Chapter 2 of Carl’s Doomsday Scenario follows Carl through the race and class selections that define his new build on the dungeon’s third floor. In Mordecai’s guildhall room, Carl gives up the immediate advantages of remaining human to become a Primal, a race that preserves his appearance while allowing every higher-tier skill to advance to its maximum level. He then chooses Compensated Anarchist, a class that combines explosives, traps, unarmed fighting, and social advantages but forces an expensive investment in Charisma. The Second Floor collapses while he is still studying his options. By the time Mordecai presents him outside, Carl has a powerful long-term plan and a weak starting position that will demand training, levels, and money.
Race selection in Mordecai’s room
Carl begins with 398 available races. Donut and the sleeping Mongo remain beside him while Mordecai guides the selection. The system recommends Hobgoblin, Human, and Sasquatch, and Mordecai is surprised to see a crawler’s existing race among its recommendations. For Carl, the choice is more than an allocation of numbers: selecting a race can permanently change his body. A projected Hobgoblin makes that consequence immediate. Donut objects to its appearance and proposes an incubus or changeling instead, but neither is available to Carl. He is wary of the compromises behind a changeling’s versatility even before considering whether it can be selected.
Hobgoblin is closely matched to skills Carl already uses. His level-five Explosives Handling qualifies him for the limited race, whose benefits include higher trap and explosives skills, faster progression in those skills, access to specialized workshops, and a higher possible skill ceiling. It also grants Regeneration, which Carl already has through his Trollskin Shirt. Its substantial Charisma penalty and cap would restrict a different part of his build. Carl nevertheless rejects it chiefly because he cannot accept the bodily transformation. He also believes the race’s disturbing appearance would cost the team viewers. Mordecai later confirms that Hobgoblins are unpopular with audiences and interviewers, so the concern has practical weight in a dungeon where exposure can affect a crawler’s opportunities.
Remaining Human is the simplest alternative. It offers two points to each base stat, a small increase in skill progression, and access to exclusive Earth classes. Unlike Hobgoblin, it requires no change of appearance or new physical liabilities. The system’s third recommendation, Sasquatch, offers a different set of immediate gains: Carl’s level-five Smush makes him eligible, and the race adds considerable Strength and Constitution along with improvements to Bash and Smush. Its penalties to Intelligence and Charisma, and its conspicuous body and oversized feet, make it unattractive to him. Carl connects the recommendation to earlier comments about the system’s interest in his feet and refuses to become a spectacle on those terms.
Mordecai advises Carl to keep searching because other races preserve access to Earth classes. Carl spends roughly two hours reading the wider list. Among the forms he sees are Night Dwarves, Lyrx Elves, Coal Engines, and Intellect Hunters. The last are small parasites capable of taking over the bodies of creatures they kill, though those bodies decay; Mordecai considers the option viable, while Carl cannot imagine living in that form. Most ordinary races appear broadly balanced to him, with stat gains offset by special abilities or limitations. Some limited races supply stronger packages. His survey establishes that the three system recommendations are useful starting points, not an exhaustive account of what he can become.
The Primal decision
Carl finds Primal farther down the list. Unlike the other races, its projected image is empty. Its description says Primals were the starting race of contestants in the earliest seasons of Dungeon Crawler World. A crawler selecting it keeps the appearance and skills associated with the current race, but loses one point from every base stat. In exchange, all higher-tier skills become trainable to level 20. It also retains access to exclusive Earth classes. The choice therefore leaves Carl looking human while sacrificing the Human option’s immediate stat bonus for a much higher potential ceiling.
Carl asks Mordecai what that ceiling is worth. Mordecai explains that regular use can bring a skill to about level ten or eleven, but progress beyond that becomes increasingly difficult. Guilds, equipment, costly potions, unreliable spells, and potentially sponsor gifts can help. Few crawlers who select Primal ever raise even one or two skills past level fifteen. The gain, if achieved, is extraordinary: Mordecai describes a sharp jump in power between levels fifteen and sixteen and uses both Fireball and punching skills to illustrate what mastery could do. His point is conditional. Primal grants access to exceptional growth, not the training, resources, or survival needed to realize it.
The numerical cost is equally clear. Compared with remaining Human, Carl forgoes ten bonus stat points and takes five points of losses, a fifteen-point gap at selection. Mordecai likens the setback to starting several levels behind. He thinks Hobgoblin or Coal Engine would suit Carl better mechanically, though either could damage his audience appeal. Carl also asks about the Legendary Skill Potion that the Maestro gave Maggie My. Mordecai says such potions are rare and worth millions of gold, then describes how war chests on the ninth floor can bring powerful compact supplies into faction warfare. This conversation shows why Carl cannot simply count on a potion to erase the work required by Primal. It also reveals a change in Mordecai’s position: now that he is Donut’s manager, he can discuss matters he previously would have been unable to explain as a guide.
Mordecai distinguishes the dungeon’s race option from the ancient Primals of galactic history. He describes the latter as a vanished species associated with the first known conquest of the universe, ruins of a galaxy-spanning war, surviving technological remnants, and legends that cast them as either objects of fear or worship. He says their original appearance is unknown. A remnant’s resident AI may assume the form of the species that discovers it, which helps explain why Carl’s selection need not impose a distinct Primal body. These are Mordecai’s account of an obscure past, not a discovery Carl makes in the room. After hearing both the mechanical costs and the history, Carl selects Primal.
