Chapter 38

Carl serves as a virtual judge at CrawlCon's children's art contest alongside two aliens: Hurk, a jovial gleener, and G'valt, a dour camel-like creature. As kids present their artwork, Carl learns he has a panel coming up that will be moderated by the mother of a hunter he killed, which has generated significant fan interest and controversy.

Carl arrives at a children's art contest being held at a physical CrawlCon location in the inner system, judging virtually alongside Hurk and G'valt. The three judges score artwork on a scale of one to 30, with Carl given no clear instructions. The children's art ranges from terrible scribbles to masterpieces, including a crude drawing from a human boy named Keith whose father apparently resents Carl, and sophisticated work like a moving lava-spitting llama sculpture. Carl tries to learn what happened in the dungeon with Donut and Lucia Mar but gets no answers from the other judges. Lix, a young gnoll child and apparently the grandchild of Carl's head of security, wins the contest with a perfect score of 90 after Carl agrees to vote for her in exchange for access to his green room. Hurk explains that the winning portrait of Donut by an Eyber slug creature was favored to win, and Carl learns that his next panel will be moderated by the mother of one of the hunters he killed, a woman who is publicly vocal about her dislike of him. Hurk warns Carl to be careful, noting that people actually pay attention to crawlers like him, and the panel has already drawn massive interest with a full line of attendees.