KINGDOM HEARTS Union X Finale

[kristi-swat]

He states that they can't defeat the darkness and have to rely on future Keyblade wielders to do so, yet follows up by saying that he and his disciples will take out seven of them on their own. Which is it, sir? Can you defeat the darkness or not?

In the fan translation it was that the darknesses are already inside MoM and the 6. The only change made by the official translation is that they are not yet inside but will be eventually once darkness grows inside them.

 

[korr4k]

Just got a wild guess: what if the shadowy figure approaching Ventus is actually his Darkness that went looking for Xehanort?

First of all, we still don't know how Xehanort found Ventus and, most importantly, the latter is in a state of "coma" by the end of Ux. What if the Darkness decided to go looking for somebody to take care of their body and is now coming back after completing his quest?

There would still be two unanswered questions: is that the same Darkness we see Ventus fight during Ux? KH3 is hinting that Ventus hosted two of them.. second, was it "destiny" that they came across Xehanort, or was the Darkness actually looking for him?

 

[LightJak]

I'm confused. Was the player attacking Ephemer and Skuld just an act or was it really the darkness conrtolling him/her?

 

[Squood!]

!!! When are there callbacks?

The two big ones are in DDD and UX. Young Xehanort and Ephemer say it respectively, with Ephemer's being the only voiced line in the entirety of UX that isn't Kairi's grandma's story.

In English however they got changed to "Come with me" and "Let's go".

 

[EternalDreamVG]

I'm confused. Was the player attacking Ephemer and Skuld just an act or was it really the darkness conrtolling him/her?

It was an act. The Darknesses aren't a hive mind, so they don't know what each of the other 12 is thinking or doing at that moment either. Since there's only 4 of them, they have no idea where the 5th is - we know Ventus merged with it, they don't. So the player takes advantage of that to act like he's the 5th darkness, and Ephemer and Skuld are shocked because they "realize" Ven's plan didn't work and believe Player was possessed by that Darkness instead.

It's actually a pretty brilliant ploy to make up on the spot - no wonder Xehanort has a thousand and one contingency plans, maybe he inherited that from us.

On the topic of translations, lets not forget KH3 changed a bunch of abilities for no reason - Withstand Combo for example. It's no secret the localization team is...messy.

 

[Tobi]

It's actually a pretty brilliant ploy to make up on the spot - no wonder Xehanort has a thousand and one contingency plans, maybe he inherited that from us

I loved that part, too. It was with the indirect help of MoM (the setup of everything), but I loved it when one single random child managed to lock up four (i originally I thought five, cus i thought there was really a darkness inside player) major - weaker, but stilm dangerous - threats to the world with just one trick. It was with self sacrifize, but the entire scene was gold for me, especially the part there Player started mocking them.

For the translation part:
It might be a job poorly done, but I can also imagine some timeline shenaningans. Had this thought since the whole "Be your heart your guiding key" stuff reached Sora through Yen Sid and them saying he did that before too... Can be just Nomura ignoring stuff, but I can also imagine someone is rewriting stuff in-universe.

Also for the post with the pictures about imagine sth. strong enough -> reality, it kinda reminded me about the concept of creation magic (ff14), but I guess even if the idea is similar, the one won't have to do with the other... although I wouldn't mind some Primals battles KH style.

 

[Clue.Less]

The two big ones are in DDD and UX. Young Xehanort and Ephemer say it respectively, with Ephemer's being the only voiced line in the entirety of UX that isn't Kairi's grandma's story.

In English however they got changed to "Come with me" and "Let's go".

Thanks! And wow, those are key lines, too. Having that callback instead of "Come with me" would have been terrifying.

 

[EternalDreamVG]

I'm a little confused about the whole formless darkness / Heartless thing.

So, long long ago, 7 "light" and 13 "darkness" were at war with eachother. Then the entities that were "darkness" gave up their forms to be able to attack the heart instead of inflicting physical wounds. In doing so however, they started slowly losing their conscious thought and purpose. They then started infecting other worlds, causing more darkness to come into existence...somehow? And then the original 13 continued to develop an individual will (how this is different from consciousness or having a purpose I do not know)?

I assume this additional "off-spring" formless darkness then entered the hearts of people, which in turn resulted in people giving in to said darkness and turning into Heartless the way it's been explained in the series thus far, do I have that right?

 

[bambii (aka foreteller)]

I'm a little confused about the whole formless darkness / Heartless thing.

Join the club

But actually, I think you've explained it pretty well given the information we have. That seems right—Darkness seeks to spread, which it has partially done through the creation of Heartless, but the "original 13" retain a semblance of identity as formless individuals seeking strong vessels so that they can regain their form. So their goal is really twofold: continue to spread ("infection"), and gain form (for the original "13"). The translation does a shit job of explaining this but I think it's a reasonable conclusion to draw.

The question this begs, in my opinion, is what was Darkness' original purpose/intention before they gave up their form to defeat the light? Sure, light vs. darkness and all that, yada yada, but I'm very curious about their original form and backstory. Not something we can really deduce from the information we've been given, though.

 

[Sign]

And then the original 13 continued to develop an individual will (how this is different from consciousness or having a purpose I do not know)?

This part you don't need to worry about, it's the same thing. We were also considering of going with "individual will" as well lol

 

[Sephiroth0812]

The question this begs, in my opinion, is what was Darkness' original purpose/intention before they gave up their form to defeat the light? Sure, light vs. darkness and all that, yada yada, but I'm very curious about their original form and backstory. Not something we can really deduce from the information we've been given, though.

