Help me understand the Explode action on Inventor

I'm fairly new to 2e but I have experience with 1e rules confusion so could someone tell me straight up does the user of the feature take damage from the Inventor's Explode?

No. With two buts.

The first is that it's an emanation, and affecting the creature at the center of an emanation is optional unless it says otherwise. Normally it's pretty obvious whether you want to be included or not, but if for some reason you want to take the damage it is an option.

The second is that it's an Unstable action. Unstable actions are ultimately kind of similar to Focus Spells, except instead of costing points using them up is random. Whenever you use an Unstable action, roll a DC 17 flat check--that is, roll a d20 and compare it directly to the DC with no modifier.
On a 17 you succeed and nothing happens. On a natural 20 you'd critically succeed, but it still does nothing.
On an 8-16 you fail, something isn't quite right, and you can't use Unstable actions again until you take 10 minutes to reset it.

And on a 7 or lower you critically fail, and that's when you take damage equal to your level.

If you happen to be in the emanation from a construct using this action, you'd also need to save against it naturally.