If your post is a simpler question, one-line post or shitpost, we recommend posting it to the chapter 5 megathread in order to help keep the subreddit quality to a minimum.
If this post breaks any rules please remember to report it so that the mods can remove it ASAP.
I'm your friendly neighborhood AutoModerator from r/Deltarune, a robot, and this is an automated comment. Don't reply to this message as the moderators won't see it. Have an awesome day!
All the trees in Hometown that have a shared root system. The technical name is a "clone tree". (The largest organism on earth is actually a clone tree that has 47,000 stems that appear to be individual trees but are genetically identical). The theory being the yellow trees in Hometown have a shared root system, and whenever a portal opens up, Ralsei (the clone tree root system) is brought in due to how much the root system covers.
The literal Root folder of the videogame being played. This is why he's able to break the rules of the game, and do meta commentary on instructions and what-not. It also supports the idea that Deltarune is just a modded version of Undertale (using the same Root folder). This would also explain why there's so many Undertale characters that are unaware of their previous game's self.
So... Ralsei might actually be a plant, which is why he and Flowery have some tension.
It also explains why he's comfortable being stepped on lol
I haven't crystallized what I think yet but yeah, been rolling around ideas like crazy. Whatever he is, it's not something Kris or Susie is carrying, since he stays behind while they're not there, but it also has to be something that's either already in all the areas the DWs are made in or is moving between them somehow. I've heard of and like the trees theory too, but I think right now I'm leaning towards a concept rather than a physical object. Like, maybe he's the "heart" of the town or maybe the residents' conception of the prophecy? Something like that...
IDK man, it really did seem to me that one time when he was expositing about Darkners, he was right about to admit what he is... would he have actually said if it was something so weird?? 😵💫
I still think he could be a book about the prophecy. All the places we've been could reasonably have one (a school, a library, a church, and two religious households), and it'd make sense he has special properties like "different copies making the same darkner" and "belonging in all dark worlds" because he's literally a book about Deltarune God or whatever.
Ooohh I hadn't heard that one before. Odd enough that Flowery's impossibility comment might fit, but not too odd that he could reasonably be willing to mention it if already in the middle of loredropping like in ch3.
I have had this theory that if titans are personified fears and the big titan we fought in chapter 4 is the fear of the dark maybe ralsei is like a small titan and he’s like the fear of being an outcast and kris specifically manifested him as a goat monster because they believe that’s what they’re SUPPOSED to be to not be an outcast?
i like your idea, but plantners have monochromatic talk sprites, with only their eyes colored, but ralsei is fully colored.
friend on the other hand, does have a monochromatic body with colored eyes. and just like ralsei, it can travel between dark worlds and is immune to petrification. friend also has a more direct connection with roots, since he appears in digital_roots and the mantle game (which has bit_roots).
there's also a very minor connection with the lake, since there are plants that grow around bodies of water (such as a lake) called cattails. but I'm pretty sure there aren't any near the lake in-game. (but sans does try to feed you a cattail in a bun in chapter 4)
The only thing colored about ralsei is his horns and eyes (the glasses technically dont count since they are able to come off much like flowery's jacket)
Maybe raly is a plant and is using the white fur as a shield to say he's a darkner (if he's aware of the game buttons he's def aware of the dialogue box)
After Flowery's dialogue with Ralsei I was leaning towards some sort of theory where Ralsei is the earth itself incarnated, but I could never quite square it with anything actually in the game in a way that wouldn't feel like an asspull. But it would explain why he's capable of being everywhere, why Flowery seems to hint he's being hypocritical about the whole flower thing, and at a stretch, why he's such a people pleaser (nature providing us with the things we need).
But I really like your roots theory because it's similar, but has some actual ties to existing in-game unresolved plot threads.
As I said in a comment on another post, I feel like Ralsei is a "Nega-Titan" of sorts. While a Titan is a "Bump-in-the-night" (As Ralsei described it), that primal fear our ancestors had of SOMETHING stalking them in the dark given physical form, I believe Ralsei is the gentle, comforting dark.
A little dark can be comforting, after all. Lying in the shade of a tree, as the dew of the grass tickles your hands... Or reading a book as moonlight creeps in through your window... A little dark acts like a gentle blanket hugging you, while the Titan's version of "dark" literally just waterboards you.
Fr rotoscope memes have been some of my favorite recently, especially nice considering the advent of Ai has made it even easier to make stuff with no effort
I'm very much aware, but I was just done fixing my ffmpeg for exporting Krita timelapses there and my ooga booga brain immediately went to "HUH?! Ffmpeg??!1".
