Multiple Endings of Undertale

Setting aside the meta elements, the story of Undertale itself is already quite excellent.

The game is filled with many interesting and charismatic characters.

For example, Sans, who shakes the protagonist's hand while holding a Whoopee Cushion, and his brother Papyrus, who is obsessed with blocking the protagonist with puzzles.

The seemingly lazy Sans loves telling skeleton-related puns and jokes to tease his brother Papyrus.

His brother Papyrus, on the other hand, is very keen on using puzzle mechanisms to block the protagonist, but when the protagonist doesn't actively solve them or can't figure them out, he willingly reveals the answers.

There's also the reclusive doctor.

What shocks players is the conversation with Sans in the golden hallway just before the final boss battle.

There, Sans begins to judge everything the player has done.

From Sans, we learn that EXP is not experience points, but Execution Points.

And LV is not what players think it is, nor is it simply LOVE; it stands for Level of Violence.

Every time the player kills a monster, Execution Points increase, and as Execution Points rise, the Level of Violence also increases.

It's not experience points, nor character levels—it's the game's violence index.

This is where Undertale subverts traditional RPG conventions.

Killing monsters to level up seems like a given for most RPG players.

But in Undertale, it's different.

For most first-time players, they experience the Neutral Ending first, encountering Flowey and feeling shocked by its content.

But if, at the end of the Neutral Ending, the player chooses not to kill Flowey, they learn from it how to achieve the Pacifist Ending.

In the Pacifist Ending, the player must not kill any monster and must befriend every monster through conversation.

Throughout this ending, players discover that each monster has its own unique traits.

Monsters that look fierce often have adorable sides. For example, Undyne is a textbook tsundere!

[Listen, human, we're not just going to be friends.]

[We're going to be best friends.]

[I'm going to make you unable to get enough of me.]

[This is my perfect revenge.]

Under Papyrus's 'provocation,' the captain of the legendary Royal Guard accepts the protagonist as a friend.

She even puts on a cooking lesson for them, even though it burns her house down.

The skeleton brothers, Toriel, Undyne...

Especially when facing the final boss, King Asgore, and Toriel's son, Asriel, countless players are moved to tears.

In this battle, When dying, it doesn't show a game over.

Instead, a line of text appears: Your determination refused.

Finally, with the determination of countless friends, the player defeats Asriel.

At the same time, they learn some of the game's backstory from Asriel.

Long ago, a human child fell into the Underground, was rescued by Asriel, and was taken in by the King and Toriel.

They became best friends, but later, for some reason, the child was lost.

Asriel absorbed the first child's soul, becoming an incredibly powerful being with the power to cross the barrier. He left the Underground for the surface to fulfill his friend's last wish.

But humans mistook him for the murderer of the first child and attacked him. Wounded and stumbling, Asriel returned home, collapsed, and turned to dust, scattering across the garden.

His determination infused a golden flower, which became Flowey.

In this final battle, Asriel finally finds release and relief, letting go of the pain he had clung to for so long.

The Neutral Ending and the Pacifist Ending are both achieved.

It seems players should be satisfied, but curiosity is human nature.

The violence points, Execution Points, and Flowey's evil side all seem to drive players to explore another ending.

And in that ending, players truly experience an indescribable shock and a kind of spiritual reflection.

Sitting in front of the computer, Jiang Ping's expression was very serious.

'3 remaining in current area'

A prompt appeared on the monitor.

In the Underground's scenes, the monsters had been slaughtered. Only three monsters remained unfound in this area.

The map was empty, and the once lively tavern was now deathly silent.

At this moment, Jiang Ping felt an indescribable sensation.

Because of the "Magic Mirror" Gentleman Game, Chen Xu's new work "Undertale" also piqued his curiosity.

The disdain upon first entering the game, and the shock upon clearing it.

After achieving the Neutral and Pacifist endings, he grew curious about the so-called Genocide Ending.

But now he felt a hint of regret.

In the previous game, monsters that were once his friends died one by one at his hands, merely to satisfy the conditions of the game's story.

Including Papyrus, that skeleton like a little angel, who even at death believed he could turn back from evil.

[What a good excuse? You must understand better than anyone how relieving this way is!]

[But at least we're better than those hypocrites who stand by and watch evil—those poor souls want a front-row seat but are too cowardly to do it themselves!]

The game's narration was dripping with irony.

Yet he still didn't stop.

All monsters, every single one, cut down in a single blow.

Until he met the Royal Guard Captain, the fish lady, again.

By a waterfall, Undyne appeared to take a blow meant for a small bean-like monster.

As the captain of the Royal Guard, she had always protected the monsters of the Underground, but now she said she had let them down.

But just as she was about to die, an intense BGM began to play.

The wind howled, accompanied by a flash of white light.

Determination Undyne appeared.

[This hero reshaped herself with the 'determination' to save the world]

Listening to the stirring BGM titled "Battle Against a True Hero," Jiang Ping felt a profound irony.

The monsters in the game were crowned as heroes.

While the protagonist he controlled was doing what monsters should do.

This was the hardest battle he had fought in the game so far.

After exhausting himself to kill Undyne, he pressed forward and finally arrived at a familiar place.

The Throne Room, resplendent and golden, with a familiar figure waiting ahead.

Before this, Sans would judge the player's actions.

And now?

No more wasted words.

It went straight into battle.

[Today is a beautiful day!]

[Birds are singing, flowers are blooming!]

[On days like this, people like you...]

[Should be burning in hell!]

As the words fell, an onslaught like a tidal wave swept in, instantly killing Jiang Ping, who had no defense.

Constant effort, constant attempts.

Finally, just as he was about to defeat Sans.

Sans in the game seemed to think of a plan—to never move during his own turn.

But unfortunately, Sans still failed.

While Sans rested, Jiang Ping quietly crept to the attack point, ambushed him, and killed Sans.

Then Flowey appeared. Unlike the Flowey in the Neutral Ending, this Flowey was terrified of the protagonist, begging not to be killed.

The Next Moment, eight consecutive slashes sliced it into pieces.

Everything seemed over, but then a figure that left Jiang Ping Stunned appeared.

Chara, the first human to fall into the Underground, awakened from death.

Two choices appeared before him: destroy this world, or don't.

Staring at the dead silence of darkness and the eerie Chara, Jiang Ping felt nothing but suffocating oppression.

At first, he just wanted to know the story of this ending.

He regretted it midway, but he didn't stop.

And now, that regret was even stronger.

So he chose no.

But The Next Moment, Chara's expression turned sinister.

[You seem to have misunderstood something? Since when did you get to decide?]

As Chara's words appeared, a flash of blade light swept by.

The game screen trembled, and a string of blood-red damage numbers—9999—flooded the display.

Then the entire game shut itself down.

So this was the ending of the Genocide Route?

Jiang Ping, sitting before the computer, took a deep breath and pressed his lips together.