#so i thought he would like. talk before boss fights like susie.

[fifty-ten]

it’s so sad when you play a game that’s earlier in a series after playing a later entry & it’s a little worse… like it’s not the game’s fault that later titles built on and improved its mechanics.

[dinosaurstirfry]

Manicquin, former warrior of "The Plateau of Innovation"

But before we talk more about him it's very important that you understand what his dark world is.

"The plateau of innovation" was a dark world created by gaster as an experiment, the experiment was to be able to create dark worlds tailored to the people entering them, this means you're actions that you would have done in previous chapters count towards how this world turns out.

I needed to explain this so you know why manicquin has a slightly different story depending on what actions you've taken

Neutral Route Manicquin:

Manicquin in the neutral version of this world was a warrior until he met a strange man who told him to fight an "evil" witch, he accepted this request but unfortunately he lost most of his movement in a battle against the evil witch who put a curse on him which tethered him to an evil demon parasite, he cannot move or speak unless the parasite allows him to.

Fight Route Manicquin:

He has the exact same story as his neutral route version except for his parasite is a lot more violent than in neutral route and it will often kill someone itself instead of controlling manicquin into doing it.

Pacifist Route Manicquin:

Pacifist route manicquin actually wins his fight with the witch, this gives him a huge boost in ego while also making him think that fighting most people is a waist of his time so you have to prove you're self worthy to be able to fight him. He is very protective of his shadow crystal because he believes that it's what makes him so powerful.

Weird Route Manicquin:

In this route things don't go very well for manicquin, he still loses the fight to the witch but also the witch ends up doing a lot of damage to him, the parasite also ends up dying due to hunger because manicquin isn't able to hunt for food for him now he's just a sad unmoving shell.

Fight Route Manicquin (All secret bosses completed):

Manicquin in this route has the witch cast the curse on him but instead of doing what it was suppose to do, manicquin found out a way to merge with the parasite causing him to become an extremely powerful warrior who's skills are unrivalled.

Pacifist Route Manicquin (All secret bosses completed):

In this route he still loses to the witch but all his friends team up to battle the parasite and set him free, they win but unfortunately he's still unable to move so to fix this they ask the ruler of the dark world to build him a new body. His new body allows him to move and speak like normal now and he's a lot stronger as well.

*H E S P E A K S L I K E T H I S

His thoughts on other characters

Kris: Likes

Susie: Likes

Ralsei: Dislikes

Jevil: Likes

Spamton: Hates

Noelle: Dislikes

Berdly: Hates

Wrap up

I made this character for the chaos clash tourney but he ended up being one of my favorite secret bosses that I've made so i hope to eventually do more with him in the future. Thanks for reading through all of this

[corals-corner]

Gimme your thoughts on how you think Spade King's gonna turn out by the end of Deltarune! For example:

Will Spade King have a redemption arc? Why or why not?

How will Spade King's relationships with other characters change? Will they get better or worse? Examples can include Lancer, Queen, Susie, etc.

Do you think any knowledge of Spade King's life before Deltarune will be given? If so, how much, and what?

What role do you think Spade King will have by the end of the game? Will he be a/the king again, a regular citizen, or something else?

What about personality/behavior? Will Spade King change in this regard? If he will, how would he change?

Those are just hypotheticals ofc lol, you can think of more questions if you want :)!

Wooo okay :DDD

1. Yes and no. I think a redemption arc will be started, but we won't see much of it. Since deltarune (likely) takes place over the course of at most 7 days, I feel like a week is too little time to really give him the development he deserves. I do really hope we see him slowly and subtlety begin to change though

2. Overall, I think it can get better over time with everyone. Once he learns about the roaring and how it affects darkners, I think it could help him change his view. Of course, if he listens to what's being told. I do want his relationship with Lancer to improve greatly and I really wanna see their father-son relationship. And I really wanna see his and Queen's relationship develop because I want to know more about them,how their relationship even was, and their past

3. I think the most we'll explicitly see will be either how he met the Knight, or some time right before the lightners left. I don't think we'll be given much story about him or even his childhood as much as i'd love to see it. He'll, we might not even see anything other than just memories told to us but not shown because he's such a disliked and minor sidecharacte, atleast at the moment. I do hope he gets a bigger role at the end and he either stands up to the Knight or we see him directly fighting with them as a sorta final boss battle thing

4. Something I think would fit is him working for Ralsei as a sort of advisor. Since he has experience ruling a kingdom, I think he could help Ralsei out a lot in ruling Castle Town. Of course only if they do talk it out at one point and if King no longer wants to kill him. I don't think the other darkners would want to see him as their king again, or that the lightners would give him the opportunity. But one of my personal thoughts that's probably unrealistic but makes me happy to think about is that he'd have a bakery or a kitchen bc I hc that he likes to cook and bake.

5. I want to imagine he'll stay the same for the most part. He'll still be grumpy and prideful and keep his high sense of justice. I do however think that he'll be calmer and more open to listening to others opinions. Doesn't mean he'll agree with them, but he won't be dismissive or aggressive towards the person. I feel like his personality he has rn is a key part of him so changing it would make him feel like he's a different character

Also, good to see you active again :D

[desultory-novice]

oh my god i just had A Thought. ok so in star allies there's a celebration image called "rockability and blues" which has taranza reaching out to the dimension mirror with sectonia in the background and joronia on the other side of the mirror, and when dedede finds the mirror he instantly encounters his mirror world self, so. what if sectonia is somehow mirror world joronia and joronia is still in the mirror world somewhere. that probably wouldn't hold up canonically but it would still be cool

Honestly, seeing as how the OG, Dark Meta Knight, successfully sealed Meta Knight in the mirror world for a time, it's not that farfetched of an idea!

I think the only thing standing in the way of that theory being super plausible is that I imagine Director Kumazaki would probably prefer Sectonia be "responsible" for her own evil deeds and face the outcome of them, rather than the Sectonia we fought being an evil mirror clone while "our" sweet Joronia did nothing wrong. Sniffle...

(My many years as an anime/game fan has taught me that generally speaking "They were just controlled/brainwashed/body-swapped" is not a very popular lead in for "...which is why X did nothing wrong!!" A lot of creators want their characters to take SOME responsibility, even if the situation got out of their hands really quickly.

I think that's why most of Kirby's "sympathetic" last bosses all have serious character flaws. Hyness was stabbed in the back by his planet and put under immense pressure to care for an entire subset of a population, but the way he channels his anger is still considered "unjustified." Magolor "just" wanted to build the galaxy's best theme park, but there was some darkness there, a larger than normal dose of ambition, that allowed the Master Crown to sway his thoughts.)

It is still incredibly fascinating! Particularly when it comes to imagining what a Mirror Joronia's personality was like BEFORE she started body-swapping like mad. Joronia might have always been fascinated by the idea by being stronger, more beautiful... the perfect queen, but never really been able to act on it? Just like Meta Knight fights against his powerful love of battle, in contrast to Dark Meta Knight who doesn't let anything or anyone take him away from the fight. So Mirror Joronia would be the one to go, "...Why don't I just take someone ELSE's strength? Someone else's beauty?" 

And of course, then they could still go into the mirror-verse and rescue Taranza's Joronia. Hey, if the novelization of Planet Robobot let Susie's papa survive Star Dream exploding (:handwaves like wild:) that would be a decent way for a potential Triple Deluxe novelization to have a similarly happy/bittersweet ending. Taranza giving his thanks to everyone while saying something like, "The Joronia I know is still out there. I just need to find her."

Of course the novels went ahead and canonized her death before she even got to appear in them sooo...

...

...

You know, at the same time, I can't shake the feeling that anything could still happen on that front? Does everyone remember the Kirby Twitter account having Magolor talk about DMK and the Dimension Mirror kinda recently? Sure, they say it's because DMK's mask was popular the time but what if it was a hint we'll be revisiting that plot later? Sectonia seems pretty popular amongst the (non-brought back to life) last bosses. And look what popularity did for Magolor!

I also get the feeling that Kumazaki may have more to say about her down the line? RtDL as a game was very "chatty." TDX was light on talking (way too light, IMO) and I feel like that was to make-up for RtDL's bevy of dialogue.

But you know that, even if we didn't see a lot of world-building in game, Kumazaki did a LOT of writing and thinking about that story. (The friggin' sun stones, man. Their petals are the same as the Master Crown's leaves...)

Kumazaki also loves his girl bosses. Drawcia was from a spinoff game, but look at her now! She's the only "spinoff" game character to get a dress-up mask! She has, for all intents and purposes, been bumped up to "basically canon." An honor not even Fluff has gotten.

Sectonia, like Drawcia, keeps appearing in these unexpected places. Getting a nod from Ohmoto and Kumazaki at the music fest and such. (Or getting her pre-corruption name dropped in Gourmet Fest. No one asked them to do that, but they did.)

So I don't know.

It's probably not a bad idea to keep an open mind as to her status...

[mar64ds]

JEVIL

where do i begin with my funny little friend... jevil is a character that i have always thought was really fun: a secret difficult boss fight, a mysterious connection to gaster and overall i think he has a really funny personality, i've always really liked him! he wasn't my favorite character and i don't think i was as invested in this character as everyone else was in 2018, back when he was the most mysterious character that we had met so far, but when chapter 2 came out i kind of started to appreciate jevil more? Since we were all so focused on new content that made me remember how much i liked chapter 1 and my love for jevil grew more

I have always really liked his relationship with Seam even if we never see them actually interacting, I have mentioned before that they just seem to me like they would have a very Sam&Max dynamic asdfghjkl and i always like duos like that they are funny and endearing. And adding all that tragedy to their relationship makes it even stronger, I just really like these two and I don't care how their relationship is interpreted they are companions and i like them and if they don't talk to each other in the game again i will break my computer

I focus on him and Seam the most but Jevil is a character that is really fun to make interact with anyone, some based on canon material and others just fun concepts

I think the idea of him and Susie becoming friends (perhaps even family) is so sweet to me, these two have so many parallels and I love the way they interact, Susie is very blunt with him and that doesn't bother Jevil at all, they are two sharks prepared to fight!!

