mirror-ralsei

[mirror-ralsei]

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[mirror-ralsei]

alright.

mental health tanked and abandoned everything and never finished all my theoryposts so here's my literal last second inb4s for fun.

Toby Fox is an unreliable narrator in his devlogs of all things. (didn’t notice the “cancelled” segments when cancellation/scrapping is an important plot element... then “tied to a chair etc etc underwater” was too similar to Spamton and also uh water. now super obvious with whatever’s going on with the Pacifypilling... Royal Sciences LLC and otherwise engaging w the real world is important to Deltarune, after all. did a Ralsei- or Muffet-benefactor-coded shapeshifter diagetically take his place idk)

GLOSSARY HYPOTHESES

Color: Examples include Undertale overworld, Home, God of Hyperdeath Asriel, Spamton in shop / Freedom ending, holidaygirl1225 colorful posts, Susie’s search result egg, Undertale save points. Associated with warmth. Connected to “Hopes” and “Dreams.” (Does CYMK factor in?)

Colorless: Examples include Undertale’s portraits and battle scenes, New Home, phase 2 Asriel, Spamton after transfer / Silence ending, holidaygirl1225 colorless posts, Temmie’s egg, Deltarune save points. Associated with cold. Connected to “Goners,” “statues,” and “Silence.”

Capitalization: Unsure (maybe all-caps is connected to CHAOS or SOUL?)

Mispelling / Anagrams: Connected to alternate timelines.

Up: The direction associated with “Light.” Connected to “HEAVEN” and “elevators.” (Upward arrows form Castle Town.)

Down: The direction associated with “Dark.” Connected to “HELL,” “Ocean,” “Roots,” “falling,” and “elevators.”

Reflection: made a post about this one. unused room 123 and 321, and now the two steeples on the countdown site (mirrored design and mirroring each other), are more examples

Memory: Major theme (“don’t forget,” nostalgia). Connected to Ralsei. Unsure of meaning

Power: Connected with “light” and “SOUL.” Unsure of relation of Deltarune “power” to Undertale “power of determination.”

Trash / Garbage: Metaphorically a scrapped idea, especially art, such as “cut content” in video games. Connected to “colorless,” “Goners,” “down,” “falling.”

Eggs: Represent quantum states. Connected to “boxes.”

Boxes (esp Elevators): Connected to quantum states (incl. eggs). An elevator is the most important box. The CORE elevators are the most important elevators we’ve seen. Papyrus doesn’t know why the CORE elevators have “L” and “R”, Sans talks about a lime green sea, the elevator is “in use” on first inspect then “out of order” on the second.

Cell Phones: Connected to “connection.” Oppose “Silence.”

Voice: Opposes “Silence.”

Silence: Opposes “Voice.” Possible examples of “Silenced” characters: Everyman, man behind the tree if he is not Everyman, “Lancer” on cliffs, Guei in promo video

CHAOS: Associated with butterflies. Connected to “Freedom.”

Order: Unsure.

Freedom: Connected to “CHAOS,” “breeze.”

Revolving: Connected to time/clocks.

Shattering: (Venturing could be related to “reflection” bc of mirror motif and “if this harmony were to shatter”...)

Cold: Connected to Noelle and the Mayor, “colorless,” “statues,” and possibly “Goners.”

Burning: Overexposure to “Light”...? Connected to “memory” and “death.”

Pain: Associated with the color red. Different from “damage.” (This means something about its connection to “trash” and idk what: “”This ‘Roller,’ ‘Coaster’ / It’s Not Actually / ‘Finished’, Yet” “WHAT DOES THAT MEAN!?!?” “Pain” “L... Looks like this trash saved us.””)

Wind: Connected to “cold.” Seems associated with absolute darkness or nonexistence.

Breeze: Connected to “freedom.”

Pollen: Unsure. Connected to “sunshine.” Opposes “wishing.”

Water: Connected to “Dark” and “down,” as well as “memory.” (Could evoke the Lethe: River Person, “Memories are flooding back!")

