Nightmare Fuel / Inverted Fate

NO! NO!!!! THIS IS ALL JUST A BAD DREAM. IT ISN'T REAL! IT CAN'T BE...

— Papyrus

ALL SPOILERS ARE UNMARKED

---

Main Comic

Neutral Route Arc

• The fact that in this AU, Frisk didn't have enough Determination to win against Asriel, and he successfully reset the timeline. Word of God says one of the reasons the changes caused were because he didn't quite have control over his powers… Just imagine what he could have done if he did.
  • When Asriel finds himself back in flower form, he decides to "help" Frisk (who he still thinks is Chara), who has no memory of the original timeline, so that he can get to the Souls again. Just knowing that he's using them to get what he wants with them being none the wiser is unsettling.
• Frisk's journey through the Ruins is fun… until they are killed in an encounter with a Loox, a Migosp, and the Dummy. Their reaction upon waking up at the point where they last saved, with the narration describing their pain, can be a surprise to anyone who thought that Frisk wouldn't be too affected by resetting after death. Especially if you've gotten many Game Overs from playing Undertale.
  • Even worse, after they successfully survive the encounter that killed them previously, they flee from every encounter after that, not wanting to die again. That one death must have been really traumatic for them.
  • Asgore asking Frisk over the phone if they're alright certainly doesn't help.
• In the playable version of the Asgore boss fight, choosing to flee the first time results in Flowey revealing himself as Asriel to Asgore and acting helpless, knowing that he will kill himself to offer his SOUL to him, before telling Frisk that Asgore was killed by monsters who didn't want him to look after a human in the Ruins, making them feel guilty about wanting to stay.
• In Waterfall, Flowey finds out that Frisk is not Chara as he initially thought they were. He does one of his famous Nightmare Faces as he tells himself that "everything will be right" when he gets the SOULS again.
• Undyne. She's now the Royal Scientist, and has created many weapons to stop humans and get that last Soul needed to break the spell. She's also much more bitter and angry than in canon, due to the Waterfall Incident and her involvements with the DT experiments, and she's determined to destroy the Barrier no matter what. She's also aware of Frisk's Save Scumming, and is possibly planning to use that against them…
• In the playable version of the boss battle against Alphys, it's possible to kill her when her guard is down. Frisk won't take it well, and Undyne will be furious. Even worse is the fact that even if you replay the fight and spare Alphys, Undyne will still remember what happened before, and it's implied that Frisk and Papyrus have lost their only chance of getting through to her, all because of what you, the player, did.
  • You can kill Alphys up to three times. After the third time, Chara will actually talk to you, calling you out for forcing Frisk to do something they didn't want to, and warning you that you won't get off easily for it when you spare her afterwards (Frisk will break the Fight button if you try to kill her again). The fact that this happens on a blank screen with no dialogue sound, much like if you open Undertale after completing a genocide run, makes it even more chilling.
    Chara: ...Really? Three times. You went through this three times just to see what would occur. I know you are not Frisk. I’ve suspected something was amiss, but I suppose this confirms it.
  • Some of the "Flee" endings involve Flowey revealing himself to Undyne and telling her some sort of alternative plan to using their SOUL. If you fled after killing Alphys, she'll be annoyed that she can't kill Frisk if they're staying in Snowdin, but since it also affects Flowey's plans, it's implied that the two are going to work together, and that Flowey could end up betraying her.
• In Hotland, the save points look slightly glitchy, but still seem to function normally. What's causing them to be that way has yet to be revealed, but whatever it is will most likely have consequences later…
  • They look even more distorted in the CORE, to the point where they look more like yellow smears than save points.
  • The fact that Undyne can see save points and remember every instance of Frisk resetting…
• In the CORE, when Mad Dummy becomes Mad Mew Mew, they do something to Frisk's SOUL that causes Chara to become temporarily separated from them… and visible to them, Mad Mew Mew, Undyne, and Flowey. Meaning that Chara can be recognized.
• The fight with Undyne involves her using a Humongous Mecha called the Determinator. Frisk dies a few times, and it soon gets to the point where Undyne tells them their next death will be permenant.
  • That's not all; Undyne reveals that not only is she aware of reloads, but she also knows that the person Frisk is talking to is Chara.
• Undyne's appearance after the Determinator explodes — half of her face is revealed to be made of metal, and she also has wires implanted into her arms, which Word of God says were to keep her body stable after she took too much DT.
• The Undyne fight ends with Frisk attacking her out of desperation, resulting in her melting away due to her Determination, but not before Mettaton tries to help her… only for it to make him share the cruel fate.
  • Even worse is what Undyne and Mettaton say when this happens:
    Undyne: nO nO NO No NOT YOU TOO no no NO WHY mY PRRoMISEPROMISEPROMISE
    Mettaton: whAT wHAT whY it hurts it hurts it HURTS WhAT IS THIS
• As if it wasn't bad enough, Word of God has said that there was no way for Frisk to spare Undyne without attacking her and causing her to melt first and then reloading, as it's meant to be similar to the neutral ending in canon where Asgore dies the first time he is fought and a reset is required for the Pacifist Ending.