I personally like to think him and Gaster were genuine friends, that Gaster didn't mean for Jevil to end up the way he did, that they both just wanted a friend...

Him and Spamton are really funny, wacky cartoon characters in one room together what could go wrong, funny exes. I know I don't focus a lot on them but I like them and some very talented artists make such cool content of them that it makes appreciate them more, keep up the good work everyone

Jevil mentions Queen once but I really like to believe they got along really well, that maybe all the other kings were stuck-ups but she was always the one who found him funny the most..... 🥹 I think they are friends :)

Now for relationships that are completely made-up by me? Jevil and Toriel, they are friends to me, they are such close friends. Heartache used to be Jevil's theme!!!! They both like jokes!!!! They both have horns!!!!! They both feel trapped and lonely!!!!! They could be best of friends. I also think him and Papyrus could have really interesting interactions, they are both positive people, just two different kinds of positivity

Jevil is a secret boss that doesn't get much screen time and we barely know ANYTHING about him, so a lot of my headcanons are just based on what I believe he COULD have been like or could be like at the moment, it's all pure speculation and having fun with a character i like and that i think has a lot of potential, he's slowly just becoming an OC at this point lol. I like to believe he was a little prankster as a kid and the funny kid on school but he didn't have many friends, when he was a teen he goes through his 'emo phase' and tries to pretend he doesn't care about being a funny little jester anymore and focuses more on his 'grim reaper' style (and the reason why he does this it's not just because it's a funny idea it's because he's tired of being rejected for being so 'different', he's masking pretty much), when he's a young adult he goes back to trying to be a funny jester and he ends up becoming the court jester!! The rest is history and I think he meets Seam after he has been the court jester for a little while

I see Jevil as trans, ace and aroflux! Autistic as well! Jesters and rubber ducks are two of his biggest special interests, he stims with his hat, tail and hands and has a a chew stim toy in the shape of a spade! He of course also vocally stims all the time! He repeats words often and likes to imitate sounds. And I also really like the idea that he has a lisp!

This might sound silly but Jevil has helped me a lot with my confidence towards my autism this last year? Papyrus too, they both have helped SO much. I don't know, i'm a very insecure person and sometimes i think i'm extremely childish (not as in... a mean childish attitude, i mean having childish interests and things like that) or sometimes i can just feel very different from everyone around me, and thinking about Jevil i don't know makes me happy? Like i get it he's the court jester but he's a guy that likes playing games like roundabout and things like that, and he vocally stims all the time and it's established that he was very lonely but the people that cared about him? They cared, they cared a lot, he was someone that was missed. And uh... wow that means a lot i'm going to explode and cry

Anyway, i like jevil, worst character ever

[bekaroth-reads]

thoughts on deltarune and papyrus’ missing status therein

So, I’ve been thinking about Deltarune stuff. Mostly just me rambling, so idk if you would consider it an actual theory of not.

There are plenty of differences in the Undertale and Deltarune stories, like how the monsters are the ones above ground, how different characters interact with each other, etc.

(Also spoilers for Undertale and the first two chapters of Deltarune)

(also another note: this was supposed to just be like a few thoughts, like, three paragraphs tops, but then, as usual, I got carried away.)

One of the main ones though is the age difference between characters and their counterparts. Kris, Deltarune’s version of Undertale’s Frisk, seems to be pre-teen to young teen as opposed a kid somewhere in the 7-10 range. This also goes for monster kid that looks to be older in Deltarune then he was in Undertale, following Kris into the pre-teen age. There is also Bratty and Catty who go from teens to being old enough to have their own families. And, of course Asriel who went from being a child, to being old enough to go to a university out of town, and is said to be about the same age as Bratty and Catty( it could be argued that he would have been about their age in Undertale if he had not been turned into Flowey, etc.)

There is actually another variation of age where some characters, and that’s some of them are younger than their Undertale counterparts. For instance there is Temmi who was old enough to go to “cooleg” in Undertale, but is in Frisk’s class in Deltarune. Or the few that didn’t have a very discernible ages that were made to be about Frisk’s age like Snowdrake.

Another thing to note about is the parallels between the characters and some of the dark world counter parts. For instance, the King is there to help Susie reflect on how she’s treating other people, and the queen is there to help Noelle to learn to stand up to people (and to a minor degree show Birdly how he treats people much like Susie and the King.) Though I don’t have much to base it on, I also get the feeling that the alt bosses are there to represent parts of Frisk that they need to understand and work on.

Jevil showing that they have a problem with controlling themselves sometimes like how Jevil being cast out and locked away for causing problems in his kingdom, and Kris being constantly reminded by his friends and family that they have a problem with taking jokes too far and having little self control with things like eating all the desert in their house before anyone else could have any, scaring Noelle so badly and so often that her family was hesitant to even let them hang out with each other for awhile. Spamton being the feeling of loneliness that they feel now that they are being faced with the consequences of those actions, with Kris feeling like they had been tossed away like trash. The feeling of isolation with Spamton could also be related to them being in a divorced household, and their brother leaving. They used to have someone to help them get through the hard times with that, but with Asriel and Des going to university out of town and Noelle seemingly not hangin out with them much anymore close to when that happened, they were left to handle their parents fighting all by themself. And, while neither Toriel nor Asgore seem like they purposely want to put that pressure on Kris they do still get them involved with things like Asgore using them to try to give their mother flowers to apologize for things, and Toriel doing things like not even using their father’s name, making Frisk feel like they’re basically sneaking behind their parent’s back whenever they want to talk to one or the other.

That idea aside, where I was going with this is that the bosses in the dark world seem to be mirrors or foils to help the main cast of characters see things about themselves and maybe find a way to work on them.

There is one returning character from Undertale, the everyone is begging to see and Toby keeps teasing, and that is none other than Papyrus. This is where the other things I just talked about come into play. As I think that at some point, Papyrus is going to be one of the friends that Kris ends up taking to the dark world, but I don’t think that will happen until one of the later chapters. This is because there might be a good chance that his dark world mirror, or perhaps the alt boss for his section of dark world could be Gaster.

Now, I’m not going to say that even with some of the hints that it’s certain Gaster will be in Deltarune at all. What a lot of people use for proof that he is, is the fact that when you stand by the bunker at the bottom of town, or use your cell in the dark world, it plays noises that sound like the ones that play in the Darker, Darker, yet, Darker sequence(which could been seen as another hint.) While that could be, it could also be Toby Fox reusing sound fonts and existing sound effects to get the point across as well. A instance of him doing this is in chapter 2 there is a mini-game where you pop balloons, and when the balloons pop they make the same noise the heart in Undertale makes when it shatters. Just because he used the same sound effect doesn’t mean that when you pop the balloons in Deltarune, you’re committing mass murder.

But, let’s say that Gaster is indeed in the game. He would make a great mirror for Deltarune’s version of Papyrus. Papyrus in this game seems to be a bit younger than he was in Undertale, though there’s not much solid proof of this. Something that makes it difficult to tell is that he was one of the characters that didn’t have a very definable age in the first one. While most people thought that he was a young adult with an innocent personality, there is the chance that he was always younger than what we thought he was seeing as he still had things like toys, a race car bed, a favorite bed-time story, and believes in Santa. Now, I think he would be a teenager at the youngest, perhaps and older teen around Catty and Bratty’s age, and his interests and hobbies lined up with things considered for people about five to ten years his age and not an adult who’s hobbies tended to be around fifteen to twenty years younger( this is an in general statement. I get people can be into whatever hobbies at whatever age, this just means, like, the people who are generally into certain things like Santa and race car beds.)

Regardless of his age in Undertale, though, there is a good chance that he is closer to Kris’s age in Deltarune. This would hold up as Sans asks Kris to hang out with Papyrus, trying to maybe get his brother friends his own age. And, many younger people, teens especially, don’t handle things like moving to different towns that well. This could be one of the reasons that Papyrus sort of locks himself in his house and won’t talk to anyone but his brother. The lack of confidence could also be a younger Papyrus not being as confident in his abilities to make friends, which was something that he also seemed to struggle with in Undertale; except in the Deltarune world, he doesn’t have his guard duty to keep him active or get him out and about, so he hides away instead. That could be his development in his version of the dark world. The whole thing with Gaster disappearing and feeling like no one can see him could be a reflection on how this Papyrus feels, and going through his adventure could help him be closer to the original Papyrus that we all know and love. We might just have to wait for him, though, as it will take Sans bugging him for a week or so before he finally gives in and decides to hang out with Kris.

Anyways, if you read this, thank you for digging through my word vomit. Again, not really a theory per se, just me thinking (typing) aloud.

[fruitypi]

Here's the fan art this post is continuing from.

Aaaaand this is a post about my favorite boy Lancer. Please have in mind it's my first time writing something like this, so feedback will be very welcome!

We first see Lancer at the very beginning of the first chapter, right after Kris and Susie enter the dark world and he is shown as a mysterious and serious freat. It's not really a battle, but a chase.

