Of Soulmates and Bonds - Errorink

The lore chapter

This chapter is an extra one, in which I give you some insight about the story as a whole and some "Easter eggs".

• This story was born as a parody, and even if I changed it a bit, the original plot is still recognizable, and there are also some quotes scattered inside the story and in a few chapter titles. Try and guess which story I'm parodying!

• Since Dream and Nightmare are empaths, whenever I write in their POV you can see that I always put emphasis on the emotions they can feel around them

• CORE!Frisk doesn't like to be called CORE, since their name is still Frisk in their eyes, though they don't mind if someone refers to them as CORE to avoid confusion (canon info, I think). When I write in Dream and Blue's POV they respect their wishes and call them Frisk in their mind (as they're friends), while Nightmare and Error don't care and call them CORE

• For similar reason, when I write in Blue's POV he refers to himself as Sans, while others call him Blue

• In the second chapter, I wrote that Error felt his destructive tendencies lessen, and decided to remain inside the Antivoid. In the third chapter, Blue explains that Nightmare started attacking and damaging positive AUs for his own gain. Nightmare was filling for Error's "destruction quota", so to speak, and that's why the Destroyer remained in the Antivoid for centuries without issues for the Balance (also time in the Antivoid moves different). When the Negative Guardian destroyed too much, however, Error and Ink were needed to fix the issue

• In the story, Error never changes his mind about the AUs or has a change of heart. He falls in love with Ink, helps to rescue him, learns about the Balance, but he never says that he now likes AUs or regrets what he did, because he doesn't. He still thinks AUs are filthy glitches. After the story, he only destroys AUs for the Balance, but that's for Ink's sake, since he needs the AUs to survive. In Error's ideal Multiverse, there would only be Underswap, Undernovela and Outertale

• The Sans Error captures while fighting Nightmare in chapter 6 is Fell

• Originally, Fresh wasn't in the story at all, but then I remembered a conversation between two other fanfic authors in which they called Fresh something like "the envoy of Chaos", and so he also got a role

• You have probably already guessed, but I'll say it anyway: the inspiration for Ink absorbing the colors around him is Pale, an emotionless Swap!Ink who destroys AUs by absorbing their colors for feeling emotions.

•The reason why Ink absorbs color is because the Doodlesphere keeps him alive thanks to the magic that permeates it, but as soon as he leaves he starts needing his paints (which he doesn't have yet). When Ink starts using his vials, he doesn't passively absorb colors anymore

•Ink's pupils have different meaning depending on the color or the shape, and whenever I describe them, I keep that in mind. You can go back to some chapters and try to guess Ink's mood from his eyes

•The names of the AUs are made with their initials and their creation date (as per Undertale wiki)

• Nightmare's empathic attack doesn't work on Error because his real trauma is worse than whatever Nightmare tries to make him feel. Same for Dust, Killer and Horror.

• When Error and Blue are looking for the entrance of the Doodlesphere, they're in Underfell because that's the first ever AU, thus a pillar of the Multiverse with Dreamtale, Reapertale, Underswap (that it's still destroyed at that point) and a few others. I wanted to write it, but couldn't find a way to mention it organically

• Another headcanon of mine that couldn't find its way into the story is that Ink can create things, but only how he knows them; for example, if he tried to create a flower before he left the Doodlesphere, he'd make it out of cloth or paper or wood, since they're materials he knows, but couldn't make it real or with plastic.

Balance canon in my story (if you're confused):
• there are four Balances in my Multiverse, Life and Death, Order and Chaos, Positivity and Negativity, Creation and Destruction
• every Balance has two soulmates, to better regulate it
• the soulmate bond can be either romantic or platonic: Error and Ink have a romantic one, the one between Dream and Nightmare is platonic, CORE and Fresh have a cordial relationship (but nothing more), while Reaper and Life are at least BFFs (I'm personally indifferent to Afterdeath, so it could go either way)
• Error and Ink are, as they told Nightmare, the keepers of the Balance: their role is to control the other Guardians, and deal with them if they go out of line. They are the strongest Guardians
• the bonding process connects the two soulmates, and also lets them know about their role, the Balance and the Creators (in the story, Ink and Error also kick ass, but they could have done it either way, the bonding was just a little boost)
• Dream and Nightmare, as Ink said, were born already bonded, so they don't know about the Balance itself, only about their own role. After the apple incident, both Dream and Nightmare met Reaper and Life at different times, and learned that they were also Guardians, but (as Error guessed) CORE decided to keep everything else a secret from Dream to not burden him, since he was already maintaining the Balance on his own

About entry and exit points:
• doesn't matter who or what you are, everyone is bound to entry and exit points
• the only two people who aren't are CORE (since they don't teleport, but instead choose to manifest a physical form) and Reaper (otherwise doing his job would be too hard)
• Dream and Nightmare have a easier time traveling through positive/negative AUs respectively, and going places where their "element" isn't present is tiring for them (that's part of why Dream was captured so easily in Underfell)
• the Antivoid, the Doodlesphere and the Omega Timeline don't have entry and exit points, as they're not AUs, but more like the space in between, so when you enter you can enter anywhere, and can exit from anywhere. You can't get from one space to another, you need an AU in the middle as a buffer
• Ink's pages are the exception, since you can use them wherever, though they still bring the user to the corresponding entry point (and the page remains where it is)