twisside - Tumblr blog

twisside · 2 months

Text

The Egg

You were on your way home when you died.

It was a car accident. Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless. You left behind a wife and two children. It was a painless death. The EMTs tried their best to save you, but to no avail. Your body was so utterly shattered you were better off, trust me.

And that’s when you met me.

“What… what happened?” You asked. “Where am I?”

“You died,” I said, matter-of-factly. No point in mincing words.

“There was a… a truck and it was skidding…”

“Yup,” I said.

“I… I died?”

“Yup. But don’t feel bad about it. Everyone dies,” I said.

You looked around. There was nothingness. Just you and me. “What is this place?” You asked. “Is this the afterlife?”

“More or less,” I said.

“Are you god?” You asked.

“Yup,” I replied. “I’m God.”

“My kids… my wife,” you said.

“What about them?”

“Will they be all right?”

“That’s what I like to see,” I said. “You just died and your main concern is for your family. That’s good stuff right there.”

You looked at me with fascination. To you, I didn’t look like God. I just looked like some man. Or possibly a woman. Some vague authority figure, maybe. More of a grammar school teacher than the almighty.

“Don’t worry,” I said. “They’ll be fine. Your kids will remember you as perfect in every way. They didn’t have time to grow contempt for you. Your wife will cry on the outside, but will be secretly relieved. To be fair, your marriage was falling apart. If it’s any consolation, she’ll feel very guilty for feeling relieved.”

“Oh,” you said. “So what happens now? Do I go to heaven or hell or something?”

“Neither,” I said. “You’ll be reincarnated.”

“Ah,” you said. “So the Hindus were right,”

“All religions are right in their own way,” I said. “Walk with me.”

You followed along as we strode through the void. “Where are we going?”

“Nowhere in particular,” I said. “It’s just nice to walk while we talk.”

“So what’s the point, then?” You asked. “When I get reborn, I’ll just be a blank slate, right? A baby. So all my experiences and everything I did in this life won’t matter.”

“Not so!” I said. “You have within you all the knowledge and experiences of all your past lives. You just don’t remember them right now.”

I stopped walking and took you by the shoulders. “Your soul is more magnificent, beautiful, and gigantic than you can possibly imagine. A human mind can only contain a tiny fraction of what you are. It’s like sticking your finger in a glass of water to see if it’s hot or cold. You put a tiny part of yourself into the vessel, and when you bring it back out, you’ve gained all the experiences it had.

“You’ve been in a human for the last 48 years, so you haven’t stretched out yet and felt the rest of your immense consciousness. If we hung out here for long enough, you’d start remembering everything. But there’s no point to doing that between each life.”

“How many times have I been reincarnated, then?”

“Oh lots. Lots and lots. An in to lots of different lives.” I said. “This time around, you’ll be a Chinese peasant girl in 540 AD.”

“Wait, what?” You stammered. “You’re sending me back in time?”

“Well, I guess technically. Time, as you know it, only exists in your universe. Things are different where I come from.”

“Where you come from?” You said.

“Oh sure,” I explained “I come from somewhere. Somewhere else. And there are others like me. I know you’ll want to know what it’s like there, but honestly you wouldn’t understand.”

“Oh,” you said, a little let down. “But wait. If I get reincarnated to other places in time, I could have interacted with myself at some point.”

“Sure. Happens all the time. And with both lives only aware of their own lifespan you don’t even know it’s happening.”

“So what’s the point of it all?”

“Seriously?” I asked. “Seriously? You’re asking me for the meaning of life? Isn’t that a little stereotypical?”

“Well it’s a reasonable question,” you persisted.

I looked you in the eye. “The meaning of life, the reason I made this whole universe, is for you to mature.”

“You mean mankind? You want us to mature?”

“No, just you. I made this whole universe for you. With each new life you grow and mature and become a larger and greater intellect.”

“Just me? What about everyone else?”

“There is no one else,” I said. “In this universe, there’s just you and me.”

You stared blankly at me. “But all the people on earth…”

“All you. Different incarnations of you.”

“Wait. I’m everyone!?”

“Now you’re getting it,” I said, with a congratulatory slap on the back.

“I’m every human being who ever lived?”

“Or who will ever live, yes.”

“I’m Abraham Lincoln?”

“And you’re John Wilkes Booth, too,” I added.

“I’m Hitler?” You said, appalled.

“And you’re the millions he killed.”

“I’m Jesus?”

“And you’re everyone who followed him.”

You fell silent.

“Every time you victimized someone,” I said, “you were victimizing yourself. Every act of kindness you’ve done, you’ve done to yourself. Every happy and sad moment ever experienced by any human was, or will be, experienced by you.”

You thought for a long time.

“Why?” You asked me. “Why do all this?”

“Because someday, you will become like me. Because that’s what you are. You’re one of my kind. You’re my child.”

“Whoa,” you said, incredulous. “You mean I’m a god?”

“No. Not yet. You’re a fetus. You’re still growing. Once you’ve lived every human life throughout all time, you will have grown enough to be born.”

