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undertalethingies · 3 years

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Self Indulgent Self Insert Fanfic, Part One

I am sitting in my room, not doing much of anything, (as per usual) when I look up and notice that my mirror has apparently transformed into a solid wall of inky darkness as I’ve been spacing out.

And well- it’s not like I can not poke it, right? There’s a high chance I’ll seriously regret it, if my life has become the isekai it appears to be, but there’s a 100% chance I’ll regret it forever if I don’t touch it, you know?

Everyone always assumes I’m risk averse, that I like to play it safe, but the truth of the matter is I’ve just never found something I really want to take a risk with.

So, I push myself out of bed with a hand and go grab my shoes, because there’s no way in hell I’m touching something that might be a portal with no shoes on. Thankfully, I’m actually dressed for once, rather than being in my bathrobe like usual.

Once I’ve got my shoes on, I grab my coat from where it hangs by my dresser and walk straight into what used to be my mirror. I hope my parents aren’t too worried by my disappearance. Maybe I’ll be lucky and this will be the kind of isekai that retroactively erases me from existence? That would be kind of nice, to exist without tethers.

The portal (because that’s what it is, I’m pretty sure) feels cool, but not unpleasantly so. Like when you first put on a fleece sweater and it takes a moment to warm up.

If this were a stereotypical isekai story, things would quickly become very unpleasant in this dark void, and some godlike being would reach out to grant me power beyond my wildest imaginings.

I’ve never been one to cave to expectations, though. Not even my own.

The darkness remains cool and comforting, and I continue walking forward because there’s no chance I’m going to turn back now, with so much possibility awaiting me if I only continue long enough.

Eventually, I feel as if I’ve passed some threshold, and something definably changes within me. Can’t say what, though. I’ve always kinda sucked at interpreting what my body is trying to tell me, so I’ll probably have to figure it out on my own.

At some point the darkness and walking grows boring, and so I do what I often do when bored, and curl up to go to sleep. This place isn’t cold enough for me to need a blanket, and I’ve got my coat with me anyway, so I’m fine. Sleeping on hard surfaces isn’t unpleasant, in my opinion, merely a bit annoying, since if you pick the wrong position you’ll inevitably wake up sore.

As always, consciousness takes a while to fade, so I occupy myself with grand imaginings about all the wonderful (and terrible, I’ve got anxiety okay, I can’t help it) things that might await me.

When I wake, it’s immediately obvious that something is different. There’s light now, for one, and for two I can feel something soft and organic beneath me. Judging by smell alone… Flowers? Waking up on a bed of flowers in a lit room… Well, I’ve always wished I could live in Undertale, if only so I could chew out the characters for bottling up their feelings so damn much. Hey, maybe if I’m lucky, that one headcanon I have about Sans secretly being a teenager will be right and I’ll be able to flirt with him without it being creepy.

Oh come on, like everyone attracted to dudes and not overly hung up about species concerns doesn’t want to kiss that guy, are you kidding me? Plus, I love puns and I’m depressed, surely we’ll get along.

Oh boy, I’m definitely going to die, huh? Thank fuck for my high pain tolerance and ridiculous resistance to trauma, am I right?

Finally, I open my eyes, because I like to wake up slow and I see no reason to alter my existing routine simply because I’ve apparently been yeeted into my favorite video game. Hey, speaking of favorite video games, will I get to visit Hollow Knight next? No, wait, that would probably suck, wouldn’t it. Ah, well.

The cave is just as beautiful as I always imagined it would be. Though it looked lovely in the game art, there’s truly nothing that can compare to seeing the sight in person, those marble pillars in a half circle around me, that single spot of sunlight in the ceiling far (far, far) above. Not to mention the lovely flowers I’m laying on at this very moment and- there’s a dead body under me, isn’t there. Is Chara going to show up, or am I left to be alone in my head?

Though their narration doesn’t actually start until you meet Flowey, in the game, so I suppose I’ll just have to wait and see.

Wait.

Wait wait wait.

Which human soul am I taking the place of right now? Because I read a fic once where the protagonist wasn’t the seventh, even if it was a fakeout, and I very much do not want to be saddled with the fate of those poor bastards.

Though, maybe I’d be able to talk my way out? There’s no one who’d call me diplomatic, for sure, but I’m pretty great at knowing exactly where to aim an insult to utterly break someone’s spirit. (Unusual skill, I’m aware, but in my defense I was bullied growing up)(I say “growing up” like I’m not still doing it, like I’m not fourteen and trapped in a world where it’s an accepted fact that the protagonist will die, and several times over, too)

My first order of business is Flowey, before I can take the time to freak out, to hold myself tight and weather the sheer panic that Toto, I am not in Kansas anymore.

I get up. I give a last fond look to the beautiful cave I’ve “fallen” into, and I walk to the next room, hoping all the while that I’m not signing my own death sentence.

Once I’m a few feet in, there he is, in all his fucking glory.

Flowey the flower, the soulless remnant of prince Asriel Dreemurr, former hope of the underground, possibly still holder of the ability to control time itself.

Yeah, I’m definitely going to mess with him. Self preservation is for losers.

“You’re a flower with a face,” I say before he can start with his usual greeting. I have it memorized anyway, so it’s not like I’m missing out on anything.

He makes his T-T face, so I know this isn’t how he thought this would go.

“Wow, human! What gave you that impression?” Ooh, sassy. Literally his only positive trait.

“Well I have eyes, see,” I was planning to ask him probing questions, but honestly this is just as good. His expression doesn’t change as he says his next sentence, nor does his ever cheery tone, (and holy fuck his voice is just as vaguely creepy as I’d imagined, all that childlike innocence paired with the fact that he’s a mass murderer)

“Well howdy, human with eyes! I’m Flowey, flowey the flower!” He says. I don’t interject.

“You’re clearly new to the underground, and it looks like I’m the only one around to show you how things work around here! Are you ready?”

…

“I’m really not, to be honest. I’ve got no idea what’s going on,” So my plan here, basically, is to stall until Toriel gets here. Mostly because I’m hoping that if he doesn’t get the chance to do his betrayal, he’ll keep pretending to be nice, which will be hilarious since I’ll know he’s faking the whole time.

Admittedly, this significantly increases the likelihood that Toriel won’t come to save me when he inevitably finds a secluded place to murder me, but if I think too hard about the long term right now I’m going to scream, so.

“Well you see, human, you’ve fallen into the underground, a land inhabited by monsters! Don’t worry though, we’re quite nice,” Oh right, conversation. I wonder how much info I can get out of him…

“What’s a monster? Like, I know what it means on the surface, but that definition is pretty vague, and I don’t want to be accidentally racist,”

His face pops back to the usual smile. (Side note: his face looks like it was drawn on with sharpie and it’s totally messing me up)

“A monster is a being made of magic!” Ok, that’s… a bit vague, but not really inaccurate. I guess he doesn’t want to get into the science, which is a damn shame, since he probably knows it backwards and forwards due to all his reset shenanigans.

“Woah, cool. Magic is real? How does it work without breaking thermodynamics?” Finally, the question I’ve always wanted to ask. If energy can’t be created, how the fuck does Toriel shoot fireballs from her hands? What is she drawing on, what is the fire burning, how hot is it, how does it keep being on fire, etc. etc. repeat for every magical display in the game.

“Well, a lot of it isn’t super understood. Scientists have mostly been pinning it on ‘dark energy’ like they do with every other phenomenon they don’t totally understand,” I wonder why he’s so willingly entertaining my time wasting antics. I know, in game, he didn’t realize he’d lost control over the timeline until after his first talk with Frisk, so maybe he’s just waiting it out to see where it goes? And then of course he must be planning other things to do with me before he takes my soul and goes to the surface…

“God, I hate dark energy in science. I know they just call it that because not much is known about it, but I’m thirsty for knowledge, you know?” Actually ‘thirsty for knowledge’ describes my mood like 90% of the time. Huh, actually, I have that in common with Flowey, right? Even if his knowledge thirst is just due to boredom.

“Hey, human, me too! Learning new things is great!” There’s a loaded sentence if i’ve ever heard one. When was the last time he learned something new? He’s supposedly read every book in the underground, but how much information from that did he actually retain?

“Isn’t it? It’s why I love Youtube so much. Free information for anyone who cares to make a few clicks!” Wait, he probably doesn’t know what Youtube is, actually.

“What’s Youtube?” He asks, cocking his head.

“It’s a service where you can upload videos or watch videos other people have uploaded,” Not the most nuanced explanation, but it’ll do for now. Before Flowey has a chance to respond, a fireball manifests next to him.

I don’t smile because I’m pretending to be shocked, but I’m laughing my ass off on the inside. The face he makes is even more ridiculous in person.

Enter Toriel, queen of the monsters, mother of no living children.

#undertale #undertale fanfiction #undertale fanfic #self insert #i'm not tagging it reader insert because the insert is very specifically me #flowey #this is purely self indulgent so i'm making no effort for it to sound polished

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puppypaw-wc · 3 years

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i just wanted to ramble ‘bout undertale... hhhhhhhh.

aka me just describing the whole plot of the game... this one’s just the ruins tho cuz i don’t think tumblr would let me type out the whole game’s plot in detail.

i understand if y’all don’t wanna see this so it’s under the cut.

soooo uh. the opening “cutscene”/whatever you call it is just a few images with text explaining the events prior to the game.

“long ago, two races ruled over earth: humans and monsters. one day, war broke out between the two races. in the end, the humans were victorious. they sealed the monsters underground with a magic spell. many years later . . . mt. ebbot. 201X. legends say those who climb the mountain never return...”

the last frames show a human who you’d at first assume to be the player character climbing the mountain and falling in; however, it is not the player character (frisk), as the human in the intro only has one stripe on their shirt, while frisk’s shirt has two.

anyways after that you get presented with the start menu (it’s track is creatively entitled, you guessed it, start menu!) with instructions on how to play the game. once you start, you get to name the fallen human.

now, this is honestly kinda ingenious. it doesn’t say “name your character”, it doesn’t say “what is your name?”; no, it says “name the fallen human”.

there’s also responses to some specific names.

like if you name yourself “fight” (or something like that) or “mercy”, the response is “that’s a little on the nose, isn’t it?”, though the name’s still allowed to be used.

naming yourself one of the main characters’ names (or however much can fit) also elicits special responses, and most of them aren’t allowed to be used, but there’s a couple instances of them being usable. like papyrus’ name is too long so if you enter “papyru” as your name the response is “I’LL ALLOW IT” and the name’s allowed to be used. the names “blooky” or “napsta” (as in napstablook) are also allowed, with the response being “... (they are powerless to stop you)”. my favorite is either naming yourself “flowey” or “temmie” tho.

the name “flowey” gets the response “i already CHOSE that name” (flowey had the ability to reset/save/etc. before frisk) with it not being allowed, while naming yourself “temmie” gets the response “hOi!!!” as a reference to the species of temmie (temmie is best undertale character /hj) and is allowed. it used to make tem flakes heal more but that was removed for some reason.