Heart: Representation of “SOUL.” Connected to “SOUL,” “shattering,” and “cut/tear.”

Heartbeat: Represents fear. Connected to Noelle and “EARTH.” Also appears at end of No Mercy route.

Cut / Tear: Could represent “reflection” through division. (“CUT ANYTHING / 2 PIECES!”)

Shaking: Unsure. Instability?

Waiting: Unsure

Angle: Unsure. Glass?

Guts: Unsure. Connected to “pain.”

Strings: Unsure.

Smell: Unsure.

SUSPECTED PUNS

“Bug” = animal OR software defect

“Cut” = wound OR cut content

“Crash” = smash OR program exit

“Glasses” = eyewear OR plural glass

“Freeze” = ice OR unresponsive program

(lot of future potential puns too, like Colonel Panic, Silent Knight, Holy Knight, Knight Mayor)

UNUSED ROOMS

These are supposed to be scrutinized and have important info breadcrumbs or I’ll eat my hat

Room 123 is extremely relevant, has friend with a creepy smile (FRIEND?), almost certainly “bug” puns on program bugs (see: basement bugs), may be the true disproportionately small gap, connects to room 321 which is completely dark (a reflected “dark world”)

room2 is reminiscent of Snowgrave on normal enemies

TESTROOM perfectly lines up w probably-Gaster’s Deltarune file labeling

272 room_water_redacted is INCREDIBLY INCREDIBLY IMPORTANT!!!! seems like a NEO dark world / nested dark world or something like that of the mysteryman room, “every time your friends forget you a little more” or something, the character resembles a white sausage so the inverse of a “darksausage” and has that tendrily look that the new trailer critters attacking Susie and Kris have

304 room_water_mushroom has dialogue that’s important enough to translate and also has a very strange crystal you’ve never seen before in it which could be or be connected to a ShadowCrystal or PureCrystal

lots more to say but it is 5 mins befor re release lol

CHARACTERS

at least two opposing sides are in play but I could not corkboard out Team Gaster vs Team Typer 2 with the information we have

I don’t know what Gaster’s motivations are but (bc of the Fun events appearing for low LV or Clam Girl who’s a Follower telling a violent player to leave Suzy alone) it seems like he wants to recruit a bunch of Pacifist players of Undertale (kind of similar to what Ralsei was perhaps told to do...) to secure a “happy ending” for Deltarune as well. However, from possible Whimsalot foreshadowing, this may be self-destructive. (Which would fit with becoming consumed by his own creation.)

Whimsalot’s morbid dialogue/descriptions may foreshadow both Kris and the ending of Deltarune. Trying to change Deltarune’s ending – “Not this time.” may be analogous to suicidal resolve.

Typer 2 has bitter jaded vibes lol idk anything else about em tho. Maybe they’ve tried this before and think they know beetter. The only clue is maybe the screen transition from dark to light: if Gaster is associated with darkness and ocean and losing oneself in fiction, maybe Typer 2 is associated with light and heaven (our reality) and the harsh coldness of truth.

Spamton made a deal with terrible consequences just like the player and possibly Kris. He may have had communion through a Bishop and had his eyes burned with light to make him meta-aware. He may have gotten a bit closer to “Heaven” – our reality – by becoming NEO; he no longer uses asterixes to precede his dialogue and can occasionally talk with normal capitalization. Also he has one more Ch 3 friend (or maybe one changable friend who got sliced in half (and maybe also burnt?)) represented by “[Man, Woman, or Child] [At Half-Price]” and “[DVDs of any movie at 50% off]”

“A hooded figure watches the commotion from afar.” seems like another Deltarune character in Undertale

MUSIC

the real lifey sampled tracks are sus. obviously It’s Raining Somewhere Else, but also the post-No Mercy black wind, the car squeaking in trash heap area in Cyber World, the tapping in Queen’s basement... “Berdly (Rejected Concept)” has terrifying implications especially considering what trash and rejected concepts mean

