In my previous post about the meaning of the Smile ARG, I concluded that the “smile” was not a literal smile but the moment Noelle attains absolute power and becomes fully indebted to us for granting it.

The power in display would be the moment Noelle uses her innate glitch hunting/narrative altering ability to create a sequence break in Deltarune’s story.

But I couldn’t tell you what or where this sequence break would be since a lot of this was mostly 3rd party evidence... and honestly vibes so far.

Until now.

Look carefully. This isn’t the lake we all know from previous chapters.

There’s different trees. There’s no bench or the spot to sit. And Kris is coming from the right side, not the left.

This scene is on the other side of the lake. The lake.

The lake that has been alluded to having a song playing in both the Light and Dark Worlds, one of the most cryptic lore details of the whole game.

The sequence break is crossing over to the other side. Splitting the red sea Moses style, which would fit into Noelle’s angelic themes.

The Flower King shop is right next to the lake as well, meaning Noelle won’t need to travel far in its Dark World to find a massive ocean version of the Lake to perform a miracle.

And the text associated with this image?

“You only need to see her once, and you can move on."

Who is “her”?

It can't be Noelle, the point is to keep her in our control and what would it even mean for Kris to see Noelle and move on?

The answer is blatantly referring to the “her” in “Find Her”.

What if the other side of this lake lies the secret of Dess’s disappearance? The ultimate, endgame level secret of the whole game? The secret that is keeping everyone trapped in the past that will undoubtedly be solved in the emotional climax of Chapter 7?

Source: @tac_bats

What if instead, we and Noelle spoil this ending 2 chapters and minimum 3 years earlier in the making?

What if Noelle finds Dess, regardless if she is dead or alive and figures out the how or the why she vanished?

What would make Noelle "happy for the first time in her life" more than having her trauma not only resolved but for someone to teach her to resolve herself through her own hands?

Despite Darkners being inanimate objects in the Light World, their personalities and histories aren’t invented by the Dark World, they are actively living their lives alongside them. Lightners just can’t see these events happen. Ex: TV World and Cyber World denizens know each other because of the time the Dremurr and Holiday kids snuck Queen’s laptop into their house.

Also Tenna wouldn’t be the most divorced man ever if he didn’t emotionally live through the Dreemur divorce.

So… problem solved.

Darker than Dark = The Dark Worlds. What is there more to talk about?

Yeah, about that…

What in the world is this room?

These guys don’t look like any Darkner I’ve ever seen. Or, what about these things.

They’re in a room that’s pitch black. In a Dark World.

And what about the Roaring? Isn’t that literally coating an existing Dark World with more darkness to the point where “darkness” becomes a physical object? 

And who the hell is FRIEND and why do they keep showing up in the darkest areas of a Dark World?

Goddamn it.

There’s a third realm isn’t there.

@Ash-Veil Lane

Welcome to the theory-crafting nightmare that is the Darker than Dark World.

God this name is stupid.

(From this point forward, I’ll be referring to Darker than Dark as DtD for short)

ENTITIES

Let’s do something fun first.

Let’s identify everyone that could potentially be a part of this theoretical third realm. I think doing this will be a far more digestible way to understand what DtD is than word vomiting my personal thesis on it.

So, if we really wanna take it easy, let’s look at a couple of suspicious Deltarune characters that have unique properties in their biology. If you don’t act like a traditional Darkner or Lightner, you’re on the list.

For each, I’ll give them a “DtDE Likelihood” level that ranks how likely they are to be a DtDE. (DtDE standing for Darker than Dark Entity) At least within my arbitrary theory rules on what I think they are.

What are these rules? How do I know what a DtDE is?

Luckily we do have a template, and it’s exactly who you think it is.

FRIEND

DtDE Likelihood: 1000% aka. DtDE’s Mickey Mouse

FRIEND is DtD’s animal mascot.

Everything we understand or theorize about the concept of entities beyond Darkners all comes from this guy.

For anyone who hasn’t been in the trenches trying to wrap their head on this character, here are the reasons why FRIEND is inextricably linked to Darker than Dark: (P.S it’s literally all of FRIEND’S appearances)

Ch 3: Shows up when Ralsei says the words: Darker than Dark 

Ch 2: Only shows up in the literal darkest room, the roots of Cyber World.

Ch 3: Only shows up in the literal darkest sections of the S rank Minigame as eyes or summoned by ERAM. Which is also in the darkest room of TV World.

Ch 4: Silhouette sneakily shows up in the literal darkest room of the Dark Sanctuary

Spamton Sweepstakes: Jumpscares you if you repeatedly click on the chair on a page literally titled “but what if it could get darker”

Sweepstakes and Ch 4 Mike Room: Has a strange association to being a rare glitch in Cat Petterz.

Like any other Deltarune theorist sniffing their farts, I have A LOT to say about FRIEND, but I’ll hold back for now and stay on topic. Are they really a Darkner or are they something else that needs pure darkness to sustain itself? FRIEND’s appearances all give off the impression that it’s potentially incapable of manifesting in front of us even within the Dark World. Even then, it’s only in glimpses and they can’t talk or be interacted with. Based on their smile and the whole “I’m-messing-with-you” nature of its appearances, I think it’s also safe to say that FRIEND is an intelligent being that is stalking Kris just around the corner. It's always around… watching. It’s also suspicious that FRIEND can seemingly move across Dark Worlds without being an object physically brought over. Even if we’re seeing multiple FRIENDS instead of just one, there’s still no explanation for what object it could be when every other Darkner is pretty clear from their design alone. Analyzing FRIEND this way, we can try to work around its currently known rules to judge other candidates:

Are not traditional Darkners. They seem to bend both Lightner and Darkner rules such as potentially not being an object and moving across different Dark Worlds freely without a Lightner bringing them over.

DtDEs cannot physically manifest unless they are in the darkest parts of a Dark World, which is still only fleeting. However…

Even when uninteractable in the Dark World, they must show signs that they constantly exist outside of our view, potentially within another alternate view of the world.

With the rules in place, we can FINALLY get onto the speculative candidates. No better one to start off with than:

TITANS + Titan Spawn

DtDE Level: 70% Very Likely

Passes: Titans are absolutely not based on an object and have the unique ability to create lasting damage in the Light World with how busted the church looks after Ch 4. Ralsei calls it a primal being that doesn’t truly have intelligence unlike other Darkners.

Passes. Titans can only spawn from the Roaring, which is a Dark Fountain/concentrated darkness made within a Dark World. When purified, they vanish.

Somewhat Passes: Titans seem newly born, birthed from hardened Dark Fountain pillars and don’t show any sign of existing elsewhere… however, in the darkest rooms in the Sanctuary a lone Titan Spawn constantly chases you throughout Ch 4. If it is the same one each time, it may prove that Titans are being summoned rather than created.

The biggest difference Titans has with FRIEND is that Titans don’t seem to be sentient and only seem to be born anew from a hardened fountain. They act more like newborns, acting solely on primal instinct.

It only knows how to destroy and create more darkness, which could be for reproducing other Titans.

Do all Titan-like creatures act this way? Are they even alive? And can they grow out of their newborn state and become more like FRIEND?

I’m particularly interested in why the game records whether you “kill” Titan spawn vs purifying them. Almost as if it's wrong to attack them in the same way you treat all other individuals/Darkners you fight in this series. Hmm.

There is one more valuable thing to talk about and it’s how Ralsei describes a Titan:

It’s the fear-of-dark. It’s the bump-in-the night. The shadow of the backside of your mind.

Are Titans based on concepts rather than objects? The idea that Dark World entities can also be a manifestation of a Lightner’s emotions is kinda crazy.

I find it interesting that what Ralsei defines Titans to be is pretty similar to how FRIEND haunts us. When I think of an entity in Deltarune that represents the same fear of a boogeyman under your bed that vanishes once you try proving it's real… it’s not the Titan, it’s FRIEND appearing for 1 frame before vanishing from my screen.

Could FRIEND and DtDE’s in extension also be a manifestation of “fear” itself?

And if Dark Worlds create new physical forms out of objects, could Darker than Dark Worlds create new forms out of emotions?

One last piece of the puzzle is that the red waved monster that chases you throughout Chapter 4’s dark rooms is actually a Titan Spawn. 

This is actually a HUGE deal, because it proves that the Sanctuary’s dark rooms have a similar environment to the Roaring where Titans can sustain themselves.

The Titan Spawn doesn’t die when the lights are turned on, they just vanish. Is this one Titan Spawn always there, only waiting for darkness to come back so it can manifest again?

These Things

If your first reaction to seeing this is “WTF is that?!!!”, please check out kesMadgik’s video which should illuminate where these are from.

DtDE Likelihood: 70% Very Likely

Slightly Passes: They don’t seem like any Darkner we’ve ever seen before nor can they talk.

Passes: These guys are only hidden within the darkness of the Dark Sanctuary’s water fountain. So hidden in the dark that you’ll never even know that you’ve bumped into them.

???: Again, hard to say because they seem barely sentient. I doubt we “kill” these things by turning on the lights, I’d like to believe that whenever the darkness is on they reappear.

Look, the fact that these are in the game and are so obscure that you have to mod the game or look into the code to know that these exist has to mean something big.

There’s not much I can say on what these things are other than that if these guys are DtDEs, it proves that the third realm isn’t entirely composed of hostile entities. Some are just malformed or similar to plants than animals or humans.

We are absolutely seeing these guys again in the future. I promise.

Evil Gerson Statue/ Sound of Justice

DtDE Level - 60% - Likely

Slightly Passes: Ralsei calls Evil Gerson a Darkner, though is admittedly a unique case with its lack of sentience.

Passes: Evil Gerson only shows up in the darkest rooms of the Sanctuary and is vanquished when exposed to light.

???: Evil Gerson seems to just die when the lights are turned back on. Then again, that’s because Ralsei breaks it and we never come back to this room, so who knows?

Evil Gerson’s fight is kind of interesting. This is what I feel like an encounter in the Roaring would probably be like. Completely alone in an endless darkness where only sound will help you locate anything. 

Generally any of the fights that use the Darkness TP mechanic is a dead ringer for Darker than Dark shenanigans (except Jackenstein).

Evil Gerson’s raw malice makes him feel a lot like how Titans act. Barely sentient, and just out to destroy as if it’s his nature.

Though I put Evil Gerson’s ranking as pretty low, that’s only because we don’t get to see him much beyond his fight and it’s likely the only time we ever will… until we see another Dustner pop up in a later chapter with more DtDE-like properties.

Mantle Boss (ERAM)

DtDE Likelihood - 60% Requires some Speculation

Slightly Passes: There’s no evidence for ERAM being or not being an object since we only see it in the S Rank game. However, ERAM’s dialogue changes in a Weird Route file. Meaning it watched the events happen in Cyber World out of sight or can read Kris’s mind – either option is unheard of for the average Darkner.

Likely Passes: Every instance we encounter ERAM, they only show up within the darkest rooms of the S Rank Minigame… which also begin played in a dimly lit room. However, it doesn't seem to vanish when the lights are back on.

Passes. ERAM has a bizarre familiarity with Kris’s history and inner thoughts as if it's been monitoring them constantly out of sight. They absolutely exist and are watching us from somewhere else.

The guy summons FRIENDS in battle and shows up in rooms where pink and gold eyes show up, in a game that is played with a pink and gold controller.

Darker than Dark Entity theories aside, ERAM is 100% FRIEND’S friend.

Even if ERAM was an avatar being controlled by someone physically in TV World, this doesn’t explain how it’s capable of killing Kris through their video game avatar in its boss fight. 

Like really think about that. The environmental conditions set by the S Rank Minigames gives ERAM and FRIEND a physical form that can directly harm Kris and hold a piece of equipment.

The whole fight is screaming that it’s a teaser for future FRIEND and Darker than Dark bullshit to come.

Not to mention that ERAM seemingly stole the Shadow Mantle from Seam either from the Card Castle or Castle Town Dark Worlds at some point, before ending up in TV World.

There’s one more thing I’d like to cover with ERAM, something that could theoretically be a huge deal in understanding not just Darker than Dark, but Deltarune’s entire world as a whole.

It’s the fact that ERAM, our first true encounter with a FRIEND-like entity, takes place within a fictional game being played within a metaphorically fictional realm, aka. TV World.

Deltarune is very specific about the way we and the characters interact with the Light and Dark Worlds. 

The Light World is treated like the real world where everything is mundane, teens go to school and do homework, and everyone has to deal with messy familial issues. 

The Dark World on the other hand is like a game where adventures can happen and magic exists. Inanimate objects are revealed to have histories and personalities and they exist for the sake of the Lightner’s enjoyment.

Creating a Dark Fountain, in this metaphorical context is like entering a video game. Being immersed in a fantasy with shrunken avatars that play with NPCs meant that exist to give the players an enjoyable experience.

Doesn’t that seem eerily similar to plugging in a controller, and immersing yourself into a game? …Which is already what we’re doing by playing Deltarune?

And if doing that in a Dark World, wouldn’t that be the same as going Darker than Dark? FRIEND too is also likely an in-universe video game character from Cat Petterz.

Under that interpretation, wouldn’t these guys also count?

S Rank Minigame Enemies + HERO_SWORD 

DtDE Likelihood: 50% only w/ speculation

Passes by Technicality: They’re video game assets, you can’t physically see them or feel them. In reality they’re just lines of code. They’re not real……… wait.

Passes by Technicality: By booting up a game within a fictional world, you are creating another layer of darkness. A window into another realm where new entities can be seen.

Fails: The S rank characters don’t seem to exist until the game is booted up. With one exception…

Forgot if they’re even DtDEs, are these guys alive?

In the normal Legend of Tenna boards, every NPC and enemy are being controlled by Tenna’s cronies. Which is why you fight them when you encounter them. 

But the S rank guys? They’re not being operated by anyone, they’re just video game assets.

…but if you’ve played Undertale, aka. The game that insists that inflicting control and violence onto lesser, fictional beings should be somewhat discomforting + the game increasing your LV when you grind these enemies + Deltarune’s more self-aware Darkners considering themselves lesser, disposable toys because they aren’t real…

Where this isn’t ambiguous is with HERO_SWORD (Kris’s avatar) popping out of its reality with undeniable sentience to torment Kris and Ramb. In a suspiciously similar way to Chara turning on their player and haunting other worlds once they’ve completed the Genocide route. 

Are the video game assets “alive”? 

Probably not, but Toby isn’t going to excuse mindless violence in any form. 

ERAM and the S Rank characters potentially being DtDEs add so much texture to the concept. Are DtDEs a lower rank of sentience compared to normal Darkners, being completely absent of personhood?

Should we be questioning what we’re actually doing in the S Rank Minigame in the same way as what we’re doing to the Titan Spawns if we choose to fight them instead of purifying?

Ralsei

DtDE Likelihood: 30% Probably Not

Passes: Ralsei is known as the Prince of the Dark and was shaped by the Grand Fountain. He has the uncanny ability to travel across Dark Worlds without being brought over (maybe) or turning into a statue. Has a suspicious knowledge on… well everything despite existing in a broom closet all his life.

Fails: Um. Ralsei’s right there. You control him in normal Dark Worlds. (Though he does say that he was born from the Castle Town fountain…)

Invalid: By failing condition 2, we already know that Ralsei exists in the normal Dark Worlds, not the third realm.

So far, we’ve been covering mostly malevolent or borderline unthinking candidates so to have Ralsei on here might be a bit strange. (Trust me I don’t want Ralsei to be E V I L, please.)

But… what even is Ralsei?

Ralsei object theories are dead in the water after Chapter 3, with most of the popular candidates (the horned headband and the green crayon) being invalid because nobody in Kris’s house/ TV World recognizes him. 

For Ralsei’s character to even work, he truly has to have been alone for years in that broom closet. The Prophecy even confirms this.

And it’s maddening, because how does Ralsei know the Prophecy so well? How does Ralsei travel between Castle Town and other Dark Worlds?? Why doesn’t Ralsei turn into stone in other Dark Worlds??? How does Ralsei know the layout of Kris and Susie’s school????

WHY DOES RALSEI KNOW THE PLAYER’S NAME?? WHY DOES RALSEI HUM IN-GAME MUSIC AND MISREMEMBER THE RED FOREST’S NAME AS SCARLET FOREST BECAUSE THAT’S THE OST FOR THE LEVEL??? WHY WON’T SUSIE QUESTION HIM ON THIS???? RAAAAAAAHH!!!

POINT IS. Ralsei is absolutely not your average Darkner and the game is teasing the shit out of the player on that fact. 

Probably the most bizarre detail on Ralsei’s biology, though dubiously canon, is actually from the unused, readable manual back in Chapter 1.

Why

Why does it say this Why is it written like that

And a pillar that gives his body form? Darkners already have bodies in the Light World, they’re objects. But Ralsei gains form from a pillar? Was he perhaps born from it?

Hatched from a pillar of Darkness… like a Titan?

Again, NOT a “Ralsei is evil” interpretation.

If anything, I’m pretty into the opposite. If a Titan is a manifestation of negative concepts, could there possibly be a Darkner that is a manifestation of positive ones? 

And if Ralsei is a DtDE, could there possibly be some good ones that are with you in the dark?

I swear to god Toby, if Ralsei is just unique because he’s just The Prince of the Dark and nothing else I will

Red Forest Tree 

DtDE Likelihood: 70% (Yes I'm serious)

Maybe Fails: The Red Forest trees are based off of the red blocks in the unused classroom and this tree is probably no exception.... BUT WHY IS THIS TREE DANCING? WHY IS IT SENTIENT?

Passes: It slowly comes into view as the world becomes darker during the spinning puzzle. Dude.

Passes: You can activate the switch even before seeing it, which Ralsei even gets shocked by. It’s ALWAYS there, you just can’t see it!

Yes this dancing buffoon is shockingly important for this theory.

If you don't remember this guy, it's the switch you use at the top of a spinning bullet room in Chapter 1.

Wasn't this moment just strange in retrospect? A Darkner that only exists once the room is completely blackened?

Believe it or not, this is actually one of the earliest cases of the Deltarune community recognizing “Darkerners”/Darker than Darkners as a world building concept.  But the real kicker on this entity is THIS:

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN??? Does going Darker than Dark reveal truths in the same way you activate the switch in this room? In the same way objects turn into sentient beings, do inanimate things in a Dark World manifest into sentient beings in Darker than Dark Worlds? Is there more knowledge someone can gain about the layers of their reality by delving darker than dark? Like an ever enhancing microscope that allows you to see more into the matter that forms the world?

This one line is so sneaky. It acts like it's just a tutorial message but if read seriously, there's so many possibilities as to what it could mean about Deltarune's world as a whole? Am I insane for thinking this?

The Roaring Knight 

DtDE Likelihood: 10% Absolutely not… but…

???: Susie deduces that the Knight is a Lightner since it can travel through both worlds and create Fountains. But… are we so sure? The Knight is feral, shapeshifts, and is coated in darkness. It can’t just be a normal Lightner.

Fails: Everyone and their mother seems to have met the Roaring Knight before the heroes.

Invalid: Doesn’t pass condition 2. And if it could travel the worlds so easily, it wouldn’t have been so late while Tenna prepped Toriel in a literal gift basket.

It has FRIEND’s laugh. 

That’s it. That’s why they’re on here.

…

Ok, that’s not an insignificant detail at all, it's actually a very big one in fact.

If you’re using the same SFX as the biggest mystery box in the game, when already being a mysterious entity with mysterious physiological properties, your natures are probably connected.

Though it's clear the Knight is not a Darkner, it's hard to say it’s a traditional Lightner either.

The Knight acts very feral, it drools upon seeing the heroes and gazes on the Prophecy as if completely unaware of its surroundings. Most DtDEs are behave in very raw, animalistic ways which could lump the Knight’s behavior with them.

However, the Knight does clearly have a mind. It can plan. It can be angry. It can mock. And most importantly, it can pose!

It’s also a shapeshifter. The image of a knight with a visor is just one form it wants to take. No character we’ve seen so far is capable of completely altering their body like how the Knight does. (well maybe Bloxer but they’re a Darkner)

If the Knight is some amalgamated form of Dess, (99.9% sure she is and I’m not going to spend too long explaining this) we could be dealing with a sort of corrupted Lightner with Darkner-magic properties.

Could Dess have come into contact with FRIEND or the Darker than Dark realm? 

She’s already oddly knowledgeable on Dark Worlds and the SOUL based on what she wrote for Raise Your Bat. And if there’s any good place for her to have disappeared to, that absolutely no one has found, somewhere deep into a Darker than Dark realm could be our best bet. 

Though my entry on the Knight is pretty barebones with little direct in-game evidence, nothing is truly concrete about them as of now. 

...

Aaand… I believe that’s everyone I can think of. I feel like we’ve gotten quite a lot from this. Hopefully.

To summarize, here’s some of the more interesting observations this list shows about Darker than Dark.

There is an entire new ecosystem of lifeforms that only exist in the darkest rooms of a Dark World. Most act on primal instincts and lack sentience.

These lifeforms are all potentially representations of emotions and concepts in the same way Darkners are reps for objects.

The Roaring and Video Games within Dark Worlds are proper conditions for FRIEND-like entities to properly manifest and interact with both worlds.

The Dark Sanctuary’s dark rooms may be extremely close to what The Roaring will actually be like. If it does happen, Titans and these dark entities will likely show up.

If the Roaring does happen, will it be full of hostile creatures, allowing not only Titans but monsters like FRIEND and ERAM to cause some trouble? 

Or

Or is it just another world. With bad parts and good parts? 

Is it even sustainable for a SOUL to delve into the Light World, into a Dark World, then further down into a Darker than Dark World? How many more artifices of reality exist in Deltarune? 

Is the Darker than Dark realm nothing but pure darkness? Or is there something else you can see? Something that can drive you crazy?

@DrawVex

I want to leave on this question:

If Deltarune follows this hierarchy of reality with Darker than Dark being the lowest, most artificial realm: