Delatrune Chapter 2 just came out, and it’s got us donning our tinfoil hats. It’s just a little bit weirder, a little bit darker, and a little bit more mysterious than the first chapter. It also has more links to the original Undertale. It certainly left us with more questions than answers.
And this is where I drop the obligatory spoiler warning for the whole article. I am going to talk as if you have seen everything there is to see, so if you want to experience any of this for yourself, now is the time to turn back.
So let’s now look at seven lingering questions from Deltarune Chapter 2.
Why is the town strangely isolated?
Let’s start with probably our biggest tinfoil hat theory: Is Kris’s hometown actually isolated from the outside world? There’s always something conveniently preventing you from wandering outside the city limits. While it’s easy to pass this off as just a game mechanic, since nothing exists in the game data outside the town, what if it had story significance?
The only resident who traveled outside the town is Asriel, and we have no direct contact with him. Also, the only other way outside the town is the mysterious doors below the graveyard, which we all know has some weird connection to either Gaster or the greater Undertale multiverse.
It’s possible the town is isolated on purpose, but from what? From humans? Kris is the only human in town, which is weird if humans and monsters are peacefully coexisting. Most people have come to regard the Dark World as “fake,” but maybe the Light World is just as fake…
Who is Ralsei?
In Chapter 2, we learn that any residents of the Dark World that are taken away from their fountain eventually turn to stone. The only exceptions are 1) if they go to Ralsei’s Dark World, since its fountain spews pure darkness, or 2) if they exist as an item in your inventory. Ralsei, however, has now traveled to two separate Dark Worlds and hasn’t turned to stone. In fact, he never even seemed to get sick. So this means he isn’t a resident of the Dark World, right?
Well you would assume as such, but Light World residents all have black-and-white portraits, while Ralsei’s is in color. This is further muddied by the fact that Queen assembles rooms for every member of your party. However, Ralsei doesn’t have a room. Instead, Asriel does.
It would seem like an obvious conclusion to believe Ralsei is Asriel, but Kris doesn’t seem to recognize him. Then again, maybe it’s more accurate to say the player doesn’t recognize him since it’s possible that we are a SOUL possessing Kris, and we never actually see Kris’s basic behavior except when he tears us out of his body.
Why does Kris seem to have trauma related to Asriel?
Kris seems to have major issues with Asrial, though those issues are undefined. When they encounter Asriel’s room in Queen’s manor, they shut their eyes tight when they walk in. They “know what they will find” but refuse to look at it.
In addition, it’s our theory that the sides of the room you sleep in are flip-flopped. The decorated side is Kris’s side and the empty side is Asriel’s side, and you are sleeping in Asriel’s bed. Why? Well Kris’s room in Queen’s manor looks exactly like the left side of the room in their house. It even has all the same things that room has, leading us to believe these are Kris’s genuine interests.
So then why is Kris sleeping in Asriel’s bed? Are they that broken up that he left for college? Or did something darker happen.
Speaking of darker…
What is happening to Kris’s family?
We already know that Kris’s family isn’t in the best situation right now. Toriel and Asgore are divorced, and while it seems as if Kris has moved on, something else is happening.
At the end of the game, if you go to Grillby’sans’s shop, you can see not only Asgore confirming that he and Toriel are divorced (referring to himself as her “eggs-husband”… a bad pun) but also that there is something they need to discuss with Kris and Asriel that they haven’t yet.
Is there a custody battle? Is Kris afraid that they will never see Asriel again?
It’s all very vague and mysterious and we don’t actually have a good theory for this one.
How real is the Dark World?
In Chapter 1, it seemed safe to assume that the Dark World was a sort of “world of imagination.” However, Chapter 2 seems to have changed that quite a bit. For example, if Berdly gets injured in the Dark World, he seems to retain those injuries in the Light World. In fact, if you go on the alternate “weird” or “Snowgrave” route, and kill Berdly in the Dark World, he won’t wake up in the Light World at all. The very fact that Noelle and Berdly can get sucked into the Dark World at all points toward it being more than just a fantasy.
Then, at the end of the chapter we see Kris, acting as the Knight, spawn a Dark Fountain in his house using a knife. This again points toward the Dark World being actually real in some way. But if that’s the case, what is it? What is it’s true nature and how did Kris gain the ability to spawn Dark Fountains? Also why is the Dark Fountain at Ralsei’s castle “pure.” What significance does the closet have?
Finally, in Chapter 1 we see Alphys offhandedly mention the closet. Presumably she can enter it without going to the Dark World. So what determines whether or not someone can enter the Dark World? What lets Kris, Susie, Berdly, and Noelle in?
What’s up with the ShadowCrystals and optional bosses?
The optional bosses are all kinds of mysterious. Jevil apparently was quite sane until he talked to a particular man, and then went insane and became incredibly powerful.
Spamton is a broken doll who has shades of an actual personality and regrets over someone named “Mike.” Despite the fanbase taking Spamton’s 1997 references to mean that it’s all just one big callback to this one Mike Ditka commercial, we think there’s something else going on here.
So… do our choices matter after all?
In chapter 1, the overall theme seemed to be: Your choices don’t matter. No matter what we did, the game ended the same. Sparing and fighting enemies had no difference. In fact, if you fought enemies they would just run away. You couldn’t actually kill any of them.
That’s not the case in Chapter 2. The “Snowgrave” route straight up lets Noelle kill enemies, and we not only get to see her earn XP and get stronger from it, but also see her morally crumble from the violence. Not only that, but we are told that our choices to either spare and recruit enemies, or attack and lose them, will have major impacts down the line.
So just how much choice do we have here, Toby Fox?