True Pacifist Arc

• When Frisk and Papyrus investigate the present boxes in the children's room at Toriel's house, they find the box that's supposed to have the locket is empty and Chara is confused, knowing it should've been there. Meanwhile, Flowey has started smiling in the background — NEVER a good sign. When Frisk and Papyrus look in the other box, they find something else...
  Frisk: ... Huh. A note?
  Chara: It says... (sudden Oh, Crap! expression) "I KNOW YOU'RE THERE."
  • Judging by their expression, Chara's realized exactly who left this note and that he's figured it out.
• Flowey knowing that Frisk has Chara attached to their SOUL makes the moments where he's ostensibly speaking to Frisk, but really to Chara, feel very creepy; he clearly still views Chara as his friend, but the scenes feel like he's playing a cat-and-mouse mindgame with them, with Chara helpless to do anything but watch as he manipulates everyone else and winks at Chara about it. Having figured out that Chara has been trying to warn Frisk behind his back not to trust him for whatever reason, and now viewing Chara's attempt to keep him from the SOULs as a game the two of them are playing, he tosses this out:
  Flowey: (smiling reassuringly) Aw, don't look so glum, buddy! You should be smiling, too. Aren't you excited? Aren't you happy? (smile suddenly turns sinister) YOU'RE going to be free.
• After the Toriel battle, Flowey gains control over the timeline via the SOULs and decides to let Frisk believe they're still in control of the SAVE file. The next time they save, the file briefly displays Flowey's name, maxed out LV and time like during the Photoshop Flowey encounter, and location text replaced with "I WIN, CHARA."
• The True Lab fully lives up to its counterpart in the original timeline in sheer creepiness. To wit:
  • The Mechamalgamates, the result of Undyne trying to keep the melting monsters stable via cybernetics. The first Frisk runs into is AVN-13, a mechanical bird with torn butterfly wings, a bloodshot eye, and a frog-like tongue that the Everyman bullet attempts to use to attack Frisk… only to end up strangling itself instead. AVN-13 then summons butterflies to throw the Everyman's corpse as a projectile.
  • Frisk decides to watch the tapes after making sure it's okay with Chara. The first tape starts off the same as in canon, with Toriel talking to Asgore... and then her second line of dialogue ends in garbage text and the screen cuts to a warning about "flashing lights and imminent possibility of pain and seizure" with a dull industrial noise. The screen then starts displaying distorted images of the original timeline while a staticky sound plays. As the images start changing faster and faster, the TV screen starts to crack and eventually explodes.
  • Mettaton's body gets hijacked by Memoryheads, forcing Frisk, Papyrus, and Alphys to fight in order to bring him back to his senses.
    • In Undertale, the Memoryheads all shared a sprite. Here, they each have a unique sprite in their classic shape that's been assembled out of the sprites of various characters and objects, and if you look closely, you'll find that these are actually taken from the original timeline, which no longer exists. There's also a fourth Memoryhead.
    • Glitchy text is everywhere in this fight, from the Memoryheads' dialogue being written as if it were text strings for a game to Mettaton's dialogue pouring out from his dialogue box and fading in and out of view. Most of it is taken from Undertale (including unused lines), some of it is from Deltarune (as an easter egg), and while Mettaton's lines are mostly what he said in the old timeline, parts of them are actually him calling out for help, indicating that he's fully aware of what's happening to his body.
    • Mettaton strikes poses and his face glitches into different expressions whenever he tries speaking. Those poses and expressions, along with his default stance for this battle, aren’t reused from the first fight with him. They're a call-back to Mettaton EX.
• Part 61 is where the other shoe finally drops. Flowey reveals his true colors by trapping everyone in vines yet again, then takes perverse glee in hurting Frisk, Chara, Papyrus, and their friends For the Evulz. Once Papyrus finally surrenders and Frisk is forced to flee, Flowey uses his reclaimed god-powers to break the barrier... setting his sights on the human world. The visuals of human SOULs and white fire, while seemingly just a symbolic effect, do not bode well at all.
  • The faces the Flowey makes are terrifying, not helped by various parts of his Photoshop form gradually appearing, and his animation makes him look even more unhinged.
  • Flowey is able to make Mad Mew Mew's separation of Frisk and Chara permanent, but it causes their souls to appear smaller, with them only having a maximum HP of 10 each.
  • The end credits are based on the modern Windows error screen... except the emoticon is of a smile rather than a frown, and the text has Flowey/Asriel taunting us once again.
    Howdy! If you're reading this, then it's already over. This is MY world. And now...
    Hee hee hee. Well, why would I spoil the surprise?
    For more information about this issue and possible fixes, cry about it. It's too late.
  • The post credits scene is an opening based on Undertale's, showing Asriel leaving for the surface with the implication that he's going to either kill all the humans in the city or absorb their souls the same way he did the monster's. Either way, it's strongly hinted that his power will be even greater than that of just seven human SOULs...
  • Frisk's friend from the surface is shown to be close to arriving in the Underground, which means that when she gets there, it will be mostly empty. She'll also likely find her old friend in a seriously bad mental state.
    • A secret page shows that after she recovered from her injuries, she was adopted. What will happen when she finds out her family were killed or left in a soulless state while she was away?
  • It's easy to overlook, but one of the images shown in the new intro is of Chara's hand reaching out of the ground, revealing that not only is Asriel powerful enough to bring them Back from the Dead, but they had to dig their way out of their own grave. It must have been really unpleasant for them to wake up in the soil like that, and it's lucky they didn't die again from suffocation.
    • In the following chapter, you'll see that the hole they dug themself out of is quite big, making it seem like it took them a while to do so.

