"* THE SUN SMILES AT YOU WITH ETERNAL MALICE *

The ending is just the Protagonist walking along an empty plane, filled with random people also just randomly walking along an empty plane. The text talks about the Protagonist awakening, to a new world, surrounded by friends, the sky is blue and air smells great. But as you can see, there's nothing to do, and you are trapped forever. The life before is forever in your mind, and the sun is constantly taunting you.

So what exactly does any of that actually mean?

To start off, the boss that you fight at the end of Archon Grid, was probably death. More specifically, the Triagon Death. In the level House, you are introduced to the concept of the Triagons, the three beings who supposedly created the world the people of Cruelty Squad live in. I'll be talking about them individually when it's important to, but for now I'm gonna talk about the third Triagon, Death.

In the story offered by the targets in House, the third triagon seemingly gave human beings value, by giving them death.

The third Triagon was born of death. It saw the world was radiating excess energy. It wanted to put great things into motion. But it saw that greatness wasn't possible without value. The first transaction.

It took its blade and cut a large hole into the boundary, creating a sudden flash of high volume transactional power. And just for a moment, things seeped value into themselves, assuming souls. The second transaction.

The hole was quickly mended, and the overpowering transmission of value was cut short. But in that moment the seed of primordial financial might was planted, and the world took on its transactional form. Conflict and discord emerged, and the third Triagon was ecstatic. The third transaction.

I think it's very important to note here, while much of the language here seems to denote economic transactions and economic value, more often than not language like this is used for interchangeable purposes in Cruelty Squad. The Georges Bataille quote, discussed at the beginning, was originally discussing economics, but in the context of the game was used to denote the human value of life. The same applies here I think.

Essentially, the story tells of the Triagon introducing the concept of death to human beings, in order to give value to their life, something they previously didn't think much of.

So, to bring it back to the boss fight here, the Protagonist kills either Triagon of Death itself, or an avatar representing it, I can't really say for sure there. What is important though, is that by doing this, the Protagonist experiences a world truly without death.

Initially, the world seems pleasant. A world without death would mean a world without loss, without sadness. However, as it goes further, the Protagonist realises that there truly is no value to a life like this, life continues forever and becomes pointless, and is trapped forever.

--u/girlwhocantread

https://www.reddit.com/r/CrueltySquad/comments/ocnoti/unnecessarily_long_post_talking_about_the_endings/"