Once Alphys got control of her breathing, she managed to get to her feet. "Why...why would that be in play now?" she asked, still somewhat terrified.
"Umm...cause I can use it?" Woona offered cautiously. "I can tap its power without being overwhelmed by it, and only draw what I need."
Alphys scratched her chin thoughtfully. "When it was created...it was never meant to be used. But then again...the Determination it absorbs from monsters is SOUL Power, the same power that powers the barrier. In theory, the Soulstone has enough power to do...incredible things. It might be enough to break the barrier. But...that much Determination crystallized can have...unexpected results. It would probably be best not to tap it any more than necessary."
"A reasonable precaution," Chara replied, his mind going back to what he'd learned from Gaster. Papyrus being made of crystallized Determination, the same thing the Soulstone was made of. If the Soulstone had that much power when fully tapped...how much could Papyrus unleash if he was determined enough? It was rather terrifying to imagine. "Now, what, exactly, did you do in these experiments here?"
Alphys sighed sorrowfully, walking along the path, leading them in. "There's...a machine in here. It's designed to extract Souls for storage. I was able to...modify it after studying the blueprints, to extract Determination from the human souls, the substance that allows human souls to persist even after their body dies. The goal of the experiments was to strengthen monster souls so that they could be used to break the barrier...but..."
"But monster bodies can't handle Determination in large quantities," Woona concluded. "That's why the Soulstone was created in the first place."
"Yes," Alphys confirmed. "If a monster generates more Determination than they need to survive, the Soulstone drains it out of them. With discipline, that process can be accelerated on the part of the monster...but it doesn't go the other way, unless all living monsters are united in thought and will. The resonance reaction would, in theory, allow a small number of monsters to sustain a large amount of Determination by balancing the excess energy through a spiritual link." She looked away. "In fact, Mettaton's body was originally designed for just such a purpose...to create such a link by uniting all Monsters in their faith in a single hero. The idea was that it would allow Mettaton to tap reserves of Determination stored in his chassis to supercharge his body enough that his Soul would gain the strength of a human soul...and then use the six we currently have in storage to break the barrier without completely merging with them, so that he could remain completely himself. After all, according to the theory, absorbing the soul of another causes a 'shared life' experience...though the only ones who had ever done so before never provided testimony regarding that..."
"It does," Chara replied calmly. "When Asriel absorbed my soul so we could cross the barrier, we shared control of the body that resulted. The same thing's happening to a lesser extent with me riding around inside Woona...likely because I don't have a true soul of my own."
Alphys nodded in understanding. "The theory's correct then...that explains some things about...what's happened down here..." Seeing Woona's hesitantly curious glance, Alphys sighed. "I...didn't want to experiment on living monsters. That would be...horrible. So instead, I had any monster who had 'fallen down' but not yet turned to dust brought down here, where I steadily injected them with gradually increasing doses of Determination until...it looked like it had worked. They...they stood back up and were able to walk around. They were talking and laughing, looking forward to going back to their families. I...I told Asgore it was a complete success!" She bit her lip as she glanced away.
"But something went wrong..." Woona clarified as they reached a split in the path.
"Y-yes..." Alphys confirmed, walking up to a vending machine. Getting several bags of chisps out of it, she handed half of them to Woona. "I-If we're going to find the keys quickly as planned...we'll need to split up here. The ones down here...they aren't hostile. But...they might be hungry. If you give them some chisps, they'll leave you alone. And...you'll see what went wrong."
Nodding, Woona pocketed the chisps, then glanced to either path. "I'll go left first," she decided.
"O-okay," Alphys agreed. "S-should be safer..." Without explaining, she rushed off towards the right, the door in the middle sealed with four different colored diodes. Confused and more than a little worried, Woona went left.
To the left, Woona explored a very short path, leading past a few storage units and three sinks. A note on the ground suggested that something important might be in one of the sinks. As such, Woona went to the three sinks, turning them on and off one at a time.
When she turned on the third sink, something that wasn't water came out of the faucet. The white goo pooled and filled the sink. A face appeared...and then a horrific form of several faces and a gaping maw in the center rose up with a frightening laugh.
Woona leapt back in fear as the FIGHT lines appeared. "W-w-w-what?" she gasped out, eyes wide.
"I...I don't know..." Chara replied, afraid.
When the creature spoke up, it did so in a strange staticky noise before unleashing a wave of white dots that erupted into faces. Woona barely managed to dodge out of the way.
"Static...Woona, take out your Cell Phone!"
Confused, Woona did so...and heard a voice from within. "Come join the fun!" the voices said from the phone, the static translated.
Woona backed away nervously as the wave of white came again, now seeing the name 'Memoryhead' over the being they saw. "I...I'm scared to join..." she whimpered softly.
"Such a shame..." one of the voices spoke.
"It's a real get together..." another replied.
"...but it's alright..." a third spoke as the monster withdrew, the FIGHT lines vanishing, leaving behind only a glittering red key.
Woona shivered, but lifted up the key. "They have the keys..." she murmured softly. "I...I need to befriend them, so they'll give us the keys, and we can activate the nodes..." Going back to where the note was, Woona inserted the key and turned it in the nearby node, causing it to light up. When she returned to the main path, she saw that the red diode on the door was lit.