Final Arc Part 1 (NULL)

• All of the new songs introduced after Asriel successfully reset the timeline are named like file names you'd find if you dug through the game's code, indicating how terribly wrong the situation is.
• If you attempt to reset in the menu of "Null_1," the child Asriel shown walking with Chara will glare back at you, accompanied by the message:
  I WORKED TOO HARD FOR THIS. I WON'T LET YOU.
• When Frisk finds Chara, they are laughing to themself about the fact Asriel succeeded again, blaming themself for it and believing that they didn't deserve to be brought back to life. Their expressions alternate between Hidden Eyes and a very unnerving smile. What's even creepier is the background noise that sounds like a more intense verson of what plays at the end of a genocide run in Undertale.
  Chara: Isn't. That. FUNNY?
  • Remember how the gift boxes in New Home were empty? Chara now has both of the items from them, implying that Asriel gave those to them when he resurrected them. When Frisk approaches, Chara tries to scare them off with the dagger, and magic attacks of fire and vines. While they're not actually trying to kill Frisk (in fact, in the playable version you won't get hit at all if you don't move), it's still unsettling to see them this way after they've spent most of the comic being the more level-headed of the two.
• When we see the Ruins, they are not only grey with all the flowers having wilted, but there are glitching effects everywhere.
• Frisk has clearly had enough of Flowey's taunts, strangling an Echo Flower holding a message from the former weed. The way it happens so abruptly makes it almost like a Jump Scare.
  Frisk: Shut the HELL up!
• Whenever either of the humans read a sign while an image of Asriel or Flowey is visible, its mouth moves as if to imply that Asriel is speaking through it. Sometimes its eyes also move, indicating that he's watching them.
• The snow statues of Flowey and the snow vines after Frisk and Chara complete the noughts and crosses puzzle in the corrupted Snowdin. Frisk shoots one of them down, though it doesn't do much to reduce their menace. One of them is even a thorn with Asriel's head at the end.
  • One of the earlier rooms has the glitching effect turn part of the ground into a smiley face similar to that of Photoshop Flowey. The way it's animated is unsettling.
• The Asriel-fied holo-sky in Snowdin Town is a dark red sky with black clouds and Asriel's visage watching over Frisk and Chara, and that's before you see all the messages on the signs and buildings designed to wear down on them.
  (On the "Welcome to Snowdin" sign) BUT NOBODY CAME
  (On the shop and inn signs) GIVE UP
  (On the signs for Grillby's) HOPELESS, CRY INTO THE DARKNESS, EMPTY
  (On the library sign) ALONE, WORTHLESS
• When Frisk goes inside Sans and Papyrus' house, Asriel taunts them with an illusion of the two skeletons and the house looking normal, leading to them punching the floor when it disappears.
  • The house's actual appearance has the portal to the socket dimension missing, and the pet rock's plate broken. The picture of the bone upstairs has also been replaced with a picture of Papyrus tied up in vines.
• In one of the Forgespring shops, Chara finds that Asriel left a picture of the two of them to put in their locket and give them an extra 5HP. The effect of their HP increasing by 1 each time when they use it makes it look as if it's painful for them, and they also find that they can't remove the locket when they get the idea to give it to Frisk.
• In Null_5, Lilac recognizes Chara as the dead child from a century ago. Having Chara talk to Lilac the second time in the playable version of the fight reveals that Chara's Abusive Parents made a statue of them as a "memorial" to them. This means that if Chara ran into other humans on the surface, they would likely be recognized.
• The end credits for each part of the "Null" arc (with the exception of "Null_4") show the view of the surface from the end of Undertale, while it's raining. In the distance, a glitching effect can be seen on the city, and above it is some kind of purple circle that seems to be doing something to the place, progressing with each chapter. Also, in the playable versions of "Null_1" and "Null_5", the game closes itself at the very end.
  • During the end of "Null_3", the end credits were altered so that they played on a TV similar to Photoshop Flowey's, which showed the fierce down power of rain and lightning that emerged from the dark void above the city.
  • While "Null_5" was a Breather Episode, it ended with Asriel being upset about the fountain he wanted to show Chara before he announced that they'd have a brand-new world to themselves. The background was now distorted, and the void expanded slightly before it ended with the absorption of more energy into itself before it swallowed the city and the credits ended abruptly.
• "Null_6" is mostly a Breather Episode involving Lilac and Frisk reuniting. Things take a turn for the dark once they take the elevator upwards. Aside from the vines with eyes preventing them from turning back, the areas are all corrupted and greyed out. Then when the trio reach the gate, there is a creepy monochrome flower resembling Asriel's former flowery form. Once they leave, the flower takes on a familiar face before the episode ends. The post credits scene has a monologue by Asriel involving his goal of creating a new world. The scene is tinged with the heavy implication that the void has succeeded in consuming the town, with several souls floating in the background.
• We finally find out what the meaning of all those extra human SOULs from the new intro is... Asriel has indeed been taking them from the humans in the city. But, unlike the monsters, their bodies don't disappear - they instead become lifeless and grey and are technically still alive. Not only that, but Asriel seems to be able to control them like puppets, making them point in the directions he wants the humans to go.
  • Lilac also ends up as a victim of this. She slowly loses her color, and both her overworld and dialogue sprites get the "lost soul" effect over her face as she turns grey and collapses, her SOUL floating away from her body. The fact that it happens so casually without Asriel showing up or altering a sign to taunt Frisk over it just makes it even more chilling.
  • The post-credits scene for "Null_7" implies that Asriel isn't just adding Lilac to the thousands of SOULs he already has but is instead planning to do something else. It certainly doesn't help that a person's SOUL is still conscious, and while all the absorbed SOULs aren't fully aware of what's going on due to there being so many of them, Lilac most likely will be if she isn't also absorbed...

