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Linde opened the door to Sans's observation room. Suddenly, a voice sounded in his mind.

"Come on in... come on in..."

Linde jolted. Where did that voice come from?! A trap! This was definitely a trap!

Without looking back, he quickly fled the observation room.

Just then, pain ten thousand times worse than a wounded soul struck him. In a single instant, it knocked him unconscious.

Terrifyingly, the pain did not end there. This mental torment destroyed his soul outright.

The player poked half their head out of the rift. "The backlash from the power of time... really is terrifying... now... all I need to do is merge the soul from the previous timeline..."

A gray, translucent soul entered Linde's body, stabilizing the consciousness that had been about to slip away.

Memories were stored in the consciousness, so even if the soul was replaced, the memories would not change. Thus, Linde would remember nothing about the Void World.

The player nodded in satisfaction and slipped back into the rift. "Oh, fine. Might as well help Gaster too..."

Linde abruptly sat up in the snow. Recalling that inexplicable pain, his heart raced. It had been so intense that merely thinking about it seemed to make him feel that unbearable agony all over again.

So he simply stopped wondering what had caused it. In his own words, why make himself miserable just to satisfy his curiosity? Curiosity wasn't his soul trait anyway...

Huh?!

Linde stared at his soul in disbelief. When had it turned gray?! And why was it translucent?

Suddenly, sensing something, he summoned his keyboard. Sure enough, it had turned gray too, and there seemed to be more working keys.

Linde was utterly baffled. "What the heck?! How did I get stronger out of nowhere? Could it... have something to do with that earlier... hiss... ow, ow, ow... can't think about it, can't think about it!"

"Linde!" Frisk ran over joyfully. "So this is where you were! I didn't see you at Grillby's just now, and I was worried about where you'd gone."

Linde let out a breath and shook his head. Sans's lab could wait. For now, it was better to keep moving.

Frisk ran up to him, then suddenly stopped in puzzlement. "Your eyes..."

"What about them?" Linde asked, confused.

"Your eyes turned from purple to gray, and... they look so deep..." Frisk unconsciously placed her hand on Linde's face. Two seconds later, she realized what she was doing and hurriedly pulled her hand back, blushing.

"I don't know what happened either, but it probably doesn't matter." Linde helplessly spread his hands.

Frisk couldn't help looking away. "Anyway, I'm sorry... if I hadn't made you force down all that spaghetti earlier, you wouldn't have run into the Dog Couple."

Linde smiled unconcernedly. "It's fine. They were pretty nice. They even treated me to a burger."

"Stop pretending..." Frisk's eyes were red. "There were signs of a fight all over the ground."

The corner of Linde's mouth twitched. It seemed... even if he told her those marks came from him rolling around in the snow, she wouldn't believe him...

"I'm perfectly fine, aren't I?" Linde finally decided to change the subject. "Come on, want to hang out at Grillby's? I'll buy you a burger."

"Okay." Sure enough, Frisk was distracted, and she obediently followed Linde into Grillby's.

"Aha! Sans is here too." Linde waved.

"Come on over, kids. My treat this time." Sans pointed at the two seats beside him.

Once the two children sat down, Sans turned to Frisk. "Do you think my brother Papyrus is cool?"

"Hmm..." Frisk gave it some serious thought. "Honestly, rather than cool, I'd call him cute."

Sans smiled in satisfaction.

After everyone's fries arrived, Frisk accidentally squeezed out too much ketchup, so Sans happily traded fries with her.

"So..." Sans suddenly changed the subject. "Have you heard of a talking flower?"

Up on the roof, a certain flower nearly fell off upon hearing that question. How had watching other people's drama turned into being the subject of it?

Linde, who had been keeping an eye on Flowey all along, chuckled to himself.