Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-27907368-20160428221757/@comment-32182236-20180614114615

@GetYourFix:Alright, I have two responses. This first one first will me my critique of your theory, and the second will be my rival theory. Seeing how we both agree that every detail should be explained, and no contradictions should exist within the lore, this should go well.

Split Your Soul: Three Parts of a Whole

"We start every run in a physical body that is shared by the player, Chara's essence and Frisk's essence. The coelescence of these three beings constitues the SOUL - all three entities can contribute determination but cannot function alone during the game. However, the player provides the most determination and has the sole ability to SAVE."

You're already making massive assumptions here. While it is indeed true that Chara is indeed sharing essence with this body, as I argue here, seeing as we see their memories appear, and the narration shows references to Chara within Frisk's jokes, and that Chara's flat-out the narrator (Something I've also argued here), there isn't really evidence supporting there being a THIRD entity, at least not that you provided here. (You didn't provide evidene even that Chara was part of it:I only aggreed there because I already have the evidence supporting this.)

""Determination", or the resolve to change fate. Chara says that they do not want to do this during the genocide ending; they only bring back the world because they want your SOUL. Frisk is only named in the pacifist ending. Near all choices made in this game are made by us."

And they're choices involving Frisk, that they make. Hmm, maybe the two are the same!

"It's no stretch to say that we, the puppetmasters of the protagonist, have the most determination. We're a lot more physical than pixels, after all!"

Haha.. No. Omega Flowey steals that from us, and he's a part of the game too, so.. Yeah. It's clearly Frisk. Which must be the same as us for us to use it.

"However, the physical body "rebels" in all routes, giving an indication that we are not working alone. In the genocide route, these movements may be more noticeable, but they are seen in every route."

Yeah-They're called cutscenes! These days we can't seem to have a game without cutscenes! (Also, that's probably Chara.)

In the Photoshop Flowey fight, the protagonist takes a step forward to fight Flowey. While Flowey is monologuing pre-Asriel, it is indicated that the protagonist interrupts Flowey to ask "Why he's doing this". ... "The narrator for genocide is interesting. After desolating the Ruins, they only smile. This is unlike the protagonist in neutral and pacifist runs who do speak."

Yeah, Chara's the narrator. Not Frisk. Also.. Why can't they be cutscenes or Chara? (Yeah, it's not Frisk that I'm arguing doesn't canonically exist, it's the PLAYER themselves that I'm arguing against. Let's just say that adding in the player adds in a whole new set of problems that I'll go over as a bonus at the end of this post.)

"Anyway. Let's talk about the Frisk/Chara essences. Frisk is the declared dominant spirit in pacifist - they say their own name to Asriel. However, Chara is still within them after the fight."

Of course they are. Their essences are interwined. They will forever be there.

"Alright. So, once Flowey "becomes a god", Asriel appears to us as he was when he was a child. He picks up his head (he may have been crying) and smiles. He then says "Howdy! Chara, are you there? It's me, your best friend." Then, he turns into his boss form and tries to get us to stop fighting him."

Actually, he wants us to lose the fight, not give mercy. These are two completely different things. In fact, he DOES want us to fight.. Just, well.. Lose. Hemce him saying we'll never defeat him, that he'll reset so we can do this ALL over again..

"What happened here? Well, we know that Chara requires determination and a human soul to be inbdued."

..Um, no. They can exist without the latter. Just like Flowey."

"And they also love STATs. When Asriel calls for Chara, they come and corrupt him into trying to use force to get us to keep playing. More indication of this is how many 9's the Lost Soul's have in their data STATS - it's no wonder that Chara has sucked the hope right out of them!"

Why can't this just be Asriel's doing, trying to "play" in Chara's way? They are best friends to Asriel, after all.

"Okay, we SAVE our friends. Then, there is one last person to be SAVED - Chara. Asriel smiles up until this point in the battle - then, he starts to cry. We SAVE Chara by reminding them of what they were in life; a beacon of hope to the monsters. Then, they can let go of all the STATS - and hop over to our SOUL because we called for them."

