The cursed mountain Ebott. Every man, every woman and every child knew the legend of the mountain: every human that fell into it's caves was doomed to never come back alive. Some people also talk about monsters living in the depths, but very few people believe in this madness. Monsters or not, nobody entered the mountain for centuries because of the legends. That is, until she decided to go. She ran as fast as she could, tears falling from her eyes, in the direction of the mountain. She wasn't scared of dying: she was hoping for it. Her insignificant human life would end soon. She didn't notice the time passing: all she cared was to end this. There was no way in hell someone in the village would ever find her body in the mountain, and that's what she was hoping for. After a long walk she finally reached it: the pit inside the mountain. For a second, she hesitated and thought if it was really worth it. However, she jumped, hoping to die in the fall. She closed her eyes and jumped.
After a while she heard a loud "crack" sound and felt a burning opened her eyes. She was inside the caves, really injured, but still alive. In moments like these, your survival senses really kick in, and that's when you realize that you really like being alive. But in her situation, she had no hope. She was alone and injured in a cave where nobody would help her. She was doomed. She tried to stand up, but the pain in her legs made her scream. There was no hope for her. There was nothing to do now. She made her decision, and now she could only regret it.
For her surprise, she heard steps coming in her direction. She thought she was hallucinating, but then she heard a voice saying "hello? Anyone?". She couldn't believe it. There was actually someone in there. "Help!" She screamed. The person ran in her direction. To the girl's surprise, it wasn't a person: it was a small bipedal goat. She would be terrified if it wasn't the friendly and caring smile he was giving her. "Here, let me help you" he said. He helped her stand on her miraculously not broken foot and they walked together "My name is Asriel. What's yours?" Asked the goat boy. "My name is Chara. Thanks for your help Asriel. Where are we going?" "To my house, the castle. My family and I are going to help you."
She was happy. Down there, she was truly happy. Happier than she ever was in the surface. She had a new family. A new home. A new life. With the monsters she was finally happy. Then, she saw the mirror in her bedroom. She saw herself. She wasn't a monster. She was a human. She was destined to be a human for ever. She would always be just a human in a world of monsters, and she hated that. She hated humans. All humans she met were bad people. Liars and traitors, all of them, and she was one of them. "Chara, are you ok?" Asriel said, entering her bedroom and snapping her out of her sad thoughts. "Yes… Yes I am"
"Asriel, what did you do to that pie?" Said Toriel, quite angry "n-nothing, I put everything you asked to: cinnamon, flour, buttercups…" "Buttercups? I said cups of butter! That's why Asgore is sick like that!" The small confusion of words resulted in a deadly poisoning pie. The irony in that made Chara laugh. "Chara, don't laugh like that! That's bad!" She stopped at once "Sorry mom" Toriel could be scary as hell when she was angry. "Oh, don't be so rough on the kids Tori." Said Asgore between coughs "I'm fine, I'm big and tough, it's going to take more than a small poisonous flower to kill me!". Toriel started calming down "ok, I understand that you just confused the two things, Asriel. But don't do that again now you kids go out and play" they started walking away, but this episode gave Chara an idea, an idea that would change the history. "Asriel, can you show me where did you find those flowers?"
"You are not being serious, are you?" Asriel said incredulous "why do you think that? That's a wonderful plan!" "That's a horrible plan!" "You will save all the monsters! You'll be their hero!" "But I will lose you! I wouldn't sacrifice you even if it meant saving all the monsters!" "You won't lose me, my soul will be with you!" 'At least that I think that's what going to happen' she thought, but decided to not say that loudly "you just have to take my soul, go through the barrier, take 6 more souls from the humans and boom! You'll be a god and you can save every monster and destroy humanity!" Asriel then looked at her in doubt "wait, why are you saying to destroy all humanity? Why do you hate the humans? And why…" He hesitated for a second "why you came to the underground?" Chara's expression became dark. "I… Forget about it. Asriel, just promise me, you will follow this plan." He didn't say anything "Promise me" he hesitated. "I don't like that plan" "If you don't accept it, then maybe the monsters will be stuck forever here." Asriel just couldn't accept the idea, but she was right about that. It was the first chance to escape from the underground they had in centuries. Maybe it was the last. And he could see in her eyes that she really wanted that. He couldn't understand why, but she wanted. "Fine, but I will only follow your plan if there's nothing more to do. I'll show where are the flowers." However while Chara was following him, she started thinking 'he's a bit too soft. I wonder if this is going to harm the plan. Nah, he wouldn't go back after promising me.' Also, she had a plan B to make sure he wouldn't fail.
