❄️Snow's Art Blog✨

1. Remain in the ice crystal and we have to break him out?

This would give us some excuse to use Ralsei's fire shock outside of offense magic, and maybe he drops a little bit of knowledge about what the hell we actually did to him.

Berdly's either dead so pointless... (& Morbid) OR

He wakes up and has to remain in the dark about what actually happened in Ch2 in order to not derail completely again. (Imagine he learns of the SOUL tho. Lol. Imagine... seriously imagine it.)

There's a slim chance of a "Sleeping Berdly" scenario for no ice crystal yet in a coma, so he has to be healed in order to reawaken. I have a vivid mental image of this so I shall pass this along to you all.

No matter what living scenario above, he has new mental fuckery (trauma yippee 🎉). Cause imagine you died in your "dream," and even tho it was "just a dream," you are being told you actually entered a coma. Real physical consequences on top of having vivid images in your head about being frozen to death by your friend who u hold dear. Dreams eventually fade away. This feels like you literally experienced it...but everyone is telling you otherwise. Who do you trust? Why does it feel like everyone is leaving you in the dark about something? Everyone knows more than you do and you can do nothing about it. You're helpless to your relentless nightmares.

Or it could mean nothing teehee.

Unfreezing him would probably be mandatory just to keep the story straight. Our actions did not matter in the end. If any of the gang comes across him, they will likely attempt to save him without our input. They're far beyond listening to us now.

Noelle's reaction to this would simply depend on the state of mind she's in. If aborted in Ch2-4 and Rudy is confirmed to be dying, she'd probably get a little hope back seeing her friend was saved from the rampage that is her fucked up life.

If she's in a worse mental state (aborting post Ch5), it could be an anchoring moment for her that it wasn't a dream and there were real consequences from our actions. She almost lost another person in her life. There's no indication she's seen Berdly yet, so maybe doing so is what allows her to value her current life a little more, what makes it feel more real. The story corrects itself. Basically my last point but even more heartbreakingly so because she literally attempted to leave the game/su*cide implications.

Maybe a bit anticlimactic, but I want this simply for more lightnerds content 🥹 I'm biased sorry

I don't see any rematch happening here cause 1. He'd be weakened probably 2. Won't fight the rest of the gang ESPECIALLY Noelle 3. Bringing him back will likely already be a big scene

2. Become a Dustner

If we take Gerson as an example, he'd appear almost completely normal. Perhaps confused on how he got there at first, but the gang, minus Kris, will treat him as they always have.

Technically it's not "Berdly," but a recreation OF him, so there are bound to be differences. Knowing what happened to his real self could lend itself to some cool meta break-y things.

He could also straight up see Kris as a threat to Noelle, and he still doesn't fault her. He becomes a little paranoid and extra protective of her, but this time he has a reason to be. He knows what we did.

Idk a boss rematch 1 V 1 would be pretty fitting here...and no matter what we do his fate is already sealed. He is a Dustner after all. He once again failed her.

It would be a little hard to hide the fact he is a Dustner, because Darkners have colored portraits or none at all. Berdly has portraits, removing them would immediately be suspicious. There could be a hint of color somewhere "for those who know" so it's not as much of a shock later.

Or Toby could straight up confirm it once he shows up, and it's a known secret to us (and maybe Kris who would be mortified af) and the rest of the gang is left in the dark till after...but that may be too shocking. We already have another dying lightner.

But...there are conditions to create a dustner, and I don't think there was an example of what happens if those conditions are not met for no reason. There's a chance something creepier happens, so I vouch for him to...

3. Become a failed Dustner

Is this really a coined term yet? Idk. I'm coining it.

The person who wants to bring back a loved one has to have known them very well. The next possible fountain openers are either Noelle, Kris, or the Knight.

You want me to believe any of these three know him well enough to bring him back? Noelle and Kris are the two closest to him, but Berdly is the guy aiming for the world record of committing to the bit, which means...I don't think anyone REALLY REALLY knows who Berdly is. Everyone knows the masked version of him, these two have barely peeked behind the curtain.

They would fail to bring him back. Being mostly a Darkner now would make him act pretty single-minded...so he once again is relentless on the party, mainly Kris, to not get close to Noelle. If Noelle is in our party, I'm sure he'd act pretty distant. He doesn't want to attack her after all.

Let's get a Kris/Berdly 1v1. Like the old times. There is no other way to deal with him. He will not reason with you. It's time to fight.

This is also just a hype moments and aura theory but can you blame me???? I want a cool rematch!!! I want Berdly aura!!!

