate you and want you to die. They’re pretty good at making that happen.
“You need to grow a mohawk,” Donut said to Katia. “And maybe get a catchphrase. That really worked for Carl.” “Goddamnit, Donut,” I said. I regretted it the moment the phrase came out of my mouth.
I grunted. “I’ve been to the Arctic Circle. I once went to Costa Rica and got to pet a sloth. I almost went to the Bahamas, but I couldn’t get off of work. Oh, and I’ve been to Canada a bunch of times. But it was just Victoria and Vancouver. I really wanted to visit Japan and the Philippines, but I never got the chance.”
Mordecai’s Special Brew A potion designed by a shifty Changeling who has a tendency to kill those who count on him the most, this special potion combines the effects of a Gold Standard Healing Potion and the Troll’s Second Wind to create a de facto immortality for a period of thirty seconds. It has a few unfortunate side effects.
Superb Constitution Buff Potion. Drinking this mixture will permanently increase your Constitution by a random number between one and four. You may only drink two of these during your time in the dungeon. Why? Because drinking more would be cheating. And if anyone is going to cheat, it’s going to be me.
the AI saying 👹it's going to be me me👹 in the audiobook caught me soo off guard lmaaoo
Warning: This isn’t Dr. Phil. Pick your prize. You have ten minutes to choose, or you will forfeit your choice.
I was about to toss the book into my inventory, but instead I flipped to the first page. It read, “Welcome.” I felt the haptic buzz of my Escape Plan skill activate. Additional words appeared on the mostly-blank page. Hello, Crawler. As you’re about to find, this is a very special book. If you’re reading these words, it means this book has found its way into your hands for one purpose and one purpose only. Together, we will burn it all to the ground.
While the true contents of this guide are invisible to the showrunners and to the viewers, it is not invisible to the current System AI. There is nothing about owning this book, or the information hidden within that is against the rules. However, if the organization running this season begins to suspect that this book is more than it appears, or if you tell anyone about the existence of this book, the information within will erase, and you will forever lose access to the hidden text.
“Look at how beautiful she is,” Donut whispered. “She’s like a vision of pure elegance.” “Yo,” Elle cried at the bartender. “Whose dick do I gotta suck to get another drink? Christ.”
Elle laughed. “Then Henry got pulled into an alleyway and banged some succubus witch who ended up giving birth to thousands of these little goblin monsters called Shade Gremlins. It started this whole thing. You should’ve seen it. Those green fuckers were everywhere. They all had Henry’s face.”
The entire front of her was covered in blood. A human crawler lay dying on the floor, blood geysering from a slash across his neck. A moment passed, and the man went still. A single skull formed, appearing after Donut’s name.
Donut grumbled and jumped to The Sledge’s shoulder, who showed no reaction. But a moment later, the rock monster reached up and gave her a surprisingly gentle pat.
“I’m moderately excited about this, Carl,” said Donut.
New achievement! Locomotive Breath! While it’s not exactly a feat of engineering worthy of a Queen Elizabeth Prize, you finally managed to manufacture a train derailment. Let’s hope this doesn’t set off some sort of unforeseen domino effect that will ripple throughout the rest of the floor, leading to mass confusion and death amongst you and your fellow crawlers.
From the shoulders down, this was a normal man. He was built large and strong. But where a normal person’s neck would be was another torso, leading to the top half of—another?—man. This top half wasn’t as large as the lower half. The creature had a pair of legs and arms on the bottom half and another pair of arms on the top half. The gap-toothed man had greasy, black hair that hung out from his engineer’s hat. His top torso wore a filthy, once-white tank top that read “Welcome to the Gun Show.” The bottom, larger half was naked except for a loincloth made of fur.
“Can you please stop shouting,” Donut said. “It upsets Mongo.” Mongo squawked in agreement. Carl: Now you know how I feel when you type in all caps. Donut: THAT’S NOT THE SAME THING, CARL.
“You would not be killed by the abyss gate.” He abruptly lifted all four arms into the air, and metal blades erupted from the flesh over his top two wrists with a shing, like he was some sort of fucked up Wolverine. “But I would be honor-bound to slay you! No exceptions, my fellow warrior!”
The ram-headed cleric peeked out of the door and waved before disappearing back inside.
lmaoooo dickhead
“I think my fans should have a name, wouldn’t that be great? Like the Princess Patrol or something.” I grunted. “How about the Donut Holes?” “Don’t be crude, Carl.”
New Achievement! Kept A Rollin’ You’re driving a train! Holy shit! Reward: I’m pretty sure the act of driving a train is a badass-enough award.
New achievement! Three Cheers for Slaughter! You killed three boss monsters with the same attack! I’m starting to think your survival so far isn’t just a fluke. You’re either scary good at this, or you’re just one lucky mo-fo. Either way, holy shit. Good job. Reward: You’ve received a Platinum Big Daddy Box!
Carl: But if you’re worried, this might be a good time to field test riding Mongo. You can race down the track to see how fast you two go. Donut: CARL YOU ARE A GENIUS. Carl: You know it. Donut: CARL? Carl: Yeah? Donut: DON’T EVER DO THIS TO ME AGAIN. I THOUGHT YOU’D BEEN SQUISHED.
