acopytopy

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Ralsei having a big messy breakdown in Chapter 4 about how he doesn't mean to be secretive hits a little different when you've been paying enough attention to know he's full of shit because you caught him manipulating cutscene triggers to have private conversations with Kris without the player overhearing as far back as Chapter 1.

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I feel really weird about Deltarune because on the one hand it is A Game rmthat Exists and therefore is to be played, but it also explicitly tells you that it doesn't want you to play it.

I think the fact that a video game criticising its own audience is perceived as bizarre and outside normal boundaries points to the fundamental immaturity of video games as a medium. (n.b.: "immature" in the sense of "undeveloped", not "childish".) It would rightly be regarded as absurd to be having this conversation about literally any other artistic medium.

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Theory time

There are 5 characters who we know have side effects from trust: Nice, Lin Ling, Moon, Firm Man, Ghostblade

4 of them are in Treeman

I wouldn't be surprised if fear was used to assist with every Treeman hero image (we know it was used with Nice's)

So what if the side effects are only present if you mix fear in? We know that fear can twist your powers (as seen with Shindiq)

And the fact that Ghostblade became physically unable to speak happened recently, so already after the discovery of fear. And I also wouldn't be surprised if Rock started to experiment too.

And yeah, lh0 told us about there always being side effects to trust, but I find it weird how rarely we actually see them, cause lh0 would 100% just lie to us

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Nice "the perfect embodiment of what a hero should be like"

Vs

Loli "Appearances shouldn't define me, I'll be the hero I want to be"

Nice whose identity was created through trust and fear, and Loli who can negate both trust and fear with the armor she made

------

Ghostblade, "I won't question who I'm told to assassinate," protecting his target Little Johnny

Vs

E-Soul/Yang Cheng, "I need to uphold the people's trust and bring justice to the wrong," going after Little Johnny and Ghostblade

Both did not doubt killing a former Hero and X (Og E-Soul, Sheng), but Ghostblade goes against orders to protect little Johnny, and E-Soul doesn't doubt the need to kill them both

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https://www.tumblr.com/acopytopy/784357085219602432/you-know-what-im-doubling-down-on-my-theory-that?source=share

Do you still think of this theory as plausible after what was revealed in episode 19 and 20?

Probably not anymore lmao 😂

I can’t deny I wasn’t expecting them to go so morally black with Yang Cheng. He seemingly only cares about being #1 now, to the point of willing murder, which is quite a huge change from the more justifiable revenge motive.

But Yang Cheng is still my goat even if he doesn’t beat the allegations. He just straight up kills people now and I love that for him

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the best part bar none about kris being involved with the antagonist is that they are so fucking dogshit at being evil. "throw this fight it's a scripted loss" okay. "your teammates are down it's good as over why are you hitting me harder now" my friands..,.,.. "you need to keep the guitar away from susie" okay. "what the fuck do you mean you lost a brawl with your own soul and she took it out of your own fucking hands" you don't understaaaaaaand,,,.

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I'm thinking of kris repeating berdly's name in shock when you try to tell ralsei that you are going to the festival with berdly of all people. Thinking about the conversations we only get to hear half of, where kris presumably tells ralsei and susie that ralsei and asriel don't look that much alike. Thinking about all the times where kris changes the prompt we give them into something that they'd prefer to say.

Kris talks. They chatter, even, but we as the player don't get to hear it. They don't get a text box. We only ever know that they spoke at all from the reactions of other characters, and even then, we rarely know exactly what was said.

And part of this is that whoever the deltarune narrator is seems intent to pretending like kris doesn't exist. You check the mirror, and it says, "it's only you". Kris plays the piano and it says, "your hands begin moving on their own." If kris speaks without your permission, the narration doesn't acknowledge it at all, committed to the lie that kris doesn't exist beyond their role as our vessel. But that's not what this post is about.

This post is about how it's entirely possible that kris has tried to talk to us when no one else is around. They could have tried to tell us their plan, or begged us not to make certain decisions, or explained that we don't actually need to steal asriel's 5 dollars because they have a piggy bank buried in the front yard. Kris could be asking us questions, or asking us not to look for the bunker password because they have a plan and we should trust them, or asking us to let them sleep a bit longer, and we the soul just carry on the same regardless, their one-sided monologue falling on deaf ears. We would never even know, because of how thoroughly the narrative of deltarune has denied kris a voice.

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Kris is THE nonbinary character ever.

They’re human in a town of monsters, an allegory for being nonbinary. They’re not Frisk or Chara but a secret 3rd thing. They’re a walking commentary on how nonbinary game protagonists get treated as ��self-inserts”. They’re weird and it’s portrayed as a good thing. They have a secret life their parents can’t understand. They’re working for the enemy (literally playing both sides). They have a kickass storyline and personality.

Their life is a prison. Their body is a prison. Their gender plays into the overarching theme of the game, that being determinism. The struggle to choose who you are when God and religion already chose for you.

Well, player? Which do you choose?

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This is gonna be a Deltarune blog for now, sorry. Got obsessed over the past couple weeks

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Og E-Soul and Zero >:D (I am in stupid mode fkfmngkd)

Being a faceless hero has its implications. Not only for you but also for your poor coworkers

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yang cheng got so much trauma he started working out because he needed bigger tits to protect his fragile heart

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I do want to mention that a key part of this theory is X having good intentions.

