“Carl,” the next goat asked without preamble. This one had a strange, fat, jowly face and was unlike any of the others. I missed the ability to be able to examine them and get a description. “Are you aware of what Justice Light did at the end of the previous floor?”
I straightened. “I know he made a trap that broke a lot of things in the dungeon, and I know it killed him. And I also know that he was my friend. Can you please explain to me what exactly he did?”
The goat seemed to contemplate for a minute, then nodded.
“It’s quite interesting, and I’m happy to explain. He created a trap that broke the in-game version of the Nothing. This unleashed all of the inhabitants of the Nothing into three different levels of the game. We can only truly see what is happening on the twelfth floor. Some of these creatures are entities that haven’t been seen since the very early days ofDungeon Crawler World. The ones who invaded the twelfth floor appear to be the weakest. We have no vision of what’s happening on the fifteenth, and we only saw brief snippets of the ongoing slaughter and torture within Club Scolopendra. The dread Kyryap is there. As is Krakaren Prime. As this is a parody of our partner, it’s interesting that?—”
One of the goats we hadn’t yet spoken with cleared her throat.
“Anyway, thank you for the question, Carl. You have been judged worthy, and you may walk amongst the herd.”
As he was talking, my interface crackled back on. There was no warning. My HUD just booted up. As that happened, I was still looking at the talkative goat with the strange face.
This is Bathin. He is one of the chief engineers of the Plenty Tunnel Project, which opened up the veins of the galaxy.
Huh,I thought,what a strange description.
Orren: Carl. Donut. I am online with Prime Minister Victory. I need you to listen very carefully.
Donut: HI, ORREN! HI, PRIME MINISTER VICTORY!
Orren: I did not realize what was happening until it was too late. You have an amazing opportunity here. The people who are judging you are the leadership of the Plenty. If you are judged worthy, they will answer your questions. I need you to ask them about the integrity of the tunneling system. I will give you the exact question to ask.
Carl: Eat my ass, Orren.
Prime Minister Victory: Carl. I am going to level with you. I think even you will understand the gravity of the situation. The current AI is spread well beyond this solar system. It killed an entire Mantis system, and it just blew up a group of Valtay-leased manufacturing facilities. We do not know how it is feeding itself. We do not know how it is doing any of this. Furthermore, certain mobs from the dungeon have gotten loose. They are appearing in places they shouldn’t. This is more than an emergency. This is the end of life as we know it, and all of our attempts to communicate with the Plenty regarding this emergency have gone unanswered. They control the tunneling system. They are the only ones who can shut it all off. We hope.
Carl: Isthatwhat Quasar was trying to tell me before he got cut off? Gods are getting loose? Is thatthe entity that’s on the surface with Katia? The goddess Eileithyia?
Orren: Yes, Carl. Though it’s a different god in thekinderfacility. A good portion of the unsponsored gods are roaming free. Right now it appears they can only manifest themselves within a relatively short range of the tunnel nodes, and not for long. To make matters worse, it appears the AI has no control over them. They are at cross-purposes. But even that shouldn’t be possible. This is why it is crucial you ask the Plenty leadership the question I have prepared.
While this was happening, we moved to the next goat, who asked who took longer to prepare for battle each day, me or Donut.
Carl: What? The AI has lost control of them?
Orren: You need to understand the AI is specifically programmed to be unable to manually interfere with the minds of gods and goddesses. It’s a hard limitation. It was programmed to keep an insane AI from using the gods to kill everything. We had limited ability to temper that. It’s the same system that allows us to use sponsors to drive gods. But that ability to control non-sponsored gods has been turned off. We normally use this ability quite liberally on the later floors due to the destructiveness of such powerful creatures. It’s a checks-and-balances system that is now broken. And since the AI can’t control them, either, the deities are acting independently.
Donut started yapping about her daily routine, though she was clearly distracted with one ear on this conversation.
Carl: Sure. I’ll ask your question. But let me rephrase it.
Orren: No, Carl. Please. Wait. You have to be careful with the way you say it.
I raised my finger when Donut was done.
Out loud, I said to the goat, “Here’s my question. Does the public know that the gods have escaped from the dungeon? And that the enhancement zones of the current AI have jumped into your tunneling system? Do the people know they’re in danger? Worse danger, perhaps, than us crawlers? Do they know that they need to fucking run?”
Prime Minister Victory: Gods-fucking-damnit, Carl. You just said that on live. And the AI let it go out.
Orren: And now the party really begins.
[ 29 ]
“Wait, what?”Botis asked, his demeanor changing once again.
“It’s true,” Donut said. “They just told us in our messages. They said they’ve been trying to tell you all about it because you control the tunnels or whatever they’re called, but you’ve been leaving them on read.”
The line of goats all started to make braying noises. All the spotlights turned on at once, showing the caprids descending into panic. Across from me, the door back to the greenroom opened, and Lexis stepped into the studio, eyes huge.