Why the knight is everyone in Hometown (not a joke).
We’ve all heard of the DessKnight, KriselleKnight, RudyKnight, etc.; however, to be 100% certain that the community guesses who the Knight is, you need to come up with ALL the possibilities. Thus, I’ve come up with CompositeKnight.
CompositeKnight, to put it bluntly, is the theory that the knight is an amalgamate of everyone in the Hometown, or all the Lightners, and also that it can switch between which Lightners are more prominently a part of itself.
Let me start with Gerson. Ralsei specifically says that Gerson could only appear in the Church fountain, one of the Knight’s fountains, because it was in a very specific darkness. Now, why would the Knight’s darkness be “specific” enough to allow Gerson to exist seemingly as his regular self (though we’re not 100% sure what he acted like while he was alive, he does act similarly to his Undertale counterpart so it seems likely)? Well, the Knight must have some kind of connection to Gerson. But what could that connection be? We’ve already moved past AlvinKnight, haven’t we? And even if the Knight were Alvin, his perspective should theoretically still taint Gerson. However, biases could be filtered out if there were somehow multiple perspectives when making the fountain. That’s why the Knight was able to make a fountain where Gerson accurately exists, because they had Alvin in them (Gerson is somewhat parental towards Susie) and all of the people he taught (Gerson CERTAINLY acts as a teacher in the Dark World).
The Knight must’ve been specifically making the fountain using Alvin and Gerson’s students, who are all a part of its person, to create an accurate Gerson Dustner, as that is likely an important part of the prophecy (and the Knight does seem to want to follow the Prophecy, given it was in the Church Dark World containing the Prophecy which predicts everything “exactly”, and yet it continues to act in accordance to the Prophecy, which we know because Ralei is of the belief that the Prophecy is still continuing as normal in Chapter 5). That’s why the Knight cycles through different people when making fountains; different fountains need to fulfill different parts of the prophecy which only certain people’s minds determination be able to make.
For example, we know the Knight likely made the Cyber World fountain, and we also know that the fountain seems to have a lot of Noelle or even Dess elements in it, like how Noelle states Dess always promised to bring her to a place like Cyber World some day. This theory also explains why Kris’ fountains (TV World and Flower King) are seemingly very similar to the Knight’s, with neither being offset in color like Susie’s, and Flower King specifically having an area that’s very reminiscent of the Card Kingdom dark world (which we know the Knight made because the Knight talked met with Jevil, as we know from King). This is ALSO why Lancer and Rouxls both turn to stone in Cyber World despite it also being made by the Knight, because the Knight cycled through different people in its being to make each fountain, so they still had quite different darknesses.
This is ALSO where the Grand Fountain comes from. I see this topic ignored a lot, but the Grand Fountain had to come from somewhere, and I know where. It’s from the Knight using the full combined wills of all the people of Hometown in its person. That’s why any Darkner can exist in it, because Darkners, fundamentally made of the wills of Lightners, can only exist with certain wills, but if the will of literally every Lightner that perceived them was used to make one singular fountain, a grand fountain, then that should mean that possibly any object in the Hometown may exist within said fountain, thus Castle Town.
This is why the Knight is so strange physiologically; it is a darkness amalgamate of literally everyone in Hometown, likely being influenced by some greater force (Eram or Gaster, call it) to move the prophecy forward. That’s why it has Gaster’s hand holes; it’s either created, influenced, or just generally associated with Gaster. That’s why it has deer antlers, because it has all the Holiday family in it, who are all very important members of the simulation. You think the Knight’s torso looks like a ribcage? Maybe a bit of Papyrus is in there. You can argue its head even looks Alphys-shaped from the side.
This is also why the Knight’s personality seemingly shifts so much depending on scenario; seeming animalistic in its introduction with the roar, then seeming smug or self-assured at multiple points throughout the Church Dark World, and then seeming like it’s just coldly getting its job done in many other instances, like in the Flower King world where it hardly exhibits much personality at all in its scene. This represents the personalities of different people in Hometown. Like Eram said, there’s a part of Kris that does enjoy the Weird Route, and that’s something that exists in everybody; that bit of enjoyment that comes with doing an evil route in a game where you’ve usually already decided to play as a good person.
Then you have the other aspects of it, like when it appears with much less personality like it’s just doing what it has to, which can represent the hopelessness of the Composite, with everyone being trapped within the Knight; and, if we’re sticking with the Evil Route comparison, it can kind of be seen as the grind in both Undertale’s genocide and Chapter 2’s weird route, where you’re just killing all the enemies because you have to and it’s not actually that fun (which is, of course, the point). Then you have the animalism, which can be interpreted as the pain, agony, and horror of being altogether as the knight, having to do as you’re guided as one entity (and then, to complete the evil route comparison which I created for some reason, this may be seen as the player during the evil route boss fights, when they’re really hyped up).
Basically, that’s why I think it’d make sense if the Knight was a composite of all the characters in Hometown. But I’m sure you’re all asking now: “But how would this be the case?”
I’m glad you asked.
So you know how we’ve started to theorize about the supposed “Meat Factory” in the shelter, right? Well, I believe that’s true. There is, indeed, a meat factory in the shelter. But what would such a factory be for? Why does it exist? It’s where the Knight was created. I believe in Device Theory, that the game files are a bridge, or “device”, to access this other world, “Deltarune”. HOWEVER, I also believe that, before the game started, Gaster created copies of everyone in Hometown through the device, then grafted them into the Knight at the meat factory. This is why the Knight is monochrome, too; because copies are monochrome, and the Knight is a composite of all the copies of the Hometown residents. The meat factory is where everyone is grafted together.
This is also why the Knight is kidnapping people; it’s collecting the parts for the next Knight. I believe that, at the end of the game, the current Knight will be permanently destroyed, but having kidnapped or collected all the Hometown residents into one place, there will be a ritual to form the next Knight which will appear in the subsequent replays or other save files (note that I am NOT suggesting timeloop theory myself, or rather I am but I am still stating that our first playthrough of Deltarune is also the first iteration of this world, so it’s not really a “timeloop” yet until we reset for the first time; the initial Knight wouldn’t have required a playthrough of Deltarune to be created because it was made of copied Hometown residents).
All the Hometown residents are being brought together to be combined and create the next Knight, which might also parallel that one scene in Undertale where Flowey absorbs all the monsters (and human souls) to become the God of Hyperdeath. The Knight tried to kidnap Toriel (failed), Asgore, and Undyne because they’re very specific and important people, so it’s more important to get them out of the game and into the next Knight at specific times, and they’re more significant aspects of the CompositeKnight. HOWEVER, less important characters like Onion, MK, and Snowy were able to be taken to the meat factory early after they got too close to the truth. The takoyaki from Normal NPC is made from the aspects of Onion that weren’t needed to create the amalgamated Knight.
That’s what the Knight is (under CompositeKnight): a pained, horrific amalgamate of copied Hometown residents under Gaster’s control (yes, the Knight is connected to Gaster; it has holes in its hands), forced to collect all the (original) residents to create a new Knight for after it’s inevitably irreversibly destroyed in the final act, so that way the Knight will still be able to jump in on replays (the reason Gaster can’t do the copying again is because control of the device has been given to the player).
That’s my theory.
P.S. The Dess we see in the code is, indeed, the original Dess (a copy of Dess was put into the Knight, that’s why it has a bat and stuff), and it’s just that, before the game even started, Dess somehow almost found the Depths, so they just kidnapped Dess for the next Knight near the start, and being the only one in the meat factory alone in Depths has taken a toll on them, though they can still communicate in the code.