i love cats

(Spoliers and speculation ahead obs)

I don't think that this is being done maliciously, or is purposefully being pushed aside. It is something that is genuinely hard to distinguish, and is something that many seem to find a stumbling block

You can theorise any which way about who is behind the knight, any number of candidates are at this point plausible

But its hard to ignore what we are presented. The knight is decidedly different from others we have encountered. They do not take on the regular form of either a lightner or a real world object, changed by the darkest of darks.

It can change its form at will, moulding itself into any shape it wants to be. It's also strong, even more then the boss enemies we fight at the end of the first 3 dark worlds, requiring a special item for most to beat it. An extension of this is that it seems to drip, frames of it show it seemingly melting

It is genuinely unlike most other beings we see in game. The only ones that come close are the titan and its spawn, but even then the knight seems distinct. For one it creates these beings, seemingly more power then they have, and it also seems more aware. It's able to interact with the world outside of destruction, it has secret aliances with several characters, indicating its ability to handle more complex thought

So, it is like nothing we have seen in Deltarune

But maybe we have seen beings not to dissimilar elsewhere.

Recall its melting, and ability to shapeshift. Think of its black and white overworld colour palette.

These qualities align it with a cast of monsters, unusual in themselves, present in Undertale

The amalgams

Looking at the knights design once more, I think that we can pin down one of the precursor beings.

The antlers are the most obvious, and there are plenty of other connections which align the knight to be one of the Holiday family. Using the logic of the amalgams, and the fact that we never see one reverted back to its original form, the easiest conclusion to make is that the knight is the Holiday we know to be missing, Dess.

I must adress what to some would be a weak point of this theory. The knight and amalgams are different. Amalgams are weak, barely able to express themselves, and animalistic. The knight in comparison is capable of strong attacks, and is much more stable and in control, of itself and its surroundings.

I believe that the difference between them can be explained by the 'glue' that houses them together.

Amalgams are formed by injecting the essence of human determination into a monster. It seems that this determination, without a proper vessel, will cause the melting of the monster's body (recall also Undyne in the genocide route)

I propose that the knight does indeed contain a proper vessel, an actual human soul, sourced from the only human in town, Kris

Kris is seemingly controlled by a soul which is not their own, which they reject and oppose, and yet to which they are beholden. What became of their original soul? Why have they become a vessel for this otherworldly being

This could explain some of the closeness between Kris and the knight. While they do not openly communicate, if they come into close contact with each other they will not fight unless already engaged with one, Kris will make signals at them to end a fight early,

They seem to have an inate connection. I say that they are two halves of the same whole