SOUND EFFECTS

the egg sound effect and the dimensional box sound effect are the same

Pacify has such an ominous sounding sound effect (this one feels like it’s already getting confirmed lmao)

why does alphys opening undyne’s letter use the same sfx as hyper goner

snd_paper_surf you say

the door opening/closing is another very real lifey sound

snd_fountain_revival and “THE DEATH” and whatever’s going on with Kris being a zombie seem connected. that or “sealing” (stealing) the fountains is reviving some ancient evil maybe

RANDOM IDEA FACTORY

what if there is an “ocean” antagonist character and a she/her “earth” character

there are too many knight puns to only be one Knight also “Knight Mayor”

welp didn’t finish typing this out but pencils on the table lol game is gonna be out in minutes

[mirror-ralsei]

[mirror-ralsei]

human... I remember youre release droughts...

[mirror-ralsei]

Since the outbreak of armed conflict in Tigray in November 2020, Amhara security forces and interim authorities have carried out a campaign of ethnic cleansing against the Tigrayan population in Western Tigray, committing war crimes and crimes against humanity. Recent Human Rights Watch research found that two officials, Col. Demeke Zewdu and Belay Ayalew, who were previously implicated in abuses, continue to be involved in arbitrary detention, torture, and forced deportations of Tigrayans.

“The November truce in northern Ethiopia has not brought about an end to the ethnic cleansing of Tigrayans in Western Tigray Zone,” said Laetitia Bader, deputy African director at Human Rights Watch. “If the Ethiopian government is really serious about ensuring justice for abuses, then it should stop opposing independent investigations into the atrocities in Western Tigray and hold abusive officials and commanders to account.”

[mirror-ralsei]

COMPILATIONS AND SPECULATIONS: Timeline Weirdness

The messed-up clock in the unused classroom

"All the coupons expired before the book's print date."

“For some strange reason, for just a brief moment... You thought you saw Susie glaring at you, coldly... But when you moved the glass away, You see her looking at you, smiling and making a rude gesture.”

The closet Dark World seemingly contains a waterfall frozen in time

"WELL, HAPPY NEW YEAR! OR, WAS IT THE OLD YEAR."

POSSIBLE: Gaster wants us to create "A NEW FUTURE" for Deltarune, perhaps implying there was an undesirable "old" future

POSSIBLE: "flashback_excerpt" (occurring in and talking about the present) (with a ticking clock)

POSSIBLE: Unused dialogue of Susie begging Kris to wake up (they're not friends yet)

SPECULATION CORNER

...gonna be honest I think I've covered my thoughts already between my "Winter Theory" stuff and "Recursion Theory" stuff.

basically, i think there's a lot of foreshadowing about Deltarune already having met with a terrible fate, and about reflections and recursions, which combined could imply a strange loop scenario.

in summary: "A strange loop is a cyclic structure that goes through several levels in a hierarchical system. It arises when, by moving only upwards or downwards through the system, one finds oneself back where one started. Strange loops may involve self-reference and paradox."

in short, it could be the new year and the old year simultaneously. susie could be kris' friend and their enemy. a current letter or an egg or a man behind a tree could already be gone. and noelle and kris could flashback to things that were currently happening. and the same story could play out over, and over, and over again. forever.

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If there is magic in the light world, I will eat my hat

And here's why:

We've already seen a world with magic, so every difference between worlds is important:

toriel's stove

the books on magic in the librarby- note that in deltarune it's a book of magic *tricks* that require *floating hands*

this also comes with a more profound understanding of the soul than we have in deltarune...