It shows how talented he is when it comes to magic. His patterns are well thought of. Maybe not that hard to dodge (unless you're me B3), but they weren't chaotic or weak.

When we get to know him for real, at Ralsei's castle, he turns out to be... A small, bratty kid. I remember thinking "gosh, I hate this kid" in that moment. If only I knew... The first dialogues are showing he's character perfectly.

1) he cares a lot about he's father's opinion

2) he doesn't know why he doesn't want the fountain to be sealed

3) he's... not a very wise person

After Susie "joined" the team and encountered Lancer, Susie's patience ended and she simply threatened him. And what did he do?

He thanked her for "showing him how to be scary". I think it somehow shows how he doesn't see bad in people, even if it would hurt him (hmm, I wonder where I've seen it before). Maybe that's why the king wasn't dethroned before. Yes, in my opinion... You know what? I'll write about it later. Let's keep the chronology.

The next important thing to happen is Susie joining the "bad guys" side. Despite the dangerous sounds of it, she just became friends with Lancer. That's a very important moment, because without it, Susie would never join the "heroes side" again. It's also important, that it was her first true friendship. Susie is known for her "tough and dangerous" persona. She threatened Kris and Lancer at some point, se beated the crap out of anyone in her way also when being on the good side. So her getting along with Lancer was an unexpected twist. But this duo seemed to be inseperable. Lancer much like Susie never had a real friend before, so I think it was making up for the lost years. Of course, he had these parties of enemies appearing at his call, but as they said themselves, they were forced to take care of him.

It wasn't unusual for King to give custody of his son to others. But we will come back to it later.

Right now Susie and Lancer joined our "the fun gang". We get to enjoy a small walk with jokes, funny moments, and relationship tightens and we get to see a landscape with a castle! Ralsei is relieved, Susie and Kris are relieved to finally go home and Lancer is happy for them to see where he lives.

And then the conversation turns to Lancer's father. The king turned out to be a lighter's blood thirsty bastard.

But when Ralsei asked if Lancer's father was happy..

I love this "scene" overall, because of these sweet interactions our heroes had. We get to know their motivation (in Ralsei's case), we see how this adventure changed them ( in Susie's case). I love the moment Lancer realized, that our main heroes- his only friends he ever had- are going to fight his father.

Despite never saying the exact words out loud, we can see that he's inflicted on what to do. Unfortunately Susie doesn't get what Lancer was talking about.

This moment made Lancer make the decision of traping his friends in the dungeon.

And here my favourite scene happens. A fight between Susie and Lancer.

Alright fight with Lancer and boss fight with king will be in part two, because I have school to pass and fanfiction to write. Byeeee

[the-meme-monarch]

I've been wanting to tell someone about a fan game idea for Deltarune I've had for a while but really haven't had anyone to tell about. I'm randomly seeing if you might be interested because it is like your Obscurian AU a little (even though I thought of the idea way back during Halloween...). You don't have to read it if you don't want to though and that you be fine. It would be a Deltarune Chapter 2 fan hack that would be like Toby Fox's Earthbound Halloween Hack. The basis of it would be that the 2nd chapter starts as normal except Kris is able to pick up a flashlight under their bed. Nothing else is different until they get to the Dark World where suddenly everything is suddenly super overly spooky and edgy in the Cyber World and everyone is mean or scary. You don't see Spamton when you pass that first dumpster though and only can only meet him by going into the dump and knocking. Unlike in the real chapter 2, this Spamton seems to be totally fine and acting like a happy and smart business man who is actually nice and sells you good items unlike the other mean characters. He seems to be the rebel in this horrible world. Near the end of the chapter though, when you are supposed to fight Queen, instead of having a totally overly scary boss fight, you find out that everyone is actually throwing a sort of prank with Kris. It turns out that in this game it seems like everyone knows that everything is a game (sort of like actors on a movie set) and they all wish Kris a Happy Halloween. It is at this point though that Spamton comes out in his own spooky costume of his own and horribly fails to be spooky in any way. Susie would say that Spamton did a good job as acting as a calm business man in his shop and Spamton would be really confused and say that he was too busy on his costume to appear earlier. It is at this point then that Kris, Susie, and Ralsei suddenly wonder who was at the dump...

Before they had made it to the end, there would be some subtle hints that everyone was just acting spooky for Halloween. This would appear in characters accidentally falling out of spooky character. One of these times would include the Pink Addison mentioning that they weren't sure where their mannequin went. Near Trashy the Trashcan, there would be also a new piece of trash that looked like the bottom of the mannequin stand.  If you ignore the weirdness with the other Spamton and end the game like usual, you would get a weird unexplained ending where a note is given that hints at a horrible thing occurring.  If you go back to the dump after the party, you then can see the true horrible boss of the Halloween Hack, a kind of parasite that is made of hands, eyes, and a bloody heart that was puppeteering a fake Spamton mannequin. It had been workings its hands towards all the characters in the Dark World and was getting ready to consume them alive and puppet them as well. When you confront it, it would burst out of the fake Spamton mannequin and fight you. Once you defeat it, you then can have the good happy Halloween ending after all. But... Now did you forget about the flashlight at the beginning of the game though? If Kris picked it up and used it in battle, Kris would be able to flash it at characters and turn them into items that can be picked up (like how Lancer was able to turn into a card in Kris' pocket). If they did pick up characters, they will talk in your pockets like Lancer and make a huge crazy mess in Kris' pockets. This could lead to some funny interactions and you can always drop their items so that they can go back to where they were on the map before. 

Why does that matter though? Because the fake Spamton can offer to take those items in their shop to "help" turn them back into their "normal" selves who aren't acting spooky for Halloween. What the fake Spamton would be doing instead though would be controlling them from the inside. If you give some of the characters to the fake Spamton, they will also reappear on the map and act "normal" like in the original Chapter 2 Toby Fox made. When you reach the party though, those characters won't appear at the party, and when you go back to see the fake Spamton, you will see that those characters you gave the fake Spamton are squirming and writhing on the map with the parasites eating them from the inside. They seem to be slightly aware and you cannot save them. They will fight you and you can have alternate battles with all of the zombie characters.  In the worst ending, if you give all of the flashlighted characters to the fake Spamton, you will reach the end party and Queen will suddenly get taken over by the parasite hands and eyes when she was going to start the Halloween party. You will then have to fight an alternate final boss with the fake Spamton and it will use all of the controlled characters to try to kill you. The horror at the end though is that Kris, Susie, Ralsei, Berdly, and Noelle will be left with no one of their friends from the Cyberworld alive.  OK. Uh.. I'm sorry for the info dump, but I wanted to see what a person though about my story. If you read this, thanks! But if you didn't that's ok too!

—

OOOH THATS REALLY FUN I THINK… the idea of making a halloween hack of a toby fox game is just :] the circle is complete

[shazos]

Rouxls is Hiding Something Big: A Deltarune Theory

FORENOTE- For some needed context, it may help reading my previous Deltarune theory here for important details that I will cover in this post. (My previous theory provides notable evidence on why Gaster is indeed the “Knight” figure talked about by multiple characters in Deltarune.)

Now, this is going to sound crazy. But after much time of poring over and analyzing Deltarune, I have come to a conclusion. One that I’ve been convinced of for awhile now. Something that’s been lying right under all of our noses without many of us even realizing it. We have all been bamboozled. Hoodwinked. Tricked. Why, you may ask?

Because the comically stupid and inept Duke of Puzzles is actually... not an idiot. No, he’s the complete opposite. He is a downright mastermind.

As collective players, we are all falling into the same trap once again. Putting faith into a character’s preconceived personality !

When their true personality turns out the complete opposite of what we expected...

It is here, my evidence for this claim begins—and we delve into the true identity of Rouxls Kaard. Buckle up everyone, cause this one’s gonna be a fun ride. 👀

So, to spill the beans up front, and get it over with. I believe Rouxls Kaards identity... is none other than W.D. Gaster in disguise.

Now. I didn’t immediately become invested in this theory—I was skeptical at first like everyone else. But, once I began examining Deltarune and all of its characters a bit closer...things weren’t exactly adding up about the Duke of Puzzles.

Point #1: Anagrams

I initially began to become suspicious of Rouxls Kaard because of his odd name. Sure, it is a play on the words of the term, “Rules card”. But it is spelt in such a peculiar way. If it were just simply a play on words, I think that there would be a much better way of going about spelling it rather than just jumbling a bunch of random letters together. There is a very intriguing reddit post found here that goes more into depth about his name that ties well into my theory. The thing that stood out to me in particular, is that Rouxls’s name is actually also an anagram for “A Dark Soul RX”, (with the left over RX typically being used in terms relating to doctors/medicine.) Not only is Gaster a Doctor, but he’s also always associated with darkness and the research of souls. Toby loves his anagrams—so I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if this was intentional. But it doesn’t end there.

I’ve noticed that Toby Fox has a tendency to tease certain things about his games through merch. And wouldn’t you know it—he has in fact, a particular item on fangamer of a “dark heart.” One which description describes the Angel’s Prophecy. Hm...

But let’s back on track onto my second observation, shall we?

Point #2: The Physical Resemblance to Gaster

Now, there seems to be some interesting foreshadowing related to inverted colors in Deltarune. Before Ralsei takes his hat off, he appears black. But once he takes his hat off, voila, his colors are inverted, and he is revealed to actually be a white goat highly resembling Asriel.

In addition, the entire Dark World is literally just. An inverted version of a normal world.

The Dark World could have hypothetically been the created world/experiment that Gaster had fallen into in the first place. After all, his experiment had to do with “darkness”, and “negative” photons--AKA the Dark Fountains, and the negatively/inverted landscapes of the Dark World.

