Journey of the Sanses

Chapter 16: Queen Renrink

Tension invaded the throne room as Queen Renrink examined the eleven monsters before her. Life Toriel and Death Papyrus had gone to the sidelines of their Queen's lair in a subordinate manner to allow her to look at her visitors without any distractions. Geno gulped nervously, and Sera clung onto his white hoodie in fear of the powerful individual who was now carefully scrutinizing them.

Everyone else went silent and stared back at the Queen, trying their best not to give away the fact that they were scared of her. Only Reaper was unfazed by his mother's intimidating glare, for he knew that he had no reason to be afraid of her. "Maybe she's just untrusting of us, just like her guardians are with her visitors," the cloaked skeleton thought to himself.

A few moments passed before the Queen inquired them. "Why are you here?" When no one answered her, she only spoke up again. "Alright, here's a better question," she said as she pointed to the two youngsters. "Why would a couple of children like Stick Cat and Anger be all the way out here in the ReaperTale Universe, which happens to be my kingdom?"

The two youngsters only stuttered anxiously as they tried to come up with their explanation for being in her domain. Sera put on a determined expression on her face and spoke for the youngsters. "Their creators, along with Toby Fox, were killed at the hands of Fallacy," she interjected. "They've been living on their own without anybody to take care of them ever since then."

Renrink nodded in understanding of the situation of the two youngsters, but Reaper could tell by the twinkling of curiosity in her eyes that she wasn't done with them yet. His best guess was that she'd wanted to know why he and his eight companions in the original group had chosen to visit her.

The Queen of the ReaperTale Universe inquired them once again, however her question was more directed at the original group than the two youngsters. "Why... have you nine monsters chosen to visit me, out of all the rulers of the various Universes that you could have gone to otherwise?"

"That's your cue, Sera," Reaper thought to himself, hoping to somehow telepathically tell her that it was her time to speak for their seemingly impossible quest to save the Multiverse, despite knowing that skeleton monsters, and other monsters in general, didn't have the ability of telepathy, much less monster children.

Sera nervously gulped before answering Queen Renrink. "Do you... happen to know about the prophecy? The one where five skeleton children and Yekel's incarnation are supposed to go out and end the Multiversal War?" "The one where Fallacy's destined to die? Yeah, I know about that particular prophecy," the Queen replied.

Sera tried her best not to shudder at Renrink's words, more specifically at the idea of killing the Vampire Lord, and continued to speak. "Well... we are those monster children, besides the two youngsters and our three caretakers," she said. Queen Renrink seemed mildly surprised, but gestured for the pink Draconian to continue on with her explanation of their quest.

Sera continued. "And I... I am the one who's destined to kill Fallacy and save the Multiverse." She then whispered quietly. "Despite how much that I don't want to destroy him." Fortunately, no one heard her, and so she continued. "I also had the idea... of perhaps traveling through the Alternate Universes of the Multiverse, and convincing the rulers of those domains to make alliances with us, cooperate with the Crayon Queen so that they can distract Fallacy's armies, and then have me go into his castle alone to face him and fulfill the prophecy."

Everyone else gave Sera their expressions of approval of her explanation, while Renrink gazed upon the pink Draconian wearing a look that indicated that she was impressed by the cleverness of her plan. "Very well then," the Queen said. "I shall help you in your quest to end the Multiversal War. However..."

Tension once again overtook the throne room as the Queen contemplated on what she should have her visitors do for her, while everyone else was silent and possibly speculating on what tasks they needed to do for Renrink. At last, she spoke out her answer. "You must prove to me that you are worthy of my assistance before the official alliance between us is made," she said.

"What do we have to do?" Classic Sans asked. "Oh, there is no 'we' in this particular challenge," the Queen responded. "Only one of you will be allowed to face the ultimate test of loyalty." Geno immediately raised his hand to volunteer, but Sera pulled it down and hissed in his nonexistent ear, "You don't even know what the requirements are! You might get hurt!" The red-scarfed skeleton understood her and put his hand down completely.

The Queen noticed that and chuckled in amusement as she further elaborated on what she'd been talking about. "But only a monster who hails from the ReaperTale Universe can take the challenge," she then turned her attention to Death Papyrus and Life Toriel. "And no, you may not volunteer, for I will only accept someone from the group itself."

"That only leaves me to do it," Reaper realized. Then, he remembered what Life Toriel had said about being judged and realized that the challenge was the judgement that she'd told him to expect. And so without any further delay, he immediately volunteered himself. "I'll do it," the cloaked skeleton said.

To be completely honest with himself, he was terrified. Terrified of the challenge and the unknown trials and tests that he would surely face. "But this is what I wanted, isn't it? To be able to prove that I'm capable of having loyalty?" He questioned himself. Everyone else was staring at him with wide eyes and wearing the "Are you insane?!" expression on their faces. Especially Cross.

Queen Renrink only smiled in delight at her long-lost son volunteering to take the challenge and spoke up. "Very well then," she said. "You, Reaper Sans of the ReaperTale Universe, shall be faced with the Trials of Loyalty, starting tomorrow morning. I am looking forward to see how you will fare against my challenge."

She paused for a moment, then continued. "But you and your friends are most likely curious about what the challenge is called," she said, then she went on with her announcement before any of the monsters could answer her. "It is simply called Judgement. The reason for its name is that it is the very judgement of your loyalty as a whole. And you, Reaper Sans, will most likely find this challenge useful. That is, if you pass or even survive."

Then, she spoke up once again. "You are all dismissed," she said. "Feel free to roam around and find materials for your beds, because you will definitely be here for a while." She then gestured for all of the monsters to leave and search for a place to sleep, since Reaper was going to take the challenge in the morning.

With that, they all left the throne room almost instantly, walking in different directions and to different places. Of course, Geno and Sera went together, while the others were pretty much scattered across the room and separated from each other. Reaper made sure to isolate himself away from his friends, the adults, and the two youngsters. He just needed to be by himself for a while.

Once he'd found a place to sleep and gathered together the materials for a makeshift bed, he simply just sat on it and contemplated the reason why he had taken the challenge. Sure, he'd wanted to prove that he was loyal to his friends, but he also felt that somehow, there was something about loyalty that he didn't know about. If so, he could only hope that not only would he pass the Judgement Challenge, but also perhaps even learn the true meaning of loyalty.