Gary/AI teleports Donut in, needing a female perspective on a relationship conundrum. It presents a metaphorical scenario about dating someone whose ex-boyfriend is actually in prison. Donut advises caution, warning Gary that the current girlfriend may be manipulative. Donut asks the Gary/AI whether his girlfriend is pretty, and he replies that she is much older than him. When Donut jokes about Gary’s girlfriend looking like Agatha, Gary slams the desk in warning.

The AI accepts Donut’s advice and declares the game proceeds as planned, then collapses. The real Growler Gary sits up, drunk and confused at level 175, before teleporting.

Notifications reveal the Bone Clan and Dream have left the Bloc. Florin reports fleeing enemies are being picked off. Donut exchanges heated messages with War Chief Stalwart, brother of Stalwart, taunting him about his father’s death.

Orren teleports Carl and Donut back to base. Boomer debriefs the group: The southern front is quiet, most castle mages were lost in the brain worm attack, and the enemy is fractured. Carl agrees to initiate Operation: Snake Pit.

Carl encounters a crying spell book that teaches Run, Little Günter, Run—a spell summoning a childlike creature to carry a stored attack to a target. Katia transfers hat buffs to Donut’s tiara and gives Carl a permanent tattoo using ink from Li Na’s blood mixed with toraline yam, temporarily granting Carl one of Li Na’s skills.

Zev announces the warlord council is beginning. Operation: Snake Pit has officially begun.

Carl, Donut, and Ferdinand arrive at the production facility for the warlord council. Zev reveals shocking news: After Formidable disappeared, her crew manually triggered the fail-safe at the Venus station. Nothing happened on Earth, but the entire Aryl system—location of the previous crawl—went dark. Its tunnel node switched off, cutting off tens of thousands. The AI in Aryl had stopped communicating weeks earlier.

The warlords of the remaining factions gather: These include King Stalwart, robot Fangs, Architect Houston, Epitome Tagg, and Princess Vinata of the Naga Blood Sultanate, the chief target of the Princess Posse in the Faction Wars. Vinata is a massive, six-armed white serpent-like creature radiating overwhelming power. Donut and Ferdinand burst into laughter at Stalwart’s crown. A system warning appears: Scolopendra, the dungeon boss, stirs, something that has never happened before.

Odette replaces the injured Chaco as announcer. Vinata secretly whispers to Carl, offering to kill Katia and ally with him, revealing she has knowledge of events outside the dungeon.

Carl demands to know how warlords communicate externally despite the ban in place during the game. Odette explains they pay to change their TV channel names to send messages. Carl closes all communication workarounds.

Juice Box condemns the warlords for treating NPC lives as entertainment, then transforms into the Nothing—a trans-dimensional entity with hundreds of root-like legs. She warns it is coming for them before walking through the wall.

Houston explains the Nothing is a trans-dimensional being, possibly what some see at death. Carl suddenly connects the Blood Hunter drama—owned by the Sultanate—to reality: Mercenaries were killed at the start exactly as the real Naga army has been. The Sultanate’s forces are already dead and their stronghold nearly empty. Carl laughs uncontrollably, realizing Operation: Snake Pit’s false premise actually makes their mission easier.

Elle confirms the Naga army is dead, corpses rotting in barracks. The goat Prepotente killed most of them, driven by vendetta, and is now level 99 but in penalty stasis. Carl orders the assault to continue. Mordecai warns not to anger too many gods with the black potions.

Operation: Snake Pit targets four specific Naga to break the line of succession and free Donut and Katia. Rosetta explains Vinata’s escape method: using a god of light to follow a Bijou fairy’s tendril to a temple in Club Vanquisher. Vinata cannot use goddess Theia this season, leaving only the obscure god Khepri.

The plan is to wait for Edgar to detect the Naga transferring to the Temple of Khepri, break into Club Vanquisher, breach the temple, and kill everyone before Vinata’s one-hour grace period expires.

The assault begins. Imani and Elle’s team infiltrates the Naga castle. When Imani uses Carl’s Tripper spell through the tattoo link, Carl feels searing chest pain. Donut reveals she is feeling guilt about the risks being taken on her behalf.

Katia privately tells Carl that Bautista, an ally who has a soft spot for Katia, fears Carl might turn on Katia to get the flower for Donut if the plan fails. Katia confides she would give Carl the flower for Donut if needed—knowing Donut would never allow it. Prepotente arrives on his dragon.

