#btw ralsei isn't a candidate despite the possibility of shadowy shapechanging and a sweet smile because he's not rich

[mirror-ralsei]

THEORY: Who hired Muffet?

Back before Deltarune, we assumed Undertale was a self-contained story, and could be figured out with the information we had. River Person dialogue, Sans' laboratory, even Gaster - everybody fit the puzzles together, never realizing we might not have all the pieces. Muffet's benefactor was one of those things. A shape-changing antagonist with a sweet smile? Had to be Flowey.

Except... a few things never quite lined up.

Here's the dialogue in full:

While Flowey is an antagonist associated with smiles, shapeshifting in the shadows isn't really a strong hallmark of his - and throwing around huge wads of cash? That's right out.

Things get even more mysterious with Charles the mole NPC, describing a similar occurence with the CORE workers:

Unfortunate "joke" aside, we still don't know the truth behind this strange rich character.

So I believe that with Deltarune's full release, we may finally see the identity of this benefactor. Here's why.

PART 1: Antagonist Sketch

Before we dive in, I'd like to compare Muffet's normal dialogue to her No Mercy route dialogue.

On a No Mercy route, Muffet will reference a different character, and this character is clearly Alphys.

We can suspect this character is Alphys from Muffet's description of "a total nerd" wanting her to evacuate, who uses she/her pronouns. But we don't need to. Undyne has already confirmed that Alphys is this character, as she talked about Alphys evacuating everyone. There is no doubt about the identity of the character approaching Muffet on this route.

Not so with the other routes. Despite having more information about the smiling shapeshifter, there was no definitive match. You could make cases for Flowey, or Gaster, or whomever, but nothing was outright confirmed in the same way that Alphys was.

With that in mind, we're going to reestablish our criteria for Muffet's benefactor.

The character must be rich, or otherwise known for throwing money around.

The character must want a human SOUL.

The character must have a notable smile.

The character must be capable of shapeshifting, likely involving shadows or darkness.

That being said, so many major antagonists across the series are after our SOUL, so I'm not going to search based on that particular criterion in this theory. It's just too broad.

And I'm going to tell you upfront that we are not going to find a conclusive answer right now. This "theory" is more about exploring possible lines of investigation than it is about finding a definitive identity, because even if we have met this character already, we don't know enough about them to hard confirm all of these criteria yet.

Let's get into it!

PART 2: A Dark Shapechanger

When speaking of shifting in the shadows, a couple of Undertale characters actually jump to mind... as they may be tied to Deltarune.

There's some compelling speculation by VGFM about the CORE mercenaries being out of place in Undertale. Personally, their connection to darkness and the CORE itself, as well as their fantasy themes, make me suspect they may hail from Deltarune, or at least relate to it somehow.

The overworld sprites for the CORE mercenaries are known in the files as "blacksausages." When spoken to, they explain their appearances:

The repeated stressing of the "angle" sounds like a tongue-in-cheek reference to some plot element we're not aware of yet, which has tended to mean something only revealed in Deltarune.

(Personally, I wonder if this could be referencing something to do with the ShadowCrystal, since that similarly seems to glean alternate views of things. But we don't know enough about the ShadowCrystal mechanics yet, so I'll let it lie.)

But Muffet isn't in the CORE. She rarely leaves her web. It's likely the strange rich character would have had to approach her.

There is, in fact, a character in Hotland with a very similar appearance.

Introducing "waveguy!"

This character has a low chance of appearing on the ledge in the apron room. They are distinct from the darksausages.

And unlike the darksausages, "waveguy"'s object name is pretty ambiguous.

The only connection I can think of is the shadowy intro Lancer, who I believe is mysterious for several reasons, and who is not only shadowy, but described as "waving" at Susie and Kris. He is similarly present on cliffs, observing the protagonists silently.

There is also the egg man behind the tree, who waves at Kris from his car in the traffic jam. This is another possibility, especially as waveguy is described as a "guy," if not a "man."

It's of course possible any of these characters are one and the same - we are dealing with a shapeshifter, after all.

The only other connection I can think of is that "wave" here does not mean a gesture with your hand, but the motion of a water surface. As in, an ocean wave guy.

