After the Scolopendra warning, the council waits for another event, but instead Odette appears as an emergency replacement for the unconscious Chaco. Odette is out of her usual crab-host costume and explains that she has entered the Ascendency as Nekhebit. Odette calmly reframes the warning as an early sign that the AI is escalating the season, then begins hosting the warlord council despite Cascadia’s drunken silence.

Odette recaps the war’s status: Lemig Sortion, Prism, and the Operatics are eliminated, leaving seven teams, including Carl and Donut’s crawler team and Ferdinand and Juice Box’s NPC team. Odette tries to interview Cascadia, but Cascadia laughs drunkenly instead of answering. Beside Carl, Princess Vinata privately reveals that Cascadia has learned her ex-husband and much of her family died in Borant’s civil war, then needles Carl by predicting he will soon face his own devastating loss and offers to solve his “Katia problem” for him.

Odette questions Stalwart and the Princess Posse about their forces. Donut insults the other armies and Stalwart, while Epitome Tagg mocks Stalwart’s depleted finances, compromised hardware, and impending civil war. Carl interrupts to demand an explanation for how the off-world leaders still know real-time outside information despite Team Retribution’s earlier communications ban.

Odette explains that teams with the galactic news media center upgrade cannot watch live feeds, but they can still see feed-directory titles. Off-world factions have been paying to repeatedly rename programs and transmit messages through those titles. When Donut asks Ferdinand to use Team Retribution’s emergency action item to close the loophole, Juice Box stops him because Carl and Donut’s enemies still have emergency requests too; Carl uses one of the Princess Posse’s remaining action items instead, and the AI accepts it. Cascadia drunkenly warns that food menus, activity schedules, trainer boards, and gossiping NPCs can also transmit information, while the AI complains that it already understands its job.

Odette continues interviewing leaders until she reaches Juice Box, who refuses most questions before making one statement. Juice Box condemns the world leaders for creating dungeon NPCs, implanting memories, manufacturing suffering, and treating their lives as entertainment. Juice Box then transforms into a terrifying black tentacled form that alarms Odette, Cascadia, Stalwart, Tagg, Fang, and even Ferdinand, while Architect Houston reacts with strange excitement. In a demonic voice, Juice Box warns everyone watching that “it” is coming for them all, then walks through the wall and disappears, leaving the council stunned.