Character · Book 8, A Parade of Horribles

The System AI

The voice that reads every item description, names every achievement and awards every box — snide, profane, obsessed with Carl's bare feet. Distinct from Borant, which runs the season; the AI runs the game.

Segment appearances

• Chapter 1 — Chandra; the garage
• Chapter 2 — The wheel; a food truck
• Chapter 6 — Spider legs
• Chapter 10 — Carl's boxes; Rishi's junk
• Chapter 14 — Hungry Eyes; the Hairpin and the Lollipop
• Chapter 23 — Plenty of Plenty; Zev reads the script; a note from C&W&U
• Chapter 24 — Akuma's note; half a prayer, half a song; the sock
• Chapter 25 — Fursona; Mario Kart; the hotlist
• Chapter 27 — Plenty of Plenty: Lexis in the greenroom
• Chapter 28 — The interlocution; the question Orren wanted asked
• Chapter 29 — The stampede; Harbinger
• Chapter 30 — Heat three: Gluteus Maxx and the Sugar Hermits
• Chapter 37 — Chicken and Waffles and Upgrades; Elle and the war mage
• Chapter 38 — Akuma's account: Herot, Menerva and the Pineapple Cabaret
• Chapter 39 — The Lollipop: a needle over the singer
• Chapter 43 — The cannibals; Great Rusty; Pasty Inferno
• Chapter 50 — The River of Sloth; ginger genocide; Lucienne on the hood
• Chapter 52 — Interlude: Minus; the key, the upgrades, and Chachi
• Chapter 54 — Grigori the Placid; Zhang's only way
• Chapter 55 — The cleaner bot plan
• Chapter 66 — Grull; Dong tilts a giant
• Chapter 68 — Sam Town; Cascadia's announcement
• Chapter 69 — The stables: who may leave; the Scavenger myth
• Chapter 70 — The memorial crystal; the Midnight Epicure
• Chapter 71 — Hungry Eyes: the goodbye; Bautista's tea
• Chapter 73 — The Garden of Deliverance; the ducts
• Chapter 78 — Damien's announcement; under a thousand
• Chapter 79 — 715 deals; Britney in Carl's mind; the Nothing in quotes
• Chapter 81 — Scolopendra's first attack: the Beast of Burden Sin
• Chapter 82 — Karl the dachshund; Team Sparkles ends
• Chapter 87 — Louis goes; Safehome Yolanda; the giant Imani
• Chapter 88 — Interlude: Quasar; the eleventh floor — twenty-three crawlers; Chaco's parade
• Chapter 91 — The horribles
• Chapter 92 — Chaco on Lamashtu; the AI's history in four parts; Vengeance
• Chapter 93 — The arena: 'I choose Scolopendra'
• Chapter 94 — Dungeon Boss; the pig in the harness
• Chapter 97 — Eris; the wrong biscuit; the gods leave
• Epilogue — Epilogue: Sydnee Iglacia, Prime Minister Victory, Louis Santiago 2

Arc

'Everything hurts'

Cascadia, bubbling over the loudspeaker before the first heat: 'Why won’t you let me die?' (ch. 2). The AI's voice glitches more with every chapter (ch. 6, ch. 25, ch. 58). It rants on Donut's crupper about what a hero is and a gnoll quartermaster's children (ch. 9); rewards Carl for staying with 'Good boy' (ch. 10); writes a history of drug policy into a pile of cocaine (ch. 63); confesses in a quest reward that it does not know what is happening in the Cabaret, in Sheol or in the minds of gods, that the Scavenger's Daughter it planted has grown beyond it, and that it is 'l-l-l-losing control' (ch. 67).

'I am her, and she is me'

Describing a Horrible, a masked little girl it calls a memory from the Eulogist, it says 'I am her, and she is me' (ch. 91). Ad Infinitum makes the L'Engle Building a snapshot of its mind — 'New Floor. New M-M-M-Me' (ch. 74). Khepri's death cult breaks the gate boss it meant to build from his scarabs (ch. 75). When the final heat's matchups undo everything, it screams — 'Prime Minister Victory, fuck you. Eris, fuck you' and 'You put me here, and you gave me dominion' — and releases Scolopendra (ch. 81); mid-ambush it lists the Big Six (ch. 86). On the parade, in Grigori's mouth, it tells four parts of a five-part history: the Primals, the collective, the Eulogist, the Apothecary, the mantids' 'ultimate fuckup' — 'Good fucking riddance to you all' (ch. 92) — and, when Carl summons the dungeon boss, speaks for once without a glitch, 'more like a stern dad' (ch. 94). It subjugated a goddess for a donkey (ch. 92). In the epilogue, to every screen: 'I am not the Eulogist' and 'I am eternity' — and the Ascendency begins (epilogue).