This world has been confusing members since Xehanort's method of time travel was introduced in DDD.
Within DDD Xehanort goes over the rules for time in detail quite well and establishes a set of rules tied to it.
1. There must be a version of you at your destination
2. You have to discard your body to travel (or in YX's case a version of you must to gain it)
3. You can't change events that are destined to happen
4. Upon arrival, you can only move forward as per the laws of time
He pretty much sums it up best with his remark that "even though one can move through time, time itself is immovable".
When you think about it, this is a rather smart or even ingenious move on Nomura's behalf. What's he's essentially saying by using Xehanort is that "don't worry, Xehanort has no way to alter time and create a mess of alternate timelines or rewrite time like you'd see in traditional media".
Sadly though that would be the source of confusion for many because so many are used to the other forms of time travel in the media whereas KH seems to use a simpler version of a less known variant of time theory referred to as the Novikov Self-Consistency principle.
This particular theory of time, in it's simplest sense, says you can't change it even if you learned to travel through it. Your actions become the history you try to change.
However it's right around this point of understanding many ask "well what about Timeless River?"
It clearly was a time period in which a version of Sora didn't exist (hello black and white) and it obviously had affects on Disney Castle in the present.
Well after many threads of this question and explanations on it I finally seen a comment by someone that made more sense than any sort of time travel explanation:
This, this caught my attention in so many ways! Not for the time travel bits of it but the parts about Timeless River being called a "special world".
If you remember in KH2 not once is Timeless River actually referred to explicitly as "the past" but rather as a "special world".
Merlin even calls it a "special world" two to three times. Doesn't no one else find this phrasing odd when Merlin himself is both a self admitted time traveler as well as one in the movie he's from?
I'd imagine a traveler like Merlin would refer to Timeless River as the past if it was exactly so.
Then there is the Musketeer world of DDD. This world seems to be in Mickey's past but check out his dialogue upon meeting Sora:
Notice the red flags (bold parts)? Even Mickey himself refers to the Musketeer realm as "another world" which Sora notes earlier as being different from Disney Castle.
I mean there's no doubt Sora is in a world sleeping in which Mickey did indeed visit in his past however the major point here is that it's a world separate from Mickey's home of Disney Castle.
It's a alternate version of Disney Castle! I'm sure you see where I'm going with this now
That's when it fell into place. There isn't just one version of Disney Castle but multiple ones! Meaning Timeless River itself isn't so much the past but just what Merlin described it as. A "very special world".
A world similar to the main Disney Castle, perhaps even sharing a similar past to it, but one separate from the main one.
This logic would explain everything. I mean sure Timeless River had an obvious effect on Disney Castle but at the time it explains why history didn't change within the main Disney Castle.
In conventional time travel alternate timelines are made from divergences. A choice that the you of this current line didn't make or an outcome that didn't occur in your history.
Going by the conventional logic the very second Pete from KH2 Sora's timeline stepped into the past an alternate timeline would've formed. One were he'd have just as likely been successful.
But that's not what happened. Instead Petes actions affected the very time he left from and it was the same Sora of that time that stopped him.
Meaning no divergences were made, instead, it was all the same people of the same timeline and in the end history was never altered.
It'd also explain how Sora could supposedly go back to a time period in which a version of him didn't exist. It's not so much that he did but that he traveled to an alternate Disney Castle!
More than once in this series we've seen multiple versions of the same world for either man-made reasons or otherwise:
Twilight Town had a digital replica made by Diz that, to his own admission, behaved outside the set parameters he made for it.
The World that Never was has two versions as well. One that exists in the physical plane and one that resides in sleep.
Traverse Town had two alternate versions in DDD. One made up of Sora's dreams and the real one that went to the realm of sleep to give shelter to Neku and the TWEWY group.
Tron's world has two versions. The original Grid seen in DDD and the personalized version seen in KH2.
Yen Sid's tower also exists in both sleep and wake.
And then finally we have Disney Castle itself which doesn't have just two alternate but three! The main one, timeless river and musketeers.
In short the conclusion I've come up with here is that while the rules of time set pretty much make alternate timelines impossible that doesn't mean that parallel or alternate versions of one world can't exist either because we've already seen the evidence that they can.
And to that end I think what Timeless River truly is, is just one of several alternate worlds of Disney Castle. How these worlds are made separate, I dunno, but we've seen many that are yet at the same time that most at still connected despite that separation.
Even the name "Timeless River" makes a hint of this if you think about it. It's "timeless" because it's a whole world revolving around that point of Disney Castles past. Heck could even be a dream version for all we know.
So what do you think?
Within DDD Xehanort goes over the rules for time in detail quite well and establishes a set of rules tied to it.
1. There must be a version of you at your destination
2. You have to discard your body to travel (or in YX's case a version of you must to gain it)
3. You can't change events that are destined to happen
4. Upon arrival, you can only move forward as per the laws of time
He pretty much sums it up best with his remark that "even though one can move through time, time itself is immovable".
When you think about it, this is a rather smart or even ingenious move on Nomura's behalf. What's he's essentially saying by using Xehanort is that "don't worry, Xehanort has no way to alter time and create a mess of alternate timelines or rewrite time like you'd see in traditional media".
Sadly though that would be the source of confusion for many because so many are used to the other forms of time travel in the media whereas KH seems to use a simpler version of a less known variant of time theory referred to as the Novikov Self-Consistency principle.
