#cathper

obv the anagram that everyone and their mom noticed, but i like to think of ralsei as his own person, related to asriel in an AU/extension kind of way

i mean he does have colored horns, which boss monsters don’t have, but then there’s the speculation on them being related to kris’s fake red horns they wore as a kid

big shoutout to uuuuuuh the delta rune symbol being super important both here and in undertale

more asriel-related things are, in the practice fight/tutorial ralsei sets up for u he says almost the same exact lines as flowey does when he first shows u the battlebox in undertale. he also seems to have fire-related healing magic which is boss monster-related. 

he ALSO sings as one of his spells- father alvin the preacher in hometown notes that asriel use to sing a lot in the choir.

the fact that ralsei just??? lives in this completely empty village and says he’s always been alone his whole life. did he just raise himself as a baby? did he and the town just manifest when needed? has his own timeline been reset in a way he doesn’t remember something???

his castle is just like on the edge of this fucked up oily silent dark world whats up with that. NOTHING living or sentient seems to exist here and it seems ancient with the eye glyphs but the metallic wiggly things are??? its completely detached in terms of atmosphere and appearance to the card land (or whatev u wanna call it).

he DEFINITELY knows somethings up with the whole “player possessing” theory. he gives u a manual which u (the player) can’t read. it says something like “its too dense for you to make out”. the manual is still in the files and had something that REALLY stood out to me

“seizure” first comes up in the vessel creator*** and in this case seems to stand for it’s definition of “to control or use by force”. the “coveted seizure-related” options here are things like game volume etc, things the game characters cant control and undertale didn’t offer, but of course, the player possessing and controlling kris can.

also lightly asriel-related. the manual cover has macaroni art which was in asgore’s castle/home back in undertale as artwork that said “for king dad”, assuming from asriel (chara drew the flower).

another time ralsei seems to notice kris is not themself is in the prison. he’s testing something. first, he asks kris to help susie with a puzzle on the other side of the wall. he KNOWS kris can’t see it. but kris “talks susie through” the puzzle anyways. because the player can see it. so then, no matter what option we make kris say, ralsei will ask us to close our eyes and imagine what susie is doing, prompting us to focus on her and semi-control her for a bit while, i’m assuming, ralsei voices his concerns or questions kris when we can’t hear.

ppl have pointed out that other characters group ralsei in with the lighteners, he’s NEVER called a darkner or calls himself one. i tried to fact-check bc i swear one person might’ve referred to him as a darkner but i can’t find it now. even jevil calls him a lightener and if anyone would know he would.

like ralsei’s entire introduction (if u wanna pick at every single word or phrase, which toby fox just BEGS us to do). the prophecy is “foretold by time and space” didn’t sans and pap refer to this? “is he pranking you across time and space?” “a massive anomaly in the timespace continuum”. also, does ralsei ever directly refer to himself as the prince from the prophecy?? does he just insert himself???? someone else pointed out it could be lancer, an actual prince from the dark.

when u return to hometown/lightener’s world and you show up in the unused classroom, the whole card land is shown as toys and boards and stuff.... but the locked door is the great door and where ralsei is from??? is the pitch black supply closet with no form.

the only thing that would support ralsei being a darkener is his manual stating the darkness gives him his form- but does he just not know any better, or does everything living in the darkner world just have to rely on the fountains?

*** i have like a whole book on vessel creator theories too half of them came up just typing this out