The orphanage dean also technically did, since he often mentioned how many people Cyan could save. So even if X is causing trauma and anguish for the top 10, it might be more of a “lesser evil” situation.

OK can someone tell me if this theory holds water or if it’s just batshit insane

So this is probably X here meeting Cyan before she joins the top 10. It can’t be a coincidence that this encouraged her to play her guitar in public to make money. And we can also link the animation changes in Lin Ling’s and Yang Cheng’s arcs to X due to the snapping sounds.

��Is X personally choosing/supporting heroes to join the top 10? If that’s the case, it would make sense as to why none of the top 10 we’ve seen so far have been evil/corrupt, but rather innocent and kind.

But you know who that also sounds like? The orphanage dean.

He chose to turn kind-hearted children into heroes, but it cost them their happiness.

And look at the slicked-back hair, the glasses, the white clothes—is this guy trying to look like X or is this an intentional narrative parallel??

X is an antihero grooming the top 10 into sad heroes theory?

Look, if I had omnipotent power and had to choose a successor through a top 10 tournament, I wouldn’t be leaving that shit to chance, that’s all I’m saying—

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OK can someone tell me if this theory holds water or if it’s just batshit insane

So this is probably X here meeting Cyan before she joins the top 10. It can’t be a coincidence that this encouraged her to play her guitar in public to make money. And we can also link the animation changes in Lin Ling’s and Yang Cheng’s arcs to X due to the snapping sounds.

—Is X personally choosing/supporting heroes to join the top 10? If that’s the case, it would make sense as to why none of the top 10 we’ve seen so far have been evil/corrupt, but rather innocent and kind.

But you know who that also sounds like? The orphanage dean.

He chose to turn kind-hearted children into heroes, but it cost them their happiness.

And look at the slicked-back hair, the glasses, the white clothes—is this guy trying to look like X or is this an intentional narrative parallel??

X is an antihero grooming the top 10 into sad heroes theory?

Look, if I had omnipotent power and had to choose a successor through a top 10 tournament, I wouldn’t be leaving that shit to chance, that’s all I’m saying—

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OK can someone tell me if this theory holds water or if it’s just batshit insane

So this is probably X here meeting Cyan before she joins the top 10. It can’t be a coincidence that this encouraged her to play her guitar in public to make money. And we can also link the animation changes in Lin Ling’s and Yang Cheng’s arcs to X due to the snapping sounds.

—Is X personally choosing/supporting heroes to join the top 10? If that’s the case, it would make sense as to why none of the top 10 we’ve seen so far have been evil/corrupt, but rather innocent and kind.

But you know who that also sounds like? The orphanage dean.

He chose to turn kind-hearted children into heroes, but it cost them their happiness.

And look at the slicked-back hair, the glasses, the white clothes—is this guy trying to look like X or is this an intentional narrative parallel??

X is an antihero grooming the top 10 into sad heroes theory?

Look, if I had omnipotent power and had to choose a successor through a top 10 tournament, I wouldn’t be leaving that shit to chance, that’s all I’m saying—

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Call me naive, but I genuinely don’t think it’ll end this way. Maybe there will be a scene where he considers it, but the show itself? I think it’ll at least end on a hopeful note.

I say this just based on what we’ve seen. There are the characters, their personalities and interactions. Look at Wreck’s love for Nice and Lin Ling’s love for Moon. Look at Cyan and Luo. Yes, these stories likely have tragic endings—but these relationships are important. Tragedy has no meaning on its own. Even scenes like Nice’s suicide practically invite the audience to wonder and care about Nice as a person. To understand that Nice was his own person; that he’s different from Lin Ling. The show wants us to hope.

There’s also the glaring fact that none of the top 10 we’ve seen so far are purely evil. In real life, I’d 100% believe people with that much power would be corrupt. But in TBHX, they’re not! They might make the wrong choices, but we can clearly see their goodwill and heroism underneath.

And of course, X exists. The everyman hero, tied to no corporation, not reliant on believers, who has everything and seems to have lost nothing. It can be done. Why would suicide be the answer for Lin Ling if there’s proof that he could be free?

So call me naive but I think TBHX has a hopeful and optimistic core. I don’t think it will end that way.

You cannot tell me to be hero X won't end where it started, Lin Ling was already going to kill himself if Nice didn't do it first and everything that happened after that only made it worse, him having to replace a dead man and watching people around him die and Moon literally gets shot in the head in front of him, I promise you the last episode is gonna be him being a top rank hero, stepping on the same rooftop where it all started as he sees another man looking like his age standing there about to jump and the last scene is gonna be him jumping as he says "good luck" knowing what will happen, The commoner didn't die that day, but Lin Ling did

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just caught up on tbhx eps 5-7 and like, Much To Process. right now tho im kinda obsessed with yang cheng and his doomed polycule situation but particularly how like, BEFORE it was tragically doomed, it kinda struck me as the funniest thing ever. yang cheng essentially gets adopted by his crush at school and this other student whos entrepreneurmaxxing and BOTH those individuals are WHOLLY obsessed with him but yang cheng is too nerfed by his low self-esteem to notice. really giving me the vibes of "ot3 where two people already in a relationship try to coax in a 3rd party into the arrangement but that 3rd guy thinks everybody hates him so it's like coaxing a traumatized stray dog into the house for some treats" exquisite dynamic, no notes.