This particular theory of time, in it's simplest sense, says you can't change it even if you learned to travel through it. Your actions become the history you try to change.
However it's right around this point of understanding many ask "well what about Timeless River?"
It clearly was a time period in which a version of Sora didn't exist (hello black and white) and it obviously had affects on Disney Castle in the present.
Well after many threads of this question and explanations on it I finally seen a comment by someone that made more sense than any sort of time travel explanation:
gelandporn said:Timeless River is labeled as a special "world," not a "when" per se.
So here's how I break it down to avoid the supposed violations of time travel:
Disney Castle and Timeless River make up a... we'll say, world ecosystem. They operate as two interdependent universes. Sort of like Neverland and London, or Halloween Town and Christmas Town. Except there's a more causal relationship in that Timeless River's "past" can alter Disney Castle's "present." That's not to say that by traveling to Timeless River they're going back in time, at least not on a larger scale. Meaning, if the Sea of Worlds is a multiverse, and they were to depart Timeless River's world without exiting the door, I don't think Sora Donald and Goofy would, say, find themselves decades in the past on any other world. It's limited to the nature of these two worlds alone.
Or just, you know, ignore it. Timeless River was already bizarre since it technically implied the world developed color over time. lol
This, this caught my attention in so many ways! Not for the time travel bits of it but the parts about Timeless River being called a "special world".
If you remember in KH2 not once is Timeless River actually referred to explicitly as "the past" but rather as a "special world".
Merlin even calls it a "special world" two to three times. Doesn't no one else find this phrasing odd when Merlin himself is both a self admitted time traveler as well as one in the movie he's from?
I'd imagine a traveler like Merlin would refer to Timeless River as the past if it was exactly so.
Then there is the Musketeer world of DDD. This world seems to be in Mickey's past but check out his dialogue upon meeting Sora:
Sora: Wait, is this like what happened with Jiminy and Tron? But...I'm not
in Disney Castle, and that world isn't one of the ones that's asleep. I
don't get it.
(Mickey walks over)
Mickey: You okay? What's wrong?
Sora: Oh, um... I was wondering...where I was?
(Mickey notices his Keyblade)
Mickey: Hmm? Where'd you get that key?
Sora: This? It's a Keyb--
Mickey: Shh!
(Mickey runs closer)
Mickey (whispering): I know. You came from another world, right?
Sora: Huh? Uh, yeah.
Mickey: My name's Mickey. I'm workin' on a problem. That's why I'm in this
world bein' a Musketeer.
Sora: Hmm... So, am I in a world the king visited that I don't know about--
a world that's trapped in sleep somewhere? 'Cause I guess...
Notice the red flags (bold parts)? Even Mickey himself refers to the Musketeer realm as "another world" which Sora notes earlier as being different from Disney Castle.
I mean there's no doubt Sora is in a world sleeping in which Mickey did indeed visit in his past however the major point here is that it's a world separate from Mickey's home of Disney Castle.
It's a alternate version of Disney Castle! I'm sure you see where I'm going with this now
That's when it fell into place. There isn't just one version of Disney Castle but multiple ones! Meaning Timeless River itself isn't so much the past but just what Merlin described it as. A "very special world".
A world similar to the main Disney Castle, perhaps even sharing a similar past to it, but one separate from the main one.
This logic would explain everything. I mean sure Timeless River had an obvious effect on Disney Castle but at the time it explains why history didn't change within the main Disney Castle.
In conventional time travel alternate timelines are made from divergences. A choice that the you of this current line didn't make or an outcome that didn't occur in your history.
Going by the conventional logic the very second Pete from KH2 Sora's timeline stepped into the past an alternate timeline would've formed. One were he'd have just as likely been successful.
But that's not what happened. Instead Petes actions affected the very time he left from and it was the same Sora of that time that stopped him.
Meaning no divergences were made, instead, it was all the same people of the same timeline and in the end history was never altered.
It'd also explain how Sora could supposedly go back to a time period in which a version of him didn't exist. It's not so much that he did but that he traveled to an alternate Disney Castle!
More than once in this series we've seen multiple versions of the same world for either man-made reasons or otherwise:
Twilight Town had a digital replica made by Diz that, to his own admission, behaved outside the set parameters he made for it.
The World that Never was has two versions as well. One that exists in the physical plane and one that resides in sleep.
Traverse Town had two alternate versions in DDD. One made up of Sora's dreams and the real one that went to the realm of sleep to give shelter to Neku and the TWEWY group.
Tron's world has two versions. The original Grid seen in DDD and the personalized version seen in KH2.
Yen Sid's tower also exists in both sleep and wake.
And then finally we have Disney Castle itself which doesn't have just two alternate but three! The main one, timeless river and musketeers.
In short the conclusion I've come up with here is that while the rules of time set pretty much make alternate timelines impossible that doesn't mean that parallel or alternate versions of one world can't exist either because we've already seen the evidence that they can.
And to that end I think what Timeless River truly is, is just one of several alternate worlds of Disney Castle. How these worlds are made separate, I dunno, but we've seen many that are yet at the same time that most at still connected despite that separation.
Even the name "Timeless River" makes a hint of this if you think about it. It's "timeless" because it's a whole world revolving around that point of Disney Castles past. Heck could even be a dream version for all we know.
So what do you think?