Derse

Derse, also known as the Kingdom of Darkness, is one of the two kingdoms in the Incipisphere. Derse wages an unending war against the Light Kingdom, Prospit, striving for the destruction of Skaia. Derse has always been destined to defeat Prospit, forcing the players to kill the Black King on their own to prevent Skaia from being destroyed.

"Derse" is a of "dearth" and "terse", which contrasts with the root of Prospit's name. The demonym of Derse is "Dersite".



Derse is a shadow-cloaked violet city planet that orbits Skaia from far away, outside of The Veil, and is connected to its single moon by a large purple chain. Derse is ruled by the Black Queen, and the planet is inhabited by black-carapaced citizens who resemble black chess pieces. A series of spires exist on Derse, one for each player in a session of Sburb. The tops of these spires contain the data from pre-entry Kernelsprite prototypes. As the players prototype their sprites, the spires activate and the prototypings are applied to the monarchy of Derse. Note, though, that only prototypings that occur prior to a player's entry into The Medium are stored in the spires of Derse.

The moon of Derse possesses a series of towers, one for each of the dream selves of roughly half of the players in any session. The other half of the dream selves reside in similar towers on the moon of Prospit. These towers contain rooms that very closely resemble the bedrooms of the players in their home world, except they are portrayed largely in a single color tone associated with the player - in Homestuck, the player's font color in Pesterchum; in Hivebent, the player's blood color. While Dersites are opposed to the players, there are rules against harming them before the war begins which Dersites have a natural instinct to follow. It has suggested that even if these rules are broken that attempting to harm them would be "tricky" suggesting some sort of defense. According to Dirk, the Derse dream selves are treated like "HS 6354 (team mascots)". Derse has tabloid newspapers that regularly libel Prospit.

Derse also has a prison system like Prospit. However, HS 7454 (according to Caliborn) Derse's form of punishment for crimes is much more severe, when compared to Prospit's "". This may be exclusive to his dead session and Derse as run by the Condesce though, since pre-scratch Dad was held in a Dersite prison that could well be considered a joke. Alternately, due to Caliborn's odd standards (such as viewing even mild affection as disgusting, and finding hateful and disgusting things attractive) he may have assumed that the comfortable room was torture.

Similar to Prospit dreamers receiving visions from Skaia during a Skaian eclipse, the Horrorterrors' intents apparently become clear to Derse dreamers during a HS 4940 (lunar eclipse), when Derse skirts the edge of the Furthest Ring.

Monarchs
The Dark Kingdom has a King and a Queen who are the highest in command. The Queen has a Ring of Orbs (one orb for each player in the session) representing the spires on Derse. As long as she wears her ring, she is physically affected by the prototyping of each player's Kernelsprite, such that, for example, she gains tentacles and scars, loses arms, and sprouts wings corresponding to each specific prototyping. With each additional prototyping, the bearer of the ring gains additional power.

Similarly, the King possesses a scepter with orbs around its larger end, like the Queen's ring, and a large orb that resembles Skaia on top. He is also affected by the players' prototyping, his physical size increasing significantly with each prototyping.

The Black Queen resides within the halls of Derse, overseeing administrative and political duties, while the Black King fights the perpetual war against Prospit off-planet in the thick of The Battlefield.

Officers
One very high ranking officer is the Archagent, who is in charge of the most tedious paperwork, for example, handling parking tickets and illegal parcels. He commands various Agents and Underlings and surveils the inciphisphere in his 3/4 Cubicle of Vigilance. Jack Noir is the only known archagent and implied to be the only Dersite to hold the rank.

An Agent is a relatively high-ranking member of the Dark Kingdom, who has a wide range of different duties. While some work as a sort of police officer who writes tickets, others clearly work as the muscle of the place. They work under the control of the Archagent.

Known Agents include:
 * Authority Regulator
 * Hegemonic Brute
 * Draconian Dignitary
 * Courtyard Droll

A notar is a person in the Kingdom whose job is, for example, to notarize Parking Citations.

