The indie-hit Undertale is known for the way its charming art, music, and gameplay gave way to a larger story about intentional violence and its consequences. This story began with Chara, the first ever human to fall down into the monster world. Chara haunts the eighth fallen human, Frisk, throughout their Undertale adventure. But what’s Chara’s story?
Who is Chara and where did he come from?
Chara was a child who escaped to Mt. Ebott after finding disappointment and misery in the human world. They wanted to leave and never come back. When they tripped over a root, they tumbled down a hole and ended up underground, in the monster world. Asriel, the son of Queen Toriel and King Asgore, found Chara and brought him home. Immediately, the two monster royals adopted Chara. Asriel and Chara became inseparable and spent all their time together, as siblings and best friends.
As a character, Chara is known for their quirky, striped-shirt style and bob-cut hair. They also loved yellow flowers, winning at chess, chocolate, and their newfound family. According to other characters in the game, the player character, Frisk, and Chara share an unsettling resemblance.
Related: Who is Temmie from Undertale? Temmie backstory, explained
What happened to Chara?
However, despite their happy new life, Chara’s resentment for humanity never left. If anything, it grew stronger. Chara wanted monsters to be free above ground, not the people who hurt them.
One day, Chara ate poisonous buttercups. The game implies Chara did this on purpose. They created a plan to become a being powerful enough to return to the human world. When Chara died, their soul fused with Asriel’s. Because of this, Chara compelled Asriel’s body to carry their corpse over the barrier and into the human world. Once there, Asriel and Chara were confronted by humans, who began attacking them. Chara was ready to kill these humans, but Asriel resisted, which led them to be fatally wounded. They barely had enough energy to crawl back into the monster world before collapsing on a pile of flowers and dying.
While Toriel and Asgore laid their children to rest in a coffin below the castle, neither of their children were completely gone. When Asriel’s body collapsed, Asriel’s soul spread to the flowers under them. This meant that Asriel came back as the twisted, malevolent Flowey.
Meanwhile, Chara only reappears to the main character, Frisk, as a whispering, dream-like demon during the Genocide Route.
How does Chara fit into each Undertale ending?
Undertale is known for its many, heartwrenching endings, which often led players to restart the game to change their route. That was part of why the game became such a beloved indie hit. Unsurprisingly, Chara is a part of many of those endings.
During a True Pacifist Ending, Chara is nothing but a bittersweet memory on a VHS. You’ll find his corpse wrapped in one of the human coffins below the monster castle.
In the Genocide Ending, Chara appears to you after the game ends and asks if you’d like to erase what you’ve done. All it costs is your soul.
If you do the Soulless Pacifist Ending, AKA where you erased the Genocide game and then went back to be kind and merciful, Chara will vandalize some of the epilogue’s photographs and images. This leaves players with unsettling feelings in the middle of their “happy ending”.
However, if you choose to repeat the Genocide Ending and dare the Sans fight again, you and Chara will have an entire conversation about demons and cycles of destruction. When you choose to erase the world again, Chara seems pleased. If not, Chara seems confused and annoyed with your sentimentality, destroying the in-game world all over again with a bang.