ANYWAYS the game starts after you name yourself (the “true name” is chara, which elicits the response “the true name”, so i’ll be referring to “the fallen human” as such). you start out with your armor as the bandage and your weapon as the stick... both of which have 0 of their corresponding stat.

in the next room, you meet a talking flower, who introduces himself.

“howdy! i’m flowey! flowey the flower! hmm, you’re new to the underground, aren’t’cha? golly, you must be so confused! someone oughta teach ya how things work around here. (oop i’m listening to the undertale ost and finale started playing-fitting-) guess lil’ old me will have to do? ready? let’s go!”

you then find yourself in a battle. on the bottom of the screen, there’s two things: your LV, which is 1 at the time, and your hp, which is 20/20. in the middle of the screen is the bullet board, with a red heart inside. flowey’s above the bullet board. oh, and in battles, everything’s black and white other then the heart and some attacks.

“see that heart? that’s your SOUL. the very culmination of your being! your SOUL starts off weak, but grows stronger with LV. what’s LV stand for? why, LOVE, of course! you want some LOVE, don’t you? *he winks* down here, love is spread through little, white... “friendliness pellets”. go on! collect as many as you can!”

now, here, there’s two options: run into the “friendliness pellets” (which makes this part go by faster) or dodge them, which elicits some funny responses from flowey.

“hey buddy. you missed them. let’s try this again, shall we?”

“is this a joke? are you brain dead? RUN. INTO. THE. BULLETS friendliness pellets.”

“you know what’s going on here, don’t’cha? you just wanted to see me SUFFER. who would pass up an opportunity like this? DIE.”

running into them elicits basically the same thing as the last response, though he states that “in this world, it’s kill or be killed” first. i also don’t remember what he says if you run into them cuz i always dodge them... cuz it’s funny...

you find your SOUL surrounded with the “friendliness pellets”, and it seems that you’re doomed to death... but when they hit you, instead of harming you, they heal you.

flowey gets a confused look on his face before he’s hit with a fireball and goat mom toriel appears!

“what a terrible creature, torturing such a poor, innocent youth. do not be afraid, my child. i am toriel, caretaker of the ruins. i pass through here everyday to see if a human has fallen. you are the first to have come here in a very long time.”

she also says some other stuff but i don’t remember it so. :shruggie:

anyways, you follow her into the next room, where you find a four-pointed star; a save point.

“the shadow of the ruins looms above, filling you with determination. (HP fully restored).”

this is your first opportunity to save, which is interestingly enough not just a game mechanic; it’s an in-universe feature as well.

(okay wtf undertale ost on shuffle, it played temmie village and then tem shop immediately after, wtf???)

anyways, toriel guides you through (read: does for you) a few puzzles, before you find yourself in a long hallway, where she says she wants to test your independence by making you walk to the end of the hallway by yourself.

she’s just hiding behind a pillar at the other end of the hallway.

toriel says that she has a few errands to run, and gives you a cellphone before leaving. you can get some funny calls if you do wait, and at the end of it all her phone gets stolen by a dog. despite this, she still calls you when you leave the room. she does actually have special dialogue, though: “My apologies. A strange dog kidnapped my phone.”

anyways, you travel through the ruins, getting encounters with the enemies (froggit, whimsun, loox, vegetoid, moldsmal, migosp), who you can all spare.

i forgot the dummy battle tutorial, basically toriel has a training dummy as a battle tutorial.

things you can do:

talk to it: this makes the battle end, and makes toriel seem happy with you. it’s technically the right thing to do but the others are funnier.

fight it: this kills the dummy, though it doesn’t give you exp, and thus you can still get a true pacifist route.

flee: you run away from the battle and toriel says that it’s a good strategy... but it’s just a dummy, it can’t hurt you and doesn’t seek revenge.

do nothing: if you do nothing for eight turns (including missing attacks), dummy “tires of your aimless shenanigans” and leaves. toriel is confused by this, but continues on as if nothing happened.

whatever you do elicits a different response in a future mini-boss’ pre-battle dialogue, so. yeah.

ANYWAYS!

the ruins’ mini-boss is napstablook, a ghost who, according to themself, “usually comes to the RUINS because there's nobody around”.

to spare them, you need to cheer three times; this makes them show you their “dapper blook” trick, which is a top hat made of tears. they stop attacking to await your response, and if you flirt or cheer, the encounter ends.

also random fun fact: just like with the dummy, killing napstablook doesn’t give you exp, and thus a true pacifist route doesn’t end.

“FIGHTing Napstablook causes them to remind the protagonist that they are a ghost and therefore unable to be killed; they were only lowering their HP to be nice. They then vanish, and the protagonist suffers a loss of one "experience point" (not the same as EXP). This action does not abort the True Pacifist Route since it does not accrue any EXP.”

(x)

oh yeah, did i mention that EXP and LV don’t mean experience points and level?

flowey was actually correct about LV being LOVE. however, it’s an acronym, namely for level of violence. EXP, on the other hand, is an acronym for execution points.

continuing through the ruins and doing some puzzles (one of which includes several holes you must fall through to find a switch, one of which has the faded ribbon, a piece of armor, in it), you can get the toy knife, a weapon, before heading to toriel’s house, where she’s made you a butterscotch-cinnamon pie.

you see, earlier on in the ruins, she asks if you prefer butterscotch or cinnamon (if you’ve reset/loaded a save from after this point, she actually remembers your answer), before asking if you’d turn up your nose at the sight of the other/if you have allergies. there wasn’t enough of both at the store or something along those lines if i remember right.

anyways, you go to sleep in your room (yes, you have your own bedroom and yes, that is pure, and yes, toriel is the best), and she puts a slice of the pie on the floor for you to collect. it’s a healing item that restores all your hp, but i’d recommend saving it honestly.

toriel’s reading in the living room, where you can talk to her and either ask how to leave, or just talk to her. you do have to leave for the game to progress, though.

after asking her how to leave like three or four times, she goes downstairs and talks to you before fighting you, asking you to prove that you’ll be able to survive.

you see...

“Every human that falls down here meets the same fate. I have seen it again and again. They come. They leave. They die. You naive child... If you leave the RUINS... They... ASGORE... Will kill you. I am only protecting you, do you understand? ... go to your room.”

the fight with toriel is one that people often mess up on, though the strategy for her fight is actually foreshadowed by an npc froggit earlier on in the ruins.

many people think that you have to weaken her, or just end up killing her because they don’t see how else to do it.

so, what does happen if you kill her? well, it depends.

if you attack her once she stops attacking:

“You... ... at my most vulnerable moment... To think I was worried you wouldn't fit out in there... Eheheheh!!! You really are no different than them! Ha... Ha...”

on a neutral route:

“Urgh... You are stronger than I thought... Listen to me, small one... If you go beyond this door, Keep walking as far as you can. Eventually, you will reach an exit. ... .... ASGORE... Do not let ASGORE take your soul. His plan cannot be allowed to succeed. ....... Be good, won't you? My child.“

on a genocide route:

“Y... you... really hate me that much? Now I see who I was protecting by keeping you there. Not you... But them! Ha... ha...”

fun fact: until today my dumbass though that “them” was referring to chara and only just realized that it’s referring to the monsters further in the underground.

and now, it’s time for flowey (slash indicates a break in the text).

on a pacifist route (where you don’t kill anyone):

“Clever. Verrrryyy clever. / You think you're really smart, don't you? / In this world, it's kill or be killed. / So you were able to play by your own rules. / You spared the life of a single person. / Hee hee hee... / I bet you feel really great. / You didn't kill anybody this time. / But what will you do if you meet a relentless killer? / You'll die and you'll die and you'll die.Until you tire of trying. / What will you do then? / Will you kill out of frustration? / Or will you give up entirely on this world...... / and let ME inherit the power to control it? / I am the prince of this world's future. / Don't worry, my little monarch, my plan isn't regicide. / This is SO much more interesting.”

on a genocide route (where you kill everyone, exhausting the kill counter until the “but nobody came” message appears):

“Hahaha... / You're not really human, are you? / No. You're empty inside. Just like me. In fact... / You're Chara, right? / We're still inseperable, after all these years... / Listen. I have a plan to become all powerful. / Even more powerful than you and your stolen soul. / Let's destroy everything in this wretched world. / Everyone, everything in these worthless memories... / Let's turn 'em all to dust.”

(note that by “chara” i mean “whatever you named the fallen human”)

and that’s it for the ruins.

uh. yeah.

sorry for rambling about undertale so much on main, i love it too much.

#puppy rambles #undertale #things that're definitely my special interests

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leonhaxor · 5 years

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Hello, yes, welcome to a Deltarune Theory

So, we all know how Gaster was the royal scientist for King Dreemurr. Built his greatest creation, the CORE - which we know that is a massive power source - and that Gaster famously "fell into his creation." Most interpreters thin it's the CORE he fell into, but it's not exactly elaborated upon. We also know what whatever he fell into, he basically became a glitch in the system of UNDERTALE's reality.

Do we really know HOW his CORE works, though?

The CORE was Gaster's greatest creation. Which, as far as we ever knew, was an absolutely MASSIVE energy reactor that provided power to all of the Underground. These are the facts here. Judging by all the lava, it'd be safe to say the power source was geothermal in origin.

The thing is, as far as 'greatest creations' go, this seems a little bit... too mundane. Yes, it's massive. Yes, it looks like Shadow Moses and Hollow Bastion had a lovechild (the castle in KH1, not the variant with an actual town around it). Yes, the overworld theme there is a banger. But at the end of the day it's still a glorified power plant. To his credit, it's unknown how long it actually took him to make it, as well as the implied time period they were sealed away being at least around Medieval Times, if not further back.

But even then... what about the CORE could shatter Gaster's existence across time and space (assuming it was the creation at all)?

Monsters can die to a lot of the same things any other living being can die to. There might be certain allowances, based on what kind of monster they were. If the CORE was geothermal in nature, if a fire elemental was to fall into its workings... well, barring the "drop of water in an ocean" possibility, it's highly likely they'd survive intimate contact with such high levels of heat. A monster that may or may not be a skeleton, like Gaster is widely believed to be? Probably has a melting point.

With the heavy implications that his fall into the CORE spread his essence across time and space, and the specific attention to getting those details across... would a fall into a mere geothermal reactor, no matter how large, actually spread one's being across existence in such an anomalous manner? What would set it apart from dying in literally any other part of the Underground, where monsters turn to dust instead?

As we have seen in both UNDERTALE and deltarune, a Fall is an *incredibly important thing*. Chara/The First Human fell into the underground, arguably fucking up everyone as badly (if not more so) than the human wizards of old who trapped monsters in the Underground. The six human children that came after did the exact same thing, leaving only their SOULs and their gear behind for Asgore and Frisk, respectively, to use. Frisk... well, they too fell into the Underground, and gave us the means to interact with that world.

