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If someone were to ask Chara what his favourite genre was, he would answer in a heartbeat. “JRPGS!” He loved them. Even though the genre could be formulaic and sometimes repetitive, he found something charming about them, especially the well-made ones. The feeling of progression, the amazing satisfaction of raising a puny level 1 kid with a stick to a respected and honourable warrior… it was like crack, but better! It was unfortunate when he found out what EXP and LV meant in real life, but hey, it wasn’t like the monsters he fought in Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy were actual people.
It was no wonder that Dr Gaster chose him to be the lucky kid to playtest his new game. Deltarune. It was really neat – the beginning and sequence at the end of the first chapter were a little weird, but he supposed there would be explanations for those later. From the scene where Kris woke up and travelled to school, the boy was instantly captivated by the game’s quirky atmosphere, lovable characters, and fun gameplay. The music was awesome, too – he heard the scientist hired a professional musician. What was his name again…? Toji? Tobias? Ah, whatever.
His favourite character by far was Ralsei! The healer reminded him of Asriel a lot – sweeter than butterscotch pie, unnatural bad luck, and his design looked like a cartoony version of a Boss Monster! Although little did Chara know, the character was a little too similar to Asriel in terms of drawing in misfortune…
DELTARUNE Chapter 4: Break My Heart, Break Your Heart
Chara tried to steady his breathing, swallowing the lump in his throat. The controller kept slipping out of his grip. He could have sworn he wasn’t this sweaty a few moments ago!
The plot had taken a turn for the intense. The Delta Warriors had fought their way through the Dark Castles, taking down three of the Four Card Kings and shutting off their Dark Fountains. However, the final obstacle in their path – the black-hearted Queen of Hearts, as evil as she was beautiful – had a cruel and terrible trick in store! She invaded the Light World with her army, taking the fight to Kris and Susie! The Lightners were caught off-guard and lost instantaneously. Hometown was now completely occupied by Darkner soldiers.
Chara was forced to play a blood-pumping solo stealth mission with his favourite character, racing against time to crash his friends’ public execution. Just when he made it, Ralsei was forced into a hopeless boss fight against the queen herself. Now the situation had reversed – the Queen of Hearts was holding her sword to Ralsei’s throat, and Chara had regained control of the freed Kris. “OHOHOHO~! Your time is up, boy!” Four dialogue options laid before him…
What do I pick? What do I pick!? If I mess this up, I might have to go through the Ralsei stealth segment all over again! But … maybe the game designer knows this. Maybe, knowing that the last save point was half an hour ago, he’ll be merciful with whatever I choose.
>“Why are you doing this!?”
“Why are you doing this!?” Kris demanded.
“World domination, of course! Lightners and Darkners getting along as equals? Bah! What rubbish! This world is ‘the world of the napkin’!
“The ideal world can only be realised by the victors! And victory only goes to those who seize the ‘first napkin’ – the opportunity to dominate! And by eliminating even one Delta Warrior, I have taken it!”
“T-that’s not true…” Ralsei choked out. “Kindness, love, and compassion is what drives this world… W-without them… the world will become coldhearted and empty. N-nothing about it will… be… ideal…”
“Is that so~?” The scantily clad tyrant didn’t even bother to hold back a chuckle. “Then I invite you to watch! Watch the results of your precious ‘compassion’! The Dark Knight sends his regards~” Before Kris could move a muscle, Ralsei’s head had been sliced clean off!
With a deafening thud, Chara’s controller fell to the ground. They even had a CG of the goat boy’s demise! He could feel the shock and raw emotion on the faces of Kris and Susie, see the life fade from their precious friend’s eyes. As pixelated blood trickled from the boy’s neck stump, Chara felt his heart start to break…
In a rare moment of voice-acting from the game, combined with an unintentional scream from its player, the entire Underground knew a single word.
“ RALSEIIIIIIII! ”
The speed of Chara running to the console and smashing the power button broke the world record for fastest thing alive. Toriel, who had walked down to check on Chara after hearing his shout, was blown into the wall by the gust stirred up by his movement! “C-Chara!? Are you alright, my child?”
“Sorry Mum, busy! Trying to save a friend!”
The Boss Monster shrugged and went back to her study, leaving her adopted son to continue.
Okay, so he had to reload from the last save, no biggie. Losing an extra thirty minutes of his life was trivial compared to virtual goatbro dying! Now that one of the four options had been confirmed as a bad option, that meant there were three left! A 1/3 chance of saving Ralsei!
>“Let’s negotiate.”
Kris raised his hands in the air. “Alright, I surrender. Let’s talk this out…”
The hourglass-shaped aristocrat merely laughed in the high school student’s face. “Ohoho~! There is nothing you can offer me that the Dark Knight cannot. The Dark Knight sends his regards~”
SLASH! Chara’s vision blurred, bile rising in his throat as he was confronted with the same CG of Ralsei’s untimely demise. He turned the game off again, pausing to wipe the tears away before reloading for the second time.
>*Distract
“Hey, look!” Kris pointed to a random space behind the queen. “A free pizza giveaway!”
She didn’t lose focus at all. “Hmm… Tempting, but I need to watch my weight. The Dark Knight sends his regards~”
SLASH!
Despite being the third time seeing it, Ralsei’s death still made Chara choke up. Was the character’s resemblance to his brother intentional!? He turned it off and on again. The last option had to be the correct choice, right!? There had to be a way to prevent the pure innocent fluffy boy from meeting a cruel end!
>*Run the bitch through!
