Asgore's Plan

Monsters had finally been freed. I'm not sure exactly how, but the barrier was broken. The human freed us all. The joy I felt from this freedom, not just from the Underground, but also from my burden as king was indescribable.

As we stood atop the cliff looking at the sunset, all seemed well, but minutes later, as we began to head down the mountain, Toriel pulled me aside to speak to me privately. I knew this was coming; I just hadn't expected her to speak to me so soon. She demanded to know what I was going to do to her child before she interrupted the FIGHT. It seemed she wanted to confirm what she feared she already knew. I took a deep breath and asked her to sit down. This was a bit of a long story.

I had no intention to actually take the human's soul. I knew that if I did shatter the barrier, humans would declare war on monsters again. When we were first trapped under the mountain, there were tens of thousands of humans. Now, there are billions. Humans had also developed far greater weapons. Even without magic, humans still have an amazing and terrifying capacity to cause harm, if the recordings found in their waste were anything to go by. They could kill countless monsters with just one of their 'guns', as was the case with one human that had fallen into our world. They could level an entire city with a single weapon. A monster with a human soul is a powerful entity, indeed, but even it can be killed. My son, sweet Asriel, absorbed the soul of our adopted child, Chara, and crossed the barrier. Upon his return, our fears were made real as he came back fatally wounded. What hope did I have to defeat the humans? Even with seven souls, I would never be able to destroy humanity. We monsters are simply too weak. To break the barrier would be to begin the genocide of all monsters.

But my peopled needed hope. After the death of our children, the Underground fell into despair. They needed to have hope that they could one day be free. As king, it was my duty to care for my people, no matter the cost. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. So with a heavy heart, I declared war on humanity and decreed that any human that fell down into the Underground was to be killed and their soul harvested to be brought to me personally. I promised that I would break the barrier once we had collected seven human souls, the exact same level of power that was used to seal us under this forsaken mountain. In reality, I hoped that my royal scientist would be able to find a way to break the barrier without the human souls before the last human fell.

After obtaining the first human soul, I could've absorbed it and crossed the barrier to collect six more, thus bringing our freedom quickly, but I knew this would never work. Whether or not the humans still knew of our existence as the years passed I knew not, but if they did, they would not take kindly to the fact that I had killed one of their own and had come to claim six more lives. Even if I could collect six more souls without being killed in the process, it wouldn't change the war that would have inevitably followed.

When the final human arrived, I knew I could never take their soul. I felt that I had to do something to atone for my sins. The least I could do is send at least one human child back home. However, I knew the human wouldn't want to kill me to take my soul, so I forced it to fight me. I knew of its ability to SAVE and LOAD. I made sure that the human was allowed to have all the time it needed to prepare for our battle. Then, when they were finally ready, I would destroy their MERCY option and attack. I would kill them as many times as I had to until they finally fought back. I would continue the FIGHT until I was nearly dusted, then I would offer them my soul to leave this place. If they refused, I would force their hand by removing the last bit of health that I had left. They would have to absorb my soul, or I would simply fade away for nothing. The least I could do for a child that kind was to SPARE it from having to kill another. It wouldn't make up for what I've done, but at least my people would be safe.

That was my plan. I thanked Toriel for stopping me from having to follow through with it.