Donut reacts first when the casino suddenly turns hostile: tables, chairs, slot machines, chandeliers, and even some NPCs reveal themselves as mimics. She releases Mongo and uses Clockwork Triplicate while the room erupts into chaos. Carl, still trapped in dachshund form, identifies Mitch as a level-120 adolescent shadow mimic, and the Dungeon AI interrupts the ambush to explain that Shadow Mimics are a powerful sapient-mob faction, part of a larger struggle among major groups in the dungeon. The AI also reveals that the original Mitch was a Wall Rat NPC who had been eaten and replaced.

Once the surprise passes, the fight swings toward Carl's side. Carl awkwardly attacks in his dog body, Samantha slams into attackers, and Carl helps tear down a mimic that briefly copies his human form. Around the room, Florin fires his shotgun, Imani blasts the enemies, Lucia shifts into her hag form and uses a portal lasso to cut a mimic in half, Goblin Elle kills a slot-machine mimic, and Mongo tears through chair mimics while his attacks spread Cruel Sepsis. Some guards flee, but others recover and join the battle.

The mimics collapse quickly because they are strongest only during the initial ambush. Soon Mitch is the last one left. Donut repeatedly blasts him apart with magic missiles whenever he tries to reform, and Carl, Donut, and Mongo close in to question him. During this standoff, Carl realizes the Eye of the Bedlam Bride is hidden on his dog forehead and feels it trying to seize control, but Carl refuses and keeps it contained.

Mitch tries to bargain for his life and says the mimics needed some of the crawlers for the Cabaret. He claims that the war mages, the ogres, and a faction called Cock-A-Doodle-Doo are all fighting over the dungeon's "back door," and that controlling crawlers would help seize it. Mitch denies knowing anything about Li Na, then suddenly lunges at Carl. Carl reflexively opens the hidden eye, which freezes Mitch in terror, and Donut immediately kills him. Mongo lands on the corpse in a final burst of aggression, and the scene ends with the survivors stunned and joking darkly about it.