It is notable that lower ranking agents do not have sharp teeth; rather, they are "blunt [ones] like that of livestock".

Derse in the pre-scratch session


John's Dad is kidnapped and imprisoned on Derse, only to be later released by Jack to spite the Black Queen.

In the kids' session, the Queen is murdered by Jack Noir using the contents of Jade's package. He promptly removes her ring to prototype himself and receive its power. The Black King meets the same fate, and Jack Noir crowns himself Sovereign Slayer.

The Wayward Vagabond uses his chalk to draw an ominous planet on the Skyship Base's wall. The planet, described as being behind an impenetrable veil of darkness, was, of course, Derse.

Its moon is home to the dream selves of Rose Lalonde and Dave Strider. Dave's dream room is portrayed largely in HS 3604 (tones of red) which clearly resemble his font color in Pesterchum. The room is infested with black crows and also inhabited by Dream Lil Cal. In addition, there are brightly colored graffiti of Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff on the walls. Rose's dream room is a purplish/pink color, and has the MEOW code written on the walls.

Derse in Hivebent
Little is shown of Derse in the trolls' session, aside from the consideration of which trolls have a dream self on Derse. The trolls have activated all twelve of their prototyping spires by the time they are trolling the kids from The Veil.

Derse's moon has five towers in this session. It is home to the dream selves of Equius Zahhak, Nepeta Leijon, Eridan Ampora, Feferi Peixes, Sollux Captor (who also has a dream self on Prospit), and Aradia Megido who, being already dead, resides in Derse's core. Only HS 4381 (Sollux's dream room) is seen. It is portrayed in tones of mustard yellow, very similar to his blood color, and has curtains in red and blue, alluding to his personal color duality.

After destroying Prospit, The Demon blows up Derse as well. Feferi and Nepeta's dream selves were killed. Unlike Prospitian dream selves, Dersite dream selves don't seem to leave Derse for the duration of the adventure, so it's highly likely that the dream selves of Equius and Eridan also died.

Derse in the post-Scratch session
After the Scratch, Derse's moon is now home to the dream selves of Roxy Lalonde and Dirk Strider. Like post-Scratch Prospit, it lacks prototyping spires. Due to its short distance from the Furthest Ring, Roxy was easily able to access one of the dream bubbles during her sleep walk.

This Derse is ruled by the Condesce, who overthrew the real Black Queen prior to the beginning of the session. She orders the Draconian Dignitary to find and kill Dirk after he launches an uprising against her, giving the Dignitary the Black Queen's ring to aid him on the mission. The Dignitary uses his new power to unleash the Red Miles upon Derse, believing that nobody - including Dirk - will be able to escape the ensuing devastation.

Derse has imprisoned Jane's Dad, just as Pre-Scratch Derse imprisoned John's, only this time he has not escaped so easily, and has been imprisoned there for five months. During this time, he was kept in a Very Important Prisoners cell and was kept safe on the orders of the Draconian Dignitary, eventually becoming a celebrity due to his fashion sense. The Condesce also imprisons Roxy here for a short time, but she escapes with the help of the Dignitary's ring, which is supplied to her by the Courtyard Droll. After the events of Act 6 Act 5 Act 2, Roxy and Dirk are put on their Quest Beds in the center of the moon, while the Condesce seizes the opportunity to destroy it either at or very near the moment Jack Noir destroys Prospit's moon.

Cherub Session
Interestingly, much like Caliborn's half of his room, not a single image of Derse or its moon has been shown in this session. All that is known is that the Dersites wear white clothing, and Caliborn is a Derse dreamer. It presumably remained intact after the First Break, as it would've been much further away from Skaia than Caliborn's planets were, and also because Caliborn is in fact stated to have HS 8145 (killed himself) to become a god tier.

Trivia

 * According to views of the center of Derse and the center of its moon, they have hollow centers and are held together by chains.
 * Some of the views of Derse are edited photos of the roof of Milan Cathedral.