If Chara's the narrator, they should be saying that "You called my name." In the case of Asriel, there are sifferent ways to interpet the strange "they" instead of "he":This could be talking about the collective Asriel:Asriel AND all the SOULs he has within him. It could also be the collection that is Asriel and his former self Flowey, as he does show signs of that kind of behavior in his form.

"(A total side note here. Recall that the monsters at the end of a neutral route say that Asriel refused to fight the humans while smiling? Asriel doesn't mention smiling in his rendition. They shared control over the body - and Chara was doing the creepy smile while they were being killed.)"

It was a smile. Not necessarily a creepy smile. On fact, it probably wasn't because the monsters don't see any signs of creepiness within the smile. But yes, that was Chara. If anything, it was a smile of joy-They were going to enjoy killing those humans.. Right after that's when Asriel walked off. The smile likely ended there, but it wouldn't be seen, so, the monsters would assume it continued. (Or it could be that Asriel just left that out of his rendition, seeing as it wasn't important. In fact, this latter explanation is likely the correct answer, seeing as Asriel's the only way the monsters ever could have learned of what happened on the surface-They were trapped underground, after all. If Asriel didn't mention it to the monsters, than who did? Chara? And if so, why would they tell the version they did?

"After Chara's essence has left Asriel, he begins to cry and then turns back to his old self."

Chara's essence was within US the whole time. Narration was still there, and the rainbow text for "ASRIEL DREEMURR" is quite significant.

"So. Pacifist runs post-genocide are ruined for this reason. Though Chara is a part of Frisk's SOUL no matter what, once they've been awoken in the evil way they will not let you forget. They don't need STATS to overwhelm Frisk."

If this is your take, then tell me, why can't all the independent actions be Chara?

"After our time in the Undertale universe, we relinquish control of the protagonist. Evil Chara overwhelms Frisk once our determination no longer affects the story because Frisk alone cannot stop the psychopathic killer that has been awakened."

Also because Frisk doesn't own their SOUL anymore. Can't forget about that. =)

"On the other hand, Chara will live alongside Frisk in true pacifist endings. Maybe they were confused about humans and monsters when they "died" with Asriel, but they were SAVED by a human and monsters did go free at the end of it all. (and maybe they considered Frisk's friends their own friends, too.)"

And kill everyone.

"This one confused me for a while. After a true pacifist ending, Flowey speaks into the fourth wall and tells Chara to leave Frisk alone and let them have their happy ending. This made no sense to me - I thought Flowey was speaking to the player and calling us Chara for the longest time."

It could literally be to Chara. Flowey assumes they're going to reset, when we show no indication of doing so. Not onky that, there's no reason to assume that Chara's essence isn't STILL intertwined with ours, allowing us to hear a conrsation that was clearly meant for Chara, and not ourselves/Frisk's. Seeing as how one can't tell the difference between two members of the same body, Flowey might not know whether it's Frisk or Chara that has the choice to make that True Reset. Under this lense, analyze the speech again. It CAN make sense. Sometimes you just need to look at things from another perspective.

"However. I had a good feeling about the SOUL jumping part from before and knew that this had to fit somehow. Then, it dawned on me - we see Flowey and he is talking to us in the first person.

Frisk/Chara returned to the Underground to see him. He believes the only one that would want to "see him suffer" is Chara. Remember that he is a self-depreciating character and that he doesn't really hold Chara in a high esteem when he's Asriel again. However, Flowey cannot understand Frisk/Chara returning if they are doing it in an act of compassion or love.

So, he thinks that Chara dragged Frisk's body down here (like what Chara did to Asriel) to snivel at him or laugh at him or something vaguelly not nice.

For all we know, Frisk/Chara went down there to apologize and be at peace. He tele-flowers before we have a chance to say anything, perhaps because the protagonist is speechless."

..That works too.

Alright, next time, I'll be presenting my own take!