Carl invites the goat Prepotente (once a crawler’s pet, Prepotente is now a powerful sentient being) to join the Princess Posse; he immediately agrees with a tearful hug. Samantha antagonizes him and threatens to kill his mother. Katia reveals Prepotente’s mother is already dead—the reason for his vendetta.

Elle’s team kills the head of the guard, one of four required targets. Edgar confirms he can sense noncorporeal movement rising from below the castle, proving the Naga are escaping to the Khepri temple.

Carl writes a cookbook entry explaining that when someone worships a deity for the first time, a Bijou fairy creates a tendril to the strongest temple. Edgar’s Sense Movement can detect this, confirming when Vinata activates her escape and which god she chose.

Carl’s group approaches the Temple of the Dagda, which houses Club Vanquisher’s entrance. Prepotente has a complete internal map. Carl devises a deception: He shackles Prepotente with fuzzy handcuffs and claims he is a bounty. The temple’s ram sentry Mork agrees to split the reward, lowering his guard.

Katia bursts in disguised as a mantaur, shouting about demons. Bautista’s demons attack the guards. Carl rushes into Club Vanquisher, keeping portal doors propped open with capacitor wire to maintain Li Na’s aura connection.

Li Na activates her Dark Purpose dread with catastrophic results: guards mutilate themselves, taxidermied heads animate, and rugs come alive. Mork tears out his own eyes. Carl receives a Celestial Boon from the god Emberus. Li Na reveals she is using the chaos to power-level all her dreads.

Carl keeps the wire connected as Li Na cycles through dreads, each more awful than the other. They reach the temple portal room. Prepotente operates the dial while Carl confirms Vinata, her guards, and a bug-headed figure are inside the Temple of Khepri. Samantha’s damned status will let her open the deity-locked door (temple doors can be opened only by their religion’s believers and the “damned” or atheists; never by the believers of another religion). Li Na activates her final dread. Victory watches with a sad expression, knowing the carnage that is about to ensue. The posse rushes through into what they realize is an elaborate trap.

It turns out that the Posse did not ambush Vinata. Vinata knew they were coming since Vinata summoned the invulnerable god Khepri himself—level 250—into his own temple. Vinata has Immortal status with 63 seconds remaining, which gives her enough time to fight the posse without being killed. The AI announces a surprise boss battle and adds Li Jun, Bautista, and Zhang as cannon fodder. The Blood Sultanate’s adjutant calls foul, but Victory dismisses the complaint. The battle begins.

Three Naga guards charge. The two cousins and Vinata take Invisibility and flee. Katia and Prepotente drink Black Nimbus potions and are ejected from the temple. Carl summons Günter to target the god, activates his own temporary immortality, and then detonates a massive thermobaric bomb.

The explosion grievously injures Carl, held together only by the immortality. Günter’s delayed explosion hits Khepri, killing both cousins and the three guards. Carl is blown back through the portal with Vinata wrapped around him. Vinata, driven “mad” by the Eye of the Bedlam Bride on Carl’s chest, crushes and stabs him while sobbing about her ruined plans. She reveals that she had planned to leave the dungeon with her lover, one of the killed cousins, and start a family. As Carl thrashes around in pain, the AI announces Khepri has left the temple. Carl wonders when Vinata’s immortality will end.

The god Hellik, brother of Emberus, appears, delivers a message for Emberus about their mother Apito being corrupted and their sister Nekhebit’s return, marks Carl as a friend, and vanishes. A sluggalo named Kandy “Bigs” Newton bursts from a boil on Carl’s back and buries a hatchet in Vinata’s head just as her immortality expires.

Kill credit for Vinata goes to Kandy “Bigs” Newton. Carl frantically heals as his body reassembles. Samantha found a male skyfowl impostor in Theia’s temple instead of the goddess. Victory clarifies that sponsors causing deities to act outside their nature violates the rules.

Carl throws a Black Nimbus potion, drops Megadeth alarm traps triggering a Mantaur Mosh Pit, and activates Profane Iron, summoning chains that slaughter the berserking guards. Prepotente leads them to the hidden Calligraphy Guild, where Carl comes face-to-face with Milk—author of the sixth Cookbook—and recognizes his “sister”. Carl breaks down sobbing in Milk’s embrace and messages Donut that the mission was easy.