And how does Rouxls Kaard appear inverted anyways? Well, he looks like THIS.

He even has the strange dangling lip thing—which another character said to directly resemble Gaster, Seam, has as well:

In addition, if you look at Rouxls’ text-box profile very closely, his eye colors are actually mismatched which is a rather interesting detail!

Point # 3: His Accent is Extremely put on.

I think anybody that has read any sort of Shakespearean/Old English writing, can instantly realize that Rouxls is as bad as imitating an Old English accent as a high-schooler reading Hamlet for the first time. Rouxls absolutely butchers it. He practically adds eth, and est at the end of any word he chooses, and calls the job done. What is even more interesting though, is when he gets nervous or panicked, he drops the act all together and talks normally.

Point #4: He is Pretending to be Dumb; His Puzzles are Actually Impressive!

I found it intriguing how there are countless puzzle traps in all the forest areas and in the Card Castle prison that were actually very well done. You have to flip the spades, diamonds, hearts, etc to unlock doors, and open secret chests. They require a decent amount of thinking skills, and are actually competent. But who made them?? Oddly enough if you observe one of them in the forest areas, it appears that Rouxls Kaard vandalized one of the puzzles to make it harder for the player to beat it—which further implies that he actually indeed made those puzzles himself. This shows that Rouxls is much more competent than only being able to make a single box shove puzzle that is comically easy. Where else do we see a place full of plenty of rather well made puzzles + traps seen? All throughout the Core in Undertale—a place which Gaster himself created!

Point #5: Rouxls IS Aware the World is a Game--AKA DON’T FORGET TO READ NPC DIALOGUE FOLKS!

I think it is well aware by now that Rouxls likely wants us as the players to underestimate him--and deem him a fool so we wouldn’t bat an eye at what he’s actually up to. But the most biggest give away to this is something that I have surprisingly seen no one mention at all. And oh boy, it is the most damning evidence that Rouxls is no idiot to be trifled with.

To the left of Seam’s shop, there can be found a little group of former puzzle-makers that used to live at Card Castle, until they were fired and replaced with Rouxls Kaard. They are now all out of a job, and are just barely scraping by since the Spade King didn’t give them any severance pay. However, Rouxls Kaard offered them a way to get money--by selling the tutorials he made.

These tutorials go over TP, stats, information about Susie, Ralsei,  and Kris. Rouxls Kaard has never once met any of the players yet--and he knows everything about them. He knows about stats. He knows the world is a game.

HOW??

In addition, when you talk to Rouxls in his shop, he calls you three the Heroes of Legend. He is well aware of the Angel’s Prophecy. He knows.

Whenever any character in the world of Undertale & Deltarune knows that the world is a game, it is an instant red-flag. It goes to show that they know much more than they let on. Flowey and Sans are big examples of this in Undertale. Pure hearted, dorky idiots that we trust earlier in the game--but wind up seeing the real side of them later on.

...So why should we treat Rouxls any differently?

Point #6: The “Control Crown”

Something that I immediately thought was kind of weird, was the fact that Rouxls Kaard was able to control the K. Round with a “Control Crown” device. If he is so stupid, how was he able to create a full on mechanical device that can brainwash a life-form into being violent/cause it to triple in size?! That is genius material right there!

But things start to take on a much darker side when you begin to look at the subtext of this realization, which I will get to in a moment...

First of all, Seam claimed these exact words.

The remaining king was the Spade King-- as the King of Hearts, Diamonds, and Clubs are seen to be locked up in the Dungeon. Therefore, the Spade King put the Knight, and his strange son into power. IF it were the Spade King in power, the dialogue box WOULD have said “himself”. Therefore, the Knight, and his strange son were put in place to control the kingdom. And who are they?

Gaster/Rouxls Kaard, and Lancer.

Evidence to back this up:

Lancer calls Rouxls his “Lesser Dad”. And Rouxls calls Lancer, his Strange little darling/son.

The Spade King is not in charge. During his boss-fight, he states that he obeys the word of the Knight.

If you observe more of Lancer’s dialogue in the scene right before the gang enters Card Castle, he states that his dad, (Spade King), recently forced his troops to listen to Lancer instead. Therefore, Lancer is by all respects actually second in command to the Knight.

One of Rouxls main interests is...Lawmaking. Even though he is just supposedly an innocent Duke of Puzzles.

Another one of Rouxls main interests is...Cages, and long strolls in the dungeon... 

There are innocent puzzle-makers locked up in the Prison who are terrified--they were arrested for the simple act of making a puzzle without a license. HM, I wonder who could have possibly locked them up? *Wink wink nudge nudge*

And what ties this all together, is perhaps the most obscure, tiniest detail that no one would have likely observed on a first play-through. If you go to the first floor of Card Castle and click the description tablet next to the elevator to the Prison, it claims that the Prison used to just be a Basement Which Just Happened to Have a Lot of Cages. This is backed up by the caged animals in the basement, who say that they miss the “good old days” when they used to be the only ones there in cages, and not a bunch of people behind bars.

In summary, Rouxls is locking up a bunch of innocent people, and playing nice to our faces. He IS the knight. And he is not to be underestimated.

Point #7: Rouxls’ Plan is Already Set in Place

The part where this theory gets a little dark, ties back to my mentioning of the control crown earlier.

If you observe the throne room, it looks like it was recently torn apart in a sort of...conflict.

Why was the Spade King the only king left un-caged to begin with? Why wasn’t he locked up too?

Well...Rouxls Kaard needed someone to put him in charge. But not only that—he needed a scapegoat. Someone to blame. Someone to be “The Bad Guy” for the Heroes to fight.

The Spade King...is actually innocent. He is obeying the Knight, because he is being controlled by a Control Crown. The throne room is in ruins because the Spade King likely fought against this at first, but Rouxls won and successfully put the Spade King under his command. I thought it was strange how the King was so...violent. So irredeemably evil, and even murderous toward his own son Lancer. Yes, it could be argued that this is indeed his true personality, that he is a complete, abusive jerk. But, the whole ending battle of Deltarune chapter 1 feels so...set up in a way? It feels so starkly good vs evil, black and white. Almost like a play.

And oh boy. I think I was onto something.

If you pay close attention to the fight with the Spade King, there is a brief moment at the beginning where he is completely shrouded in shadow. Except. For. His. Crown. It glows stark white in comparison to himself. Like a Chekov’s Gun if you will.

And even more interesting, in the supposed good/pacifist ending, the Spade King is locked up in Prison, the other three kings are still locked up in cages, everyone else is freed, and Rouxls and Lancer now have full control of the kingdom...

Guys. We just played right into Gaster’s hands.

Point #8: Seam Knows that Rouxls is the Knight...

The final observation that genuinely makes me convinced in this theory, is a small detail I noticed at the end of the Pacifist run of Deltarune. Once you have beaten the game, and all of the prisoners are freed, everyone comes to celebrate at Card Castle for your victory. Everyone, except for Seam. That is because Seam knows what the “Strange Knight” did to Jevil. He knows who the Strange Knight is. And he knows what the Knight’s true intentions are.

Point #9: Extra Tidbits I noticed:

When compared to the other denizens of card castle, Rouxls seems out of place. He is the one vaguely humanoid character among a bunch of card and chess themed Darkners. 

His puzzle is... too easy.

Rouxls is oddly excited about overthrowing the king/taking his place. 

Rouxls is well versed in calligraphy of all things. (Relation to fonts + letters.)

Rouxls “sparkles” have an odd resemblance to the shining save states...?

He makes pop culture references, such as ones seen here and here. Could just be random throwaway jokes, but often times more “aware” characters such as Sans and Papyrus are keen on breaking the fourth wall at times/making references to relate with the audience.

His hair looks strangely out of place. Especially the hairline which is really receded to an unnatural degree on the left side. It’s a wig guys...

He gets a suspiciously new position for no reason at all. In any normal situation, he would be extremely unqualified for it if he were as stupid as he makes himself out to be.

Rouxls is literally wearing armor, akin to a medieval knights.

If you pay close attention, Rouxls has a few very subtle similar speech patterns to Gaster. They both occasionally repeat words twice. They both use the words wonderful and truly a lot, etc.

When Kris and the gang beat the K. Round, Rouxls said it was just to test their abilities.

Rouxls theme has leitmotifs from Gaster’s theme.

End of discussion. Deltarune’s finale is legit going to be Gaster getting his wig snatched.

[clorofolle]

Miscellaneous Deltarune ch. 2 thoughts under the cut because I LOVE reading these from other people

It slaps. So hard

I personally thought chapter 1 was a bit weak overall – still had loads of fun playing it, and replayed it a bunch, but it left me hoping Toby and his team would do something a little different in the next chapters. And OH BOY did they deliver with this one!!

The music!!! Is so!!! Good!!!

The characters! The dialogue! Chapter 1 got so many chuckles from me but I still feel Chapter 2 managed to be even better on this front.

The weird/snowgrave route is as disturbing as it is exciting, especially since we know there's only gonna be one ending.

The Player's relationshop with Kris is... interesting? I can't parse it. It doesn't feel in line with Toby Fox to make a game where the only moral thing to do for the in-game people is not to play it at all, like we can only do bad by possessing a kid who would be better off without us...? But also, Kris is so much their own person, I feel like I am intruding, or making them do things they wouldn't usually – even in Pacifist. Like – I wish them and Ralsei to be friends, so I make Kris hug Ralsei. But is Kris okay with that? What would have they done?