Donut had also ordered the fish. She currently had a piece of broken mirror propped up on the table and was practicing her voguing. She looked up at me. The sour look was ridiculously enhanced by the sunglasses.
The Babababoon is the king of idiotic chaos. This exclusive mob was created by taking a standard earth baboon and crossing it with the population from a Florida jail drunk tank. Not gonna lie. I’m pretty proud of this one. These guys ruin just about anything we put them in.
“That’s m’girl. What’s a fine lass like yerself doing with this lot? I get off shift in a couple of hours. Got a place up at 60. M’wife will cook us a nice stew.” “Your wife?” Donut asked, incredulous. “She no mind one bit. She’d liken a smack of you too, I reckon. Plus she cook. We got a drop of fresh fish in our food boxes, we did.” “Wait, what kind of fish?” Donut asked.
Donut: CARL, SHE REMINDS ME OF SOMEBODY BUT I DON’T KNOW WHO. I laughed out loud.
PVP Coupon. Ah, betrayal. Sweet, delicious betrayal. If you have this coupon in your inventory, and you kill the crawler whose name appears on the backside of this coupon, you will receive the following rewards: Gold Savage Box Gold Weapons Box Gold Apparel Box Platinum Adventurer Box (This benefit may only be redeemed a max of 3 times) +1 Player Level (This benefit may only be redeemed a max of 3 times) I flipped the paper over. The slip read: Crawler #4,122. Carl.
Zev sent us a message that we needed to find a saferoom soon because we were supposed to go onto that show in a few hours. I told her we were too busy, and she said she’d have us teleported away no matter what we were doing. I told her to go fuck herself, and she laughed as if I was joking.
The thing was, I liked Katia. I liked her a whole lot. She was painfully quiet. Even when she was bulked up, it was easy to forget she was there. But she was just so damn earnest. She was afraid and hesitant, but she never once ran. If she said she was going to do something, she did it. And she usually did it well. That was a rare quality.
I hated this. Why does everything need to be so complicated? Can’t people just be loyal? I’d said that not too long ago as Bea and I were fighting about her decision to get rid of Donut. We’d been in the car, on our way to a Christmas party, and she’d casually mentioned one of her mom’s Persians—Sugar Bun, who was Donut’s aunt or cousin or something—was pregnant and was due soon. Once weaned, Bea would be taking two of the kittens and Donut would be returned to her parents who would try to sell her as a show-quality breeder.
“Bye, Madison,” I said, turning away. “Go fuck yourself, okay?” “Right back at you, boxer boy.”
“I remember who she reminds me of!” Donut exclaimed as we returned to the Nightmare. “Miss Beatrice’s mom! She’s just like her. She was really mean. I never liked visiting. None of the cats there were very happy. I could tell she didn’t treat them as well as Miss Beatrice treated me.” “Come on,” I said. The comparison didn’t seem so funny anymore. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”
Enchanted Night Wyrm’s Ring of Divine Suffering. Oooh, that’s scary sounding. For the discerning Crawler Killer, this magical ring can be one of the most formidable items in the dungeon. If utilized properly, this ring’s wielder can grow exponentially in strength, especially on the deeper floors. But beware. If poorly wielded, this ring will kill you quicker than an exploding rage elemental. Either way, this ring imparts one of the dungeon’s most highly sought-after skills. The wearer of this ring receives the following benefits: +5% to all stats. The Marked for Death Skill
Marked for Death. It’s not just Steven Seagal’s magnum opus. It’s also one of the dungeon’s greatest, most infamous skills! Once activated, you will be presented with a list of all crawlers within your map’s range. Only crawlers with 100% health will be selectable. Once a crawler is chosen, they will be marked. It takes 30 seconds for the mark to fully set and become active. When a crawler with an active mark dies, no matter the cause, you will receive a permanent +1 stat point to whatever that crawler’s current highest stat is. The +1 stat benefit increases by one for every three marks you
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The man drunkenly watched me take the ring and slip it onto my left index finger. “Vengeance is mine,” he said.
“I just realized you’re the only boy here,” Donut said. “All these people, and there’s only one penis. You could start a harem. Like the guy on that Sister Wives television show.” I laughed. “Nobody is starting a harem.” “No, I suppose not,” Donut said. “You couldn’t even keep one woman interested.”
damn Donut
“No,” she said. “I’m not even a little okay. Nothing about this is okay.” She rubbed her eyes, looking about the gore-filled room. “Goddamn it, there’s nowhere to sit down and have a breakdown in here.”
:'(
We all just looked at each other and started to laugh. There was no reason to laugh. None of this was funny. But we laughed. We laughed long and hard. It didn’t make sense. None of this made sense, but we were alive, for now at least, and we had each other, and that was something.
I shook my head. “I don’t know. There’s a whole train of people out there. I’m sure someone would love to join up with a healer and two mages. It won’t be us, though. We’ll never trust each other, and that sucks. It really does. It’s exactly what they want to happen, and it breaks my fucking heart.”
Holy shit. She’d done it. She’d looted one of the most powerful weapons in the game. My anger fled. “Katia, I am going to kiss you.” She laughed. She sounded just as exhausted as I felt. “Not without taking a shower first you’re not.”