What do monsters call dying of old age in their culture? Falling down. You know who also did this by the time we're in Chapter 1 of deltarune? Gerson. There’s a book in the The one person alive who knew what the delta rune was, and who has been getting an awful lot of mention for a dead turtle, but I'll get to that later. Note that there was a distinct difference in the way that it was described for Gaster - he “fell into his own creation,” but he did not “fall down.” Humpty Dumpty might have been pushed.

But the point is, Gaster's own fall is fascinating because like in the context of the human children's falls, his Fall marked a beginning of a story (most obviously, Alphys', but I'm not sure that's where it ends), and the context of an end (such as Gerson's fall in deltarune, and his posthumous reverence by the community that he was from, much like the Followers do).

...so, what exactly might be the cause for Gaster's non-existence, regarding the CORE itself? How exactly did any of that end up being relevant?

Let's talk about deltarune's story for a second.

Recall that the Knight has been referred to by Spade King in crimson text... which, if you recall, is rather similar in color to that of the human SOUL in Kris.

But what kind of creature could this Knight be, to fight the Spade King and instill such profound loyalty within this monarch? When he is so powerful, so cunning, so ruthless, as we see him in his boss battle (as well as indirectly, though his effect on the Darkners' Kingdom)? What if I told you...

Ahem.

Jokes aside, we do have to consider what kind of monster this Knight would have to be, one with the power to create the Holy Fountains. One that we haven't actually seen onscreen, and have heard even less of than King. Except... we might actually have seen someone, or rather something, that DOES have ties with the Knight, or at least his ability to manipulate the Fountains.

Kris.

Or rather, their SOUL.

Or even more specifically... a SOUL that we simply control.

Let's walk back a bit from the stinger, and work our way from there.

Here's a picture from the final scene we have so far in the Dark World, specifically of the “fountain” that we encounter.

If you are viewing this in-game, the pattern is constantly scrolling diagonally, along the same line but in different directions. If you pay attention to it, you'll see this strange symbol that looks like a chinese fingertrap with spades on the ends.

Now take a look at this picture from the vessel creation screen. It’s been taken from just before the other menu items appear, for maximum clarity.

Note how, while there is a constant rippling effect from the center, not unlike water in a pool, we can clearly see that there is a shape being distorted.

One that bears a striking resemblance to that of the fountain itself.

Both times we see this pattern, texture, whatever you prefer calling it... there is a brief interval where we see it, before a *Red SOUL* is seen in the center of it. And, directly afterwards, we are shown a white light that encompasses the entire screen, before we are brought into the World of Light.

Curiously, in the earlier variant, the screen turns white from the center x-axis and outwards, where the second one turns white from the center y-axis and outwards. Not entirely sure of the significance of the differing choice in axis, but I think it has something to do with the context of each entry. The first is our entry into the game, or rather the prologue, while the latter is our entry into the epilogue.

I believe that the former is representative of the SOUL's entry into the CORE, while the latter is representative of it returning from the depths of the Dark World.

Yes, you read that right.

I believe that the entirety of this game take place inside the CORE.

Between the curious reactions to entering his name into either of the inputs, along with all of the references to sounds and words associated with him, most people think Gaster is the narrator in the opening sequence. Or Chara, according to @Squigglydigg's initial theories playing the game. But while that'd be interesting to explore, I'll have to go a third route for the moment, as I believe there is more evidence to back this idea up.

I might as well address the name input easter eggs before I go farther. Neither "Frisk" nor "Chara" happen to elicit any sort of unique response from the narrator whatsoever. If you name Gaster as the Vessel, the program soft resets. But if you name him as the Creator... it shuts down immediately, before you can truly enter the "R."

I believe that this narrator we are introduced to is actually a program designed by Gaster himself, made to oversee the CORE's operations.

If Gaster is named as the creator of this vessel, the program crashes. Note that this name is also used as that of the SAVE file's profile. As far as we know so far, the vessel's name is inconsequential. It's been hypothesized that this vessel will become relevant in later chapters, but it is unclear if and how it would actually be used.

My current thoughts as to what the creator has to do with this program... is that whoever is actually using the program is in some form of VR simulation. One that, as suggested by the cage at the end of the chapter, is meant to trap the player. I’ll get more into how it tries to do so in the next part of my hypothesis.

I haven’t forgotten about the "Chara" figure at the end of the chapter. I think this is actually a clue to the true identity of the Knight, or at least the World of Light's equivalent. Recall that the one in the Dark World is never seen, but is able to summon the Holy Fountains of Darkness. King, in his fight, has an odd hatred for Kris specifically, calling them the specific name of "Lightbringer" for the first and only time so far in the game. Picture the act of what the Knight *does*, bringing forth a fountain of shadows from the Earth. When Kris stands before that castle fountain, it erupts into light (and is presumably destroyed, but then again, we don’t actually see the aftermath of this action).

The Knight is implied to be obscenely powerful, in both conventional combat and enough to create dark fountains, enough to make King into a willing and eager servant. If we look back at UNDERTALE's genocide route, we see Flowey (who in terms of power and personality greatly resembles King) eagerly supporting "Chara" in their slaughtering of the Underground. And, by the time we have defeated Sans, we've made them into a truly unstoppable killing machine. Note how the Knight's colortext has a unique red and black gradient effect, representing their ties to the darkness while also bringing to mind the infamous red text that accompanied our player-made killer's thoughts. Thoughts laid out in simpler text rendering, but noticably brighter hue than that associated with the Knight.

Also recall the words of Seam the Shopkeeper, should you defeat Jevil. He heavily implies that Jevil is only a taste of what is to come, that later enemies will be even more powerful than that reality warping madman. In the world of UNDERTALE, what has proven more powerful than a human with high LV?

Apart from human error... not much comes to mind, honestly.

In the next part of my Game Theory(TM), I’ll be going over what I think Ralsei’s part to play in all of this really is, as well as what the CORE actually *does* to generate power for the Underground.

#deltarune #game theory #squigglydigg #because some of what she said in her stream of the game got me thinking about things from another angle #which i will get into soon #but this post is kind of goddamn long as it is

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mynameisntburgerpants · 6 years

Note

Underswap

send me an au and i’ll give you 5+ headcanons about it || accepting

I actually have a whole-ass text document about my own personal version of Underswap, making it more of a roleswap along the lines of my own personal swap AU (PLEASE ASK ME ABOUT THAT IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN ME MAKING THAT A REALITY) than a personality swap. This is gonna be a long one, so I’m putting it under the cut.

First of all, instead of Chara swapping with Frisk and Asriel swapping with Monster Kid for some reason (WHICH DOESN'T EVEN MAKE SENSE CONSIDERING ASRIEL IS STILL ASGORE AND TORIEL'S SON), Asriel and Chara swap and Frisk stays where they are. I dunno what happens to Monster Kid, I guess they stay put too. Wouldn't make sense to swap 'em with Frisk. Maybe not even every single character would switch.

Toriel/Asgore swap:

Asgore was so ashamed of how Toriel received his idea for collecting the human souls necessary to break the barrier (that is, poorly) that he exiled himself to the Ruins, never to be seen again by monsterkind. Toriel finds herself, regrettably, taking Asgore's mantle on his promise, but she doesn't have it in her to do it and ends up just taking all the humans in under her wing--or would if any of them other than Frisk survived to get to her.

Asgore basically serves as the Goat Dad of the ruins, much like canon Toriel, but given his lack of self worth, he doesn't try to stop Frisk from leaving by sheer nature of the fact he thinks he couldn't if he tried. An optional sidequest before you leave the ruins allows you to engange in battle with him and subsequently spare/betray him (he is too strong to even hurt with your starting equipment and LV unless you betrayal kill him), which is required on the True Pacifist route--alternately, he stands in your way regardless in the No Mercy route, because no one else is left to stand in your way and he doesn't want the fact that he let you murder everyone outside weighing on his conscience.

Napstablook/Mettaton swap:

Napstablook owns a multimedia empire and a robot body thanks to Mettaton's help and encouragement. They're the underground's premier DJ and star, though they're genuinely kind and humble--not nearly as narcissistic as their cousin. Actually, Blooky ends up being one hell of a pushover even despite their confidence boost. Mettaton, still being a ghost, handles the PR side of things, but takes frequent breaks in the ruins.

Dr. Undyne designed Napstablook's robot body to be as shonen as possible--like, Kenshiro from Hokuto no Ken levels of ripped, which humorously juxtaposes their placid demeanor. Their battles are mainly rhythm game segments, given their affinity with music, but Undyne's Human Eradicatin' Weapons Systems frequently accidentally kick in to make things dangerous. Even when they just want to talk ;~;There could be a sidequest in which you help convince Undyne to build them a body that maybe isn't loaded with deadly weapons (good luck with that part) and an appearance more befitting their tastes and personality.

Sans/Papyrus swap:

Papyrus finds out through overhearing a conversation that he's just "too sweet/gentle" to be in the Royal Guard, but not being one to give up on his dreams so easily, he instead pushes for Sans to join the Guard, so Papyrus can live vicariously through him. Sans doesn't really care for it, but as long as his brother's happy, he is too. In trademark Sans style, despite him successfully making the cut for the royal guard, he doesn't really try. His puzzles are all extremely easy (if you can even call some of them puzzles) and his fighting ability is laughable at best, so he hires Papyrus to "help out." This serves a double purpose: so Sans doesn't have to do much, and Papyrus still gets to do what he loves, even if it isn't officially sanctioned by the highers-up.

If you try to kill Sans during your "fights" with him, he just conveniently avoids each attack and makes a snide remark--you have to betrayal kill him after having not tried to attack him for a few turns before you're able to spare him. Papyrus has some new tricks up his sleeve if you fight him as the judge of your sins, and he's a total damage sponge along the lines of Undyne the Undying.

Nice Cream Guy/Burgerpants swap:

Burgerpants runs a burger stand in Snowdin, but boy, he is not happy about it. But it pays rent, and nobody is hiring for the skill set he has, so he just begrudgingly does what he has to do to survive. Over the course of a Pacifist run, you help him get over himself depending on how well his burgers sell. The burger wrappers initially contain morbid observations about the world around him the first time you meet him, but he ditches the idea altogether because it's too much extra work, and just sells them plainly wrapped from then on.

Nice Cream Guy, meanwhile, works at the Nice Cream Parlor in Napstablook's resort. Mettaton gives him a hard time sometimes, but he genuinely seems to be happy, doing what he loves working for someone he looks up to. Napstablook actually treats him with respect compared to canon Mettaton with Burgerpants, and the place ends up being surprisingly successful. He hints at Burgerpants being immensely awkward around him but trying to make an approach nonetheless, and he finds it simply adorable.

Grillby/Muffet swap:

Grillby lives with his niece/daughter/other-younger-female-relative, Fuku Fire, in Hotland. He runs a moderately successful bar/nightclub where you would normally encounter Muffet in canon Undertale. He's trying to raise money to put Fuku through college. You have to pass through, but he mistakenly believes you're trying to get into the club despite obviously being underage and has a bouncer fight you off. Once the bouncer is talked down, Grillby realizes his mistake and opens up a limited shopfront for you, where you can buy non-alcoholic beverages that provide different buffs. If you kill the bouncer, he'll give you the alcoholic menu selection out of fear, with stronger buffs but debilitating side effects that affect your soul's movement in the Bullet Board. Frisk, being a child, is quite the lightweight. You don't encounter Grillby OR the bouncer on a No Mercy run, allowing you to loot the place for free, like the Snowdin shopkeeper.