Especially since it seems like Kris doesn't like Ralsei all that much...? Kris drinking Ralsei tea is the only combination where one of the trio drinking the tea of another one restores 60hp and not 120. What's up Kris? What does he tell you while I'm not looking? You ok? You know you can talk to me, right? And that you can just. Ditch the soul for a bit if you wanna play the piano and go out with friends. Yo it's chill man

We all already knew Toby was inspired by OFF for a lot of stuff, but imho this is the first time it really shows!! Maybe because some stuff had been there even before Undertale. Queen being simply Queen, the Swatchlings have big OFF vibes... but especially the Acid Tunnel of Love! I think one of the imagery OFF fans are most familiar with is the Batter traversing these rivers of meat on a creepy duck/swan-like Pedalo. I've read some theories about how we're actually playing the Bad Guy, since we & Kris are the Knight, and will end up having to fight everyone else. While I don't think that's the case at all... I can't help but feel it would be *cool* to have a sort of Batter situation with Kris, hehe.

I think since Toby knows that by now, pretty much the whole fanbase is looking out for signs of Gaster, they might be,,, tricking us a little? I definitely thought that the man who “spoke so eloquently” and gave “blueprints” to Sweet Cap'n Cakes might've been him! Turns out it was just Roulx Kaard, who might look a bit the part but is definitely not Gaster, haha.

On the same vein... I think general fandom consensus is that Gaster is the Knight, no? The games sort of keep pointing at it. My guess is, it's gonna be more complicated. He's leading us on.

PAPYRUS. papyrus Papyrus PAPYRUS

I am so worried for that little skeleton and yet!!! so excited!!!

The fact that we couldn't see him yet gives me high hopes Toby has big plans for this Best Boy. After all he was by far the weirdest (lore-wise) character in UT, the one with the most dialogue after the Narrator, inexplicably loved by all and any fourth wall breaking anomalies (Flowey, Toby, and me <3)

Also his design was based on Dedan from OFF! What a funny piece of information. How fun that he was based off a villain. Nothing could go wrong!!!

My belief is that he's gonna be an interesting character, and we're gonna meet him in the Dark World. Fight him probably!!! But we're gonna be his friends at the end.

And last thing... Sans has not once mentioned the name Papyrus. Papyrus just. Isn't in the game so far

Which is the most troublesome thing so far,,,

Especially since. I feel there might be a thing with siblings or similar people with similar names and us players being confused about it...? Catty UT is here, but our peer and likely to be in adventures is Catti. Noelle has/had a sister we yet know nothing about, except her full name might be December. We were promised we would soon meet Suzy, yet only met Susie so far. We haven't seen Asriel in the game, but Ralsei sure looks how we imagine Asriel to, huh?

Can't wait for Toby to troll us. Sans is gonna open the door to his house like hey meet my brother. He's a little shy because he only speaks in sign language. His name is Gaster. Oh? Wasn't he who you were expecting?

and then Papyrus shows up and kicks our asses and in this other timeline he's the final boss or something and we could've never seen it coming

[gayseyjones]

UM. I'm not that familiar with your interests other than deltarune so for the ask game I'll say Susie!

My overall opinion on the character: SUSIE. MY GIRL. THE MOST IMPORTANT CHARACTER IN YHE WHOLE ENTIRE WORLD. she is so full of love and issues and joy and AAAAAGSHSGHSGSHS [biting sticks]

One virtue they have: she loves her friends. so much. She just has so much love in her heart all the time it makes me want to sob. she cares about her friends so so much the way she carries lancer when he isn't well and cheers kris up so easily after spamton neo and awkwardly shuffles her way through talking with noelle like oh my god. she's so happy she has friends. AGH

One flaw they have: on the flip side of that she DOES struggle with getting her emotions across, she doesn't like being particularly vulnerable, she has all this love in her heart but she can't just SAY that so she shows it in her own ways and then she unabashedly does it with her whole entire chest I love her. I'd pay for her therapy

Favorite moment from their arc: Oh man where to begin. the lancer fight of course is just sooooooo. "I don't wanna kill you man" WHAT IF I KILLED US ALLLLL and the ferris wheel scene with noelle was so sweet and silly and cute and gentle I aagahsgshsvjsdksjd starts snapping things in half.

Least favorite moment from their arc: I... do not have one. her arc has been pretty well written and coherent so far thank you toby fox

One relationship they have with another character: KRIS. RKIS. KRIS. HELLO ITS ME KRISUSIE FAN NUMBER 1 OHHHHH MY GOD THEY FUCKING GET EACHOTHER THEYRE BOTH THE OUTCASTS THEY BOTH ACT OUT FOR ATTENTION THEY BOTH HAVE THE SAME MORBID TEEN HUMOR SUSIE IS EVERYTHING KRIS WANTS TO BE AND KRIS IS EVERYTHING SUSIE WANTS TO BE. THEY FIT TOGETHER LIKE TWO PIECES OF A PUZZLE THEY'RE INSEPERABLE

One relationship I'd like to see explored from this character: loooots of people have said it before but more susie & toriel AND also susie & undyne. troubled youth and kind/batshit insane mentor figure... esp bc undyne is so close to susie, in terms of aggressively loving their friends

What I would have liked to see happen with them in the media: well we only have 2 chapters out obviously so I'm just gonna turn this into the theory section. I REALLY deeply truly believe in the "susie is the true protagonist and kris only seems like it/is forced to be it because of our involvement" theory. like. the way both of the darkworlds so far have deeply related to susie AND her love interest, only the secret bosses have related to kris, the way susies slowly learning and developing magic and all kinds of other things in the darkworlds, how she feels like the heart of the party, even just shots where she's at the center of it all and not kris. There's so much more oh my god but I haven't thought about deltarune like this in months so. Wah

[endmii87]

Some info on the blue Addison and that mini Au.

Aight, like I said yesterday, I was gonna go into this Au that I imagined for myself.

So in that Au (I don’t have a name since I don’t see why), Banton didn’t accept that his brother is dead and thinks that he’s still out there. Although, he’s discouraged in trying to find him and slowly looses hope. Cue to Kris appearing which (knowing they’re a lightner) gives him an opportunity, so he joins your team. There would be some dialogue between him an Noelle, hearing about someone missing their sibling can quite hit home. He doesn’t like fighting and is an absolute coward (giving the option to Flee). However, he will later say that he feels like he’s slowing them down, so he’ll leave and ask that they could tell him if they found some leads on Spamton.

The run goes normally until you get the disk from Spamton. At that, you’ll be able to tell Banton and he will rejoin your team. If you try to tell him before the disk, you won’t be able to find him and if you ask the Addisons, they’ll tell you that “he’s on a break” or “off doing something” (if you tell them about Spamton, they’ll ask you to stop being a sadist and leave their brother alone). Banton will start feeling unnerved the more you lead him to the basement.

For the Neo fight, the dialogue is pretty personal between those characters, at the same time, it would sound incoherent to Banton (but Kris can understand). Ralsei and Susie aren’t there, but they appear after the fight saying “they heard noises, so they came quickly”, proceeding with the usual options if you’re ok like the normal run. Banton definitely leaves your team to go back and have a long talk with his brothers. The trash zone dialogue doesn’t change.

So yeah, this is just a small Au that I thought while drawing some fanart. I could have explained better but I’m ass when it comes to those things. On a side note, I hope that the secret bosses could reunite and reconcile with their friends (Jevil and Seam, you get the idea) possibly at the end of the game, it just feels like something that Toby Fox wouldn’t let that unresolved yn?

[madamecricket]

Fourth (and Final) Impressions of Deltarune Chapter 2

Edit: forgot to put a readmore. Forgive me! Spoilers under the cut!

- So I wasn’t even in the palace very long before we got to a series of puzzles that Berdly couldn’t solve, much to his frustration. I figured Berdly was building up to something, either a boss fight or a growth moment, and it was the second one. Turns out when you thrive off of praise, you develop a bit of a dependency... good on him to be self-aware.

- In the flashback sequence with the spelling bee, I noticed the word Noelle got nervous and stuck on - “December”. See, I remember another sequence in the city where we had a character moment with Noelle while pressing a series of switches that spelled out “December.” Clearly the word is significant to her in some way, and probably a negative way considering how it made her freeze up. Either something big happened in December, or something big happened involving a person close to her named December, since I remember her mentioning a “Dess”. I’m looking forward to where this goes.

- The theme in the Queen’s palace slaps, just gotta say that before we go further.

- So backtracking a bit, Lancer has been stone-ified, and Ralsei knows exactly what’s up: the dark fountains create worlds, the dark fountains that was sustaining Lancer’s world is gone, and that’s why Lancer is stone now. He’ll be fine, though, if we can get him back to Ralsei’s castle town and the fountain there. Good of him to offer a solution, except...

- ... hold the fuck up, Ralsei. So you’re telling me that this happened to Lancer because of the loss of his dark fountain - which Ralsei encouraged us to go through - and because of that, the Dark World that Lancer comes from is no more? And what’s more, Lancer now depends on the Castle Town fountain - that is, Ralsei’s fountain - to live. He is now life-bound to your town, Ralsei. He literally cannot leave you and still live, and even if he could, the world he knew is gone. Oh, but it’s ok, because you conveniently have a place for him to live under your roof now. 

- And, hold on, who was it who told us we had to go through the Dark Fountain to get home?? I played through the first chapter just recently, that was you, Ralsei. I definitely remember Ralsei saying we had to do that, he gave us that quest in the first place, and I definitely do not remember him mentioning at any point that this would end with Lancer’s world being destroyed. This is absolutely not fine, Ralsei. Oh, and considering how conveniently us getting isekai’d in the library lines up with Ralsei suddenly insisting we had to go and do homework... Ralsei, are you the one isekai-ing us???