Kris grit his teeth, conjuring his weapon. Even though he was still in the Light World, his courage caused his battle armour to manifest then and there. “We’ll see who’s laughing… once I’ve pierced through your beating heart!” Bravery and fury welling up from within, the warrior charged at the tyrant, plunging his sword at her chest!
tink
“It’s a good thing my skimpy outfit is enchanted to be swordproof! The Dark Knight-”
Chara exhaled sharply, pulling the plug of the console out. His heart was racing, his face burned, and he was seeing red.
At the time Dr Gaster finally finished the complete version of his creation, he was satisfied. He was sure Chara would have enjoyed his spin on the standard JRPG. Unfortunately, this satisfaction was quickly shattered by a metal chair headed his way.
An audible crack sounded as the furniture collided with his skull. Dr Gaster hit the floor, seeing stars.
A seething Chara retrieved the chair and lifted it above his head again. “YOUR GAME IS THE WORST! IT’S THE MOST PRETENTIOUS STORY I’VE TOUCHED IN MY LIFE! WHAT DO YOU MEAN, ‘OF COURSE THEY ARE THE SAME’ AT THE BEGINNING!? EVERY KID NAMES THEIR AVATAR AFTER THEMSELVES!”
SMASH!
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN, ‘YOUR CHOICES DON’T MATTER’!? I LIKE GAMES MORE THAN THIS HORRIBLE REALITY BECAUSE I CAN ACTUALLY MAKE CHOICES IN THEM!”
SMASH!
“WHAT IS WITH THE IDIOTIC ‘YOU’RE POSSESSING KRIS ACROSS THE FOURTH WALL’ CRAP!? WHY THE HELL SHOULD THE PLAYER FEEL GUILTY FOR PLAYING VIDEOGAMES!? THAT’S THE STUPIDEST THING I’VE EVER HEARD!”
SMASH!
“AND WHY DID YOU KILL OFF RALSEI!? HE WAS THE BEST CHARACTER IN THIS STEAMING, CANCEROUS PILE OF-!!”
Chara dropped the chair and backed away, withering under the horrified gazes of his parents, who had just entered. With the exception of Dr Gaster’s weak moans of pain, the lab was deathly silent.
Then, Toriel spoke. “Chara Dreemurr. When we get home, I am going to spank you 1000 times. And when I am finished, you are grounded for the next five years.”
His rage vanished, replaced by a gnawing guilt. What had he done…? He was beating and cursing at a helpless old man over a videogame! What kind of scum was he…? 1000 spanks and a grounding were lenient compared to what he really deserved. The boy hung his head as his parents escorted him home. Even if the multiverse theory was true, he bet there was no one in the entire realm of reality with impulse control as poor as his.
Meanwhile, in another world, unconnected in time or space …
It took the combined strength of all three of Kris’ friends to hold him back from further injuring Mr Gaster. After realising he had come to the end of the game Gaster made, he was frothing at the mouth. “GIVE HIM BACK! GIVE HIM BACK! I WANT MY GOATBRO BAAAAACK!”
The combo attack of a good backhand from Susie plus a bucket of ice water over the head from Lancer was enough to cool the teen off. The boy dropped to his knees, panting heavily.
Ralsei cast a healing spell on Mr Gaster, helping him up before bowing deeply. “We are so sorry for the trouble we caused! My friend has issues with his emotions, you see…”
Lancer fidgeted, unable to meet the skeleton monster’s gaze. “He’s normally got a total pokerface, but when he does express himself, he does it full force. When he finished Undertale and realised there was no way to save Asriel – Asriel’s game counterpart, I mean – Kris, uh…” He glanced down at his friend uneasily.
“He went ballistic.” Susie bluntly dropped the message that had to be sent. “You’ll apologise, Kris, now won’t you?”
Kris could almost see the Japanese symbols that denoted MENACING hovering around his classmate’s body. Knowing her, she wouldn’t have given him an option anyway. “Yes! Yes I will. Mr Gaster, I’m really, really sorry for what I did! If you can find it in your heart- I mean, find it in your SOUL to forgive me…”
The skeleton monster dusted himself off. “It’s fine… It’s partly my fault, I shouldn’t have written about real people in my game. If someone like Undyne or Napstablook’s cousin found out their roles in the story, they would have gone bright red… I can only imagine what your older brother would have done if he found out I went through his Deviantart for inspiration.”
He disappeared into the kitchen, then returned wearing oven gloves. In the tray he was carrying were chocolate chip cookies. “I say we put this all behind us and enjoy some snacks.” The delicious scent wafted into the teens’ nostrils, their mouths starting to water.
Their stomachs grumbled even louder when they remembered they all skipped lunch to see Kris play Undertale for the first time in one shot. But…
“Is it really okay? Kris just beat you up, and now you’re offering us food?”
Mr Gaster smiled, kindness shining through his intimidating undead-like appearance. “Don’t worry, Ralsei. I’m not a spiteful monster at all – I don’t hold onto grudges. Besides, I had to use this chocolate anyway.” The sound of boiling water caught his attention. “Oh, I almost forgot! I have tea, too! You can have that as well!”
At the end of the day, the four friends walked away with a warm feeling in their hearts and stomachs. Mr Gaster was a recluse who lived in that strange hill at the outskirts of Hometown. When Kris first saw him, he found the skeleton utterly terrifying… but it turned out he was a kind man after all.
Once the Delta Warriors (and Lancer) vanished from both his field of vision and earshot, Mr Gaster stopped hiding his smirk. Those cookies were spiked with laxatives. Enjoy your violent diarrhoea, you little shits.