This is also pretty tragic for him because he's known to be pretty self-sacrificing, wanting to be someone's hero, wanting attention, praise, and affection. If he dies for it, well...he already did didn't he? Why not end it all with a bang?

My one counter to my own idea is the thing Susie fought was the statue from the Old Man's study, but it was so Gerson-like I wonder if there's some weird unexplained imprint of his will on it or something. There's still no explanation on why that statue lashed out like it did. These scenarios could still work if he does come back as a regular Dustner, but I just thought about how much further Toby coullllld push it.

If I'm wrong, then a dead Berdly who failed to be recreated could just...not show up at all.

There's a secret fourth option that up until recently I was vouching for very hard. Thinking about it more, it doesn't quite make sense, but I'll still leave it here for more thoughts to chew on.

4. He becomes a Goner

Berdly has a shocking amount of connections to goners and being "forgettable," which ties back to the main theme of the game: Don't Forget

Even though the thematic ties are there, I'm not sure if he qualifies to become a Goner though??

Goners are connected to Gaster. Most Goners talk about him. Normal NPC might become a Goner, and he's connected to Undertale since he mentioned G currency and doesn't have a regular overworld counterpart in UT. Clam girl hinted at Deltarune. The Goner Maker segment is very much a Gaster thing. Even Kris's Goner connections still tie back to the man.

Goner Kid is the only outlier, having no mention of either Gaster nor Deltarune. They're just having an existential crisis that we can sorta help with. Does this prove not every goner has to be connected to Gaster? Is Goner just some category of characters who've slipped out of existence that G has left his influence on? Or are they all created by him? Gaster is kinda also a goner in his world if you think about it though...

GKid's dialogue would be perfect for Berdly, who is seemingly being wiped from the world and who's disappearance has yet to make any meaningful change in the aborted routes. He was just a tool. It's like he never existed.

Let's say... hypothetically. If Berdly is slowly being Gonerfied by people around him disregarding him completely, that means he's slowly slipping out of Deltarune's overworld. Soon, he'll be...well I don't know. We'll just find a greyed out version of him somewhere obscure, talking about how pitiful his existence was in the first place. Maybe now in this state he can see beyond what his world is and he drops a little knowledge.

Goners aren't hostile. They're practically the unnamed ghosts of their world, which would make sense for Berdly. The only question is how becoming a Goner works in the first place and why they seem to revolve around Gaster (or vice versa). This point is what makes me doubt the theory.

There's another reason why I feel Goner!Berdly is the least likely for an aborted route. It's cause it could end up being redundant. Why?

Chapter 3 egg room hints at an "evil place" that looks like the grey glitched-out room from the Mother games. This could be the place Noelle and Kris visit after glitching into Ch7. A grey scale recreation of the town? Will this include all the residents?? Or just a new sector of residents that got cut/forgotten from the main game? If it's a recreation with the residents, we might get a Goner version of plenty of characters, including Berdly.

This could also...not happen at all since we don't know if this is where Kris and Noelle went. My previous doubts still hold up as well. We don't know exactly what a Goner is. Thematically relevant to Berdly, yes! Literally a goner? I don't know.

There is the idea that he's somewhat slipping into wherever Dess/Voice in the code is at, but I have no reason to really believe this. That case seems to be if someone intentionally crosses out of the world's boundaries, or falls into some deep darkness. Tbh we don't know exactly what happened to Dess/Voice, so this is still up in the air.

Couple of final thoughts

I truly believe no matter in what conscious scenario Berdly is in, he will not be attacking Noelle in any way. His whole thing is trying to be a knight in shining armor for her, protecting her from "dangers." At most, there will be internal conflict over how she really did end up using a fatal spell on him, despite how much he's devoted himself to being by her side. Maybe they'll voice the flaws of their friendship, but I can't see either party lashing out at the other. Apart from that, full on leaning into the cartoonish knightly persona cause he's frozen before he gets to finish his arc.

I really think this is why it's so important that Kris and Berdly's relationship is so shaky, so it's easy for him to switch into either intense rivalry or a deep yearn for connection. We need to account for both scenarios right? (This is also kerdly propaganda. Fall for it!!)

Would be cool if this protective version of him was in the Ice Palace as it'd fit the theme, but there's no way to get his body over to the Holiday Mansion lol. Only way to see him is Hospital DW, or the Roaring.

He could just not show up at all any more, but I keep doubting this. There has to be some resolution to his WR self, especially if his Main Route arc continues. Please, look at the potential of a Berdly who gets carried away by being proved right and how much toxicity can come from that mindset vs a Berdly who's learned to listen to his friend's needs and lets his walls down for real companionship.