- *deep breath* Okay. I’m calling it now. There’s something Ralsei isn’t telling us. I joked earlier about how he wants to bake us into cakes and eat us, but to be clear, I think whatever’s going on here is more complicated than “Ralsei was the bad guy all along”. I get the feeling that Ralsei’s desire for friendship, especially towards Kris, is very genuine. It’s just... this whole situation is reminding me of Asriel’s deal in Undertale. Fitting considering the whole anagram situation... I wonder how Deltarune!Asriel is going to play into this.

- Okay, back to more current stuff in the game. I met up with Roulsx Kaard (idc how to spell it) again and he’s facing me in... the thrashing machine I made in the first chapter. I’m serious. Same color and everything, holy shit.

- behold the majesty

- COMETH FORTH, MY SQUEAKY DUCKY!!!

- ...whut?

- this is excellent. I’m going to die of excellent.

- ohh, now he’s gonna transform... aaaaand...

- oh. ... you know, I wondered when it was gonna catch up to him?

- ice cold, Ralsei. Ice cold.

- “Why don’t we close our eyes and imagine how she’s doing now” Just like last game... is Ralsei actually activating some kind of power when this happens?

- “I wish Dess could see this”? I knew it! I’m on to something!

- taking a moment to acknowledge the shipping energy in the air

- Noelle (paraphrased): “Where are we, anyway?” Me: say “Dark World” Susie: “You’re just having a dream” Again with Susie thwarting player intentions...

- .. a heart-covered Ferris Wheel. Okay, Toby Fox, we’re doing this now!

- Susie has a tail???

- BERDLY WHAT

- And again, we return from a Susie Sequence to Ralsei apparently explaining something to Kris and finishing with a variation of “so that’s why-” before getting cut off by Susie. What are you explaining, Ralsei.

- Checked a calendar in Noelle’s palace room. “Every page is the last month, every day is the 25th”... what??

- another banger of a final battle!! let’s do this!!!

- See, I had a feeling that the Queen didn’t actually want to hurt anybody, but she has a... funny... idea of what constitutes helping. It clicks with her being basically a personified search engine - she literally wants nothing more than to give people what they want and make them happy, but she’s not always great at figuring that out based on what they search. She mentions Noelle’s “sad and lonely searches”... Noelle, honey, are you ok?

- Excuse me, Queen, this Dark World was created *today*? ... And it was created by the Knight... and I already suspect that Ralsei is “isekai-ing” us... Ralsei, are you the knight?

- New important info: “Lightners” are apparently necessary to create Dark Fountains due to their determination, and unlike Undertale, determination isn’t exclusive to humans

- BERDLY!!! BERDLY IS PUTTING THAT REDEMPTION ARC TO GOOD USE!!!

- ...

... this game just became perfect

- Oh hey, White Diamond, what’s up?

- “Oh Damn I Did Not Know That” WELL NOW YOU TELL US, RALSEI!

- Susie doesn’t have a tail? Make up your mind, game!!!

- Phew. Okay. Okay. The actual game part is over. Time to process some thoughts...

- So we’ve seen two Dark Worlds so far, Lancer’s world based on games (cards, checkers, etc) and the Queen’s world based on computers and the internet. The running theme I notice so far is escapism. During her fight, the Queen monologued about a desire to fulfill the desires of people who turn to the internet to dull their pain or look for new distractions. And as for Lancer’s world... well, it’s implied to literally be made of abandoned toys. Both of them things people turn to when they need a little entertainment or escapism to avoid their real-life problems for a bit. And I think it’s been mentioned that Darkners are essentially made to serve Lightners; perhaps helping them cope with the difficulties of life? 

Even putting aside the symbolism here, Susie and Kris literally escaped to this world to blow off their classwork, and Susie in particular seems to think the Dark World is better than anything in the Light World. In the final battle, Susie, Noelle, AND Berdly were all just about to open up a Dark Fountain themselves and make themselves better lives in the Dark World and only stopped when Ralsei very firmly informed them about the Roaring. Is this going to come up again? Are these kids going to struggle with the temptation to abandon their real lives to go play eternally in the Dark World?

And isn’t that just a perfect microcosm of the relationship that people have with video games in general - including this one? The perfect opportunity to just forget about your own life for a bit and temporarily live in a different world altogether, one with battles and magic and adventure?

Just what the fuck is going on here, Ralsei? Was I too quick to accuse him of being a secret villain earlier? Is Ralsei just trying to get us to process our shit in the Dark World, and then destroy it so we move on to the Light World with renewed hope in life? .. or is he just trying to make himself the center of our fantasies?

- HOLY SHIT THE QUEEN IS HERE! THE QUEEN IS HERE AND SHE’S GONNA BE A MOM FOR LANCER!!! (or “girldad” as Lancer puts it)

- ...have the Queen and King met? I mean, it would make sense, but they haven’t been mentioned as having a relationship of any kind or even knowing each other. Is this another Toriel/Asgore kind of situation?

- HOLY SHIT I KNEW IT SHE IS HIS MOM

- So I’m just talking to NPCs around Castle Town, right, and I meet up with Seam again. He just told me to be careful not to stay in there too late and that I don’t want to get caught when the sun goes down... DAFUQ YOU MEAN, WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE SUN GOES DOWN???

- This is wonderful, I’m now witnessing Toriel and Sans having a joke-off in person.

- (Sees Kris going in to wash their hands) (Hears Toriel say “they do that sometimes”) ...so Kris has like... a condition? The heart-ripping thing has happened before?

- (Sees last thing before credits) ...okay then!!! I think that’s all the things I can get into one post, haha! Forgot to mention some things, but I can only type so much!!! Can’t wait to talk about this later, haha!!! (holy shit)

[youllallriseintheink]

Prison Cell, chapter 1

Well, this one took on a life of its own. I intended to write a simple one-off taking place in an AU where the studio became the sketch dimension before most of the sacrifices were made. Turns out that this is going to take longer than that. While this AU will have an emphasis on horror, especially in the later chapters, I also want to show the resilience of some of these characters.

---

Joey Drew Studios was once an animation studio. Functionally, it still was. But before everyone’s eyes, it had become Hell.

The machine had been hard to ignore, but easy not to look into. No one seemed to know what it did save for a few, but no one was about to quit over it during the Great Depression.

The cult behaviour, in retrospect, had been the first sign. It isn’t everywhere that your boss demands an item from your workplace as a sacrifice to the Gods. But back then, it had seemed nothing more than a minor inconvenience. Pedestals had been set up in the break rooms. Sometimes your coworkers would go there to pray. It was strange. But again, not worth looking into, and not worth quitting over.

Joey had always been eccentric. Joey had always been unreasonable. Joey had always had an angry streak. If any of that was getting worse, it was getting worse at a fairly slow rate.

All of it happened so slowly. Until it happened all at once. The machine malfunctioned. It went into overdrive. Gent workers had rushed to quiet it. They turned off its power supply, and nothing happened. In desperation, they broke the pipes that had once fed it ink, and nothing happened. Finally, they frantically tried to dismantle it as it spewed ink, and... nothing happened. Even the strongest of men could not so much as loosen a bolt from the machine.

Then, something happened. An rapidly-growing area surrounding the machine lost its colour and detail- reduced to lines on a page.

In a last-ditch attempt to fix the machine, Joey and the closest members of his inner circle entered the ink machine room. No one knew what had happened. To outsiders, it had sounded like the ink machine had exploded. No one who had been in the room at the time emerged except for Sammy Lawrence, who came out limping and covered head-to-toe in ink.

From that point on, no one could leave. Doors to the outside were locked, and windows showed only black void. Sammy talked to many people in private in the coming days, and firm lines were drawn between those who were loyal to the cult, and those who weren’t- those who were donning masks and uniform. Those who were loyal left the studio occasionally- for meetings or to pick up supplies. Those who were not loyal had no way of knowing how they did.

Joey Drew still existed. Early on, there were rumours that he was dead and that his loyalists were merely following him in spirit, but before long, most people knew someone who had seen his new form.

Work remained much the same, albeit with a few fewer people, who had either not been in the studio that day, or whose primary duty was now distribution and getting supplies because they were some of the only people allowed outside. Everyone fulfilled their role. Gent workers maintained the machine. The others made cartoons, which, apparently, were still making it out to the outside world somehow. They ate. They slept. They mourned their losses. They formed small groups and tried to keep hope. A few small insurrections began, but but quickly ended in violence and were abandoned. With no access to medical professionals, no one wanted violence.

While no one in the studio had it easy, Susie Campbell held an additional secret. Every few days in the dead of night, a creature would come to her- a creature with a mask and curling, demonic horns made of ink. She’d wake up to the horrible creature sitting on her chest so she couldn’t move, and it would put a syringe in her neck and draw blood. This went on for weeks. Locking the door didn’t stop it. Eventually, it made her want to sleep as little as possible, and she began to wander the halls at night, oftentimes falling asleep in random places.

One night, after falling asleep in a hallway in the music department, she was roused by Norman Polk.

“Hey. Come with me tonight,” he whispered, helping her up. “That thing’s been stealing your blood, hasn’t it?”

“Yes,” Susie whispered back.

“I know someone else in that situation. But don’t worry- it doesn’t bother him anymore, either.”

Norman led Susie into one of the offices. Two cots had been set up, and one already had a person sleeping in it. “You settle in. I’ll go and look for another cot to bring in here. If the demon wants your blood, it’ll have to go through me.”