This would tie the character in to water theory, whatever that entails for them. But the truth is we have little knowledge right now of what the ocean is meant to represent in UTDR, only that it's a major motif, so in any case, this is something to come back to later.

What we do know about waveguy is their appearance. They look strikingly similar to the CORE mercenaries' overworld sprites.

It seems to follow that whatever the "angle" mechanic causing the mercenaries to appear in the overworld as "black sausages" instead of their true appearance, it likely is the same for this character. And if the mercenaries who emerge from the shadows are indeed related to Deltarune, it seems possible that this unexplained shadowy "waveguy" may be as well.

Perhaps waveguy is the leader of the CORE mercenaries? If waveguy is connected to the CORE mercenaries by their similar appearance, then maybe waveguy is the one bribing the CORE workers to shuffle the layout. And if waveguy is the strange source bribing the CORE workers, then they're almost certainly the same strange source bribing Muffet.

Unfortunately, though, we again don't really have enough information about them to tell. Sure, if waveguy's name relates to waving in a friendly way, then maybe they have a friendly smile. And if they are related to the blacksausage mercs that "emerge from the shadows," then maybe it follows that waveguy could change shape in the shadows too. But that's all a lot of assumptions.

And there's another character that might be relevant here, too.

PART 3: Our FRIEND With The Creepy Smile?

Let's take a quick detour to unused room 123.

Undertale contained a lot of "unused" rooms, but it's my belief that some of them may have been intended as hints to Deltarune. Room 271 "TESTROOM" contains the line "Time to wake up and smell the pain," which is referenced in Spamton NEO's flavor text. And of couse, "room_gaster" contains the famous Entry 17, which has been referenced multiple times in Deltarune and its website. So it's safe to say we don't actually know which, if any, rooms are truly "unused."

Room 123, "room_water_prebird," also known as the bug-catching room, is definitely one of the most outstanding ones. It's easily accessible, as it isn't even Dogchecked, which is a property shared with the infamous "room_gaster."

There are a few interesting things here, but for now, we're focusing on the NPC with this dialogue:

I believe it's possible this smiling character is the same one that approached Muffet and the CORE workers. We have another mention of a smile, and then of the character quickly disappearing. If they're able to change shape in the shadows, this might make sense.

Moreover, we've already met a character like this.

Not only is the basement face smiling and disappearing in the shadows when we try to look behind us at it, but it's even literally named "DEVICE_FRIEND." This is a pretty exact match for the bug-catching room NPC's criteria.

But there could be a little more to it.

The only concrete information we have about "FRIEND" is their naming convention, and their yellow-and-pink eyes.

The former would appear to tie them to Gaster, who seems to use this all caps convention, and is extremely likely to have created "SURVEY_PROGRAM" and the "GONER_MAKER" within.

And the latter ties them to only two known characters: Spamton, and "face," the pair of eyes that randomly appears on the "chair" page of the Sweepstakes. (There's also "tinybug," but they're less a character and more...creatures?)

FRIEND does not seem to be Spamton, as Spamton cannot enter the basement without help and has different-looking teeth. I also think FRIEND is not "face's" pair of eyes, as the pair of eyes is more square. But it is possible that FRIEND is connected closer to "face."

Both appear from the darkness. Spamton describes Queen's basement, which FRIEND appears in, as a "[Deep Abyss]". And "face" appears on a page with the dialogue "But what if it could... ...get darker than dark?," while FRIEND is likely created by or otherwise linked to Gaster through their all-caps naming convention, like "SURVEY_PROGRAM" and "GONER_MAKER." And as we know, Gaster is infamous for his "dark yet darker" experiments. This may indirectly link the two characters through their mutual connections to the "darker than dark" concept.

If FRIEND and "face" end up connected in a significant way, this could provide a bit more evidence toward figuring out the rich character.

That's because "face" appears with an audio clip of a distorted laugh track.