“So the whole universe,” you said, “it’s just…”

“An egg.” I answered. “Now it’s time for you to move on to your next life.”

And I sent you on your way.

814 notes · View notes

twisside · 5 years

Text

Wow...

Undertale/Deltarune Theory: The Two Angels of The Prophecy

Since I’ve been playing Deltarune as of late, I thought I would share some very compelling details I’ve noticed in game that have been rolling around in my mind lately…

This is a theory pertaining both Undertale AND Deltarune, because I found connections between both of them interestingly enough. To start my theory off: I will begin with the very prominent theme in Deltarune of religion. There appears to be a strange emphasis on how religious the home town of Deltarune is, with everyone worshipping some deity called “The Angel.”

It seems to be done in such a manner, that it is building up that the town is worshipping some false God of sorts. The town itself feels very…off. A very ominous vibe to it, especially with the very creepy bunker to the south of town as well.

The question is.. who is this Angel..? To answer this question, we will have to dig deeper. Another notable theme in Deltarune, is that many items found in the Light World—represent places and people in the Dark World. It mirrors it, essentially.

In the light world school closet, the cards on the floor represent the card suite inhabitants/card castle. The plush doll represents Seam, etc. Additionally, the red horns in Kris’s house could symbolically represent Ralsei’s presence, with his little red horns.

However… even more interesting enough, is that in the town hospital can be found two angel dolls. One— that was made by Kris and Asriel, where they “wasted the whole time making big wings for it.”

And the other, which was made by Noelle and her friend—looked like a typical angel doll, only “it’s lack of facial features was unsettling.”

This appears to be clear symbolism for two different characters/angels… but whom? The first one, I believe matches the description of Asriel’s final form in Undertale perfectly: it has a rather disproportionate body, with huge over-sized, magnificent wings.

Additionally, Asriel’s final form matches up with the Deltarune of Gerson’s prophecy, with each part of his angel body aligning with the runes. Gerson also mentions an Angel in his prophecy, saying that it will free everyone from the underground—which Asriel does at the end of Undertale, with the power of the seven souls.

Then… who is the second angel, who is symbolically represented in the hospital? An angel we haven’t seen yet, but likely will at the end of Deltarune. Based off the evidence/implications given, I believe it is Gaster.

To begin, the second angel doll is described with a lack of features that makes it unsettling—which is very reminiscent of Gaster.

To build upon this, the angel of Undertale—Asriel— plays a focal point in Undertale’s story. He is not shown until the very end of the game, with the true ending, and is very mysterious at first. On top of this, many.. many songs in Undertale have the leitmotifs of Asriel’s theme: HIS theme.

Meanwhile, Deltarunes soundtrack is heavily focused around Lietmotifs of Gasters theme, with the intro song being called ANOTHER HIM… Another angel, if you will. This implies that he is going to play a heavy role in the story, which is very much seen on the surface level of Deltarune—with the involvement of the “strange knight” as well as the subtext with Jevils backstory, having met a man that made his vision of the world grow “Darker, yet darker” and made him go insane, as told by the tale Seam the shopkeeper tells the protagonist.

Additionally, the very first castle we see in the game–(not card castle, mind you) has wings on it… much akin to an angel’s, and is spewing a dark fountain forth from it.

At the end of the chapter of Deltarune, Susie shows clear concern that they did not get rid of the right fountain. One fountain—the original, brought the dark world its life. The other, an unnatural source of darkness to upset the balance. And Ralsei, strangely enough, eagerly directed Kris to get rid of the Card Castle fountain—not the one coming from the Angel’s castle. The Angel’s Castle is also an empty kingdom, with no subjects.. except Ralsei.

But who is the king? Nobody knows… And a very foreboding music plays in the castle town, adding to the mystery of it. Ralsei, who is quite suspicious enough as it is, (might go into this further in another theory later) will not let Kris inside the castle, stating that Kris must save the world/complete the prophecy first… and then they can come back. Ralsei acts very nervous and distraught when Kris keeps trying to enter the castle, and blocks him from going in. He then shuts Kris out of the kingdom gates, barring him off from going back inside–sinisterly enough.

Additionally, the plot of Deltarune is based off the prophecy, to “banish the Angels heaven”. This makes the Angel seem like a very malicious figure…but why? What are the Angels motives, and what is the “Angels heaven..?” Well, if you talk to Gerson in Undertale, he says an interesting bit of dialogue that could be interpreted a bit differently with my context/point of view. One could argue that he is talking about “the angel of hyper death”, Asriel, when he says the Angel of death, but I believe it not to be the case.

Gerson states the following:

“Lately, the people have been taking a bleaker outlook…callin that winged circle the “Angel of Death”.

A harbringer of destruction, and waitin to “free” us from this mortal realm…”

This seems like a much more sinister view of the Angel, and not like Asriel. Even though Asriel is very threatening, he is still pure of heart, and ends up saving all of Monsterkind in the end. The second angel however? Wants to “free” every one, and brings destruction in his wake. In Deltarune, we see much destruction and chaos being brought about by a strange “knight”, who appeared one day to take over the card kingdom and beyond, using the Chaos King to help him assert control.