“Thank you,” Susie said. She wanted to say more, but didn’t know what to say. She was fast asleep before Norman returned.

Before the transformation of the studio, it would have been strange to see the two of them together, but times had changed. The big, strange, sneaky cryptid had gone from someone you avoided to someone you wanted on your side. And yet, on a social level Norman still mostly left the music room to themselves most days- he preferred to eavesdrop or hang out with the people who’d accepted him before all of this.

That changed after he started sharing a room with Susie, though. She started inviting him to talk with her and Wally, or any of her other friends in the music room, and he’d agree to it, mostly because he wanted to spend time with her. Eventually it became well-known what he was doing for his ‘guests.’

It continued like that for a few weeks. The creature found other victims before it found her. Then, one night, it slipped into the room, and it did not like what it saw. Two of its previous victims, including Susie Campbell. Susie was tucked into Norman’s arms. She opened her eyes for a moment, saw him, and went back to sleep. She felt safe and protected, and it made the demon’s blood boil. Blood wasn’t worth being clobbered for- not while he could get it elsewhere. But something had to be done.

The night after, Thomas Connor and two men nearly as strong as he was, each wearing loyalist uniforms and masks, entered the room. They pulled Norman out of bed, handcuffed and gagged him, and began to lead him away. Susie woke up to the feeling of him being pulled off of her.

For a moment, she was stunned. The next, she was yelling for help. The man in the other bed woke up as well. Susie had never gotten to know her “roommate,” but that didn’t matter now. “Come with me,” she said. “We need to wake people up!”

“What? Why?”

“You’ll see. Just trust me!” Susie had thought this day might come for quite some time, and she’d planned for it.

And so, the two followed the loyalists down the hall, banging on the doors and yelling to try and wake people up. Susie cursed herself for not finding out where people had been holing up. Her partner eventually found Emma Lamonte. Finally, one of the doors opened- it was Henry Stein- another person who could fight decently enough. “Henry, you’ve got to help. They’re taking Norman away. Hurry!”

Henry looked over to see it happening, and hesitated.

“Henry, if they get him on that elevator, we’ll never see him again!” Henry jolted into action, and soon he and Emma were in close range of the three loyalists.

It ended about as quickly. Emma managed to mule-kick one of the men in the stomach and knock the wind out of him before another one of the men snuck up behind her and began to choke her. Thomas was still holding Norman Polk as he squirmed in attempt to escape. Henry attempted to punch out the man strangling Emma, and he managed a few blows, but the man she’d kicked recovered and restrained Henry until Emma was unconscious. Once she was unconscious, her attacker rejoined Thomas, and they dragged Norman to the elevator. Before morning, Emma had been taken, too. Henry had run.

---

“I should have gotten in there,” Susie’s roommate said, breaking a long, tearful silence between them.

“You couldn’t have done anything. Those men were twice your size.” It hadn’t been as though they hadn’t spent the duration of the fight banging on doors in hopes of finding allies.

“I know.”

“What’s your name? I haven’t seen you around the music department.”

“Grant Cohen. Finances.”

“Oh. Norman’s talked about you. Well, I’m glad you’re from another department. Tomorrow, I’m going to try and get as many people together as possible- a rescue party, I guess. You could help. Tell everyone in your department to meet in the recording theatre after hours.”

Grant laughed bitterly. “Sure. I’ll gather all the bravest souls in accounting and finance.” There was a pause. “Don’t you get it? We’re helpless. People haven’t been forming big groups because when they do, things like this happen. And anyhow, I’d bet anything that Norman is dead already.”

A part of Susie agreed. But that wasn’t the useful part of her right now. “Look, I’m not going to try and convince you. But personally, I don’t like feeling helpless just because I can’t knock out Thomas Connor.”

---

The following evening, Susie had gathered quite a number of people. Henry’s friends had come, terrified that he was essentially a wanted man and that he had to be hidden from loyalists. Grant had showed up with a few others from accounting that had agreed to come along. And of course, the music department had all noticed Norman’s absence.

Susie began the meeting by telling the story of what had happened to Norman. Surprisingly, what followed was a number of other people coming out about various grievances. A few others had had the same experience as Susie, of having their blood harvested. There were also a few from other departments who had refused to work and had been punished by having one of their bones broken in the night. Wally complained about having to mop up blood.

“We need to handle all of that, too. But first can we talk about Norman?” Susie said, trying to regain control of the meeting.

“If he got onto the elevator, he’s probably dead,” Abby said, as gently as she could. “Or at least, he’s on one of their levels. There’s no way we can go down there and rescue him. But, since you’ve brought us all together, we might as well get organized. Maybe there’s a way for us to defend each other. And figure out who will be running the projector from now on.”

A knock at the door sounded, and everyone in the room went perfectly still.

“Do we open it?” Susie asked.

It seemed entirely ridiculous that the loyalists would try to get in by politely knocking.

“If they’re right outside this door, this meeting is over anyhow, and we can’t stay in here forever,” Abby reasoned.

On the other side of the door was Sammy Lawrence, holding a cardboard box. He was wearing the uniform of the loyalists, but thankfully he was alone. “I am not your enemy. I come bearing gifts,” he said.

Abby carefully opened the box, as though she were disarming a bomb. Inside were a few loyalist uniforms and masks of different sizes. She inspected them carefully and found nothing suspicious about them.

“Why?” Abby asked.

“Joey is working on a way out for all of us. None of us are getting out without his help. That is why I’m a loyalist. But, evermore since the machine cursed us, he’s been… worsening. I still have hope that he will get us out of here, but until then, you need to stand up for yourselves. Consider these a tool- they could let you visit the lower levels. But I beg of you- don’t interfere with loyalist work. Loyalist work is what allows some of us to visit the outside, and us going to the outside is what keeps you fed. Remember that.”

Abby nodded. “Thank you. This is very… courageous of you, Mr. Lawrence. But we’re still going to escort you to the elevator now. We can’t risk that this is just you trying to spy on us.”

Sammy did not resist as Henry and Jack escorted him to the elevator, and he left for the lower floors without issue.

“Well," Abby said, “I guess we have a way of finding out what happened to him after all.”

[firaknight]

Follow up of Adeleines opinions on the helpers :) (stuff in parenthesis is the ability they have)

Blade Knight (Sword): 7/10 Mysterious little dude:

He’s cool! He’s kinda hard to understand at times (he’s got a thick accent, idk what kind), but he’s very nice! He’s got a lot of standards when it comes to swordsmanship and is very strong! He’s working on showing Adeleine the proper stances for sword fighting (it’s possible for her to emulate that style with her paintbrush, minus the cutting ability of a real sword).

Chilly (Ice): 9/10 Snowed Man!!

Snowed man friend!!!! He’s very serious about things but he’s a good friend! Only problem is he has to stick around Adeleines Ice Dragon drawing to prevent the poor guy from melting (they’re working on finding an eternal ice that won’t melt so he can stay cold!). He likes to make snow cones!!! (Which are hella good btw)

Bio spark (Ninja): 8/10 Speedy!!!

One of the fastest helpers around! They’re speedy, sneaky, and all around a mysterious little dude! They have a habit of showing up so quietly that nobody notices for a good couple minutes before they’re just like “I wasn’t even hiding I’ve been standing here this whole time.” Overall, odd but kind little friend!

Birdon (Wing): 7/10 Soft birdie!!!

They’re just a little birdie!!! Birdons probably the most carefree helper out of the bunch, and they like relaxing really high up (much to Adeleines dismay). They tend to make stuff out of the feathers they shed (and they shed very often), so they’re always giving friends bracelets, headgear, jewelry, and such made out of their feathers. Adeleine actually has a coat lined with their feathers and it’s SUPER warm! They’re a little strange (and Kawasaki keeps trying to cook them [see: Star Allies title screen skits]) but they’re a wonderful buddy!

Wester (Whip): 9/10 Yeehaw man!!!!

Dude is legit just a very small cowboy. He cannot help his smallness... He’s agile and absolutely has an accent when he talks. He’s a little chaotic, but has a good heart. Probably taught Adeleine how to mount and ride a grizzo just for fun. She’s got a cowboy hat he made for her!

Plugg (Plasma): 10/10 Old friend!

She’s known Plugg since Crystal Shards! The two are good friends and Plugg likes to paint with her! He’s got some... interesting ways of painting (sticking his entire face into paint and then running facedown on the canvas), but he’s a lovely friend! He likes to run around a lot tho, probably because he’s constantly generating electricity and needs to burn it off so it doesn’t overload him. Will absolutely charge electrical devices without a second thought.

Como (Spider): 6/10 Spider...

While they’re similar to Taranza, they have a lot more spider tendencies, and therefore kinda scared Adeleine. She’s tolerable of them (more so than Susie), but tries to keep her distance. They’re helpful and are very very very sweet!!! They just tend to do creepy spider things and it freaks her out...

Bugzzy (Suplex): 7/10 Massive bug dude

He’s like... huge. Closer to, if not taller, than Adeleines height. He has very sharp pincers on the front of his face, and they can be painful when used, so he either wraps them in bandaging or puts rubber caps over them! That way he can grab and hold friends without harm! He’s oddly cuddly and likes to carry people around (not neccisarily throwing them) in his pincers. Overall, big doofus bug who has lots of love.

Broom Hatter (Clean): 8/10 Clean freak

Literally cannot handle dirty shit. At all. Has the urge to clean everything. Perks are that they keep the base everyone hangs out in super duper clean! Adeleines taught them to draw and it helps them not want to compulsively clean everything. They make really pretty art!