2. The Direct Evidence

Note that Susie and Noelle here are listing the ways in which the dark world is DIFFERENT than the light world, also following on that last line...

sorry I got something in my eye

note again, that magic is referenced in terms of tricks- sleight of hand- only further emphasized by the name "jongle" a portmanteau of the words "juggle" and... something else (this carries over in JP)

now this one is slightly more esoteric, but bear with me-

the mere fact of a bathroom and the lack of healing the hot chocolate provides means that the food, quite simply, is not magic like it is in UT- it is decidedly mundane

LAST AND VERY IMPORTANT POINT:

DETERMINATION =/= MAGIC

THE ABILITY TO SAVE AND LOAD IS NOT, BY LORE, MAGIC

THE ABILITY TO CREATE DARK FOUNTAINS IS NOT, BY LORE, MAGIC

3. The Counterarguments

This first one is easy to move past, and a fairly weak argument overall, but it involves, in particular, catti:

pretty suspect right? until you consider the surrounding dialogue

She's an edgy goth teen- this is in reference to her family being loud.

again pretty convincing right? not really no:

"studying the occult" from a goth teen is about as reliable as it sounds- and on the same level as the party tricks from earlier.

the second counterpoint is something along the lines of "but what about noelle and snowgrave"

to which the obvious answer is: we already know one line of spells from the "Dragon Blazers" games, it isnt much of a stretch for snowgrave be the metaphorical firaga to flare of final fantasy

Another relatively tame explanation could be that our monster allies simply *know* spells upon entering the Dark World (Susie with Rude Buster, Berdly with his Tornado) and snowgrave is either something she acquired through the route (Like susie with ultimate heal) and REALLY doesn't want to use, or a spell she simply actually doesn't know.

The other two counterpoints however, are harder to dismiss, and they have specifically to do with monster biology

Monster Funerals, technically speaking

While not directly stated in game, its a fairly reasonable assumption to make that the reason monsters turn to dust when they die is their lack of physical matter. Where this becomes relevant is through Father Alvin's infamous line about "this hammer" which implies that the burial tradition (and thus the physicality) remains constant between the two games. This would imply that, in-spite of the food and bathrooms, monsters are still made mostly of magic (further obscured by the lack of confirmation on monster blood we have)

2. Blookster

Let's assume for a second that monsters are physical. That they are confirmed to have blood and dont turn into dust and all that comes with it. Then what about Ghosts?

hmm.

(many images stolen from @nochocolate )

[mirror-ralsei]

[mirror-ralsei]

Alright this a dumb question with a very obvious answer from a gameplay perspective but hear me out here: WHY can we leave ralsei's dark world on command?

Now this is only weird because of a few lines in chapter 1, most notably this one from lancer:

and this line from ralsei:

Which is demonstrably only true AFTER...

I'm on to you green boy

[mirror-ralsei]

i dont know why people claim the soundtrack doesn’t include certain no mercy/weird route tracks for “spoiler reasons” when eg the pacifist route is spoiled completely with “hopes and dreams” and the like, and no mercy route songs “battle against a true hero” or “megalovania” are literally on there

[mirror-ralsei]

look man i understand why most no mercy/weird route tracks aren’t on the official osts but also flashback_excerpt might actually be tied for my favourite deltarune track and i need to hear it on repeat

[mirror-ralsei]

From February 10th

[mirror-ralsei]

Some things we know about de-termination, our favourite mcguffin

Monsters can have it regardless of whether they're mostly magic or not (see UT Undyne)

Monsters in DR definitely have it (see Berdly almost opening the fountain)

Monsters in DR probably have the exact same qualities as humans including with regards to dt (unconfirmed but toby's original plan for the town to be entirely humans + also some funky silhouette stuff with the humans from the legend looking like susie and kris)

dt doesn't need a soul to be contained in a body (everyones favourite number one rated flower [[2015]])

Darkners do not have it (probably) (queens need for a peon)

It is the will to live

it melts things with high buoyancy

it is used (somehow) to create dark fountains

possibly related to the ability to save and load (confirmed in UT, questionable in DR)

its a pun

it is present in human souls (extraction experiments)

human bodies likely retain it in some manner without a soul (our favourite geno demon chara, kris able to open the fountain(?))\

boss monsters

what the fuck is a darkworld save

[mirror-ralsei]

ive had this fuckig image in my brain for ages. i dont know what it means

[mirror-ralsei]

something i've not really seen theorized about much that seems important is the DNA sequences in the teacup rides... what's their significance?

[mirror-ralsei]

LINK TO THE SPREADSHEET