Final Arc Part 2 (RIFT)

• The teaser poster for the second act of the Final Arc.
  • Asriel's fully revealed first form is hovering above the three humans with a silhouette of an even bigger form of Asriel at the bottom, accompanied by the silhouettes of monsters who were absorbed, including Papyrus right behind Chara, along with some new faces.
  • There are red hands reaching towards the center.
  • Lilac is presented with Hidden Eyes and has red "strings" over her which are also above other monsters to her left.
    • Lilac's presence in the poster suggests that she would at least have a decent amount of screentime even after what happened to her, but her state in the poster implies that things aren't going to go too well for her.
• Rift 2 falls more into Realism-Induced Horror but it's clear that Asriel's unhealthy toxic idealization of Chara and seeing the tragedies that befell him as part of a religious narrative of his ascension show how corrupted he's become. The entire video has Asriel trying to gaslight Chara and Frisk into accepting what is effectively a cult with himself as God. The whole part comes across as extremely eerie, especially for those with religious trauma.
  • Worse still, Asriel actually uses Lilac's visage for a cultist who tells them that Frisk was nothing without Flowey and that they owe everything to him, showcasing Asriel's gross entitlement and need to kick Frisk where it hurts. Except it's not just her visage, it's actually her soulless body being controlled by him, and at one point she uses the exact same smile Flowey had after absorbing the six souls.
  • The Effigy of Ego has a very unsettling art style reminiscent of Photoshop Flowey, and speaks with a deep voice in a creepy-looking font that doesn't appear in speech bubbles. It has a creepy smile most of the time, but becomes angrier as the fight goes on with Chara and Frisk rejecting it and pointing out that Chara isn't how Asriel views them, resulting in the entire area falling apart.
• Rift 3 starts with the aftermath of the previous fight, with the once splendid cathedral now reduced to a monochrome husk. After a chat with Spamton and further exploration of the Rift, Frisk and Chara are separated. Chara gets a castle to themself, which is a Gilded Cage where Chara can have whatever they wants except for Frisk. Whenever Chara tries to leave, they're brought back into the room and after the second attempt stuck with a sepia coloured illusion of child Asriel. After several more attempts to escape, Chara ends up having to make use of a glitch in Asriel's room to make a successful escape.
  • After this, Chara is then followed by a ghostly version of the illusion Asriel from earlier. As Chara gets further away, "Asriel"'s face begins to gradually distort as does his dialogue. By the fourth room, flowers start to sprout out of his body. When Chara reaches the throne room, several sepia Floweys emerge from the ground and a hand emerges from "Asriel"'s mouth. The entire sequence is accompanied by a song with distorted sounding lyrics implied to be from Asriel's perspective.
  • In contrast, Frisk is dumped into a tiny room with only a sign, an image of Asriel and a pot of golden flowers. Asriel uses the sign to taunt Frisk about using Lilac as a puppet and it's clear the room is glitched because Frisk can move outside the boundaries of the room. After destroying the sign and trying to leave, Asriel then uses Lilac's soulless body to guilt trip them. When that fails, Asriel himself shows up and reveals that he can take Lilac's soul and give it back to her anytime he likes. After a brief exchange, ending with Asriel leaving in a huff, Frisk ends up finding a castle.