Muffet's bakery in Snowdin is closed for business until after the Sans and Papyrus boss battle. During the hangout scene with Papyrus where he takes you there for the opening ceremony, Muffet is welcoming at first, but Papyrus tries to order something without having the money to pay the exorbitant price, and skele-daddles on outta there, leaving you to deal with Muffet's wrath. After calming her down, you get to see her friendlier side, convince her to charge more reasonable prices for her menu items, buy various Spider Pastries/Beverages, and talk to her about the situation of her kind. I said I don't like Underswap much at all, but I seriously dig the rollerskate café aesthetic that Muffet has going on in that AU, so that'll probably stay the same.

Undyne/Alphys swap:

Alphys built a mech suit that could change the face of the war against humanity, but unfortunately, operating it is such a complex measure that only she can figure out how to use it. Rather than letting her invention go to waste, Undyne promotes her to a high ranking position in the guard and, unable to find anyone else with Alphys's talents, offers to work as Royal Scientist in her stead, with her advice. You encounter her in a similar fashion to Undyne--she tries her hardest to block out her conscience in her attempts to kill you, but in a True Pacifist route, you manage to appeal to her conscience and eventually befriend her. The mech conveniently runs out of power during the final encounter, which is the only time you're able to kill/spare her. Else, it's impervious to all attacks. In the No Mercy Run, the mech switches to reserve power. The boss becomes straight up bullet hell, but as it expends more energy, it becomes more vulnerable to attack. Avoiding damage causes it to burn through energy faster than if you get hit, so you better Git Gud, as they say.

Undyne's favorite part of the scientific process? Blowing shit up, of course. Regardless, she turns out to actually be pretty good at the other parts, too. The lab is a complete mess when you first find it. Undyne was watching you on the screen, like canon Alphys, and came to root for you over time. She'd intermittently pipe in to taunt (or eventually cheer you on) over the cameras (with speakers attached) hidden throughout the Underground. In a True Pacifist route, you go down to the True Lab with her to find out about Alphys's DT experiments from before she was a member of the Royal Guard. She confronts Alphys about it, but ultimately she can't stay mad at her and they end up getting engaged anyway, because Undyne is more willing to look past Alphys's flaws than most of the fandom who assumes she created the Amalgamates deliberately out of malice, incompetence, or both.

Asriel/Chara swap:

Chara is Flowey instead of Asriel. Their soul ended up being bound to the being of a flower, and, given that they HAVE a soul, they still have the ability to feel emotions. This doesn't make them less mischievous, as they ARE detached from the consequences of their actions since they could previously just reset at any time. Initially, in a neutral route and most of a pacifist route, they decide they've had enough and try to kill you so they can go back to having their "fun" with the inhabitants of the underground (complete with an Omega Flowey sequence as per usual--if a lot more difficult because of the seventh human soul, but you can persevere through it). At the end of the pacifist route, they unlock the combined potential of seven human souls AND all the underground's monsters. You are physically incapable of hurting them as they can just load state back to before you hurt them. The only way to beat them is to bore them. Survive until they get bored of trying to kill you, and at that point you can try talking them into reforming, sacrificing their ultimate power to break the barrier and restore everyone back to their previous places. Unlike canon Undertale, since they still have their soul, they don't face the threat of turning back into a flower, but they do fear what might happen if anybody else saw them literally returning from the dead. You can choose to either humor them and let them stay behind with their thoughts, or talk them into coming with you to the surface, which affects how the Pacifist Ending turns out. They have a great deal trouble readjusting back to human society given their troubled past, but you managed to convince them to bear with you. Even after learning a valuable lesson about other sentient beings, they're a little uncomfortable with letting their guard down for fear of getting hurt again. Recovery doesn't happen overnight, after all.

Asriel's essence lived on in Chara's favorite bed of golden flowers, too. Frisk's sweater managed to pick it up, and, mistakenly thinking they were Chara, Asriel's consciousness latched on. Asriel serves as the game's narrator, much like the fan theory that Chara serves that end in the actual game. Whatever route you pick through the game shapes Asriel's character--he may not remember most of his life, but again, he has his personality. On a No Mercy route he initially pleads you to stop, questioning why you would hurt people like this, before eventually losing his childlike innocence and only narrating the bare essentials. He shows up at the end of the No Mercy route in his Hypergod form, as a being made of pure unfiltered LV, to directly call you out on your actions as the player, like Chara. Unlike Chara, you can't bargain to sell your soul to play the game again. He just locks you out of the game entirely, not wanting to watch those events unfold again. The only way to replay the game after a No Mercy route is to tamper with the game files yourself.Likewise, narrating a pacifist route, he's as chipper as ever--if having picked up a bit of snark from his time with Chara. He'll remark on situations that seem familiar for some reason you just can't place, and will try to reach out to Chara during the final Pacifist boss, before realizing they can't hear him. At the end of the pacifist route, you can choose to give up Frisk's soul to allow Asriel a second chance at life--again, affecting how the pacifist ending plays out. There would be some moral fuckery about whether it was the right thing to do, since that was Frisk's soul, not technically yours to give. It'd create an interesting parallel to the "you can't save everyone" narrative Toby had in mind, but on the other hand I also want it to be clear that Frisk is less a blank slate for the player to project onto, and more their own character that acts as an extension of the player's will--and giving the player that choice might run against that.

#out of vacation days (ooc)#ask meme replies #take it from me little buddy (ask)#VERY LONG POST #Anonymous

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funsizedkola · 7 years

Text

Activation

Summary: The power to bring great change does not always guarantee the ability to last long. And sometimes, it pays to be prepared.

Charcters: Frisk (Reader), Chara

Warnings: Mentions of death and violence.

This is my entry for @bonelynomore‘s 500 Followers Celebration Contest! It’s an idea I’ve had for a while now. Not really original since I’ve found out about one or two other works that considered this, but I decided to give my own take nonetheless. :D

There’s a difference between death from a monster and death from a human. Both are unpleasant in their own ways, but at least the pain is felt in a different way. When you’re HP goes down to zero, you feel your entire self shatter and disappear from reality itself, to another place that you’re not sure is entirely real or a figment of your imagination before you hear the words of a grieved king begging you to continue.

While you had sought death when you fell down, you did not think that you would go through it multiple times.

Nor did you expect to have been able to get used to the feeling. It’s funny how you’ve become more confident in facing perilous situations when the power to turn back time is in your grasp.You’d be lying if you said you weren’t tempted to take it to the next level, to really go back and see how the story can change.

After all, the real person in control is you, no longer the flower who was humbled into letting you take the reigns of deciding the fate of Monsterkind after finally remembering what it’s like to have a soul of your own.

But no matter what suggestions were whispered in your ear, no matter what actions you found yourself carrying out like a marionette crafted for destruction, knowing what taking a life is like from both perspectives pushed you into retelling the story once again, to face your fears of going back to the Surface and tread on unfamiliar territory once again.

It was difficult to ignore the RESET button with every threat and obstacle that would appear in the way of the happy ending that you worked for. It was a worry that you couldn’t talk to many people about. And the ease you thought you had about the many times your soul shattered eventually came back to haunt you in the form of nightmares, along with the memories of what you were once compelled to do. How could you explain this to your adoptive mother or father who have seen and lived through too much than they would of wished for?

You tried looking for Flowey whenever you felt the need to go back to the mountain and just take comfort in the familiar territory of the hidden kingdom, but the only golden flowers you’ve found were the silent blossoms that adorned the throne room of your father and the grave of the first child him and the previous queen had accepted from outside their race. If he really ever wished to see you again, no doubt he would question whether you had better things to do.

In the end the person you could most confide in was Sans, and even then you knew there were lines you had to carefully avoid crossing. He always smiled, but as you learned from even in your first venture to the king, that didn’t always mean that he was happy. Still, the times you ended up venting your fears and reoccurring memories that frightened you even back when it was from a timeline of assumed peace seemed to help him accept you as what you forgot what you always were and may always be. A kid. And while he hardly revealed much about himself aside from a look at a secret lab harboring pictures and confusing blueprints and a covered up machine, you felt that in his own way he has opened up to you.

But then again sometimes you can’t always been sure when it comes to that enigma of a comedian. But you were fine with that.

Because that’s something you’re learning to live with. The fact that not everything will be okay through and through, and that not everyone is willing to to like who you are or what they perceive you to be.

After all! With friends like these-

“-shooter has been apprehended and taken into custody, but the real worry-”

-who needs-

“-condition is critical despite efforts to save the life of-”

-enemies.

…

“I-It’s gonna be alright Frisk. W-We’ll take c-c-care of you! N… No matter what. T-Things will turn out okay… hopefully…”

…

Here’s the thing about experiencing death at the hands of a human. It in no way feels pleasant or surreal. There’s no magic, no real connection to the soul until you’ve bleed enough. It hurts too much and also feels so cold when you’re feeling more of the ground you’ve fallen upon and the bullet that pierced into you’re chest, feeling more strain from your physical heart rather than the soul that will soon shatter and disappear out of sight from the many eyes looking upon you’re body as yours slowly close in slumber, like they once had long ago when you’ve intentionally fallen down the mountain.

It feels worse than any previous death you’ve ever gone through.

Whiteness.

What once was pitch black had subtly shifted into shades of grey before soon enough light had surrounded you. It was… different than you expected. You were used to the black void that would engulf you whenever you were on your way to the other side, but perhaps… this is what awaits you when you can no longer prolong your lifespan.

Not really what you’re used to… But it’s not bad.

… Wait.

Mom. Undyne. Papyrus. What happened to-

*They are fine.

…

You know that voice.

* … Greetings.

You could feel them. Like you had before when you were young, but somehow you were even more aware of their presence. How you felt that they were behind you. Turning around, your shoulders tensed in case you had to be ready. If you had to stand defiant against those red eyes that once has been covered in black matter that would drip down their rosy cheeks.

Those eyes met yours… with a shimmer to them.

* You. Idiot.

* Chara…

* Admittedly, you went pretty far this run. You turned, what, eighteen this year? Ready to go to college and everything, right?

* It’s… really you.

* Maybe you can say I Told You So with how you only needed to rely on SAVES and LOADS, but that doesn’t change the fact that YOU STILL-

* [ACT] Hug

They stiffened in your arms, frozen as tears soon dropped onto your shoulder, a show that they are currently not the demon that had been ready to erase the world. It didn’t take long for them to hug you back. The last time you two were face to face, you both had the appearances of children no older than eight that nonetheless had at least one point held what seemed to be the weight of the world in your hands.

But now their outward age seemed to mirror yours, a reflection on how a decade passed since that fateful day that spanned multiple timelines.

* How come I can see you again…?

