Physical attacks

"Knock, knock, knock."

A knock sounded at Undyne's front door.

"Coming!" Frisk ran over and opened the door to find an old skeleton who looked a lot like Papyrus standing outside. "You're..."

"Hey, I told that Linde kid to come see me, but instead you lot decided to camp out at Undyne's place." Semi walked inside as he grumbled. "So I came myself."

"Oh, okay, I... I'll go get him." Frisk ran to the clearing behind Undyne's house, where Linde and Undyne were practicing.

Undyne had already entered her Determination Fish form, and countless spears came hurtling in from every direction.

Linde first typed out "Dispel," eliminating all the spears coming from one direction. Then he caught an incoming spear, spun in midair, and blocked all the remaining spears.

"Good! Now try this one!" Undyne grinned, and golden spears ricocheted around him in erratic patterns, their trajectories impossible to predict.

Linde silently applied "Haste" to himself. The word increased not only his movement speed, but his reaction speed as well.

Then, without moving from his spot, he dodged every attack with a few twists of his body.

Yet just as he prepared to counterattack, a rather strange spear suddenly grazed his waist.

Linde was shocked. He hadn't sensed any magical fluctuations at all!

But he immediately realized something was wrong, because he had barely felt any pain...

Suddenly, he seemed to feel a faint sting at his waist...

That was a physical attack! Not a magical attack!

Seemingly noticing Linde's shock, Undyne raised her head proudly. "That's right! That's our physical attack! Monsters rarely use this ability because it's so inefficient, but in a fight against a powerful enemy, it can make all the difference!"

"Wow!" Linde was delighted as well, and immediately imitated the magical fluctuations he had just sensed. When he looked again, there seemed to be far fewer words he could type with his keyboard, but they had also become much more solid.

Semi started clapping from the sidelines, and only then did Linde finally notice him. "Grandpa Semi!"

Linde felt a little embarrassed. After all, he had stood Semi up because he wanted to practice with Undyne.

"It's all right, Linde..." Semi said. "There are some things I ought to tell you... You know about the Timeline Observation Device, don't you?"

Linde nodded.

Seeing Linde nod, Semi continued, "I was the one who originally asked Gaster to build that thing for me.

"The inspiration came from two human mages who used the power of time to save quite a few monsters during the war between humans and monsters.

"Yes, you heard right. It was you two.

"At the time, I wondered what power could let someone cross a temporal barrier spanning thousands of years and survive spatial turbulence.

"In the end, our calculations showed that your chances of surviving that were zero.

"So I wanted to tell you both: whether you travel through time and space willingly or against your will in the future, don't force your way across."

After hearing this, Linde nodded. "Okay, I understand."

Frisk, on the other hand, looked thoughtful.

Semi waved a hand as he spoke. "I'm off. I'm going to stay at Gorson's for a couple of days. I really can't stand Sans's awful jokes all day long anymore."

"Oh," Linde said, half joking, "but puns can be pretty humerus!"

Semi stumbled, glanced back sideways at Linde, and walked out the door.

Meanwhile, at the Throne, Asgore was quietly watering the flowers in his garden.

Just then, a little flower emerged from the soil.

"Oh, it's you. I don't think I've seen you in quite some time," Asgore greeted him politely.

Flowey scoffed. "Don't say I didn't warn you. Something major could change before long."

"Oh?" Having lived with Flowey for a while, Asgore naturally knew what was unusual about him.

A miraculous flower Alphys had brought him over a hundred years ago, he had not only once befriended every monster in the Underground, but could also manipulate time...

Although Asgore couldn't clearly sense time, he did have some hazy memories.

The flower seemed to have once tried to slaughter everyone in the Underground and seize their souls, only for Asgore to stop him... In any case, he hadn't done that this time, so Asgore was naturally willing to let bygones be bygones.

"So, what sort of change might it be?" he asked, unable to keep from worrying.

"Something terrifying is probably about to arrive. I can feel it... Its determination is frighteningly strong... And it seems to be like me... It has no soul..."