This seems like a minor detail to extrapolate from, and maybe it is. But laugh tracks are associated with television. The page's framing device - audience reactions to opening doors with prizes - seems to be a gameshow, something mentioned by Spamton. We can deduce from Spamton's dialogue and especially the page "d_a_m_n_y_o_u_t_e_n_n_a" that there is a CRT TV-themed and possible gameshow host character named Tenna, who did something to Spamton's friend Mike and was likely partially responsible for Spamton's demise.

This is relevant because if Tenna was able to con Spamton and Mike into working for them, we can infer that Tenna might have the type of personality to go around hiring people to do their dirty work.

In other words, the type of person who might hire Muffet and the CORE workers to take our SOUL.

Furthermore, if Tenna is a gameshow host - though something that isn't confirmed - it's typical to give cash rewards as prizes. This would be further fulfillment of Muffet's description, if true.

Last but not least, we don't know who's smiling in the TV at the end of Chapter 2. But if it is Tenna, as some suspect, that would be another point for them.

(If we stretch a bit more, it's possible that Spamton wants our SOUL because he learned about it from Tenna, or that Tenna's continued success - frequently contrasted with Spamton's downfall - means that Tenna is rich. In that case, Tenna would be even more likely to be the rich character hiring Undertale characters to take our SOUL. But this is even more guesswork than actual evidence.)

So, I'm not certain if the square eyes are literally Tenna. But the laugh track might connect them to Tenna in some way.

PART 4: Review

Somewhere in this mess of pink-and-yellow eyes and black sausages, we could either have our culprit, or more likely, at least someone close to them.

Let's revisit these characters.

CORE mercenaries, aka "blacksausages":

Rich?: Unknown

Wants human SOUL?: Unknown, but are working for Mettaton, who does

Notable smile?: No

Can shapeshift in shadows?: Strongly associated with shadows, and somewhat with changing appearance

Extremely unlikely to be the ones hiring Muffet and the CORE workers, but could be connected.

"waveguy," aka apron room character:

Rich?: Unknown

Wants human SOUL?: Unknown

Notable smile?: Unknown

Can shapeshift in shadows?: Seemingly associated with shadows, unknown if can shapeshift

Completely unknown character appearing in Hotland not terribly far from Muffet. Looks similar to the CORE mercenaries, so could be associated with them - if so, could have approached the CORE workers.

Friend with the creepy smile, in bug-catching room:

Rich?: Unknown

Wants human SOUL?: Unknown

Notable smile?: Yes

Can shapeshift in shadows?: Unknown if associated with shadows, unknown if can shapeshift, but disappears quickly behind PC

Seems to be setting up a description of a Deltarune character. Appears in a non-Dogchecked room, like room_gaster.

DEVICE_FRIEND, aka basement face:

Rich?: Unknown

Wants human SOUL?: Unknown

Notable smile?: Yes

Can shapeshift in shadows?: Unknown if can shapeshift, but appears and disappears in shadows

The closest so far to Muffet's description.

"face," aka chair jumpscare eyes:

Rich?: Unknown

Wants human SOUL?: Unknown

Notable smile?: Unknown

Can shapeshift in shadows?: Unknown if can shapeshift, but appears in shadows, and linked to "darker than dark"

Seems to be setting up a character from a future chapter. Unknown if related to Tenna.

Tenna:

Rich?: Unknown, but seems to be successful businessman. IF gameshow host: might hand out cash rewards

Wants human SOUL?: Unknown

Notable smile?: Unknown. IF the smile on Kris' TV, then yes

Can shapeshift in shadows?: Unknown

Seems to be setting up an important character from a future chapter. Unknown if related to "face."

(Told you this was going to be more exploratory than conclusive.)

If there was a cameo or mention of a Deltarune character in Undertale, it's more likely to be an important one. It's also unlikely that the CORE mercenaries were the ones to hire Muffet for obvious reasons. But any of these characters could be connected to the culprit.

Our main stickling point here is that we don't know of many characters who are rich.

Going forward, if we can pick out a rich character and determine them to have even one of the other qualities, or if any of the above listed characters turn out to be rich, I think that might be our ticket out of this limbo. All the better if they're a major character.

As with many unexplained phenomena in Undertale, however, I have confidence that with the full release of Deltarune, we will eventually have our answers.

(Screenshot credit: 1 2 3 4 5)