Motif · Book 1, Dungeon Crawler Carl

'You're not going to break me'

Carl's mantra, first said to a safe-room ceiling after the You Monster! achievement and repeated whenever the game succeeds in making him feel like an asshole. The line the whole series will test.

Segment appearances

• Chapter 19 — You Monster!
• Chapter 33 — Plan Pied Piper
• Chapter 42 — The Maestro's show
• Chapter 47 — 124.8 trillion

Progression

First said aloud to a safe-room ceiling in ch. 19, after the AI's You Monster! gave him twenty seconds of false comfort about the goblin babies and took it back: 'You might hurt me, or kill me, but you're not going to break me.' Whispered as a mantra after the laminak fairy screams that they were going to move to the third floor (ch. 33); thought at the Maestro's threats (ch. 42); thought again at the cheering crowds while Donut teaches Mongo to pounce (ch. 47): 'Fuck you all. You will not break me.' The book's claim about its narrator, made each time the game has just succeeded in making him feel like an asshole.