Getting deathly ill didn't looked that bad when it happened to Asgore. However now Chara was starting to think if eating that many flowers was a good idea. All her body was filled with burning pain and she couldn't move a muscle. But seeing her family was the worst. Toriel was crying and sobbing like crazy, Asgore never looked this sad before, and Asriel was almost crying too. She said "mom, dad, can I please talk alone with Asriel for a while?" She was feeling that was almost the time. She had to execute "plan B" after Toriel and Asgore had gone away, she said to "Asriel, I want to ask one last thing: about half a mile south from mountain Ebott there's a village. I was born there. My last wish is to see the flowers from the village again." Asriel made a confused expression but then he understood what she was asking. The girl then died, and her soul, a small red heart, floated out of her body. The kid touched it and then a shining flash and a loud noise came, filling all the room. Together, both souls created a powerful being, stronger than any human or monster in the world. The monster kid could feel it. The deceased kid could feel it too, as she was conscious again. Not quite feel, as an alive being does, but rather she felt as part of powerful creature that was Asriel, which came as a surprise for her. The second surprise was that she actually had some lesser control over the monster.
Asriel picked the corpse of Chara and started walking out of the castle when he walked past his parents they stared in shock,confused, at his son, now physically bigger than he was before. Asriel simply walked past them. He had a thing to do. He was going where no monster had gone for centuries: he was crossing the Barrier. He walked to the corridor behind the throne room. There was a passage to the Barrier. He stood there for a minute, beholding the magic wall. It always looked so menacing. Now, it was nothing for him. He started walking, and the Barrier simply started bending away, like magnets repulsing each other.
The surface. He was at the surface, the place where the monster should never come again. And now, there was a chance. A chance to escape that prison. All he had to do was take the souls of 6 humans.
He could feel a concentration of souls close to the mountain. 'That must be the village Chara told me.' He thought. He started going in that direction, still carrying Chara's corpse.
After some minutes, he reached the village. He was heading towards the center of the village. Some people saw him in his walk. They were terrified at the vision of a being that they've never seen before, and while holding the corpse of a child. They came to the most obvious conclusion: that the monster was a murderer. The townsfolk went crazy. They started picking rocks, heavy branches and anything they could find to beat the assassin. But Asriel didn't attacked them. 'What are you doing Asriel? Why are you not attacking them?' Chara tried to say, but he couldn't listen. 'Asriel, WHAT ARE YOU DOING? THEY ARE GOING TO KILL YOU!' But he didn't listen. He didn't fight back. He only walked to the center of the village. He found a place full of yellow flowers and placed the kid's lifeless body on top of it. He stood on his knees and said in a sad, slow voice "there you go Chara. I could fulfill one of your last wishes. I'm really sorry, but I can't complete the other." He stayed still for a minute, while still being attacked by the people. He then finally started to go back to his home, very injured and weak. He was walking slowly and painfully, almost dying after each step he took. He entered the mountain and the cave. He fell on the exact same spot where Chara did. 'I guess that's it, then. There's nothing to do anymore.' His body started becoming white dust, and it fell over the flowers that had grown there trough the years.
The time became a blur to Chara. Her soul stayed where Asriel died, near the entrance to the underground. She couldn't stop thinking about what happened. Her brother betrayed her. He preferred to die instead of honoring his promise. It didn't matter how much she think, she couldn't understand why. He was going to be a hero. A savior of the monsters. But he preferred getting killed.
Time passed. She didn't knew how much time, but she could feel it passing. She also felt other humans falling, 6 of them. She didn't knew what happened to them, though. One day a seventh soul appeared. It looked a lot like hers, and when it appeared, it attracted her soul like a magnet. When the two souls touched, Chara felt a power that she didn't feel for a long time. When she opened her eyes, she realized she had them. Her body was recovered. She looked at the human and realized, a bit surprised, that the human was another girl that looked almost exactly the same as her. The newcomer looked at Chara and said "who are you? And where am I?" "You're in the underground. Name's Chara. I'm a child that died down here" at the mention of her death, the other girl stared at her in shock. "Wait – are you dead? You are like a ghost or something? This means im going to…" The girl started crying at the thought. Usually Chara wouldn't care about other human crying, but there was something…special about that girl. Maybe it was because they looked alike, but, whatever it was, she couldn't just stand there "No,no, you don't have to cry. I promise to you, what happened to me won't happen to you. What's your name by the way?" The girl started calming down "M-my name is Frisk. You really promise me that you will help?" Chara gave her a smile "Yes Frisk. I promise. And believe me, I HATE when someone breaks a promise."
And that was the end of the prologue of "the other side of the knife" most of the story is canon, but is Chara's perspective. The next "volume" will be published soon, so follow my account if you want to see it.
Until then, thanks for reading!