History Lesson

"Whoosh-" Frisk sidestepped the "Strike" character Linde shot at her.

Linde clapped. "Excellent! You can dodge bullet patterns pretty well now!"

With that, he fired a "Heal" character at Frisk, instantly healing the minor injuries she had suffered earlier.

After a day of experimenting, Linde discovered that he could only fire one character at a time. Very few characters actually worked, and different characters consumed different amounts of soul power.

The characters known to work so far were as follows: (assuming Linde had 10 soul power)

Life: fully restored one living being. Energy cost: 8.

Death: instantly killed one living being. Energy cost: 10.

Strike: dealt 1 HP of damage to any living being. Energy cost: 0.1.

Heal: restored 5 HP to one living being. Energy cost: 1.

Haste: doubled one living being's speed for 5 minutes. Energy cost: 2.

Blade: doubled one living being's attack for 5 minutes. Energy cost: 2.

Shield: doubled one living being's defense for 5 minutes. Energy cost: 2.

Dispel: cleared all bullets within a certain area. Energy cost: 4.

Note: recovered 1 soul power every ten minutes.

Linde was very pleased with his ability. Although he couldn't fill the sky with bullets like monsters could, it was far more versatile than ordinary bullet attacks.

"All right, that's enough. We should go have our lesson with Mom." Copying Linde's manner, Frisk strode casually into the house without looking back.

Linde shook his head with a smile and followed her inside.

"All right, children. Today, I'll be teaching you the true ancient history of monsterkind." Toriel adjusted her glasses and spoke solemnly.

"But Mom, we've already read about ancient history." Linde held up a book he had taken from the shelf earlier and waved it.

Toriel smiled and shook her head. "Then let me ask you this: after reading that history, did you feel that humans were utterly evil, while monsters were especially kind?"

Linde understood at once. Well, well. Political correctness, huh?

Knowing that both children understood, Toriel began her account. "Back then, the ancient king made some changes to the history books to fill the monsters with fighting spirit.

"Many monsters know that absorbing a human soul makes a monster incredibly powerful. Seven human souls can even turn a monster into a god.

"And yet, the history books claim that no monster has ever successfully absorbed a human soul. That alone is a contradiction.

"I learned the true history from Justice's Hammer Gerson-the only monster who lived through the great war and is still alive."

"In fact, humans and monsters had already had many conflicts long before that. However, because neither race wanted to fight, they maintained a superficial peace.

"Then, one day, a human happened to die in front of a monster.

"It's worth mentioning that when humans die, their souls dissipate within minutes unless they're preserved in special containers.

"In any case, that monster absorbed the human's soul without really understanding what was happening.

"He discovered that he had gained incredible power. With that power, he became utterly ruthless, slaughtering humans across the world at will and absorbing more souls to grow even stronger.

"After slaughtering seven humans, he became so powerful that there was no way to defeat him.

"He went on to kill more humans, only to discover that he couldn't absorb any more souls. In a rage, he wiped out several human cities.

"But no one expected the souls inside him to start rebelling against him, ultimately sending him to his grave.

"As an aside, the current king has declared that he intends to absorb seven human souls and become a god, then break the barrier to free the monsters and wipe out the humans on the surface.

"The ridiculous thing is that he knows perfectly well those souls will rebel if he does."

Seeing Toriel grow angrier as she spoke, Linde hurried to soothe her. "Mom, don't get worked up. Um... what happened next? What happened after he died?"

"Oh, all right. I'll continue... After that monster died, the humans' hatred of monsters erupted completely because their cities had been slaughtered. Then the great war began.

"During the war, because the humans had already taken precautions against monsters absorbing souls, they didn't allow a single human to die.

"In the end, just as the history books say, the humans suffered no casualties, while the monsters suffered terrible losses. Toward the end of the war, the monsters were also slaughtered by the humans...

"Almost all the surviving monsters favored peace, so the monsters finally surrendered to the humans.

"To prevent monsters from threatening humans again, seven human mages sealed the monsters beneath Mount Ebott.

"After that, the monsters actually began to forget their hatred of humans, until... no, I'm sorry. That concludes our ancient history lesson."

Linde knew that Toriel had just recalled some deeply unpleasant memories. He sighed inwardly. So this was what really happened?

He found it a little ironic. Humans and monsters had both been right and wrong in this matter. It wasn't so much a question of right and wrong as one of which side they stood on.

Suddenly, he looked over at Frisk, only to find her looking ready to fall asleep.

Linde sighed. Frisk had been unable to sleep for the past two nights, and he knew why.

As long as she kept living in the Ruins, that voice would shout at her every night: "Frisk, for the future of humans and monsters, wake up-"

That voice was what kept her from sleeping.

He looked at Frisk with an ache in his heart. Maybe we'll have to leave the Ruins after all...

With that thought in mind, he looked at Toriel, who sat beside the fire reading a book with a smile on her face. A flicker of reluctance crossed his eyes.

If only we could just keep living here...

Linde shook his head and pushed the thought aside.

He glanced at Frisk, who was suffering terribly from her sleepless nights, then resolutely stood and walked toward Toriel...