  • When Frisk and Chara reunite, all seems well until "Asriel"'s corpse emerges out of a large present. The corpse transforms into the Pawn of Possessiveness, with two thorny tendrils, two arms and a singular eye emerging out of "Asriel"'s mouth and "Asriel"'s body being tied up in thorns. The fight itself is unnerving due to the Pawn of Possessiveness being very close to the camera whenever its Frisk's turn, the distorted background or how it's plant motif will bring back memories of Photoshop Flowey.
  • The postcredits scene has Lilac tied up as Asriel's prisoner while Asriel monologues to her about he's using her to get back at Frisk for "taking Chara" from him. He then admits he could've easily killed off humanity, viewing them as a mere statisic and that he was being merciful to them. To Lilac's credit, she's easily able to get under his skin, which causes him to shock her with lightning before taking her soul again.
• Rift_4 takes place during a recreation of the day Asriel was killed. The area is depicted with an ominous blood red eclipse among a landscape of hands and tombstones. Asriel is depicted as a towering monster after absorbing Chara's soul and their killers are depicted as shadows yelling abuse, with one of them being implied to be one of Chara's parents. Frisk and Chara are often in danger of being shot with bullets and that's before the reveal that the Asriel recreation is actually the Fiend of Fatality, an embodiment of Asriel's death and associated trauma accompanied by shadows of Asriel and Chara's past selves.
• Rift 6 recounts Asriel's time as Flowey, up to and including his disillusionment with how predictable the monsters became (with everyone's specters simply spouting off lines reflecting their most surface-level traits) before he decides to do a Genocide Route. What's worse is that it's revealed that Flowey was able to find and kill Alphys and her evacuees, which even the player couldn't do in the original game.
  • Flowey's gradual downward spiral into becoming The Sociopath ends up being a case of Realism-Induced Horror. It's possible that Flowey had done enough playthroughs that he may've been trapped in the Underground for years. Years of derealization, dehumanization, isolation and being emotionally numb would've been enough time for Flowey to become a sociopath who sees other people as predictable NPCs who say meaningless things and whose personal lives mean nothing to him.
  • The Entity of Emptiness is heralded by an Ominous Visual Glitch before suddenly cutting to the battle screen, where the Entity appears as an unnerving realistic plush with a large, heart-shaped hole in its chest that has a grey realistic heart inside, which beats with a minimalistic Heartbeat Soundtrack playing for the first half of the fight and throughout the rest of it over the background music, changing in speed and rhythm. Most of its expressions are also terrifying, particularly when it makes its face look like Papyrus' when predicting what he's going to say.
  • As the Entity gets more and more dismayed by the heroes refusing to do anything but spare it, its form starts to collapse. But as it turns out, the Entity was holding resentment towards Asriel for wanting to discard it. So instead of fading away from their feelings like the other figments, it instead comes back together as it states its belief that Asriel will always be empty and never be happy, only for it to be cut off when Asriel traps it in a vine and kills it. That's right, a figment's desires can go against Asriel's, and things might've not ended well if Asriel didn't intervene.
  • Blink and you'll miss it, but during one of the Entity's attacks while it's angry, at one point Frisk reaches 0HP, only to be immediately revived with the rainbow water that they'd previously gotten from Spamton. This makes Emptiness the first figment to have actually killed someone.

