The fire burned low. The mountain, soaked in rain, watched in silence. The man hadn't spoken in a while—not since his last words had faded into the hiss of the storm. The girl sat motionless, but her fingers fidgeted, unsure.
Then she made a sign. Just one—two fingers raised, then turned down, mimicking a person falling again.
The man stared at her for a long moment beneath the deep shadows of his hood. And though his face remained unseen, something about his stillness said more than words ever could.
"Yes," he finally said, the fire casting a faint reflection in the wet stones. "The story didn't end. It reset. But not the way it had before…"
—
It began the same way.
Frisk opened their eyes in the bed of golden flowers, light bleeding through the cracks in the Underground ceiling. Their expression was blank, unreadable. In another time, they had smiled. In another time, they had extended a hand.
But not here.
Chara appeared beside them, her presence a whisper, a hum just beneath the skin of the world. She looked… curious. Something felt different. Off. She watched Frisk as they stood, brushed dust from their shirt, and took their first step forward with a silence that carried weight.
The ruins were familiar, but wrong.
The atmosphere itself seemed hollow. Light didn't fall the same way. The dust clung too thickly in the corners. Even the flowers wilted just slightly at the edges.
Then, the first encounter.
A Froggit leapt out of the darkness, just like before.
But this time, Frisk didn't spare it. They struck.
The hit landed. The Froggit didn't move again.
There was no EXP. No LV. Just… silence.
Chara recoiled.
"Why…?" she whispered, her voice faint with shock. "Why did you…?"
Frisk didn't respond. Their eyes were blank. Their footsteps echoed too loudly as they moved on, leaving the corpse behind.
And that was the beginning.
Chara followed, confused, trying to reason. She spoke of kindness, of second chances. She reminded Frisk of what they had done before—of the people they had saved.
But when the next monster came, Frisk killed again.
A Whimsun. Then a Loox. Then a pair of Froggits. The Ruins grew quiet—too quiet.
Chara's voice cracked as she pleaded, "Please stop… You don't have to do this…"
But Frisk remained silent.
With each strike, each lifeless body left behind, Chara grew dimmer. Not weaker—but quieter. Broken. Her voice trembled. Her words faltered.
"You're… hurting them. They're scared. Don't you remember what it was like before? We made friends. We were happy…"
Still, Frisk continued.
Their expression never changed, but something inside them stirred—an echo of something unfamiliar. Something cold. The halls of the Ruins grew emptier. The music that once played in the walls fell silent.
When they passed the room where Napstablook usually hovered, there was nothing there. The ghost had fled.
Chara barely spoke now, only whispering when Frisk lingered at a SAVE point. "You feel it too, don't you? The way the world's… twisting?"
Then came the final corridor before the exit.
Toriel waited in her home, as warm as it had always been. She served pie again. She smiled and spoke with gentle concern.
But the tension hung heavy in the air, unspoken but loud.
Frisk looked at her across the table, the flicker of the fire playing in their eyes.
"Do you wish to leave the Ruins?" Toriel asked.
Frisk nodded once, slowly.
The screen went dark.
—
Back on the mountain, the girl shifted. Her arms were wrapped tightly around herself now. Her brow furrowed. Her fingers pressed together, then drew a single X in the dirt—stop.
The man said nothing at first.
"I know," he whispered. "It hurts, doesn't it? Watching it break."
She didn't look at him. Her gaze stayed locked on the fire, but her shoulders trembled slightly. She hadn't expected this. Not after everything she'd seen before.
"Sometimes," the man said softly, "the world gives us another chance. But sometimes… we use that chance to do harm."
The rain had started again, soft as breath, falling around them in a quiet rhythm.
"And so begins another path. One we must follow, no matter how dark it gets."
The girl looked up then, eyes filled with something unspoken—confusion, fear, sorrow. But she said nothing.
The man only nodded.
"We'll walk it together."