Shi

I... shall block your way.

Shi, Chapter 5

Shi (JP: シ Shi) is a Darkner enemy in Chapter 5 of Deltarune who first appears in the Cliffs. They serve as immobile roadblockers who only fight the party when touched. It has a non-hostile variation, which wears farmer's clothing.

Profile

Appearance

Shi is a scarecrow-like Darkner with a brown head and a red triangular body. It wears a flowing green scarf and a pointed red hat, and stands in a T-pose.

Given the T-pose, Shi resembles several hanzi,「士」(Mandarin Chinese: shì, meaning "scholar, soldier, or gentleman") or「十」(shí, meaning "ten"). When applied to Shi's design as a scarecrow, there is a visual pun of a warrior stuck to the ground. This is similar to Guei, which is also designed to look like the hanzi it is named after.

Personality

Shi is a cocky scarecrow with a tendency to believe it is extremely fast, despite not being able to move whatsoever. It appears to like scaring people, as when the ActScared ACT is used, 30% extra MERCY is given. Shi is also shown to become sad and dejected when not engaged in battle.

Shi also dislikes Kikky, the cats from the Mike minigames. Toby Fox implied that this might be because it does not like vermin, and it may think Kikky is a bacterium.

If defeated with violence, instead of running away like other enemies, Shi begins waving a white flag in surrender and can no longer be interacted with in battle.

Etymology

"Shi" could be derived from the Japanese and Mandarin Chinese pronunciations of shì 「士」 "scholar, soldier, gentleman." As Shi is a scarecrow, its name may also come from the last syllable of the Japanese word for "scarecrow",「かかし」(kakashi).

Main story

Shi telling the party it shall block their way

Shi first appears in the Cliffs, in the room after the first room of the area with bullet patterns. It claims to block the party's path, but it can be walked around to get to the next room. This causes the Shi to call the party a coward and goad them to fight it. Touching it will initate an encounter with two Shis. Kris can climb nearby vines to the left of the aforementioned room that lead to the right, where they can collect a Pink Coin. Doing so forces them to be pushed down by running water, where the first Shi is waiting if it was not previously encountered. It claims the party now has no choice but to fight it, but they drop down in front of it and may still evade the encounter as before.

If it was recruited, a Shi appears in Flower Cafe, where it says it can do uppercuts at the table all day long. If both Shi and Kawkaw were recruited, a Kawkaw sits at the same table, and the Shi instead says it has no choice but to use its special attack, "falling in love".

In the west wing of Flower Castle, just past the Yellow Door, a Shi appears after two Shinobeetles, and touching it initiates an encounter with it and a Kawkaw. When re-entering the room after Blue enters it to investigate, a Shi's hat can be found on the ground near the top-right corner. Upon interaction, a Kawkaw pops out under the hat, initiating the same encounter.

After interacting with the blue-and-yellow scissors at the center of Flower Castle, a Shi appears in the first room of the west wing where Shinobeetles are encountered, wearing a cowboy hat. Additionally, in the room where Yellow locked himself up, a Shi stands with its arms crossed outside the leftmost jail cell, with a Kawkaw inside the cell. It says "Finally got this little chibby. Jailed for being too cutes!"

Once Top of Castle becomes accessible and the shortcut doors are enabled, which allows backtracking to other areas, the first Shi in the Cliffs will say it missed the party upon returning. Additionally, in the "ALL PUNISHMENTS WORSE THAN BURYING" room in Flower Castle, a Shi is tied up with the same rope Yellow uses to punish wrongdoers during his battle. It says "Ahh! I can't move!", despite being unable to move before being tied up.

At Top of Castle, the dash sequence before reaching Green's Shop ends with the party dashing into three Shis standing on top of one another, forcing an encounter. Seth, who was standing behind the Shis, explains that enemy formation is key, and the Shis use the Shi Spring attack. When one Shi remains in the battle, Aqua appears and uses her knife fan attack alongside the Shi's Scythe Bomb attack.

A Shi lends Flowery its power just before his battle. If it was recruited, it also appears in the PoseyZ ACT.

In battle

Appears with

• Kawkaw
• Two Kawkaws (unused)
• Another Shi
• Two other Shis

Attacks

• Scythe Bomb: Shi throws several squares, each of which emits four rotating scythes in a similar way to Jevil's Devilsknife attack. The scythes fade away after a few seconds, resulting in a maximum of eight scythes being present at once.
• Easy Attack: A scarecrow rests at the top or bottom of the bullet board and wiggles when the SOUL gets close.
• Shi Spring: Only used during the battle against three Shis and Seth at Top of Castle. Three scarecrows are stacked on top of a moving spring, which occasionally bounces the scarecrows up. When all three are present, the moving tower is unavoidable until the scarecrows bounce, creating gaps to move through. Sparing one or two Shis removes the corresponding number of scarecrows from the tower.

Available ACTs

ActScared

30% Mercy

Increases MERCY by 30%.