Classes and the shortened floor timer
The Primal choice leads to a list of more than 650 classes. Mordecai says Carl’s Desperado Club tattoo excludes classes such as clerics and paladins, as well as some monks he would otherwise have considered. The system recommends three Earth classes: Bomb Squad Tech, Prizefighter, and Compensated Anarchist. Each reflects a different side of Carl’s established abilities, and each would award a Silver Earth Box if chosen. Carl examines their specific benefits before deciding which can support the small party he actually has.
Bomb Squad Tech requires the Boom! achievement and centers on explosives. Explosive traps would identify themselves as he approached; the class also improves armor, keeps handled explosives from degrading, raises explosive skills, and supplies Bomb Surgeon. A limb-regeneration benefit partly answers the risks of bomb work. Prizefighter instead rewards Carl’s level-five Pugilism. It strengthens his punching skills, improves physical stats, and pays gold for mobs killed with a punch. Because a Cheat Code potion has already raised his Pugilism, its additional increase is tempting. Carl rules it out as a complete plan: he does not expect to solve every dungeon problem by punching. Bomb Squad Tech also lacks some of the broader tools he wants.
Compensated Anarchist is available because Carl has level-five Explosives Handling and had received at least 500 billion views on reaching the third floor. The class combines monk and rogue features with traps, bombs, unarmed combat, concealment, and social influence. It raises Bomb Surgeon, Trap Engineer, Unarmed Combat, Hide in Shadows, Find Trap, Backfire, and Escape Plan; it grants Fear and a large Charisma increase. Faster progression in trap and bomb skills supports the work Carl already intends to do. The costs steer him away from conventional weapons and offensive magic: bladed attacks deal less damage, while damage-dealing spells require more mana. Its description also grants access to the Desperado Club, which Carl already has, and names the Naughty Boys Employment Agency without explaining what the agency does. A required subclass choice awaits on the sixth floor, but neither Carl nor Mordecai can see the options yet.
Before Carl finishes reviewing classes, the Second Floor collapses. The system announces that just over 700,000 crawlers remain and gives them eight full days to complete the Third Floor. Mordecai reacts to the short deadline by considering its effect on later floors, especially the sixth floor and the factions that expect more time there. Carl continues comparing classes, including Riot Forces Support, Trebuchet Commander, Rogue Trapmaster, and Trickster, but the countdown makes the cost of a slow-developing build more immediate. Donut and Mongo sleep while Carl and Mordecai discuss the choices.
Mordecai identifies a major hidden burden in Compensated Anarchist: it requires a minimum Charisma of 25. Carl has 36 points to distribute, but even after the class’s Charisma bonus, he must commit 17 points to meet that minimum. Another six will bring his base Dexterity to ten. The class offers many abilities, yet its entry requirements consume points Carl would have preferred to spend on Strength and Constitution. Mordecai thinks Prizefighter would fit a more balanced party and Bomb Squad Tech a larger one. For Carl’s group, he regards Compensated Anarchist as potentially strongest, provided Carl can gain experience and train hard despite the shortened timers. Carl chooses it with that condition understood.
Skills, statistics, and departure
The class’s less obvious skills help make the decision. Mordecai says Backfire lets Carl pick up and dismantle traps, recover their components, and use valuable triggers in his own devices. Bomb Surgeon can divide an explosive into smaller charges or separate a smoke bomb into parts for trapmaking. Escape Plan makes hidden doors easier to find and also gives access to the Dungeon Locator. Mordecai describes the Locator as concealed directional information at major dungeon intersections, useful to intelligent wandering mobs and capable of pointing toward exits or city bosses. He can tell Carl how to find and read it because his manager role permits an explanation that his earlier guide role would have barred. He does not claim to know the function of the Naughty Boys Employment Agency or the eventual sixth-floor subclass options.
After the selection, Carl considers Donut’s new statistics and racial benefits alongside his own. Donut’s Charisma stands at 70, while her Constitution remains low despite an increase. Her cat race brings Night Vision, Slash Attack, Cat-like Reflexes, and 9 Lives. The last halves damage from the first nine physical attacks she takes each day; Carl recognizes its value but worries that even reduced damage from a powerful enemy could overwhelm her. When Donut wakes, she sees Carl’s unchanged appearance and initially mistakes his Primal choice for remaining human. Mongo wakes with her. Their exchange underlines the unusual feature of Carl’s selection: it changes his limits without visibly changing him.
Carl remains responsible for absorbing physical danger for the party. His settled base scores include Strength 10, Constitution 10, Dexterity 10, Intelligence 5, and Charisma 25, with equipment modifying several of those figures. He has enough Intelligence to read a Wisp Armor spellbook but has not decided whether to use, give away, or sell it. Fear costs three mana to cast. He doubts the immediate balance of his build because Donut is presently more powerful and his Charisma investment overlaps with her exceptional strength in that stat. He intends to direct future points into Strength and Constitution until both base scores reach at least 20. His class can become versatile and formidable only through deliberate development; Mordecai adds that it will also require a great deal of money.
Mordecai then prepares to leave the guildhall room with them. He explains that being their manager allows him to go outside and present the crawlers, although he cannot directly fight for them. Donut points out that he is technically her manager. He postpones that distinction and arranges to present Carl first, followed by Donut and Mongo. The door, which had opened onto a golden hallway when they arrived, now opens onto a busy settlement of shops and varied inhabitants under a red artificial sky. Carl steps onto its wooden street amid heat, smoke, and sulfur. Mordecai introduces him to the Third Floor as a level-13 Compensated Anarchist Primal. The chapter ends at that introduction, before Carl’s exploration of the Over City begins.