Timelines, Players, and Characters
A Timeline is the name for the miniature “universes” or worlds within Universe 777. It is quite literally a “line” of time, from past to future, that dictates an entire world’s birth-to-death life cycle. Timelines aren’t always sentient enough to protect themselves, although can be communed with by the main LLR cast similar to spirits or semi-sentient animals (in fact, one could almost correlate timelines to semi-sentient entities entirely as they often traverse through the Universe on their own whims and instincts, splitting off into multiple versions of themselves depending on varying conditions. That’s how the Universe became so rich with life, after all). A Home Timeline is the timeline where either 1) an individual originates, or 2) a timeline an individual “spawns” in, should their original timeline be dead/gone. This applies to Players as well as Characters.
Timelines also possess the power to accept and expel people from their “bodies,” or the story/world itself, if they do not deem them worthy or important enough to the story (especially Outlier characters). They can also fight their destinies, although it is rare a timeline itself wins that fight (it’s more common that a timeline’s Characters fight and win over fate, not the timeline itself).
Timelines must be obedient to the Conductors and Orchestrator or they run risk of complete eradication.
Players are far different in LLR than they are in ENDGAME. The term Player refers to anyone within Universe 777 who can create and control characters, npcs, and timelines, but is not themselves unbound or outside of the Universe’s Veil of Reality. I.e., they have not Ascended and become aware they’re a Piece in an even bigger Game.
These Players can, at their whim, create entire timelines and a cast of characters all their own. They are the ones who lead to the destruction of them as well, as they can “delete,” “kill,” or simply “erase” timelines and characters at their will. Due to not being aware of their impact on the Universe, however, Players are often held captive by the bounds of their own creations, meaning they must live and thrive in a world they made and abide by those physics without the memories of their Player lives - at least until they “wake up” or “snap out of it” in their home reality. This is what some people refer to as getting lost in one’s thoughts, or getting lost in one’s own world. It’s a semi-trance that allows creative Players to enjoy their timelines in peace, but may very well cause consequences in their home timeline.
Very rarely do Players themselves come from Universe 777. They’re typically from outlier universes, such as Universe 606 or Universe BETA. That being said, there is a definite problem in Universe 777 that causes Players to get sucked into their worlds, literally (which is not the same as getting lost in one’s thoughts), due to the complete loss of their Humanity by a certain Beast prowling about.
This is also why the main cast of LLR came to be. Players have no one stopping them or keeping them in check, meaning, if left to their own devices, Players could’ve been the sole reason for the demise of the Universe and, consequently, the Board it makes up. On top of that, the Beast poses such a threat that there needed to be a way to stop him and all his cohorts. In an attempt to protect the Universe from threats both inside and out, the Conductors decided to pick their favorite characters and forcibly Ascend them above Players, making them Protectors.
Protectors all have powers unique to them and their Ascension that allow them to perform unique roles only they can fill. Most Protectors were found similarly to how Apprentices are found for Players - they defied the laws of the Universe so fervently that the Conductors couldn’t help but notice them, and thus picked them as their “favorites” and blessed them with powers. Protectors know of the Conductors, but are not 100% aware that they are still Pieces in a Game; they simply think they are now working a job to help keep the Universe in order. Which is... half true.
Above the Players and Protectors are the Conductors and the Orchestrator, those outside the Universe who are, quite literally, playing a Game with it. The Orchestrator, or Game Master as he also likes to be called, is the one who created the entire universe and board, as well as wrote the Game mechanics that force it to run. He - being none other than My’rath - is the one who first decided what the Game within Universe 777 would be like. His Apprentice, Ladyette E.K. Rungaroven, and her Apprentice friends, Yitumu, Fate, and Yim’ram Devoltn’er, are the conductors of the Game. They’re the ones actually playing it, trying to work together to come to a full ending in order to understand how the real Game is played. They are responsible for most of the happenings among the LLR cast - except for those caused by the Beast, who is My’rath’s main playing Character.
