Decided to skip the dummy fight, as I had nothing planned for it and it would probably have been super boring if I had left it in. We find Frisk selling some wares in Temmie Village, where Sans comes to update them on the Hotland situation.

On another note, we've reached 20 chapters. I honestly wasn't sure when I set out if I would make it this far, but we've made it. Hopefully we can make it the rest of the way in a reasonable amount of time as well.

All that aside, enjoy!

Chapter 20: Spar

Frisk handed the excited Temmie the ballerina shoes, getting showered in coins as a reward. They giggled, before waving goodbye as they left the shop, intending to proceed through Waterfall.

"that temmie really seemed excited to buy those shoes from you." Sans leaned against one of the outside signs, winking at Frisk as they passed.

"You might even say they were dancing with glee when getting them." Frisk smirked, stopping opposite him. "Hey. How's things going up ahead?"

San's smile dropped as much as it could, a worried look appearing upon his face. "not great. gaster's sent an order to evacuate all monsters from the lowest levels of hotland because the unstable determination ejected by the core's overflow could rise to a hazardous level over the area soon. you'll still be okay to go through there, but for us monsters it's a little more hazardous. he's also installed some airlocks on the lab so that it's safe to continue investigating the problem."

"So we're still in the clear for the moment?"

"it won't be long, frisk. you're gonna need to hurry, we don't want anything problematic occurring there."

"I'll do my best, but it might be difficult. Undyne's caught on to the fact that you're not escorting me, and so I'll probably still have to fight her up ahead.

"noted. if that's the case, I probably won't be able to persuade her otherwise, and you'll just have to get past her fast."

"Alright, will do. I'll see you later, Sans." Frisk waved at him as they passed, heading for Temmie Village's exit.

They had memorized the path through the lanterns and through the dark, so they managed to completely bypass Undyne there. Continuing onto the bridges, they stopped at the base of the sharp mountain. Undyne stood at the top, facing the other way.

"Seven.

"Seven human souls, and King ASGORE will become a god.

"...Six.

"That's how many we've collected thus far." Undyne turned towards them, a glower in her eye. "Understand, Human? Through your seventh and final soul, this world will be transformed."

She turned away again. "First, however, as is customary for those who make it this far… I shall tell you the tragic tale of our people."

As usual, Undyne paused, then Frisk heard a sigh. To their surprise, Undyne took off their helmet early, turning back to them, eye closed. "No, forget it. I'm sick of trying to hide this." They opened their eye, looking straight at them. "Frisk, I… I have to admit I remember the last reset. I remember everything that happened, from the beginning when Chara attacked, to when you reset with the promise to set things right."

She paused, as Frisk took some time to let that sink in. "I know I can't kill you for good, since you can just LOAD. And so far, you've done well on your promise."

Undyne closed their eye, turning away again. "And I don't doubt that you'll keep it as you continue to the castle. No… that's not what I'm stopping you here for. The reason you're being stopped from progressing…"

Suddenly, Undyne summoned a spear, twirling as they turned back towards Frisk, a grin on their face as they pointed it at them. "I want to see your battle skills!"

Frisk stepped back a bit, surprised. "Wait, wha-"

"That's right! I wanna test your mettle and see how tough you are! Because if you're untrained with your magic, you're not gonna stand a chance in a real fight! Sure, you can spare your way through the underground, but what if we leave and you have to fight a human? You're gonna need some practice, Fuhuhu!" She leaped down from her vantage point, the ground thundering as she landed in front of Frisk. "So, you wanna do a quick spar before you continue? You can always just LOAD if you need this time, right?"

Frisk hesitated. "I suppose so…"

"Then what are you waiting for? Let's battle!"

Frisk shrugged, smirking. If Undyne was so intent upon battling, then so be it. They summoned their staff and cape, getting into a battle stance as they stepped away from Undyne. "Alright, sure."

Undyne cackled slightly as she summoned a few spears, grabbing one with her hand. "Fuhuhu… This will be interesting. En garde!"

She sent her spell that turns souls green at Frisk, but, with a twirl of their staff, Frisk blocked it, smirking. "Thanks, Undyne, but that won't be necessary. I got my own magic to block and dodge with this time!"

"Ooh, getting cocky, are we? Alright, show me what you got!"

Undyne summoned several spears, sending them at Frisk at various angles. Surrounding themself with a shield, Frisk deflected the first few before leaping over their shield, staff poised to strike Undyne. Caught slightly off guard, Undyne held up their spear to deflect their strike, but to her surprise Frisk thrust it forward early, creating a powerful force blast that sent Undyne flying backward, and they hit the far wall with a crash.

Frisk paused, choosing not to follow through with their attack. They noticed Undyne stagger a bit as they got up, and so they gave her a moment to stabilize. "You alright?"

Undyne grinned, shaking off any instability and summoning another few spears. "Are you kidding? This is the best fight I've had in a long time, and we haven't even started!" Shouting a battle cry, she charged forward, summoning spears under her feet in front of her and from various other locations, holding one poised in her hand as she charged at surprising speed.

Seeing the oncoming wave of spears, Frisk dodged to the side as Undyne charged past.

Tossing their staff away, Frisk summoned their grapplers, two armored claws shining red around their hands. They reached out with one and grabbed an incoming spear, spinning it around them and sending it back at Undyne. Undyne grinned, deflecting it with her own spear and sending three more at them. Frisk grabbed two of them, yanking them into the ground before narrowly dodging the third.

