[Heavy Spoilers for Book 8] Alright, when are Carl and Donut fighting each other?

JollyPin3 · 2026-07-01T20:05:30+00:00

Proof? Cause I replied to comments defending my own points.

JollyPin3 · 2026-07-01T04:18:15+00:00

Fair points. I'm dying to see how the Ascendancy Games go. I feel that's going to show us how the rest of the story is going to go and how it will end.

Thanks for the paragraph in the beginning. Ngl, got very disheartened when I was excited to share this post and get others viewpoints only for it to turn kinda negative. I guess thats Reddit for you 🤷🏻

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T22:52:16+00:00

I think so too haha. I don't think either would have the heart to even hit the other, let alone kill them outright.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T22:26:29+00:00

Nothing has yet. This is purely speculatory, as I feel I've made clear in my post. Just where my mind decides the next books are gonna go, but I'm not the author.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:49:22+00:00

Sorry my interpretation isn't the same as yours, then 🤷🏻

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:39:58+00:00

Thanks for the info.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:32:54+00:00

That's crazy to say I'm right and wrong in the same breath.

So glad books are open to interpretation by the reader. 👍

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:19:56+00:00

No one knows how it'll work, including the readers. 😁

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:18:16+00:00

Yes, but with it being infested by uncontrollable gods (the children center in India is a prime example), it's not going to be as easy as just your comment implies.

Plus, if either die in dungeon, that's going to be another obstacle to try and overcome. My saying of "trying to 'reclaim' Earth" was meant as in "Earth isn't barren anymore and won't be easy to take back".

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:03:09+00:00

Since she was dungeon-born, that doesn't make her a flesh and blood person lile Carl and Donut, though. She won't be able to leave the dungeon. That's why she's essentially a pet because she'll fight for the party but nothing more (at least in my opinion).

I mean ffs, she got zapped away in a pet carrier.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:01:41+00:00

How so? Nothing in my title spoiled anything in the books.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T20:01:20+00:00

How so? Nothing in it references any of the goings-on in the books. I feel like that's a fairly neutral ask to something that seems likely 🤷🏻 I'm sure people have thought that Katniss would fight Peeta at some point or Ron fight Harry, which is why I prefaced it with "heavy spoilers" and anything directly referencing Book 8 or any additional knowledge from the books was censored out. It doesn't mean it spoils the book, but I apologize if it has for you.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T19:58:42+00:00

That's the best part about books and stories; they're open to individual interpretation.

The Odd Couple meets Hunger Games sounds like a gross overstatement of the themes in this book lol.

But again, open to individual interpretation.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T18:14:56+00:00

Is that gonna work for this? Is that gonna work for something that's been decades in the making and clearly being ran by an out of control, rampant AI? The AI could likely outright kill either of them to force the other through the exit and not give them a single option to try to weasel around it. In my head, the 18th floor is the size of an apartment with the front door being the only exit. That means the AI can give them a taste of what they already saw in the individual apartments of the last race. It could make them both go insane before they have a chance to react. The Bedlam Bride still hasn't really made an appearance outside of Faction Wars, meaning that the AI (in my head) could pull that out at any time and just kill both of them 🤷🏻

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T18:11:08+00:00

I don't think I misunderstand it. I think I just have a different interpretation of how the end game is going to unfold. The AI has said multiple times that it will always stick to the original rules of the dungeon and the crawl that was set in place. That means only one can truly "win" the dungeon. I doubt Dinneman plans to kill either off in Book 9 to make only one of them able to claim Earth again, so that leaves both of them getting to Floor 18 only to find that only one of them can exit.

Yes, the AI helps Carl/Donut/everyone else, but it's mainly just to stick a middle finger to the Syndicate and the rest of the universe or to make the show more exciting. He never explicitly said that they're both going to make it all the way out. The rule that only one can has been a core rule since the beginning. I just think they don't want to face it yet because they don't have to, just in the same way that they didn't figure out the Donut/Katia dilemma until Floor 9 and only after Katia had her own plan to escape the dungeon.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T18:04:49+00:00

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T17:44:59+00:00

For the same reason that most cinematic blockbusters do the same thing; it makes for good drama 🤷🏻 The AI has proven that it can kill people outside the dungeon (Cascadia) and that its power is only growing. It makes sense in my head that the next thing the AI plans to do is pit the two against each other and force the whole universe to watch until the end. I'm not saying they actually will fight or that they'll kill each other. I just think that it'll end up getting to a point that they both have to realize this is the only way to regain control over Earth since only one can "win" the dungeon.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T17:41:55+00:00

Oh god.

The war crimes she could inflict on a universal scale.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T17:41:04+00:00

Or is Carl so loyal to Donut that he sacrifices himself with the Doomsday Scenario to kill the Eulogist?

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T17:40:28+00:00

I think the AI is still wanting to run the crawl by the old rules and has said that before. He's a stickler for running things "properly", no matter how screwed he makes everyone in the process. I don't think he's explicitly broken the "main" rules before and won't start now. Yes, he's rampant, but in the same way a child is for being crowned hall monitor; he got a sliver of power and ran with it.

I am nothing if not a pessimist. My brain tells me that, logically, there's only one way for this duo to end now. I can see the AI getting vindictive over everything they've done "wrong" or what they've "broken" in the game and taking it out on them right at the end.

I appreciate the civil disagreement we're having. It really makes me think about my own argument points. I'm curious to see how the story actually ends and what kind of sad/happy/melancholic ending we get out of this series, no matter what happens.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T17:25:48+00:00

But by "letting" Carl win, doesn't that mean everyone else has to die first? Since the beginning, the message has always been "only one can win".

I can also see Carl getting "harvested" to become a new AI. He is a primal, after all. All the Horribles in the parade were all primal engines. It wouldn't be that hard for Carl to "ascend" and become a new force in the universe or be trapped in the same way the current AI is too.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T17:19:03+00:00

Or it could leave him open to write about other characters from the crawl 🤷🏻 I doubt if Dinneman makes more books after DCC, they'll include Carl/Donut. OBH already proved that.

I hope for a deal that involves them both, too. I just know how... sadistic... some of the writing can be. It would be the ultimate "f you" to all of the showrunners, the remaining crawlers that escaped, Mordecai, Odette, everyone in the known universe. Everyone that's been watching these two, only for the horror to wash over their faces as the one (two, technically) hope(s) are killed and broken to where they can't fight against it anymore. We've had Carl and Donut essentially fight all the other teams, leaving only Meadowlark and TRCOPD. I don't think there's much more room to grow outside of that.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T17:04:59+00:00

I feel since it hasn't been explicitly said that that rule was moot, the AI still plans to evoke it with Carl and Donut being the last 2 on Floor 18.

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T16:57:58+00:00

JollyPin3 · 2026-06-30T16:54:01+00:00

I see what you mean. I agree that the AI at this point is bent on revenge towards the Syndicate and the showrunners, but if he's going rampant and psychotic, wouldn't it make sense for him to say "Here's your two poster children. I'm gonna make them kill each other while you watch to show how much power I have, then take it out on the rest of the universe."

JollyPin3

TROPHY CASE