A choked attempt to speak was muffled in your shoulder before they took a deep breath before stepping back a few steps. Their eyes had a hard look to them that reminded you of one your mother gave you a few times.

* Because you are now nearly like me.

It took you a couple of seconds… but it soon dawned on you. At your realization they looked away, their bangs now shadowing their expression.

The only reply needed to confirm this was a slow nod.

… It finally happened. You couldn’t reach the LOAD button in time. The chance to escape death was no longer there. And now you’re on the other side of the door that can no longer stay unlocked for you to return to your life. Hands tightened on Chara’s arms as the will to stay upright wavered. Staggering, you stumbled forth until your head rested against their chest, overcome with shock. Their grasp on you adjusted until it felt like they were shielding you, arms around a no longer physical body.

* ……… And everyone else?

* …. They are alive. They apprehended the one who shot you.

Trembling now as reality continued sinking in, you felt yourself being lowered until the both of you were on your knees, what is seemingly the ground beneath you feeling like suspended air that sent more of a chill across your entire being.

* The doctors tried saving you… but your body failed before they could do anything.

Your family is alive. They are not in danger. They’re safe. Over and over again you chanted that to yourself, as if that would be enough to satisfy you. But the memory of your final death had you drawing in haggard breaths as you remembered the last eyes you looked at being the frantic look of that man who just needed to walk up to you with a concealed gun behind their back in a matter of seconds before pulling the trigger.

Tears of your own dampened Chara’s sweater as you began to giggle hysterically. After all you went through, it just took one act, not even a FIGHT, to prevent you from relying on your determination soon enough.

* Going against humans is not like FIGHTing monsters. The connection to your soul is not as strong. Not as aware. And thus all the more deadly. If he decided to target someone else maybe you would of had the time to LOAD. But since he went for you…

As usual they were telling the truth in a matter of fact way of speaking, even if the edge to their voice betrayed their true thoughts. Taking a deep breath to attempt to calm yourself, you sat down as you pulled away a bit. Shoulders slumped, you just stared at your knees that were covered by denim and brightly colored patches of fabric that had been sewn onto them. You remembered when you decided to add them onto your jeans on a whim when tears appeared from the result of rambunctious adventures with your family.

*…. I didn’t know how far I would be able to go… or that if the end would arrive at all…

Silence is all that could follow after that. It was eerie the lack of noise that surround the two humans who at points in time were so crucial to the history and futures of monsters and humans alike. Strangely enough, if you concentrated enough you could hear the sound of… beeping… Brow furrowing, your head tilted as if to crane your ear towards the noise.

* Alphys and Sans made sure to contain your soul before it shattered. That’s why you have not fully crossed over yet.

Eyes widening, you snapped your neck up to look back at your once deemed partner. A cross between frustration and relief showed through their frown and creased brow.

* On one hand I can see why they would not want to give up on you. But on the other hand I don’t see how they can fix you.

As if their words were clearing the fog, you could feel yourself suspended in the air, yet surrounded by something… solid. Something that felt… secure. Is this how those previous children that were killed felt when their souls were contained in those glass containers? You gave a wry smile as you gave a small shake of your head. And you thought you were supposed to be the determined one. It didn’t last though as you took thought to this situation.

The body your soul was in could no longer be used. So as far as you can see, the only option is to either stay in the hands of your well meaning friends or…

* How is it like?

* …?

* Being dead.

At that question they raised an eyebrow before pursing their lips and shrugging.

* Honestly I am not entirely sure yet. I did not… let myself fully pass on. At first I was too tied to my own grave to even go beyond the Barrier until you came around. After that…

* … Were you waiting for me?

* No! I just- You couldn’t- There was-

Pinching the bridge of their nose, they took a moment to collect themselves. You bit back the urge to laugh a bit at how flustered they looked until a wavering look pierced you again.

* I wanted to see if you were right. In continuing what you claimed was the Best Ending for everyone. If you and everyone else would be… better off without me.

* … You and Asriel could of joined us. I wouldn’t of minded.

The sigh they gave showed they believed otherwise.

* You know that even as Flowey he wouldn’t be able to face mother and father again with how you have proven us wrong. And someone had to look after him. He’s hopeless on his own.

So they gave him company… that was a relief. At least they had their best friend. You quietly gave your thanks before receiving a look of ‘Of course, what else would I have done???’ That made you laugh for a short moment before feeling solemn again.

Here sat two fallen humans that had their souls slip from the realm of the living, with neither having yet to pass on to the true end of death. It was comforting that you were not alone. Were you ready to see if the both of you can make that leap to follow those six children that had accepted peace when the Barrier was destroyed?

That… you were not certain of yet.

* How much did you see outside the Underground?

* … Parts of it.

* I guessed as much. You want me to tell you all about it?

For the first time since you were reunited with them, they smiled with more of a glimmer to their eyes.

* Why not. We have all the time we could need for now.

It was hard to tell how much time had passed. What little you could feel on the surroundings of where your soul is being kept didn’t even have the sound of a ticking clock. But you felt like you would be going nowhere for the time being, so you relaxed some more and told Chara as much as you could remember.

How scary it was to finally move forward without knowing what could happen next. How monsters and humans made history together with you in the center. Balancing being an ambassador and a kid that still had to turn in math homework on time and still managed to break records on flirting one friendship at a time. The joy you felt at seeing the dreams of your friends come true one by one (Mom being a teacher with Dad as the school’s gardener, Papyrus finally riding the convertible of his dreams, knowing that Sans was grinning like never before as you both looked at the stars, Alphys making breakthroughs in science with her supportive girlfriend becoming a police officer to be envied, and so much more) and how that made you feel more at peace with your decision.

It felt so good to finally talk about everything to someone, no walls needed to be put up for the sake of keeping secrets. The feeling that a weight had been lifted off your chest when you confessed about the nightmares and inner struggles of what kept haunting you. And Chara listened with hardly any fuss, aside from looks of guilt that they hide by looking away, the two of you having moved to sit side by side.

That isn’t to say that there weren’t tears. Sometimes you could not help but get choked up at how it finally is over. All you’ve done and paved the way for the sake of your friends and family has now reach the end for how much you can influence with your own two hands. It was hard to accept, yet so relieving, yet so guilt inducing at how much relief you felt.

* Normally I would be alright with this… But now you are reminding me too much of how big of a crybaby Asriel was.

You could only respond with a watery laugh as you wiped away the new set of tears you shed. By now the two of you were holding hands to help ground one another. Chara did not talk much about themselves, but you can figure out by now that it was hard for them too. They had their own burdens to bear as well with being the shell of a once alive human that is vulnerable to turn from a wandering ghost to a menacing demon with only the emotions of what is left of their soul to guide them.

* … I still don’t know if I want to go yet. I know I can try seeing what it would be like but…

* … Yeah… I still don’t know if I’m ready yet.

Another episode of silence proceeded as the two of you pondered over everything that had been said and done.

* Flowey still needs someone looking after him.

*Well I suddenly found myself with a lot of free time.

* You are still stuck in containment.

* I’ll find a way out. I’m DETERMINED to.

“N-Now Sans!”

You made a show of puffing out your chest which only made Chara roll their eyes.

* Well at least you are finally more like yourself.

* Give me a break, it takes a while to get used to the fact that I might as well be dead.

That silenced them before they nudged you.

* A bit of advice. Even I have trouble accepting it sometimes.

* Oh, great. Thanks for the heads up.

That sparked more chuckles that grew into full blown laughter. Oh how surreal it feels to know that it will never feel real again. You feel back onto the ground as you embraced this feeling of ironic humor as the laughter just grew louder and louder. Till you were on the verge of hysterics as the buzzing in your center tickled some more, like a physical hand trying to grab hold-

Gasping. You were gasping now. You were feeling death once again, but feeling life as well, the whiteness you’ve been staring that was above, at all angles, darkening back to that black, black setting that reminded you of when you died more times than you could remember as a child-

* Frisk?!

Chara, they’re still here, looking down at you in fear like before, causing you to feel scared as well, whywhywhywhy-

“-mon kid, c’mon, we’re rootin’ for you-”

A change went over their expression, one of utter shock and disbelief as they froze. They whipped their head to the side as if looking at something before turning back, eyes hard and showing hardening will that had you wondering if you ever looked like that before. Hands gripped on your shoulders as their drew in closer.

* Stay. Determined.

You were trembling once again, unsure of how you can do such a thing when like this. As if reading your thoughts, Chara’s expression softened.

* It will be fine. You know why Frisk?

Tear once again threatening to burst forth, you managed to hold onto their wrists in an attempt to calm yourself.

* W-Why?

A smile then overtook their expression, matching their rosy dimples and eyes that also were welling up with tears.

* Because it’s not over for you yet.

You then finally heard it. Voices. Pleads for you to come back. To turn around and return to them. Feeling tears drop onto your cheeks, the pull that tugged you away from this place felt more like a hand guiding you, like how one person would show you around a new world that you would call home.

And with that, you smiled as well.

* You better come back to us.

Because this moment…

* Because someone really cares about you too.

fills you with…

D E T E R M I N A T I O N

…

You weren’t sure that you were alive.

It felt a bit more like you were… tied to something. But it can’t be your body. It felt too stiff to be one. Too… cumbersome?

You try turning your head… Still feels weird.

When you finally open your eyes, you see gray. Gray with a shine to it. Lit up by fluorescent lights. Okay. This is certainly not the white void. But… was it normal to suddenly see a close up of the ceiling? Wait… your vision is backing away from it now.

Zoom in.

Zoom out.

Zoom in.

Zoom out.

What.

As if realization sunk in, you jerked into an immediate upright position. Posters. Motivational posters with bad puns on them. (Donut give up? Really?)

You look down. It looked like you wearing a plain shirt and pair of yoga pants over grey… arms… and legs…

It was too much. Swinging your suddenly strong (metallic, robotic, artificial) legs over the cot onto the floor, you froze before pushing yourself to stand before stumbling. Managing to reach what looked like an IV pole, you grabbed onto it before you could fall over. Before hearing a crunch and seeing that your fingers (plated, shiny, overpowered) have ended up bending it in your grasp. You could only look at it in numbed shock before sinking down onto the linoleum floor.

That was a good word. Numb. You felt numb all over.

* I guess Alphys did not have enough time to paint your new body.

A yelp echoed the empty room as you nearly let yourself collapse from all this insanity.

* Calm down. I’m still here. And you are still alive. Technically.

“W-What do you mean technically?”

* The only thing about this body that is you is your soul, which has managed to possess this vessel. Like Mettatton. They found a way for you to be corporeal.

“… They built me a robot body… an actual… robot… body…”

Something on your arm caught your eye. Bringing it up to your optics, you noticed an engraving on it.

Functional Relief Invulnerable Soul Keeper

“… FRISK.”

* Wonder how long it took them to get that acronym.

You noticed that you could hear distant footsteps and the drag of a tail that sounded a lot like a certain ex-Royal Scientist, along with the softened trail of someone wearing soft shoes that you could swear were slippers.