Characters are those who live within the universe who are not Players, Protectors, Conductors, or the Orchestrator. They live, breathe, and die by the Game, and they’re the ones who are the actual Pieces in the game. There’s different types of characters, such as Player Shards who are created when a Player’s Humanity is destroyed or shattered, Puppets, which are the “playable characters” of the universe that Players use to “puppet” around and interact with their world, Self Inserts, which are quite literally just an imagined version of a Player that walks around the universe instead of a Puppet, Original Characters, who are all creations made by Players that do not coincide with a timeline’s original content, and NPCs, or Non Playable Characters, who are characters free from being played by, toyed with, or otherwise interrupted and changed by the Conductors, Puppets, Self Inserts, or Players themselves. They are simply background noise.
Conductors can control all types of Characters - including the Players themselves - except for Protectors and NPCs, who are untouchable. NPCs may remain either as background “fodder” until the universe deems them important enough to mess with them or a Player convinces the universe that they are important enough to bump up to a different controllable status. The Protectors are typically always working to keep the Universe in order, meaning they aren’t always capable of being summoned or interacting with outsiders.
Due to the nature of the Game, “players” outside the Universe are unable to interfere and control/interact within the boundaries of Universe 777, but are considered Observers and are allowed to watch with a Protector’s permission. They have their hands tied unless the Conductors/Orchestrator give them permission, essentially, but may be encouraged to interact from time to time. In conjunction with this and the Multiverse Law, Protectors cannot protect anyone outside the realms of Universe 777, although do possess the ability to work their magic and other things within the ENDGAME multiverse at large should they need to or be summoned.
It is also important that you remember Universe 777 may be a Game to the Conductors and Orchestrator, but this is not reality. It does not truly have code, programming, or scripts, though a falsified series of numbers and sequences may attempt to mimic those things. It is not simply a board game, though there are pawns, pieces, and landmarks. It is also not a card game, though there are Aces, Spades, and Dealers of a Deck. It is full of living, breathing, bleeding individuals who cannot be confined to just one definition of “video game” or “pawn” or “NPC”. These are people’s lives being played with as if they meant nothing more than a few words on a script. Attempting to read them as anything but is a disservice to both them and yourself.
No, Universe 777 is as real as you and I, but it is also not real at the same time. It exists, but it doesn’t. So long as there are people in ENDGAME to live to tell the tale, and so long as there are Readers in the Outside World like you and me who are willing to give it the time of day, it shall forever exist as real as real can be. Even when all of us are said and done, when we pass on and all that is left is code and dust, it will continue to exist until the universe decides to wipe it from existence forevermore.
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Ladyette E Rungaroven is a Player unlike any other Players. Not only is she the creation of another Player (the Oracle), but she’s fully aware of her status in the universe as an original character and a Player, and has complete control over the TIMESPACE for a multiverse known as ENDGAME. She is and isn’t a Player at the same time; she can become whatever she needs to be, meaning she blends seamlessly into all UNDERTALE and DELTARUNE timelines as well as any LONG LOST RETRIBUTION timelines. The only difference is her SOUL, which is completely inaccessible to any others - even other Players who hack the game. She has a “false SOUL” that acts as a place holder for battles within the game mechanics, but FIGHTing her causes glitches and unpredictable results, often times resulting in her running away and disappearing for some time. (Similar things happen with The Stranger, @strangerhappenings, although it is up to Mags as to what does/n’t happen during battles with Stranger)
She has been one of the most “prevalent” NPCs in Karma’s life, mostly as a sideline guardian of the universes and games he’s in, but also as an advisor should he have questions and a way of escaping the Game/Universe as a whole. While the universe often leaves Karma to struggle and toil on his own, Ladyette has offered him her help as needed and answered any questions he’s had about his place in the universe from what she could make of the AU’s writing. His confusion as to how and why she knows what she does was solved when she revealed him as a Player, though some of their friendship was strained for a good few years until Karma finally adapted to the thought that not all Players were evil.
After several years of getting to know each other once again, their friendship has budded into something a bit more. Both, due to commitment issues, haven’t quite admitted to each other that they’re both romantically interested in each other, but they have come to terms with the fact there’s definitely something there and are working on whatever it is they’re feeling together.
Ladyette works alongside the Oracle to help tell the story of LONG LOST RETRIBUTION, however both do not get directly involved in the universe due to not wanting to influence the story outside of being the ones directing its path. The Oracle is also very finicky about what does and does not go on within their worlds, so they tend to keep Ladyette separate due to fears revolving to much interloping of ENDGAME and LONG LOST RETRIBUTION.
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