Intimidate

Pose for Mercy

Press [CONFIRM] when the white Kris silhouette is in the center slot of the meter for 100% MERCY. Other enemies present in the fight get their MERCY increased by 10% as well, regardless of where the Kris silhouette is placed.

Increases MERCY by 30%.

Increases MERCY by 30%.

Strategy

The best ACT to use against a Shi is Intimidate, as one can reach 100% MERCY using it with the right timing. If the player misses the cue by a bit, some amount of MERCY will still be gained, and S-Action and R-Action may be used on the next turn to raise the MERCY to 100%.

During the fight with the three Shis set up by Seth, it is advised to spare one Shi as quickly as possible and stick to the top of the bullet board, since Shi Spring cannot reach the SOUL there when only two Shis are present.

When fighting a Shi and a Kawkaw, the fastest way to end the battle is to use ShooOrCall and shoo the Kawkaw away, which gives the Shi 60% MERCY, and then ACT with 2 party members then spare the Shi with the third member.

Quotes

• HEH! I'm on that PSYCHO DRIFT! Try and CATCH me! [Neutral]
• HEH! Follow THIS! RISING... SUMMERSALT!! ^[sic] [Neutral]
• CROW KICK! HAH, did you see that? Too slow... [Neutral]
• Real boys can't do THIS! SONIC DASH!!! [Neutral]
• Ack! Get away you stupid dog! [Neutral, Kawkaw present]
• Uhh... don't look at this. [Neutral, dejected]
• Oh, GROSS! Someone's, uh... eww! Bullets! [Neutral, dejected]
• Oh, no! That, green box!! Ugh! What IS that? [Neutral, dejected]

Flavor text

• [Check]
  • YELLOW's yes-man. A scarecrow with super speed... that can't move.
  • Supposed to be ORANGE's lackey, but they've never met. As it can't move.
• Shi blocks the way! (... sort of.) [Encounter]
• Shi blocks the way! (... sort of.) Kawkaw wants to play! [Encounter with Kawkaw]
• Shi blocks the way for real! [Encounter with two other Shi and Seth]
• Shi is focusing its Chi, which it also calls its Shi. [Neutral]
• Shi shouts "heh, behind you!" Then, doesn't actually move. [Neutral]
• Shi acts like it's jumping all over the place but does not actually move. [Neutral]
• Shi lowers its hat and chuckles. "Time to get serious..." [Neutral]
• Smells like straw. [Neutral, 3/101 (~2.97%) chance]
• The opponent... ... denies being the opponent. [Dejected]
• You acted like a scared crow! [ActScared]
• Press with the right timing to INTIMIDATE! [Intimidate]
  • You engaged in a perfect pose! It was highly effective! [Good]
  • You engaged in a superior pose! It was very effective! [Decent]
  • The pose was mistaken! It wasn't very effective! [Bad]
• [S-Action]
  • Susie eats hay!
  • Susie pretends to scare crows!
  • Susie beats up the ground!
• [R-Action]
  • Ralsei trades hats!
  • Ralsei poses like a scarecrow!
  • Ralsei eats hay!
• Shi's movements finally slow. [Tired]
• Shi leaks straw. [Low HP]
• Shi seems satisfied. [Spare conditions met]

Allusions

Allusions to Undertale

• Much like Wicabel's Tuning ACT, the meter in Shi's Intimidate ACT has the same shape as the attack meter in Undertale.

Other allusions

• Shi's recruit description, design, attack names and poses may reference the protagonists of tokusatsu shows such as Kamen Rider, with Shi's "Crow Kick" being a reference to Kamen Rider's move, Rider Kick.
• Shi's design is similar to the Scarecrow status effect in Super Mario RPG, as both are scarecrows with a witch hat and scarf that cannot physically attack but can use magic (as seen in its two attacks).
• Shi acts and speaks in a similar manner to Sonic the Hedgehog, having a cocky personality with a tendency to shout, and is described as having "super speed" in its Check text. Shi also has white gloves, which Sonic also wears. Some of Shi's battle quotes and flavor text appear to be references to the Sonic series:
  • "Too slow..." may be a reference to Sonic's side taunt from Super Smash Bros Brawl, where he says "You're too slow!"
  • "SONIC DASH!" includes Sonic's name and may also be a reference to his spin dash ability, or the game Sonic Dash.
• Shi's battle quote "Get away you stupid dog!" may be a reference to the same line in Toy Story.
• The Shi with a cowboy hat says "Watch our training! Toodley-kay-yay REPPA KEN!", which may reference one of two techniques from different fighting game series: the Kuzuryu Reppa from the Street Fighter EX series, or the Reppuken from the Fatal Fury and King of Fighters series.

Gallery

• 
  Posing during its Scythe Bomb attack
• 
  Dejected or tired in battle
• 
  With crossed arms
• 
  Tied up by Yellow's rope
• 
  Wearing a cowboy hat
• 
  Thrashing back and forth
• 
  Surrendering in battle
• 
  An unused animation of Shi throwing a shuriken