The fact that you could hear them from a farther distance despite the closed door that they were heading towards just added more and more questions that you will be able to ask. An airy laugh that had an electric echo to it escaped and you slumped once again on the floor, this time in acceptance. Because as far as life changing events go…

Creak

“… F-Frisk…?”

… this is one you can certainly live with.

Raising your head to meet the eyes of your family again, you gave your best bewildered smile while giving a wave.

“So… should I say thanks for giving me a hand, or for an entire body?”

#undertale #my writing #contest submission #frisk #functional relief invulnerable soul keeper

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bublp0pr · 7 years

Text

Soul Theory abridged (+ my theories)

So a bit ago I wanted to make this post about Chara and Asriel but i realised i kept having to explain myself when i talk about the nature of souls. It’s so damn annoying to try and explain every time so i figured i should compile my understanding of the game’s pseudoscience on the matter (as well as throw in theories that i operate under). Took me a bit to get it all out but i think it’s worth it (i’m such a nerd).

I tried to be impartial but i am stating my own theories at points so don’t treat everything as fact. I try to state when i’m just coming up with my own opinion though.

I couldn’t help but start a lot of personal notes (using ~italics~) and tangents along the way, sorry (I put headers before and after them so you can skip though, don’t worry :P) .

---

Let’s start with the basics. The soul is the very culmination of one’s being. There are 2 known types of general souls: human and monster. There is also a subclass of monster soul known as a boss monster which acts differently to normal monster souls (more on that later).

Stats

A soul has the core statistic of ‘HP’ which defines its original and current state of health relative to how many hit points it could take before the soul will be destroyed. For example, a monster with A/B HP: this indicates their soul is originally capable of receiving B hit points of damage (the number to the right of the slash) and in their current state they can receive A more hit points before they die (the number to the left of the slash).

Some speculate that HP is short for HOPE.

Monster food, rest, DREAMS and “being filled with determination” are all the ways the game mentions to ‘recover’ HP, or in other words raise the statistic’s current value. With one exception, all forms of increasing HP cannot raise a current statistic above it’s original value, making this the soul’s normal limit. Rest however has the unique ability of raising the current value above this limit.

A soul can increase its original (i.e. maximum) HP by gaining ‘LV’.

LV (plus AT and DF)

Also known as ‘LOVE’, LV is short for level of violence. The normal soul begins with an LV of 1, as any being is in some way capable of committing violence, regardless of their disposition towards it. LV affects the nature of how ‘easily’ a soul is able to defend itself against others and hurt those around them. To me, this implies that a minimum quantity of this statistic is necessary for a soul’s basic survival because it regulates all defensive and offensive function.

~This sounds like weird stuff to be specific about but trust me, I’ve read comics where Frisk has had ZERO LV. Firstly: check the menu at the start of the game!! Second: I mean, come on! Come ON! Seriously? The character who 50% of the time agrees to go along with Chara’s plan has 0 LV to start?? If you had 0 LV you wouldn’t survive your first fight.You would also be incapable of gaining LV in the first place as you would find killing fundamentally impossible. But hey that’s only my interpretation. ~

Numerically, LV increases a person’s statistic values of DF and AT (which reflect that ‘easiness’ to defend and hurt). DF reduces the hit points a soul will receive from attack. AT raises the amount of hit points a soul’s attack can potentially deal. I won’t go further into these however because there isn’t much linking them to the soul.

~ohh i’m tempted to start an extensive tangent [foreshadowing my bad habit...] about what i think DT and AT are really linked to... but that’s not relevant to this bc it’s not about the soul so i’ll just drop it.~

EXP

LV is increased by obtaining ‘EXP’ through the act of killing other souls. EXP stands for execution points. A set amount of EXP is required for each increase in LV, with a larger amount needed for every transition. I like to think this is suggestive of how the more you commit violence, the more desensitised you become to the basic acts; only actions severe relative to your current stance or something you still find to be a large mass count of simple murder can trigger the rise.

The game doesn’t specifically state what variables go into determining how much EXP a kill will result in. From what i can tell based on the game: the strength of emotional attachment, overall difficulty of the battle and brutality/mercilessness in how you kill them all factor in, but this is purely personal opinion.

EXP and LV remain permanent irreversible values within a run that cannot be decreased- only increased.

There is an instance of losing an ‘experience point’ when attacking Naptsablook (whose intangible body makes the action redundant and even counter-intuitive) however note that EXP represent execution points not experience points making this situation meaningless. ~(thanks nochocolate for the blog post about it that cleared things up for me. Almost started a long theory tangent about the loss of EXP without realising the deliberate difference lol. http://nochocolate.tumblr.com/post/152125281314/if-you-tried-to-kill-napstablook-which-is ) ~

No amount of good deeds can remove LOVE gained. However, altercations to the timeline can reverse LV and EXP. This means that these qualities are not transferable with the restoration of the soul on loading/resetting a timeline. Similarly, AT, DF and HP are reset to their previous state when reloading (though, because accessing a save point restores your health before even offering to use determination to SAVE, some consider HP not to be set to its previous state but simply fully restored).

Death and persisting

When a normal monster soul loses all HP, it shatters, causing the monster to die.

Human souls and boss monster souls however can “persist after death”. The exact implications of this are unknown, however evidence indicates that it involves the soul continuing to exist after the body is destroyed (consider Asgore and the 6 human souls).

Irrelevant Non-Canon Theory Tangent Time! ( I will eventually go back to the main point, i promise... or you can just skip this lol)

This being said, when Frisk loses all their HP in the game, their soul breaks in two before shattering into infinitely small pieces that scatter off screen.

Now, their soul is exposed during battle in a way that monster souls aren’t. When Frisk uses FIGHT, they are damaging the monster’s body. After the body becomes dust, the soul then shatters killing the monster. But when a monster attacks the human, their magic is targeting Frisk’s soul, “the very culmination of [their] being”, rather than simply their body. This explains how HP can be lowered as simply a stat without affecting Frisk’s actual physical condition (like breaking their legs or leaving bruises etc.) and how Frisk is able to survive the conditions from attacks that would normally kill someone (bombs, intense heat etc.) What this means however is that a monster damages their actual soul in battle, meaning that by trying to kill them they are destroying the soul.

This does not make sense. The soul of course needs to remain intact for Asgore to use it and break the barrier. The only contradiction to this is Papyrus, who instead captures you when you reach 1 HP. But it is established that Papyrus misunderstands the general objective of monsters attacking humans, so this is not done deliberately to maintain the soul for Asgore. Even Asgore himself, when fighting you to collect your soul, triggers a shatter scenario when he defeats you.

All of this leads me to think that when a monster brings a human’s HP to 0, this is not expected to destroy the soul. That can mean one of three things: A) Frisk’s soul works differently to what the monsters are familiar with, B) The soul is supposed shatter and the pieces are collected because that’s how human souls ‘persist’, or C) Something is destroying their soul other than the monster after their HP drops.

Possibility B is irregular though, because this is not how Asgore’s soul ‘persists’ when you defeat him. For a brief period, the soul remains intact, hovering over the space Asgore previously filled. Note that this time period is longer than any of Frisk’s pauses after they lose all HP. After Flowey attacks the boss monster soul, it too shatters in the same way as Frisk’s and the game treats it as though his soul is now unrecoverable after this action. As humans and boss monsters are both described as having souls that last without bodies using the same term (persist) it would make sense that they function in the same way so possibility B is unlikely in my opinion.

My theory is that Frisk refuses to ‘persist’ in order to return to their save point. In other words, they need to place themselves on the brink of death to reload. An interesting case to correlate this is Flowey, when describing his first experience with resetting. Not wanting to live in a world without love, he chose to kill himself. It wasn’t until he was “leaving this mortal coil” that he began to refuse to die, using his determination to reload the world. Note that ‘refusing to die’ created a paradox where the soul itself had already been allowed to die because Flowey chose to, but determination made this option impossible. This contradiction may be the source of why time is affected to resolve the issue - ‘reloading’ to a point that had similar levels of determination but with a not-destroyed soul.

~but i don’t know a damn about quantum mechanics or what sort of impact determination has on it. So... yeah, the paradox thing might be overboard~

Another reason possibility C could be the case is because Frisk is aware of what happens if a monster catches them. Toriel explains to them in the Ruins about why monsters want to attack them, so it is reasonable to assume they may think this when they die. Using their determination, they refuse to allow monsters to contain their soul and instead shatter it and reload.

Tangent in a Tangent(???) The six souls

I think it is important to highlight the six already contained souls when considering this argument. Recalling possibility A, obviously how these 6 souls interacted with the monsters lead them to believe that depleting their HP still allowed them to collect the soul.

Not much information is given into the specifics of how each ended up in containers, whether Asgore killed each of them or if some were defeated by other monsters before they could get to this point. It is also not known if all the humans could reset.

Like I discussed in a previous post, Toriel mentions having the feeling when meeting all of the humans, she has the feeling they are “already old friends” (implying it isn’t the first timeline they encountered her. Note this is only mentioned after Frisk themself have also encountered her twice) and Asgore nods sadly when you tell him he has already killed you multiple times (suggesting he may be familiar with this from at least one of the previous humans). These pieces of evidence lead me to the conclusions that Asgore personally killed at least one of the humans and that all six had some semblance of determination allowing them to reset.

Why they eventually became captured despite this (again, like i said in a previous post) may be linked (in my opinion) to either a loss of their desire (and therefore determination) to continue - survival seeming impossible or their determination to return home waning - or a deliberate choice to sacrifice themselves for the cause of monsters.

*bringing tangent of tangent back to topic of original tangent now

This idea attributes more understanding into the nature of how determination and reloading works. That the humans had choice in whether to use their determination or could eventually lose that power makes the idea of Frisk also deciding what happens to their soul after defeat sound sensible.

It is also possible that Frisk’s soul shattering could suggest Chara’s intervention. It is of course Chara’s memories of Asgore insisting they remain determined that echo within the reload screen after Frisk dies so there may some sort of link there. The relationship of control between Chara and Frisk however is wholly unspecified for most of the game however so this speculation cannot be conclusive.

~This one webcomic called ‘The Thought’ by TratserEnoyreve has a scene that shows this idea about choosing death and Chara being involved pretty well here : http://tratserenoyreve.deviantart.com/art/The-Thought-45-597910634 (it was cool and inspired some of my idea so i wanted to show it :D )~

* End of Tangent * (finally)

Persisting does not specify if the soul will continue to exist forever unless destroyed or if there is a small period to use the soul before it eventually dies like others.

Boss monsters won’t die of natural causes unless they have children, that is not to say they’re immortal though because we know they can be killed (Asgore, Asriel and Toriel are/can be killed). The rest of soul types, humans and normal monsters, are also mortal and can be damaged and killed.

Composition of the soul

Monster souls are said to be made of love, hope and compassion. Human souls, as far as monsters observe, do not require these to survive and so their composition is not known. Alphys does learn however that human souls possess determination, which she concludes is what allows human souls to persist after death.