Poppy Bros Jr. (Bomb): 9/10 Funky lad!

He’s got an older brother of the same name (Poppy Bros Sr.) and he’s a boss in training! One day he hopes to be just as good as his brother! Dude is ultra high energy (which is why he’s always hopping around) and tends to be a little obnoxious. They can’t entirely help it, they’re just energetic! They’ve taught Adeleine how to yeet explosives and she’s genuinely good at it!

Rocky (Stone): 7/10 He is literally just a rock

Sentient rock! He’s a little slow and can’t really talk, but he’s a buddy! He likes to just turn into his stone form and just sit like that. It’s comfy and feels like home to him. Will not hesitate to use himself as a step or a seat for someone if needed. He also gives everyone hes friends with a special rock! Adeleines has marbling to it and looks absolutely beautiful!

Waddle Doo (Beam): 8/10 Funky little man!

He’s got only one eye and therefore has poor eyesight. You’d think one eye would be better, but nope! He wears essentially one huge contact lens to help! They’re buddies with Parasol Dee and Bandee!!! Doo is on the calmer side of the group, and tends to not be so insanely high strung. He’s still a little anxious, but he’s better at covering it than the other. He hangs out with Wester sometimes (whip-like attack squad)

Chef Kawasaki (Cook): 2/10 Hes creepy and I don’t like him.

He has this weird... unsettling energy about him. He’s tried to cook both Coo and Birdon more than once and she genuinely doesn’t like being around him. He makes good food, which has stopped him from being a 0/10 in her book, but thats it. He’s only there because Kirby thought he’d be a nice addition and everyone knows that if Kawasaki crosses the line he will get booted on the spot. (Kirby has standards too!)

Gim (Yo-yo): 7/10 Hes just a robot huh.

He’s kinda strange, and doesn’t appear to have a lot of feeling, but Gims really nice! He likes to show people all the tricks he can do with his yo-yo (which is surprisingly a lot) and gives all his friends a yo-to so they can do the tricks along with him (Adeleines is teal with red and black stripes. It’s also got a couple paint splotches on it that we’re added on purpose).

Burning Leo (Fire): 8/10 Toasty heater child!

They’re small and warm!!! All the time!!! They like to be held and snuggle up to cold stuff because it’s the same feeling as snuggling up to warm stuff for humans. REEEEAAALLLYYY wants to hug Chilly but there is the very real possibility that Chilly will literally melt so he holds off from that. Adeleine tends to be cold and likes to hold Leo like a hot water bottle. He’s learned how to make his head fire harmless so people can hold him and not get burned!!

Driblee (Water): 9/10 Oh my god they’re adorable!

Sothisispartiallyjustmebecauseilovethewaterabilityimsorry They’re a little lizard mermaid! They adore swimming more than you’d think and hold pool parties!! They hang around Chilly because their water tends to be on the colder side and Chilly can use them to reform melted bits of Adeleine can’t get Ice Dragon to do it. They’re actually made entirely out of water! They can literally transform back into water by going into water. This also means that they can conform to spaces not meant for them like bottles and containers. They like to make drinks for people since the water they use for attacking is some of the cleanest water out there! (It also tastes super fucking good)

Bonkers (Hammer): 7/10 Kinda scary...

He’s big, taller than Adeleine (especially if he stands fully upright), and has an intimidating look, but he’s all bark and no bite! Dude is literally just a ball of sunshine! He likes to carry people around and will 100% shield someone from attacks (he’s sturdy!!!). He’s helping Adeleine with her strength because she’s fragile and a little scrawny and he’s all muscle (shes gotten a lot better!). Shes got her own lightweight hammer he lets her use so she can get a little stronger!

Sir Kibble (Cutter): 9/10 Smol knight!

He cannot help his size... but he’s tough! He also has no fucking braincells and does not think but he’s a good boy! He likes to headbutt people but his helmet poses a problem (it literally has a blade attached to it) so he puts a padded pool noodle over it to protect others (the padding is so the noodle doesn’t get chopped from the blade itself when force is applied). He’s just a little dude with no thoughts... head empy...

NESP (ESP): 4/10 They talk too much and know stuff about me that I never told them.

Strange and not very cool :( They have a tendency to read other people’s minds because they purposefully don’t tune their thoughts out and therefore know a lot of stuff they really shouldn’t. They also don’t know how to keep their mouth shut. Thankfully they’re just funky from psychic power and on a good day they’re kinda nice to be around!

Vividria (Artist): 10/10 THATS MY ADOPTED SISTER!!

They’re siblings. Drawcia adopted Adeleine as one of her own and that makes Vividria her sis! They paint together and Vividria kinda sticks up for Adeleine in more dicey fights because of Adeleines low HP. They’re the bestest of friends and are super cool with one another! She’s still growing and is one day gonna reach Drawcias size!! (If we put it into normal heights [Adeleine being 5’3” and Kirby being 1’8”] Drawcia is over double Kirby’s height. Probably closer to 3-4 feet)

Parasol Waddle Dee (Parasol): 9/10 Oh my god they’re just a smol friend...

Dee is literally almost as high strung and anxious as Bandee but they’re so sweet!! They like rain!! They also give parasols to all their friends! (Adeleines is teal with paint splotches!) They tend to nap a lot and will totally join cuddle piles. On hot days they’ll utilize the chumbrella as a big shade for everyone in the nap pile. Just a squishy little dee!!!!!

Knuckle Joe (Fighter): 10/10 Hes super supportive and nice!

He saw how fragile Adeleine was and said “aight so I may not be a master but I’m gonna teach this kid how to fight” and didn’t wait for any objections. Once a week he goes out into the forest with Adeleine and shows her how to fight like him! Physical combat is important!!! She can’t fire off energy blasts or deal lightning speed punches, but she’s getting there! He’s ultra supportive of everyone and loved to teach people stuff!!! He care about everyone!!!!

Beetley (Beetle): 8/10 Why is he so angy!!

Always grumpy. He says it’s because he keeps losing to Bugzzy but it’s just because he’s super small and gets picked up like a burger all the time (if you didn’t wanna be held like a burger don’t be burger shaped idiot). Isn’t aggressive but will headbutt people with the blunt end of his horn when he’s being extra grouchy. Adeleine likes picking him up because he gets all stiff like a ferret (when you pick them up and they stick their feet’s up all stiff).

Jammerjab (Staff): 9/10 Funky but fun!

Was originally really wary of them because of the whole Void Termina thing and their assosciation with the bad guys wasn’t a good thing but they’re super cool! They’re graceful and like to stand on their staff a lot. They also help the smaller helpers get stuff up high (they themselves are small but their staff can extend a lot so they can use that for extra height). They let Adeleine use their staff and she’s not that good at it (she always whacks herself in the face while trying to use it) but it’s a nice gesture! They know a lot about the Jambastion and like to tell people all the wacky secrets it holds (like how Hyness has an entire room full of just robes that all look the exact fucking same or how theres a specific set of hallways that move and change to get trespassers lost in them). Honestly a fun little guy to be around

[janehaster]

So...I'm replaying Delta Rune's Chapter 1 and something struck me as odd.

Ralsei states right before Susie joins the party that only Kris can seal the dark fountain. But in chapter 2, we learn any Lightner can create a fountain if they have enough will, enough Determination. Therefore, logic states any Lightner could close one, right?

This led me to 2 hypotheses:

What if a fountain can only be closed by the person who created it in the first place?

That would imply Kris was the one to create the first fountain, and that they were the Knight all along.

If that's not the case, then the second hypothesis is that a dark fountain can only be sealed by a human.

Why am I saying this? Because Susie is also a Lightner. And yet, Ralsei clearly states only Kris could seal the first fountain. And Kris is the only human in the party. Their description before you met Susie in the Dark World is a body with a human SOUL. Which means their power probably has something to do with the fact their SOUL is human, meaning monsters would be unable to seal human-created fountains and therefore, would be unable to return to the Light World of their own volition.

I still don't have more evidence to support this claim, but something about Kris being human IS peculiar and DEEPLY tied to the process of creating and sealing fountains. Maybe this is the one link with Undertale, since human SOULs have more determination than monster SOULs? Could this premise also apply to Delta Rune?

Another disturbing thought we can derive from this line of reasoning is: if human Determination is indeed stronger than monsters', then couldn't Kris, the only human in that town, seal every inhabitant of their town in the Dark World forever if they willed it?

Also, notice how we never see anyone's SOUL in this game. Have you ever seen how a Darkner's SOUL looks like? Or Ralsei's SOUL? What about Susie's? It's as if SOULs didn't even exist in Delta Rune. And yet, we can see Kris' SOUL just fine. Doesn't that strike to you as ODD???

Another point worth mentioning is how DR seems to be borrowing more and more concepts from Undertale. Spamton mentions wanting to see our [HeartShapedObject], our SOUL. In his secret boss fight, he explicitly says he WANTS our SOUL, just like any monster in Undertale does! Then we have the Queen openly talking about Determination, another key concept of Undertale, and how it ties to the very process of creating a dark fountain.

It doesn't take much to understand a dark fountain is NOT created or sealed by a SOUL, but by its Determination. And a human SOUL is a well of Determination. This all connects to yet a third Undertale concept: the fact that the Barrier trapping monsters Underground can only be broken by the power of...human SOULs, aka DETERMINATION.

I don't know where Delta Rune is going with this, but there are too many parallels to deny there is some mysterious link between the two games. Let's hope Chapters 3 to 5 can provide us with some answers.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk!