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2k special

𖤓 IF I WAS EASY TO KILL, YOU WOULD'VE DONE IT ALREADY. 𖤓

"We are vast oceans, reduced to shallow creeks."

the transfem ralsei is also amazing.. you haven’t drawn her in full yet but i already love how you draw ralsei so. yay!!!!

thank u !!! i still need to figure out my ralsei design 100% but Her Cuteness....

I'd individually render the poses to get that early 3D shine ✨ Here's some of them at their original resolutions! I would work from text descriptions from Toby, and sometimes there'd be a Paint sketch to help out. Gigi drew the concept that I modeled from and some poses too!

I had a lot of fun pushing myself to match the dynamic poses Toby had in mind for Tenna - making him so crazy and expressive was something I couldn't have done without his prompts. He'd draw the faces on afterward too, which really brought Tenna to life!

(lots more after the Read More cut...!)

What do you think her motivations are?

And

Have you seen any good posts/ videos on her motivations?

Me and a friend are dying out here trying to find people theorizing on her motives (me on tumblr and them on reddit) and we are struggling to find good posts on the subject

(a lot of people on reddit think either she is possessed or rudy is the knight, and ive seen a lot people on tumblr think that carol is manipulating her which feels too close to the possession theory but im more willing to entertain it if people have strong arguments for it)

What a good question. Because honestly despite being a ride or die Dess Knighter I couldn't confidently tell you ^_^;

And I know some people use this lack of clear motive as ammo against Dess Knight, but to that I say:

Since it really does feel like where we're currently supposed to be is basically "Okay, Dess is the Knight. How?"

But even then, while I do naturally think Dess Knight being so widely accepted is a good thing, I think there is a bit of a problem in how a lot of people "Well it's obvious, isn't it?" out of scrutinizing the Why and How of Dess Knight. I'm not a fan of theories that err too far on the side of outside control like you brought up, especially ones that are functionally elaborate Damsel in Distress scenarios, but I ultimately understand the logic that informs them.

An impression of mine that colors my personal opinion (which is admittedly constantly shifting) is that Dess, as the Knight, kind of has a "hero of her own story" sort of thing going on. Although not in the sense that everything she's doing is secretly good. It's more that she seems to be a partial continuation of something Undertale particularly liked to invoke, that being the general idea of a "past protagonist." Undertale was taking a trope seen in RPG series with rotating protagonists and translating it through the lens of a setting with what is essentially a form of diegetic protagonism—the SAVE/LOAD system. The six unnamed humans played into this somewhat, but I'd say it's basically one of the main conceits behind Chara and Asriel/Flowey as characters. I kind of feel like I don't have to elaborate on that, but I will bring up how the Real Knife is undoubtedly a reference to the Real Bat from Mother 3, an item which is implied to have belonged to Ness, the protagonist of the previous game. The endgame item originally having been "Asriel's Bat" makes this even more obvious.

With Dess it's not exactly the same, but it's really hard to ignore just how protagonist-y she is, even when not accounting for the obvious Ness influence. Troubled kid wishing to get out of her small town to see the world and express herself, but then she seems to have encountered something strange in the woods that served as a terrible omen call to adventure. All of this also being filtered through the fact that Deltarune has its own diegetic protagonism through the prophecy, something that is understood by and part of the culture of Hometown, with the Delta Rune religion having a "Treat everyone like they might be Jesus" thing going on.

Although even in that scenario I was suggesting, which is more of a failed/unrealized protagonist turned villain sort of thing, there's still no clear answer to the question of motive. Has her perception been altered? Is she on an OFF-type mission? Is she using her status as The Knight as a means to complete some other goal? Is there a subset of people who interpret the prophecy in such a way where the Knight is the good guy? Has she simply embraced the villain role?

The game itself kind of gestures at the unclear nature of the Knight's motives, with Ralsei indirectly addressing the fact that the Knight could just make a bunch of fountains if it wanted to. We even have this moment where Susie herself theorizes about the Knight and the conclusion she comes to is definitely something to ponder over, considering how her and the Knight are positioned against each other.

* Why do ya reckon they're doin' it?

* ... Huh? I... I dunno. Maybe they just...

* I mean, maybe... they just wanna see everything burn.

Even in the context of dramatic irony this would feel weird paired with a Knight candidate who is "Saving Dess"-based. Maybe it'd work for Carol Knight since she actually wants to bring everything back to how they once were, to "freeze" everything. But it feels more likely that this hinting at what fire as ice's symbolic opposite might mean. Also something something December.