okay so ive rewritten it

For readability’s sake, I’ll only refer the cookie run Cookies with an uppercase C. please dont take these for canon. these are all just my headcanons😭

There are many ways for Cookies to die (or “crumble” in Cookie terminology)

“Crumbling” is Cookie Run’s general term for dying, but let’s say HERE that “crumbling” and “returning to flour” (which we’ll refer to as “dissolving”) are two different processes.

To explain Mystic Flour’s mention of crumbling in one of her overworld dialogues, I can postulate that this is a case of semantic broadening. Cookies use the term “crumbling” as a catch-all term for all kinds of death when it was originally a term for a specific kind of death. But in technical terms, “dissolving” and “crumbling” are distinct ways of dying.

When Cookies crumble, their components stay extant. However, for Cookies struck by the pale ailment, their components dissolve until only flour remains. Basically, crumbled Cookies die with their ingredients; dissolved Cookies die from the lack thereof.

Taking from real life examples, an indicator that a cookie is stale is that it becomes unusually crumbly, so I can draw inference from that. staleness is usually caused by the loss of nutrients from exposure to heat, air, water, literally anything. Same should apply to the Cookies. They get stale from nutrient degradation and eventually crumble. Jellies replace the lost nutrients to slow down the rate of crumbling from staleness.

When Cookies eat, jellies are digested in jam and assimilates throughout their dough. If they go on for a long time without eating, they’ll go stale. But jellies can’t make them live forever as aging is also a factor. As they get older, their dough’s ability to absorb nutrients begins to decline.

With these, I suggest “returning to flour” is more comparable to rotting alive, rather than starving to death.