Undyne summoned a multitude of spears, hovering them behind her. "C'mon, I know you're holding back at this point! Give me all you're worth!"

Frisk hesitated, summoning their shield to protect themselves as the spears were thrown. "I don't know if you could handle it…"

"I don't care! Even if I die, you can just reLOAD, so it doesn't matter how much I can take! It matters how much you can deal!"

Frisk's eyes darkened behind their shield. They summoned some spikes, dismissing the shield as they stood straight, staff clutched in one hand.. "If you insist."

They then thrust into the air as Undyne summoned more spears, tossing their spear out to create a bridge such as they did in their battle with Chara. Summoning their bow, they began to fire countless spears of their own down at Undyne. Simultaneously, they began summoning spikes which they cast down as well.

Undyne had difficulty reflecting all the spears, and the spikes were challenging too. Finally, she leaped into the air with tremendous strength, surrounding herself with spears as she hurtled towards Frisk. Caught off guard, Frisk received a heavy punch to the face, staggering off of their platform as it faded away.

Landing on the ground with a thundering shake, Undyne allowed Frisk to get up from their great fall. "You alright?"

Frisk took a moment to rise, wiping some blood off their cheek. "I'm okay, although that hurt. I can't take many more hits like that though… I only have 20HP."

Undyne paused, eye widening a bit. "Wait… only 20HP?"

"Yeah. Chara had more because she gained LOVE through her runs through the underground. But I've always had 20. ...With the exception of the time I investigated the genocide run that triggered Chara's repetitive killing. But yeah, I've always had 20."

"You must be damn good at dodging to survive all of this, then."

"I wasn't always, but practice makes perfect." Having fully recovered, Frisk summoned their staff again. "I'm ready to continue, if you're up for more."

Undyne grinned, summoning a few more spears. "That's the spirit! Fuhuhu! Now, come here!"

Frisk crouched, igniting their hands in a glowing, red flame as they smirked. "How about you come here?"

Undyne would have been wary in any other case, but they had little to lose here. Charging forward, they thrust a spear at Frisk, who swiftly threw up their staff to parry the stab, before twirling away, the flame in their hands stretching out in all directions, lighting up the battlefield in an elaborate pattern.

Undyne began to back away, before realizing that their only choice if she wanted to strike Frisk was to charge into the flames, and so she did. It scarred her armor a bit, and she got somewhat injured, but it wasn't too bad. She struck a spear at Frisk, but it was blocked at the last moment by a bone extruding from the ground. Frisk stopped their fire pattern to swing their staff at Undyne, but it, too, was blocked by Undyne's spear. The two then spent a few moments in hand-to-hand combat, where Frisk would swing, blocked by Undyne, then Undyne would make a stab that Frisk would parry.

Finally, Frisk used their force blast on the ground underneath them, blasting Undyne backward as they soared into the air. Summoning a large, intricate axe that resembled the burnt pan, they raised it above their head as they began to fall back upon Undyne. Undyne attempted to raise a spear to block the strike, but surprisingly, the axe cleaved straight through her spear, creating a large gash in her armor as Frisk drove it into the ground.

Undyne staggered backward, taken aback by the force of the strike. Frisk dissolved the axe, standing up. While they were having fun, the battle was taking a little longer than they would like, and they wanted to move on and help Gaster fix the core. With this in mind, they offered their hand to Undyne. "How's that for a spar for you?"

Undyne stared at the hand for a moment, then grinned and took it. "That was great. After all the serious fighting done last timeline, that was a nice break for me."

"Glad to hear that was relieving, somehow." Frisk chuckled, walking back towards the SAVE Point. "Well, I should LOAD now, to make up for that lost time. You heard the monsters in the lowest level of Hotland have been evacuated because of the unstable determination there, right?"

Undyne paused. "I'd heard something about it, but I'm not really sure why. Determination should be a good thing, right?"

"It can be, but it's not for monsters, and especially not as an output from the CORE. Apparently an overdose of the very stuff flooding Hotland was what caused Gaster to be erased from the timeline. He wanted to protect the monsters from losing their existences, so it had to be evacuated. I need to get to the CORE to help him handle the determination excess there, and acquire access to the control room."

"That… that was explained a lot better than Alphys does it." Undyne grinned. "Anyways, thanks again for the spar. A couple notes, if you're okay with it?"

Frisk had their hand on the SAVE star, but withdrew it to allow Undyne to speak. "Sure, go ahead."

"I would suggest trying to improve your attack and defense stats. If you have to fight another human, chances are high that they'll have higher levels on both than you will, and that puts you at a disadvantage, even with your ranging magical capabilities and your ability to RESET. I might also suggest you think about developing a special attack, such as those that Sans and Papyrus have."

Frisk smiled. "I'll take it into consideration. Thanks, Undyne."

And with that, the ebb of time warped, and jumped back to before the battle.

Three months later….

It's done. Took far longer to finish it than I honestly should have, but It's done.

Also, if you haven't noticed, we've reached 100 favorites as well. Even though this story is getting close to being 2 years old, that still blows my mind. I'm so honored to have so many people enjoy this little work of mine enough to put it on their favorites list.

Enough jabber from me though, let's get to the real business.

As always, I wouldn't expect a consistent upload rate, or at least a fast one. If this story interests you enough to want to continue reading to the end (which will [eventually] happen, I'm determined enough for that), don't forget to follow the story so you can be notified when a new chapter pops up every two to five months. (Or less. That works too.)

Regardless, thank you so much for reading, and I'll see you all next time!