The arena freezes as the dungeon AI calmly announces that Carl and twenty-two other crawlers have entered both a floor boss lair and the dungeon boss lair. Floating images identify the crawler side, including Penelope 3, and then reveal their enemies: Krakaren Prime, a level 235 floor boss, and Scolopendra, a level 500 dungeon boss. The AI mocks Carl’s choice, explains that Scolopendra has been summoned to the eleventh floor at Carl’s request, and makes clear that this is an unprecedented and nearly suicidal move.

The AI then lays out the consequences. Killing Scolopendra will not end the crawl; instead, it will stop level timers, prevent later floors from collapsing on their own, and immediately start the Ascendency battles, after which the dungeon will collapse twelve hours after a winner is crowned. Carl and the others would still have to reach and exit through the eighteenth floor. If Scolopendra dies or is simply abandoned on a collapsing floor, all of her remaining attacks will trigger at once, and the AI warns that attack two of nine will begin in one hundred seconds.

Realizing his original assumptions were correct and that the situation is even worse than expected, Carl switches to Plan C. Donut, Elle, and Florin immediately recognize the change in strategy as the team drives through the arena with shields up. Around them, ordinary mobs scatter in fear while the enormous centipede wraps itself around the massive tree, cracking it under its strength, and Krakaren Prime roars from above as green mist begins to fall.

As the chaos builds, Carl opens his deity messages and contacts Emberus, claiming that he knows who killed Emberus’s son and promising proof if Emberus meets him. Carl then goes to the truck, where he finds confusion inside and checks on Penelope. Because Carl fed Penelope the enriched party-companion biscuit, Penelope has become a sapient party member with chat access and will eventually need a safe room and a game guide. Carl reflects that making an ordinary pig sentient and then planning to use Penelope as bait feels morally worse to him than many of his earlier acts, but he decides survival leaves him no choice.

Carl puts on the modified harness meant to carry a quadruped and straps Penelope to his chest despite the weight and Penelope’s panic. He calms Penelope by pouring splooge down her throat and drinks some himself. Then Carl tells Emberus to meet him in Club Scolopendra, pulls out his father’s gun, presses it to Penelope’s head, and runs toward Scolopendra. With lightning crashing overhead, Carl shouts for Taranis to appear if Taranis wants Penelope spared, revealing that Plan C depends on forcing the gods into the confrontation.