Seam also mentions that he hasn’t seen this much chaos, since the incident that occurred with Jevil—which implies that the stranger and the strange mysterious knight are one and the same. So, what then is the meaning of “free us from this mortal realm…?”, from Gerson’s prophecy of the second angel? Well, interestingly enough: in Deltarune Jevil mentions this line of dialogue in his boss fight, which lines up perfectly with Gerson’s dark prophecy:

“I AM INNOCENT, INNOCENT. I JUST WANTED TO PLAY A GAME, GAME. BUT THE BORING KINGS FOUND SUCH FUN TO BE A TROUBLE. AS PUNISHMENT, THEY CRAVED TO IMPRISION MY BODY. THEY LOST THE CHASE, AND LOCKED UP THEIR ENTIRE RACE, BUILDING A PRISON AROUND THE WHOLE WORLD. NOW I’M THE ONLY FREE ONE”.

This is extremely significant, because Jevil was made aware by the Knight that the world is only a game, and that he can become “free” by ignoring the rules of the game, if you will—to become sentient of the game itself. This matches up perfectly with Gaster: who after being shattered across time and space by falling into his creation, became aware that the world was all just a game.

So why usurp the Dark World? Presumably, to make everyone aware that it is all just a game: to save them, from being stuck forever without choice. To make them free…done in a very twisted way of course, taking over the kingdom, locking up the rulers and all.

So why do this? After all he was a former scientist of Asgore’s in Undertale. This is where the symbolism comes in, that I noticed. Gaster seems to be a “fallen angel” of sorts. He was driven into madness after “falling” into his creation— after messing with the balance of things. What that is exactly, is unknown at this time. But it is implied that he discovered the presence of timelines, and tried to figure out how to manipulate them.

This in a sense, was an act against nature/trying to defy god by trying to figure out the interworking’s of the world’s universe.

Additionally, in Deltarune there is a repeated theme of a “shining light” that guides you—where you save your Soul at. In the bible, the fallen angel Lucifer, who defied God, is likewise represented with a “shining light”. In the files, Gaster is also associated with the number 666—which aligns with the prophecy of him being a dark, fallen angel.

One could even argue his font/name Wingdings is symbolic, from the wing in the name. It isn’t a stretch to say that Toby got some inspiration from the Bible–he has gotten many inspirations from Undertale from various sources, including Asriel’s symbolism from a Hebrew god/demon named Azrael.

To add unto this theory that links both Asriel and Gaster together as being both angels, is that both were striken by tragedy. Asriel was killed at a very young age, and is forever stuck in an endless purgatory in the body of a flower. Meanwhile, Gaster was forgotten by everyone, including the ones he held closest, and was shattered across time and space. Both characters are implied to have been driven to madness because of this, but with Asriel having a bit more heart/sympathy to him in the very end, (due to having the power of the human Souls to feel compassion again) and freeing all of monsterkind out of a deep care for Frisk.

Gaster on the other hand…? Seems to be a lot more unforgiving, and much more threatening, seen by his heavily implied actions in Deltarune, taking over kingdoms without mercy, and establishing his power in the Dark World.

Another notable feature between the two characters, is that they both have black markings on their faces, stretching down from their eyes—(Asriel’s markings are seen during his final boss fight.) What are these? Well…one datamined detail (sourced from the Deltarune reddit) from Deltarune might be the answer to this question.

Both Asriel and Gaster have gone through incredible suffering, so this “pain” could have essentially manifested into the black markings, similar to tears. In the beginning of Deltarune, with the player’s encounter with the narrator/ Gaster, (or at the very least heavily implied…he speaks in the exact same manner) he asks the player what their favorite food is. Two answers, that immediately stand out as strange and bizarre—are pain, and cold—which at first glance is just an off the wall comment/dialogue option, but upon second glance gives us a window into what he has gone through—painful suffering, much like Asriel did, on a plane of existence where they could do nothing. Both characters also have committed horrible actions, due to their fall into madness, (Asriel as Flowey, being stuck in a soulless vessel for ages,) and Gaster, due to existential madness from realizing the entire world is just a game, presumably overthrew an entire kingdom to “free” everyone.

(Almost forgot–) Additionally, another piece of dialogue which links together the Knight and the Angel being one and the same—is a dialogue seen from the Chaos King/Spade King himself. During the battle with him—he mentions multiple times how he obeys the word of the Knight, and with him he shall make a “new world out of Holy Shadows”, which backs up my theory even more, that the folks of the Light world are worshiping a false idol, a dark angel to destroy them all.

Sound familiar…?

I believe this is made all the more likely with Undertale being a mirror to Deltarune and vice versa—it would make all the more sense that each game would have an Angel character, considering each deals with a prophecy containing the Deltarune. One Angel of Light, and one of Dark.

696 notes · View notes