Story so far
Mordecai does not appear at the exit interview, but he shapes it from a distance. Carl counts him, alongside the Dungeon Anarchist's Cookbook and the once-a-floor chats with Odette, as one of the three things that have kept the team alive, which is exactly why the arrival of Loita and her censorship regime hurts so much.
Carl also knows Mordecai will be furious about the second snick and the continued baiting of Prince Maestro: the trainer has been explicit that the team should not deal with gods or factions, and here they are doing both. Carl's justification is that they have so little else, and that humiliating the prick is genuinely fun. Odette's remark about the crafting tables suggests Mordecai's workshop expertise will matter more than ever on the fifth floor.
Role
Team trainer whose advice about avoiding gods and factions is being openly disregarded.
Relationships
Carl — Student who knows he will be angry about the god-baiting.
Odette — Long-standing connection and shared interest, referenced obliquely.
Earlier in this series
Also appears in books you've already read — spoiler-safe to their endings:
Sources — 14 recorded facts, by chapter
Chapter 1
- Carl and Donut's NPC mentor, now a strikingly handsome Incubus — and tricked into becoming their permanent manager.
Chapter 13
- Mordecai settles into managing — a mycologist-alchemist who lets slip he once reached the sixth floor with Odette.
Chapter 23
- The party's game guide, whose lich lore shapes a risky plan before the supposed undead boss proves to be something else.
Chapter 24
- The guide who identifies Remex's true condition, then urges an immediate retreat when the ancient spell ruptures.
Chapter 26
- When Donut reaches the fourth floor, Mordecai's crawl-long obligation is finally discharged — he's a free man.
Chapter 28
- Freed at last and reborn on the new floor as a warty Grulke toad, Mordecai sets up the party's upgraded home base.
Chapter 33
- On the verge of cracking the rail system's secret, Mordecai attacks his old enemy Chaco on sight and is banished for seven crippling days.
Chapter 53
- Banished and counting: with the floor timer at two days twenty hours, Carl has just over a day without his manager.
Chapter 55
- Seven days gone in the space of a blink, and he comes back mid-sentence still hunting the man he swung at.
Chapter 56
- He promises not to lose his temper again, then hits Carl in the head about ninety seconds later.
Chapter 57
- His answer to "I have a glorious idea" arrives before the idea does, and it is No.
Chapter 58
- Asked a hypothetical about accidentally summoning a war god, he answers Run, then answers everything else too.
Chapter 60
- Carl's manager, revealed by Donut as the 'teacher's edition' behind Carl's suspicious foreknowledge.
Chapter 61
- The team's absent trainer, whose standing warning against gods and factions Carl has cheerfully ignored.