~I want to point out that Alphys harvested determination from the existing human souls, so all human souls have determination - NOT JUST FRISK! Siggghhh the amount of people that assume Frisk is the only human to possess it...nm. I’ll save the rant for later.~

A common theory among fans is that the qualities of Determination, Bravery, Justice, Kindness, Patience, Integrity and Perseverance (associated with the colours red, orange, yellow, green, aqua, blue and purple respectively) are what can/do compose human souls. Some fan theories go so far as to suggest one particular one particular trait manifests itself in each person, as the six human souls appeared to demonstrate qualities associated to one of these each.

~Now, i don’t really like going into all that jazz, especially since it’s all based on just the colour of their souls and a snowball mini golf game of Ball. So that’s all i’m going to say about those.~

Unnecessary Theory Tangent Time again! (I’m basically done this section so feel free to skip)

There is one thing about what makes up souls that i tend to theorise about that i haven’t mentioned yet...

Think about Flowey. He possess two things that that gave him life: determination and Asriel’s essence. Now, I’m not using that term lightly. We all probably understand at this point that when Asriel turned to dust - the seeds of the flowers Chara wanted their dead body to be buried with (before they were attacked) dragged back across the barrier with him - his dust became spread across the flower seeds that then grew like in normal monster funerary practices. And we know that the flowers eventually received injections of determination from Alphys awakening the essence of Asriel left there because of this dusting. See, I said the word again! Essence is mentioned specifically from the book in the Library, where we learn about monster funerals:

“When monsters get old and kick the bucket, they turn into dust. At funerals, we take that dust and spread it on that person’s favourite thing. Then their essence will live on in that thing”

Obviously at this point their soul (which is described as the culmination of their being) is destroyed. So what exactly is the difference between a monster’s essence and the culmination of their self?

I’ll be honest. I don’t know myself. In a lot of fan fiction and art I’ve encountered, the term ‘essence’ becomes lost in story and they suggest that Flowey has Asriel’s memories brought to life by determination. Some say that means Flowey is simply a husk of Asriel, like an imperfect replica missing a soul that replaces someone long dead. Others say that Asriel’s consciousness is that essence or memory, and Flowey is in fact truly the original Asriel. Either way, what really fascinates me are the ideas of memory or consciousness being that essence we’re talking about.

These properties sound like the kind of things that come from the soul rather than the body... so what could that mean?

Well, option number one: it’s not linked to the soul. Perhaps this essence is intertwined with their magic (i’m going to be talking about monster bodies a little later), which means it would have to go somewhere when the body turns to dust. Voilà, you have the essence existing inside the favourite thing. I wonder if there needs to be some emotional connection to the object for the essence to be able to make a new connection, otherwise the essence would simply exist in the location they became dust rather than what their loved ones intended.

Option number 2: it is a part of the soul, possibly the shattered pieces or some part of it that becomes dust when it’s destroyed. This then has a similar effect as option 1.

Option number 3: perhaps a monster’s ‘essence’ is neither of these things. What if monster essence is their form of an intangible afterlife. Consider that Chara, like Flowey, was awakened when exposed to a large stimuli of determination. Unlike Flowey, we have no idea how Chara functions. Most consider them to be a lingering memory that now happens to reside in Frisk. Perhaps determination’s residual effects, when powerful enough, draw other beings back from the dead if they can find a host. But this is unlikely.

Relationship with body

A soul establishes an inseparable relationship with a body. This doesn’t mean that the soul must be physically attached, but a body cannot be sentient or function without connection to at least some of the elements of a soul.

Monster bodies

For monsters, their bodies are composed of magic manipulated by the soul. Though this is a broad statement. Ghosts, for example, are fundamentally under this same definition as much as skeletons however there are obvious differences in how this magic manifests.

The physical forms taken by monsters are surprisingly diverse. To name a few: beings made entirely of fire that they can choose not to let burn things, bones composed of and held together by magic that can twist their skulls shape to make expressions, incorporeal expressions of non-tangible magic, inanimate objects possessed by magic to complete corporeal beings... all mixed in with the more normal forms of anatomy that we’d place somewhere between animal and humanoid. All these forms however are made purely of magic sourced directly from their soul.

Because a monster’s body is directly connected their soul in this way, attacks to a monster damage not their form but their soul - which is why attacks affect simply the statistic of HP rather than their physical body.

An exception to this rule is Mettaton, whose body shows sign of physical damage with the loss of limbs when you attack their soul. Though, i feel i should point out that Mettaton is made of both “metal and magic” (as included in the quiz) so parts of him are non-magic, purely physical.

Monsters food is designed to be converted to energy instantaneously on consumption, implying most monsters don’t have a need for digestive systems. Though a monster in Grillby’s does say he intends to try human food on the surface so it is likely that some forms are still capable of it.

Because of this direct connection between the soul and magic necessary for control of a body, all monsters can use some form of magic. It also makes their bodies more attuned to the disposition of the soul - which lets their battle statistics become dependent on their emotional state towards a fight. “If a monster doesn’t want to fight, it’s defenses will weaken. And the crueller the intentions of our enemies, the more their attacks will hurt us.” according to a book from the library.

Regardless of the form of a monster, with their body’s destruction the form shatters apart into s similar dust. There are notable instances from main characters in the game who are able to remain intact after losing their HP to deliver final words before eventually shattering, showing actual injuries such as cuts and losing their head. However most monsters simply just go paralysed for a second, shock on their face, and then shatter.

Human bodies

Unlike monsters, human bodies are composed mostly of water. I assume we all know what a human body is, it represents the actual things we have in real life. Human bodies have advantages over monsters because they are composed of physical magic rather than magic. It makes them stronger than monsters and lets their fighting skill be independent from their emotional state. But it does mean that humans can’t express themselves with magic in the way that monsters can.

This isn’t to say that humans may not have been able to use magic, as seven magicians on the side of the humans sealed the monsters underground. But we don’t see any evidence of humans being capable of magic within the game to ground any arguments on. A book in the library states explicitly though that “the will never know the joy of expressing themselves through magic” so obviously there’s some significant inability on human’s part to ‘express themselves’ with it.

When a monster attacks a human, their magic is targeting the soul, “the very culmination of [their] being”, rather than simply their body. This explains how HP can be lowered as simply a stat without affecting Frisk’s actual physical condition in the game (like breaking their legs or leaving bruises etc.) and how Frisk is able to survive the conditions from attacks that would normally kill a human (bombs, intense heat etc.)

~^ I mentioned this part in my tangent... but who the hell reads tangents??~

Obtaining additional souls

Souls that can persist are able to be absorbed by other beings. Souls of a similar nature cannot be harnessed by each other (monsters can’t possess monster souls and humans can’t posses human souls). Note that Flowey, being a soulless creature that classifies as neither category, was able to collect and use both types in his process to becoming the Ultimate God of Hyperdeath.

When a creature in possession of more than one soul dies, all souls existing connected to them die as well... though considering the only example of this is Chara, who maintains some sort of existence considering they’re awoken by Frisk (at the very least in genocide routes, debatably in all of them), I personally think the term ‘die’ may not be totally correct...

~and no, i’m not going to start discussing the tens of different interpretations for Chara’s role. So i’ll just stay as vague as that.~

Containing more souls makes the being owning them more powerful, manifesting a physical change in appearance and a dramatic increase in strength and attack abilities. The strength of the souls becomes cumulative, with additional souls adding their original strength to the new total.

The combined soul strength of all the monsters in the Underground is equivalent to one human soul.

~(though not including Napstablook for some reason...) As this doesn’t extend to Mettaton or mad dummy, it may have something to with his non-tangible nature~

Examples within the game:

- A human possessing an additional monster soul or a monster possessing a human soul becomes powerful enough to pass through the barrier capable of resisting the strength of any monster or human without this.

- Flowey possessing six human souls is in possession of enough determination to override Frisk’s ability (this is an indication of the irregular amount of determination within Frisk considering this much is necessary). It also gives him the power to entirely destroy Frisk’s save file.

- The power of seven human souls in one being is considered to make the being a god. This power is also the standard needed to break the barrier.

- Asriel, in his true Ultimate God of Hyperdeath form, is composed of six human souls and all the monster souls of the Underground that equates to the strength of 7 human souls. With this power he is able to regenerate a monster form for himself again and shatter the barrier.

Comparing the strength of this form to when he had six souls, we receive an idea of how significantly the increase of a single human soul’s worth of power can raise attack.

Determination

~A fair deal of determination stuff feels like it should really be classified as it’s own field of lore pseudoscience. So i’m not going to go into detail. Let’s just get the basics out here though...~

As previously mentioned, human souls naturally possess an entity known simply as ‘determination’. Alphys describes determination in her research to be “the will to keep living... the resolve to change fate.”

Determination is considered in multiple contexts to mean different things. However, in discussing the element as it relates to the soul, it is what lets Frisk (and quite possibly the other six souls at some point) reload after dying and reset the timeline if they wish to do so.

Here’s an overview of how i understand determination to work:

in a situation or environment that fills Frisk with the emotions and convictions of determination, this determination manifests itself as a physical thing called a save point

Accessing the save point and making use of that power, flavour text for the player provides a description of what filled Frisk with determination and they recover their HP. (determination has been shown to be able to recover HP. Consider dreams in the Asriel fight “through your DETERMINATION, the dream became true. HP maxed out.”)

Using the determination they access at this save point, they can SAVE their progress - a manifestation to their determination to continue on the path they are on (as it saves over any previous files)

They then continue on their way.

When they lose all their HP, their soul shatters and they hear Chara’s memory of Asgore speaking encouragement over their sick bed when they were dying. He specifically tells them they can’t give up, that this is all just a bad dream, and that they should stay determined. This is COMPLETELY personal interpretation but i like to think this is somehow Chara trying to communicate to Frisk through sharing memories to press on.

This reminds them of their determination and Frisk is given the option to continue.

By selecting to continue, their determination to survive brings them back to their last source of determined commitment to their progress (i.e. their save point). This brings everything about them, from their physical to soul-related properties, back to the state they were in when they SAVEd.

~I’m not going to go into quitting. Because that’s a topic for another day.~

Alphys also suggests it is the component of human souls that allows human souls to persist after death, whether this is true or not though is never confirmed.

~if it is it raises questions about how boss monsters persist... do they maybe have determination? Or perhaps Alphys was simply mistaken, assuming it was used for persisting when it actually allowed reloading instead~

---

Annd that’s everything. That i can think of. There’s probably more. If there is i’ll probably edit the original post. But that’s what i understand about souls haha.

And now that this is done i can go back to harmless lyric posts and continue writing my fanfiction because it sorta fell on hold i got so many theory concepts i wanted to back up while doing this lol.

#undertale #undertale trash #undertale theory #why'd i waste my time on this??#meh #atleast i had fun doing it #it raised more questions than answers really #and did you SEE those tangents i went on???#after i'd typed one or two i just decided to do personal notes raising the question and then just moved on #otherwise this thing could've taken weeks lol #i spent days of my life on this #atleast i somehow managed to write a theory without bringing soriel into it this time #dodged a bullet there #i mean #look how much i typed because i wanted to compare monster and human souls #imagine the essay that could be my soriel rant #it would be hell #essay

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foundlingtale · 7 years

Text

Settling in

When Frisk woke up they were greeted by the darkness of the room. Rubbing their eyes with their balled up fist they sat up and slid out of bed. The smell of the pie that his grandmother promised filled up the room. Frisk carefully felt around the walls for a light switch. There was none in the room but Frisk did come across a lamp.

