Theme · from book 1
Staying human
'If we get to the point where we don't help each other anymore, that's when we stop being human.' The book's argument with itself: Carl covers the Meadow Lark signs so no one farms the elderly for experience, is told by twenty percent of a focus group that he is carrying dead weight, and cannot decide whether keeping them alive was a kindness.
First appears: Book 1
Series arc
As of book 3. The series' thesis, stated in book 1 and complicated at once. Book 2 set 'You can't save them all' against 'this is my family'; book 3 argues with the first line — a chat list, a broadcast, seven hundred hats, six carts, a train driven the wrong way — and sets it against the people who use people: Frank's ring, Hekla's bait, Eva's 'This is why nobody likes you'. Carl's own hands are on Growler Gary fourteen times and on a mantaur kept alive in pieces. His conclusion, at the edge of the apocalypse, is that he needed other people.
Through book 1
Book 1 states the thesis (B1 ch. 37) and immediately complicates it: Carl's kindness to Meadow Lark costs Yolanda and Randall, and he ends the book unsure it was a kindness. The series' question is whether the line survives contact with deeper floors.
Through book 2
Through book 3
The argument with 'You can't save them all.' won with hats and carts and a train driven the wrong way (B3 ch. 15, B3 ch. 25, B3 ch. 28); the people who use people — a father's ring, a psychiatrist's bait (B3 ch. 19, B3 ch. 24); Carl's own hands on Gary and the mantaur (B3 ch. 26, B3 ch. 33); and 'how much I needed other people' (B3 ch. 34).
Where they appear
| Book | Chapters they are in (of the book's) | Where |
|---|---|---|
| 1 — Dungeon Crawler Carl | 1/48 | Ch. 37 · the book's own page |
| 2 — Carl's Doomsday Scenario | 0/26 | — · the book's own page |
| 3 — The Dungeon Anarchist's Cookbook | 0/35 | — · the book's own page |
By book
Staying human in book 1 — Dungeon Crawler Carl
Carl's line to Brandon (ch. 37) — 'If we get to the point where we don't help each other anymore, that's when we stop being human' — is the book's thesis and the book argues with it. For: covering the signs (ch. 23); choosing the residents (ch. 27); getting Li Jun and Zhang out (ch. 42). Against: the goblin babies he bombed knowing it was a dick move (ch. 16–ch. 18); the courtesans he kicked to death (ch. 26); Zev's focus group calling the residents dead weight; his own conclusion after Yolanda that it would have been kinder to leave them on the first floor (ch. 38), and after Elle that 'this isn't a kindness, keeping them safe' (ch. 37). Frank and Maggie are the alternative and the book lets the Maestro show what it looks like (ch. 43).
Staying human in book 2 — Carl's Doomsday Scenario
'You can't save them all,' Mordecai says of a weeping orc (ch. 14), and Carl gets up in the night anyway. The floor keeps asking the price: a manager stolen by a lie (ch. 1); a dwarf child saved by punching a guard, which costs them the town (ch. 20); a soul crystal caged because Katia has no pass (ch. 24); a genocide stopped by accident. 'This is my family' (ch. 12) is the book's answer, and the leaderboard's bounties are its rejoinder.
Staying human in book 3 — The Dungeon Anarchist's Cookbook
The floor's argument is with Mordecai's 'You can't save them all.' Carl hears it in his head over the stranded (ch. 15), over Bautista (ch. 18, ch. 21), and answers it with a broadcast, seven hundred hats, six carts and a drive to the end of the line (ch. 15, ch. 25, ch. 27, ch. 28): 'Each and every one' (ch. 24); 'Fuck you, Mordecai' (ch. 24). Against it, what people do to each other — a dagger on a dance floor, PVP coupons, phased bolts, a father who made his daughter a weapon, a psychiatrist who used her patient as bait (ch. 8, ch. 18, ch. 19, ch. 22) — 'Is this what we've become?' (ch. 24) — and what Carl does himself: Gary's hands, a mantaur in pieces (ch. 26, ch. 33). Donut's rebuke about Katia (ch. 14) and Katia's 'They came back for me' (ch. 21) are the small version. The large one is a train whistle and 'how much I needed other people' (ch. 34).