"You found one?" Alphys asked as she raced up. "They aren't where I left them, so I don't know where to look...and the Amalgamates-" She cut herself off.
"We met the Memoryhead," Chara explained readily. "That's what happened to the monsters you experimented on?"
Alphys lowered her head. "Y-yes..."
"They have the keys," Woona stated confidently. "I need to find them...and befriend them, so they'll give me the keys."
Alphys frowned. "But...they didn't approach me. That means..."
"I...I have to do it without you..." Woona murmured sorrowfully.
Lovely. One of the most disturbing areas of the game.
can't wait for woona to meet shyrens sister lemonbread
Every time I look in my mail I get a goofy grin when I see an update for Moon in the dark, I think I've said this before but THANK YOU for making my favorite fanfiction on this site and I do hope there will be a sequel, please keep up the good work!
Wonder how Woona will react when she meets the dog alamagate, although she'll probably just pet it into friendship :D
7264969 Amen to that. This is currently my favorite story to read on FiMFiction.
Doesn't feel like an appropriate time to pun. Not yet .
Here we go...
Snowy...
Well, will we see Dark Woona?
This was the creepiest part of the game. I just went "what the f-" when I encountered those things. Not...fun.
All I could think was "Dang, Alphys, what did you do?" Messed up stuff.
You know, sometimes it feels like I'm missing something. Every once in a while, Chara will say something like "Oh yeah, according to that conversation with Gaster, 'insert something that wasn't said in that conversation with Gaster here'." I could be wrong, maybe they had a clandestine conversation we don't know the details of, or maybe I'm just forgetful, but that just seems to be the case.
So blah blah, 14 years old, I thought this chapter was OK. I mean, the original had this cool thing where you'd learn everything piece by piece until you learn the whole truth from Alphys at the end (except the thing with the flower), but this is a welcome change to things that are different. Besides, just imagine how fantastic the "end" could be!... I hope it is, anyway.
Oh my. Woona has to do the key gathering mission all alone? This is gonna be scary. Hope Woona is ready for whatever lies ahead of her.
Does Woona have a Stick? that could prove useful in just a bit.
OOoooooh, this'll be interesting... nicely done Tat~
Another enjoyable chapter. Well done.
And now Woona knows.
That part of the game was pretty creepy. Yet strangely touching as well.
Go Woona, you can do it!
I'm not gonna lie. I actually tried to find a way to 'join the fun' with the amalgamates.
Sadly, taking damage from them did nothing but hurt.
i was spookt af there. excellent job
No Memoryhead in the inventory? Dang.
i was just playing undertale and Woona has evaded[\color] everyone's best nightmare since in order to do the true lab you have to beat flowey first.
(im doing the true lab right now.)
7266408 that can happen?
It always bothered me how Flowey could absorb the six human souls and every other monster soul, and still have complete control. But then again, we don't exactly know everything about Flowey. We know that he's considered neither monster nor human, as he can absorb monster souls as well as human souls. Maybe we just don't have enough to work with for theorizing what exactly Flowey's "soul" properties are capable of, or how another soulless one like Flowey can be formed.
7266660 Yep.
Wait, didn't Chara already know about the Amalgamates? In one of the previous chapters, Chara mentions how Flowey recently learned about the Amalgamates being invincible. So why is he acting as if this is completely new to him?
7267205
He knew about the Amalgamates intellectually.
He'd never actually seen one, nor did he know that they used to be normal Monsters.
7267194 I'll have to pay attention next time.
7266415 Well, she's a DETERMINED magical princess pony with so many FRIENDS. The cheats are somewhere.
Dayum I'm late
7268528 i guess so.
Finally caught up to the latest chapter. I will say for certain that this is a sweet and adorable take on Undertale. The interactions between Luna and the cast is generally great, chara's development is very enjoyable.
My only nitpick is the meme and references as a bit forced at times, sometimes I get a good chuckle other times I sigh and skim forward.... this actually made me have to go back and reread a segment. ehe one punch man/undertale ref, I had rolled my eyes and skipped as I like that comic but it wasn't necessary... only to find out it something plot significant happened during it when luna called back to it later...so yeah. that one nitpick aside I look forward to continuing this when you update next
7264985
I call that one Amalgamutt because it's a blend of several breeds.
7265916 That quote?
No, it's just including how Toby placed himself in Undertale as the dog.vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/undertale/images/2/20/Annoying_Dog.gif/revision/20160125092850
Now those are some important details about the Soulstone and about what Alphys has been working on. From the sound of things, there is quite a bit of room for loopholes in how Determination and the Barrier works that Woona ought to be able to use to break through the latter.
7267357
I imagine that Woona's and Chara's adventure through the lab will be something like this:
The clip start at 1:53 and it end at 2:51
Here we are... but it's so cold, haha...
...I remember their pain.
Though you are frightened, the mission must be completed, and this fills you with DeTemmienation.
7331042 *bangs head on conveniently placed wall* EVEN PUN BUCKING PONY IS BETTER! PUN PONY!
7266408
Memory is the key.
*disbelief Papyrus intensifies*