GASTOS

• Secret pages 1 and 2 gave hints about something that happened to Undyne in the past, mainly that her body has been melting and she'd had to use "tubes and wires" to keep it together...
• Page 4 was about Toriel's visit from Gaster, who wanted to do something with the Mage's SOUL after they died…
• Page 9 was about Frisk's friend from the surface, Lilac, who found out that they went missing, and her decision to leave to find them. So not only was one child missing, but another would soon be as well. One can only imagine how her new family felt when they found out where she went.
• Page 17 was vastly different from the other pages. It showed various lines of dialogue from Undertale and played some unsettling music. Then some words in Wingdings appeared and when translated, implyed that Gaster was aware of the reader. It also gave an additional password that when used along with Undyne's login, brought up a report that was implied to be about the memoryheads, but parts of it had been censored for some reason.
• Page 28 gives us a look into Chara's thoughts when they went to Mt. Ebott. They're very unsettling for someone who was only 10 years old at the time, and it's implied that they didn't have a good upbringing. While it doesn't go into too much detail, it also shows that their injuries from a lack of flowers to break their fall like the other humans that came after them had were so serious that they barely made it into the main area of the ruins before passing out. Good thing they'd already met Asriel...
• Page 29 reveals that the River Person remembers the previous timeline, but doesn't see it as enough of an issue to tell anyone, instead giving cryptic warnings.
• Page 56 is about when Chara and Asriel caused Asgore to become ill when they made him a pie with buttercups in it. Toriel wasn't home at the time, and all Chara could do was laugh because it completely went against the beliefs that they were an angel who would help to unite humans and monsters.
• Pages 13 and 32 include lines of dialogue that, at the time, had yet to appear in the comic. Some of them are easier to guess than others, as well as what the context will be, most notably the ones from Flowey.