Hello everyone! Today I am going to be proposing Chara from Undertale to be pure evil.
What's the work?[]
Undertale is an indie RPG released in 2015. The game mainly subverts traditional RPG tropes and factors morality behind it's game mechanics. Chara is a character that is mostly mentioned in flashbacks but is pivotal to the story.
Who is Chara? What have they done?[]
A long time ago, humans and monsters coexisted. However, a huge war broke out between the two and the humans were victorious. As a result of this, the monsters were forced to live in the Underground seperate by the world of the humans by a magical barrier that could be bypassed from the world of the humans but could only be passed from the Underground with a human and monster soul, and could only be destroyed with the power of 7 human souls. Chara was a human child who fell into the underground and was adopted by the king and queen of the monsters, Asgore and Toriel Dreemurr respectively. They adopted Chara and raised them alongside their son Asriel. Asriel and Chara were raised together as friends, however, Chara didn't truly value their friendship and was using him as a pawn for their ultimate plan. It's reveled by Asriel and implied by recordings from the true lab that Chara hated humanity and entered the Underground to escape them. Chara then devised a plan with Asriel to poison themself with Butter cup flowers so that Asriel could absorb their soul. Chara pretended to be sick and asked Asriel to take them to their village so they could see their flowers one last time. Asriel was to then carry Chara's soul to the world of the humans and Chara was going to take over Asriel's body and use the power of a human soul and monster soul to destroy humanity. This plan failed however, as the humans thought Asriel, carrying Chara's lifeless body, killed Chara and retaliate by mortally wounding Asriel forcing him to flee back to Mount Ebott and fall back into the Underground where he turned to dust on the flowers. Asriel's determination was then taken and injected into a flower from experimentations and Asriel became Flowey the flower. If the Player completes a genocide route, a playthough where they kill almost every character in the game, Chara is ressurected through Frisk's determination and either, takes Frisk's soul or, if the Player refuses, destroys the world of the game and sadistically toys with the Player waiting in a blank void waiting for the Player to give in and give them Frisk's soul. If the Player completes a Genocide run and then a True Pacifist run, it is revealed at the end that Chara is still in possession of Frisk's soul and uses them to destroy the monsters and it is implied that since the barrier was destroyed by Asriel, they destroy the world of the humans as well.
Heinous standard[]
Generally speaking, Undertale has a relatively high heinous standard, with characters resetting the universe over and over again just for fun. Chara stands out when compared to Flowey, as he was Asriel who lost his soul and was only being violent because he lost his moral agency, the Anomaly who was essentially controlling the outerverse of the world of the game and doing whatever they wanted, Frisk who was essentially a puppet of the Anomaly, and Mettaton who's crimes were noble and generally weren't played seriously. Chara stands out because they had a plan to destroy humanity, destroy the world of the game at the end of the Genocide Route, and it's implied that the ending after the Player completes a Genocide Route followed by the completion of the True Pacifist Route, that Chara succeeded in destroying humanity and the monsters.
Screen time[]
This is where it gets a bit difficult. Most of Chara's actions were done off-screen and were simply mentioned by Asriel and the recordings from the True Lab. However, Chara does destroy the world of the game and essentially kill every character in the game on-screen so in my opinion, that's more than enough to qualify.
Mitigating Factors[]
It's a common misconception that Chara was actually helping Frisk for the duration of the game while that's actually not the case. The Anomaly was controlling Frisk and Chara was slowly coming back to life through Frisk's determination during the Genocide Route exclusively and was encouraging Frisk to kill every character in the game including Monster Kid, who is only a child. The Anomaly had no control over Chara which is solidified at the end of the Genocide Route where the Anomaly is powerless to Chara at full LV. People also believe that Frisk's LV was corrupting Chara but that's also not the case. Chara had a plan to destroy humanity before the Anomaly or Frisk were ever involved, they weren't involved until Frisk first fell into the Underground. People may also point towards the fact that Chara was friends with Asriel, but Chara was simply using Asriel as a pawn as part of their plan to control Asriel's body and use his soul to destroy humanity. Chara clearly didn't value their friendship in the first place. Chara also shows no remource at the end of the Genocide Route and Chara takes control of Frisk and the Anomaly is powerless to stop them, to kill Flowey even after Flowey reveals himself to be Asriel. Chara was willing to kill Asriel for failing them. Chara also never valued Toriel or Asgore as, once again, Chara takes control of Frisk outside of the Anomlay's control, to kill Asgore. It's also worth mentioning that anyone Chara might have known from the world of the humans were also people that Chara had no problem with killing if given the opportunity.
Final verdict[]
I'd say Chara definitely qualifies but I'm eager to hear everyone else's opinions. Thanks for reading!