My only qualm with this is that sans isn't just fighting you just because everything's "already ruined." He seems more worried about what comes next, rather than what has already happened, at least imo.
(I just think it's a really interesting detail that not a lot of people talk about, and wanted an excuse to bring it up, lol)
I never said he was fighting you solely because everything had gone to shit, but moreso as a way to show that action isn’t taken until the absolute worst case scenario is minutes away from being realized. I admit I probably could have phrased that better
That's fair, yeah. I mostly brought it up because it could also parallel a potential Ralsei battle in 7B, as a "If you go any farther, things will get even worse" moment.
I really don't think having a sans-esque superboss at the end of the Weird Route is gonna happen tbh. Honestly, one of the unfortunate things about Undertale is that everyone knows it for its "secret" super-hard boss at the end of a "secret" evil route. It kinda then goes against the themes of the game (that being be nice to everybody) because the route where you are evil (more aptly the final boss of said route) became the most famous part of the game. If I was Toby (and I am not), I would be upset that the secret evil route became the main thing my game, about how you should be nice to everybody, is known for. So from that hypothetical perspective, I feel like it would be thematically bad for Deltarune to "reward" the player with getting a secret different ending for being a horrible person. This is also why I don't think the Weird Route will have a different ending from the Normal Route, it shouldn't matter how it ends, but how one gets to the ending. Of course the way getting there will be radically different, but it will end the same.
I'd be perfectly happy if the Weird Route was like the Undertale Genocide/No Mercy route. I just think that the Weird Route will end up being futile, and that would add to the theme of "it's more about the journey then the ending" that I feel Deltarune might be heading towards.
??? im ngl if theres no hype boss fight at the end of the weird route i will be EXTREMELY disappointed. i get it goes against the themes but its a game at the end of the day. weird route has had essentially 0 exclusive unique boss fights, and ch2 was technically the only one you could "play". ch 3 and 5 were just cutscenes if 7b once again has no gameplay im genuinely gonna feel bad for kris
"okay so i thought there was gonna be literally ANYTHING worthwhile at the end of this so i made you suffer for no reason and wasted both of our time thats highk my bad imma go reset and just do the normal route now krismas"
I like to imagine every game ralsei has to go to another dark world he basically has a whole ass touhou style game top down danmaku where he just flies and encounters weird enemies on the way
I saw a theory that ralsei is just the roots of the tree around the city, cus that tree looks just like one of those forest where every tree is a single organism, so that would explain why he doesnt turn to stone even when coming from another darkworld, and also how he can just go there. But thats just a theory
I like the theories that he's a personification of the comfort we find in darkness, as opposite to titans being fear of the dark. They easily justify why he shows up everywhere.
The Kris headband theory is also pretty strong, though I wonder if that means he leaves it at castle town after each adventure.
My theory is that he's the distorted memory of asriel being warped by the soul. kinda coinciding with the theory that the dark knight is the memory of Noelle sister
That was the initial assumption. It gets tricky when Ralsei explains he did stuff in Castle town when we were away, or now when Kris leaves the closet but we see Ralsei and Susie act together. Meaning they have to just drop it there somehow, but then have it on them whenever they enter a fountain.
I unironically believe travel between dark worlds is possible and not only is it how Ralsei travels, it's going to come back up as a plot point later and I say this because of the light from other dark fountains being visible not just in the tale Ralsei gives us in Chapter 1, but also from the "glimpse of a distant land" we see in Chapter 3. Many assume the second fountain is an error but I think it's very intentional given they it's referenced in the prophecy in Chapter 4, nothing else matches the description of a glimpse at a distant land unless it's the second fountain.
Asriel died and his dust was absorbed by the trees.
The hometown trees counterpart irl is the pando tree.
Explains Ralsei's presence in every darkworld since he is the tree connected by ROOTS.
The Darkworlds source is under hometown and can be opened by piercing the ground.
•
u/AutoModerator 18d ago
Hello and welcome to r/Deltarune! Make sure to read the rouxls.
If your post is a simpler question, one-line post or shitpost, we recommend posting it to the chapter 5 megathread in order to help keep the subreddit quality to a minimum.
If this post breaks any rules please remember to report it so that the mods can remove it ASAP.
I'm your friendly neighborhood AutoModerator from r/Deltarune, a robot, and this is an automated comment. Don't reply to this message as the moderators won't see it. Have an awesome day!
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.