Frisk awoke again.
There was no ceremony. No glowing light. No divine choir welcoming him back from the brink.
Just breath—slow, shallow. Just the sound of water dripping somewhere far off. Just the soft hum of power rewinding time around his broken body.
The save point flickered behind him, pulsing faintly like a dying star.
Chara sat nearby. Not standing. Not speaking. Just watching.
Her face was unreadable—trapped between numb disbelief and the ghost of hope. As Frisk stirred, her expression shifted—but not in relief.
In sorrow.
"You're back again," she whispered, barely audible.
Frisk sat up. His eyes were distant. There was no anger, no joy. Just the forward momentum of someone who no longer questioned why they moved—only that they must.
Chara reached out a hand to steady him, but paused halfway. She pulled it back.
"Why…? Why do you keep getting up?"
She remembered how it felt the first time he fell. The way her voice had cracked when she whispered encouragement into his soul. Stay determined, she had said.
Now it had become a ritual. Mechanical. A cycle she didn't fully understand anymore.
Frisk rose and turned silently toward the path ahead.
There was no hesitation in his steps.
—
The rain atop Mt. Ebott fell harder, and the wind carried a cold bite. The girl watching the fire flinched as the story continued, her grip tightening on the soaked book in her lap. Her head tilted in confusion, fingers hesitating in the space between questions.
Then a slow gesture—one hand sweeping forward, as if asking: Why doesn't he stop?
The man, still cloaked, barely visible beneath the shadow of his hood, replied gently, "Because he can't. Or perhaps… because he won't."
He glanced toward her with unseen eyes. "Every time he falls, he comes back. That's what determination is. But not all determination is noble."
The girl's lips pressed together. Another gesture. Two fingers pointed together, then down to her heart.
And Chara?
The man nodded slowly. "She wanted to believe he could be saved. That this was all a mistake. But… with every reset, every death, something changed. Not just in him—but in her."
He paused.
"It's hard, you know. Watching someone you care about walk a road you no longer understand."
—
Back in the Underground, Frisk's blade cut through echoes and dust.
Again, he fought. Again, he fell.
He was defeated by traps, attacks, resistance. Again, he rose.
And every time, Chara was there.
Her voice softer each time.
Her words more hollow.
Sometimes she sat in the dark corners of the memory-space, arms wrapped around her knees, head buried. Sometimes she stood just behind him, not speaking at all. Watching.
And sometimes, when he staggered back from a fatal blow, she still reached out to him and whispered:
"Frisk… stay determined."
But even those words… they didn't carry what they once had.
One night—perhaps the fifth fall since Undyne—the save point sparked again.
Chara didn't move. She sat with her back turned, hugging her knees.
"Do you even hear me anymore?" she asked.
No reply.
"Are you listening, or just… following the path?"
The silence answered for him.
She looked down at her hands.
There was dust there.
Not real—but remembered.
The memory of dust.