With the luminosity of lamp the room was no longer dark. In the center of the room on the floor was culprit of the wonderful and divine scent. The butterscotch cinnamon pie. And man did it look good.

Frisk sat in the center of the room and picked up the plate of pie. Wasting no time, they dug in chowing down the pie in record time. Frisk didn't realize they were starving until now. Once done with the slice Frisk stood up and carried their plate quietly out the room peeking out the door to see if Toriel was around. Seeing she wasn't they walk out the room and quietly closed the door behind them self.

Walking to the left there was two other rooms one that had a sign that said "Room under renovations". In the middle of Frisk's newly acquired room and the renovating room was what Frisk assumed to be Toriel's room. Frisk gently knocked. Hearing no answer they walked into the room. The room was large and spacious. A large bed was in the left corner of the room. It was neatly made and looked like if Frisk sat or laid down on it, it would swallow them whole with no way out.

In front of the bed was a desk with a chair in front of it. There was writing utensils and an open journal with a circled passage. Frisk decided to read the circled passage.

What did one toilet say to the other?

Man you look flushed.

Oh my. That was eggcelent, I just crack myself up. I didn't think I had such a potty mouth.

Frisk couldn't hold back the cringe. Next thing they know it, a black bar appeared in front of them There was a question:

Would you like the true reset?

Yes No

'No' Frisk thought. 'Not yet.' Frisk then backed away from the journal like it had the plague, and then left the room closing the door behind them. They let out a sigh and walked in the direction of where they assumed the kitchen and their grandmother was. Seeing they were correct they pulled at her dress looking up at her.

"Oh! Hello my grandchild. Did you sleep well? I hope you enjoyed the pie I left you. It might of burned a bit because it was in the oven too long, but I do hope it tasted alright."

Frisk shook their head and showed off their small fangs as they smiled. "It WaS aLrIgHt. It TaStEd ReAlLy GoOd."

Toriel smiled running her paws through Frisk's hair. For a few moments her beautiful eyes were glassy. She mumbled something along the lines of 'You look just like them...' "Oh... T-that's good to hear!" She blinked away the tears that were building up and gave Frisk a smile. "You know, I'm reading a really interesting passage about snails. Did you know that snails have a chainsaw like tongue called the radula? It's very fascinating! Would you like to see how it looks ?" Toriel asked with a small smile. Frisk hesitated but then nodded, they wanted to see what their grandmother was so excited about.

Toriel turned the book around to face Frisk. Frisk was able to see a diagram of what the 'radula' was, how it looked, and most of all how it work. And they couldn't help to be fascinated too. They listen as their grandmother read on, telling Frisk fact after fact about snail. Soon enough Frisk was sitting down at Toriel's feet listening intently to the soothing sound of her voice, and to what she was saying. Around the 15th fact she read out to Frisk she closed the book and let out a content sigh.

"You know I wanted to be a teacher. For children around your age at least. But as queen I am unable to do so. But maybe I can fulfill those fantasies with you. There must be a lot of thing you don't know correct?" Frisk nodded to Toriel's questions causing her to smile widely. "Then its official. Your lessons shall start next week, if you don't mind of course."

Frisk felt like even with Toriel's kind personality they would still have to go to these lessons no matter what, so they nodded. "Yes GraNdmOthEr." This caused Toriel to smile widely and gently ruffle Frisk's hair.

"That is wonderful to hear my grandchild. I am very delighted that you are willing to help me out with my dream and let me enlighten you about the underground and how it runs. Would you like another slice of pie as I read the next few facts to you?" Toriel asked. Frisk immediately nodded their head at the mention of the pie. "How many slices?"

Frisk thought for a moment before holding up two slightly furry clawed fingers. "Two PleAse." they eagerly said. Toriel nodded and got up putting her book down in the process. Tilting their head to the side, Frisk read out the title of the book. ' 72 uses for Snails.... Wait USES FOR SNAIL!? Does that mean that there's snails in the pie!?... Eh.. its still good.' Frisk thought with a shrug. Toriel soon came back into the room and then gently placed the plate with two slices of pie down in front of Frisk and handed them a spoon. "ThaNk yOu."

"It is no problem my grandchild. I am just glad you are fairing well and here with me now. And your grandfather and I will make sure you stay here safe forever. We'll take good care of you. And when he's not here I'll be here taking care of you. It get quiet lonely down here you know.. Never mind that now where was I" Toriel sat down and opened her book back up again. The only difference this time around was that Frisk wasn't listening. They were processing Toriel's words.

'Forever is a long time.. Even if it's just an ideology.. an idea. The way grandmother Toriel says it is... unsettling. Like its a prison I will never gt out of. But I'm sure there's a way out. I just hope I don't get in trouble or get hurt.' Frisk held in a sigh as they finished their slice of pie. They decide to not eat their next slice of pie just yet.

"Oh! Here's another interesting one! Did you know that when snails mature they flip their digestive system? Or that-" Toriel was cut off by the sound of rapid knocking at the front door. "Oh? I wonder whom that could be?.. Excuse me my grandchild but I must check this out." Frisk nodded in understanding and stayed seated. They could hear the muffled ribbit of a froggit and his grandmothers worried voice

"How did that-.. OK but why-.. I still don't-... OK just give me-.."

Frisk could only make out bits and pieces of what they were saying but they did understand that it must be serious for if Toriel sounds so worried.

"I'm sorry my child would you be OK for an hour on your own? There seems to be a fight going on near the entrance of the ruins in which you came from and the puzzles are involved. Someone may get hurt or worse. I must leave immediately and I'm trusting you to stay here until your grandfather comes. OK" Toriel rushed out causing Frisk to nod. Toriel quickly kissed Frisk's forehead before rushing out the door with the young froggit. Frisk took this as a chance to get the piece of cloth off the table to wrap up their last slice of pie and put it away for later. Taking a glance in the direction Toriel left in Frisk glanced at the chair.

An idea popped in their head and they rushed back to room they owned for less than a day. Opening the toy box they pulled out a crayon and piece of drawing paper and wrote, 'will be back soon, one day. i promise -frisk. " , in their sloppy handwriting. Frisk folded the piece of paper once and put it on the chair Toriel was sitting in. Frisk hesitated still holding the crayon before adding on, ' p.s will give back book too 'nother promise.' , to the note. Frisk took the book holding it close to their chest before rushing over to the staircase that lead to what they assumed was the exit to the ruins. Frisk jogged down the seemingly long corridor before reaching a large door. The door was a struggle to open due to Frisk's occupied hands and small size but eventual they were able to open it. Stumbling through the door, Frisk ended falling face first into the ground.

"Huh, You think you're so clever don't cha?" looking up Frisk saw Flowey with a smug look on their face. Frisk slowly stood up unsure of what they should do. "Don't worry kid. I won't hurt cha... yet. After all in this world its KiLl Or be KiLleD." Flowey laughed maniacally before sinking into the ground leaving behind a dumbfounded Frisk. Frisk stared at the spot the flower once was before stepping over it and jogging once more.

The more they jogged the faster they decided to run until they were in an all out sprint. Frisk ran straight, not turning left or right even when there was a fork in the road. The cold air kept hitting Frisk's face, causing their eyes to water. But that didn't stop Frisk. They just wiped their eyes and kept sprinting. Frisk ran past many monsters. Some tried to interACT with them but they didn't stop. They didn't know where they were going but they still didn't stop. Until they were stopped, by bumping into someone. Causing Frisk to drop the book.

"Owwie..." Frisked groaned out, rubbing their head. When they opened their eyes they say a bony hand. Like literally a bony hand.

"need a hand?" Frisk heard a deep voice ask. They nodded and reached up grabbing the hand but as soon as he gave it a slight pull it came off. Causing Frisk to gasp in shock. "there now ya' got one."

Frisk blinked twice looking at the hand and then the short,but taller than them, skeleton. Frisk eyes widened when it all clicked and let out a little laugh into the back of their hand. This caused the skeleton to smile "finally someone who can handle my punny jokes.". Frisk laughed again but a little louder this time. "the names sans. sans the skeleton and this is my little bro papyrus." the skeleton, now named sans, step to the side relieving a smaller skeleton that was about Frisk's height, if not an inch taller. The younger skeleton handed Frisk back their book.

"HERE YOU GO. AS MY BROTHER ALL READY INTRODUCED ME MY NAME IS PAPYRUS. WHAT IS YOUR NAME?' Papyrus asked kindly while helping Frisk up. Frisk handed Sans back his hand, and it snapped back in place with a click.

"F-FriSk.." they responded with a small smile showing of their small fangs while doing so. Sans took notice to this. Papyrus did not.

"WELL 'FRISK' MY BROTHER AND I WERE HEADING TO GRILLBY'S WOULD YOU LIKE TO JOIN US?" Papyrus asked while walking in the middle of Frisk and his brother. Frisk nodded, holding their book to their chest, and Papyrus smiled widely. "GREAT!"

"yep great i guess" Sans responded. Leading them to Grillby's as Papyrus told Frisk everything he knew about Grillby. As they walk Frisk took in the chilly and snow covered environment around them. Another human would be freezing but Frisk felt just fine. The occasion breeze was chilly but overall Frisk felt content. Not paying attention to where they were going Frisk bumped into another person.

"Opf!" Frisk grunted out stumbling back a little. When they looked up they saw a large body hidden with in a cape.

"Oh! Watch where you're going young one, you might get hurt if you don't. Oh? You don't have a sweater or jacket? You might get sick. Here take this." the large figure said. They took of their cape and wrapped it around Frisk's body. "You know you look familiar and so does that book, I believe my wife has the same one. Maybe its just my old age getting to me though."

'So this is my grandfather? He's huge!' Frisk didn't say anything only nodded bashfully Their grandfather chuckled and ruffled their hair carefully after taking notice to their horns. "OH! WHAT ABOUT ME KING ASGORE!?" Papyrus asked with eye sockets filled with admiration. Asgore chuckled and pat Papyrus's head before leaving and waving goodbye. Papyrus let out a squeal "NYEH HEH HEH!! DID YOU SEE THAT SANS!! KING ASGORE PAT MY HEAD!"

"ya bro. and tibia honest that was pretty cool." Frisk let out a small chuckle, causing Papyrus to get a weird feeling in his chest, but he brushed it aside. The king just at his head and smiled at him! That had to be a sign that he'll be let into the royal guard when he grows up and he won't let one tell him other wise! Beside he just made a new friend so everything can only get better from that.

#part3 #part2 #part1 #founflingtale #undertale #frisk #sans #papyrus #asgore #flowey #toriel #chara #froggit #mention of grilby #ruins #escaping the ruins #snail facts

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