Gwen messages that when Tran entered the crystallized glass stairwell chamber, everything flashed. A system warning appears, and the frozen Lika sex doll head ejects from Carl’s inventory, now uncrystallized. The latex head begins issuing threats. Carl examines it and learns it contains the Withering Spirit of Psamathe, a minor deity whose soul split during an escape from the Nothing. Mordecai explains withering spirits are split souls that reunited improperly, rendering them mostly harmless yet difficult to kill. Katia deduces Psamathe manipulated Ghazi into opening the Nothing to reunite her halves, but his crystallization spell trapped one half in the doll. Mongo accidentally prevented a full resurrection by shattering the statue.

Carl adjusts the jaw so Psamathe can speak clearly. Calling her Samantha, he learns her body was shattered and likely consumed by sharks. She grieves for her child, the sand ooze, and asks to join their party to seek help from a naiad. Mordecai suggests keeping her as a hired trainer in the personal space, preventing her from summoning gods while potentially offering valuable knowledge. The team agrees and places the head in the training room.

Later, Carl questions Mordecai about the ninth-floor faction wars. Mordecai explains that Larracos sits in the center, surrounded by nine faction territories. Each faction starts with 15,000 troops, builds fortifications, and purchases gear from crawlers. Tourist faction members cannot permanently die on the ninth floor, though NPCs can. However, the sixth-floor Hunting Grounds are unprotected, so any faction members who go there to collect gear risk permanent death. People can register as hunters until the sixth floor opens. Katia suspects Carl is planning something risky based on his questions.

Carl attempts to contact Henrik using the pocket watch but receives no response. Another group of crawlers, the tomb raiders, slowly descend the necropolis while Chris and Maggie remain trapped. Carl has a friendly crawler, Langley, and his archer team position the severed stairwell section outside Hump Town for later access. The party meets at a tavern in Pandinus with Britney Proskurina and Vadim Zbar, the other Water Quadrant survivors. Britney refuses to return underwater, but Vadim agrees to guide Carl, Katia, and Tran to the submarine Akula. Aboard the flying house, they prepare chum bombs to distract the sharks. After dropping and detonating the bombs, Donut levels up to 38 from the resulting shark kills. Katia reveals that female crawlers cannot conceive while in the dungeon.

The house positions itself over the submarine’s location 500 meters down. Katia transforms into a diving bell to transport the team. They descend rapidly, observing that the submarine’s top is ripped away and its nose is lodged in the necropolis. Large, non-hostile jellyfish float above. The team enters the flooded submarine, and Vadim leads them through damaged corridors. He explains how his previous party fought their way to the bridge. They reach a sealed hatch that was previously left open.

Katia warns that something enormous just swam beneath the submarine. They drain an airlock and enter a dry former boss chamber. Carl loots the neighborhood boss’s corpse, gaining the Akula map. The map reveals a single red ghost dot moving between the bridge and an external chamber. The glowing green head of Quetzalcoatlus, the ghost boss of the subterranean level, appears through a bulkhead, unleashing an aural attack that critically wounds Vadim. Katia reports the green ghost struck something massive that is now reaching for the submarine. Like in videogames, boss music begins.

Loud dubstep music fills the submarine as it is grabbed and pulled from the necropolis. Carl discovers Henrik and his fellow Changeling Principals, a group of high-level changelings, died on the bridge, meaning the second watch is there. The submarine rolls and is dragged 1,500 meters down to the ocean floor. Carl loots Henrik’s body, obtaining the second watch and a torn page describing Wailing Shrieker ghosts and their weaknesses. He understands Henrik’s team planned to use a flesh-giving spell on Quetzalcoatlus, which would make the ghost physical and susceptible to injury. A massive sharktopus approaches the porthole window. The world freezes for a Special Event Boss Battle announcement.

Orange lizard host Kevin and an orc named Magnificent Troy appear in a floating window to provide live commentary. The boss is revealed as Lusca, the Level 82 Octo-Shark Brood Mother Queen. Carl orders his allies to seek out safe rooms. Lusca bites the submarine in half, swallowing their section. A cartoon diagram appears and explains they are in her mouth with 10 minutes before she swallows the wreckage into her stomach. A timer begins counting down.

As the 10-minute timer begins, the commentators note Vadim is fleeing toward the last escape pod. Hundreds of Juvenile Octo-Shark mouths press against the bridge window as the party sets off explosives outside. Carl tapes a Potion of Bloodlust to an explosive charge and hides it in a mini-fridge. He, Katia, and Tran retreat to the captain’s stateroom as the window cracks. With all the artifacts collected, Carl begins dialing the Gate of the Feral Gods as a last resort. Donut messages that abnormal winds are delaying their return. The window shatters, flooding the bridge with juvenile sharks that attempt to open the stateroom door. Carl detonates the bloodlust bomb, causing the baby sharks to enter a feeding frenzy and slaughter each other. With four minutes remaining and an oxygen warning, they exit through the carnage and swim into Lusca’s cavernous mouth. Surviving babies flee into slits in the mouth’s roof.

As Lusca swallows, Carl casts a spell that slams into her throat and peels her upper jaw back. Ejected from the mouth and propelled by Katia’s rocket while holding a giant buzz saw, they pinwheel through the water and cleave through Lusca’s exposed brain. A tentacle stops them, shattering the buzz saw and throwing them across the ocean floor. Lusca is dead, but the crushing depth causes two percent health loss per second. Vadim launches his escape pod, punching through Lusca’s corpse, but sends a message that there are pain-amplifying jellyfish with him before a deceased-crawler notice appears.

With his allies in safe rooms, Carl activates the Gate of the Feral Gods on the ocean floor, dialing coordinates for the beach outside Pandinus. A huge portal sucks them through along with a torrent of seawater that smashes the town’s defensive wall. They run to the personal space as the world outside begins rumbling.

The personal space shakes from the disturbance. Donut warns that Juice Box, Henrik’s changeling sister, is beginning to remember past NPC lives, a dangerous sign. NPCs are wiped and reused for each dungeon crawl. Carl has leveled to 47, Katia to 44, and Donut to 39. Carl reviews his achievements and awards, including an enchanted kerchief that grants trap detection, a Tripper spell, and a remote detonator. He also receives an upgrade patch and a sewing kit.

Carl realizes the photographs and certificates identify seven of the plaintiff factions, and combined with known Naga participation, he now knows eight of the nine ninth-floor teams. Mordecai expresses concern that the AI actively harassing sponsors indicates Primal Degeneration, the term for AIs severely glitching. Elle, an ally from a previous floor, sends a message from another bubble that a giant flaming god named Emberus has appeared, smashing through popped bubbles while searching for something called Orthrus.

Mordecai retrieves the Samantha head, who confirms they released Orthrus, Emberus’s lost dog. She explains Emberus is powerful, short-tempered, and will not be grateful. Messages flood in from trapped crawlers. Tserendolgor, a dog-like crawler they met on the previous floor, reports Emberus is outside her bubble, pounding on it and calling her Orthrus while screaming. Carl realizes he caused this chaos and that they must pop their own bubble to return the real Orthrus to Emberus. With the equinox lightning storm arriving in less than an hour, Carl says they need to move immediately.