The only available information on this topic would be the original tale of the Keyblade War and how Keyblades came to be which was told in earlier games of the series by both Xehanort (in BBS reports if I recall correctly) and Yen Sid (in DDD) which was about how originally everything was full of light but then some people became greedy and wanted all the light for themselves, aiming to conquer Kingdom Hearts and access it via the X-blade.
To this end, they forged the very first Keyblades using the X-blade as a template/inspiration which originally were tools intended for conquest of light.
This greed eventually lead to the outbreak of the original (first?) Keyblade War which at its end saw the breaking of the X-blade into the 7 and 13 pieces and the original Kingdom Hearts lost to the Realm of Darkness.

From our current state of information one would be tempted to ascribe this war being the one where the Master of Masters himself participated in in his own youth, although on what side and in which role is ambiguous as well as how it relates to the "actual" Keyblade War we were presented at the end of X[chi] the browser game.
The war we were shown is also still largely a mystery in terms of its actual conclusion as we get it presented through the eyes of "Player" which only shows the opening stages of it and the aftermath, yet not the actual climax and conclusion.

 

[EternalDreamVG]

Hold on a second...

We've already seen this whole "infection" thing in action. The Unversed come from Vanitas who is heavily implied to be one of the 6 weaker formless Darknesses. The only missing step is said darkness first entering the hearts of people to then become Heartless. So it stands to reason that all 13 of them are capable of spreading any number of "darkness" in various forms - just that the Heartless are the major ones.

Unversed really are just proto-Heartless.

 

[Sephiroth0812]

Tbh I am more of the impression that Vanitas is a hybrid-being similar to Roxas instead of one of the full "lesser" six darknesses.
Yet while Roxas was created from both the hearts of Sora and Ventus, Vanitas was created from a combination of Ven's own Darkness and the one of the six "lesser" Darkness-beings which is/was sealed inside Ventus.

Concerning the Unversed though there might be something more to it as their symbol (which looks like a heart chained/captured with Darkness) seems to be part of the "alphabet" of Scala et Caelum.

 

[bambii (aka foreteller)]

Unversed really are just proto-Heartless.

Yea I think one thing Union X has effectively established in the lore is that all the various forms of darkness we see throughout the series (Heartless, Unversed, Nightmares, "Karma"/Gigas maybe??) essentially come from the same source, or the Darkness as a "whole." Meanwhile, the original 13 are still roaming about on their own...

Tbh I am more of the impression that Vanitas is a hybrid-being similar to Roxas instead of one of the full "lesser" six darknesses.
Yet while Roxas was created from both the hearts of Sora and Ventus, Vanitas was created from a combination of Ven's own Darkness and the one of the six "lesser" Darkness-beings which is/was sealed inside Ventus.

I would agree with this.

Here's another question: what relation do the 13 Xehanorts/Seekers of Darkness have to the "original 13" Darknesses? If the MoM is to believed the 7 strongest Darknesses are likely captured within the hearts of the Lost Masters, so mostly likely the Real Org XIII doesn't comprise the "original 13," though some of the lesser Darknesses may be present (e.g., via Vanitas). It would seem that Xehanort himself pulled from some massive pool of darkness, strengthened and concentrated it, then dispersed it amongst 13 vessels in order to re-enact the clash of the original 13 and 7 lights. But from what source did he draw that darkness (which we see him wading through in Dark Road Episode 3)? Is Xehanort himself channeling one of the original Darknesses?

 

[KeyToDestiny]

Tbh I am more of the impression that Vanitas is a hybrid-being similar to Roxas instead of one of the full "lesser" six darknesses.
Yet while Roxas was created from both the hearts of Sora and Ventus, Vanitas was created from a combination of Ven's own Darkness and the one of the six "lesser" Darkness-beings which is/was sealed inside Ventus.

Except Vanitas has quite literally said that he's not really part of Ventus at all. He quite literally said that he was hidden inside Ventus for a really long time and all Xehanort did was just drag him out of Ventus. IIRC, the JP dialogue even had him flat out state he was a separate being from Ventus entirely. The point is, it's not really pointing towards a hybrid situation at all. More like Vanitas was just a foreign invader who would hide himself inside Ventus before Xehanort dragged him out. From what we've seen of UX, it just falls in line with what Ventus did with one of those darknesses at the end and forced it back into his heart and forging their connection. So yes you can maybe say Vanitas did take something from Ventus when Xehanort took him out(and that was a part of his heart) but Vanitas' situation doesn't sound like Roxas' situation whatsoever.

 

[Sign]

Except Vanitas has quite literally said that he's not really part of Ventus at all. He quite literally said that he was hidden inside Ventus for a really long time and all Xehanort did was just drag him out of Ventus. IIRC, the JP dialogue even had him flat out state he was a separate being from Ventus entirely. The point is, it's not really pointing towards a hybrid situation at all. More like Vanitas was just a foreign invader who would hide himself inside Ventus before Xehanort dragged him out. From what we've seen of UX, it just falls in line with what Ventus did with one of those darknesses at the end and forced it back into his heart and forging their connection. So yes you can maybe say Vanitas did take something from Ventus when Xehanort took him out(and that was a part of his heart) but Vanitas' situation doesn't sound like Roxas' situation whatsoever.

Darkness spoke of themselves as a separate entity when it was expelled from Ven's body, wherein they claimed that the two were now pure darkness and pure light. Ven wasn't born of pure light, so the only conclusion is that they took his own darkness along with them during the exit. When Ven assimilated them again, he was taking in an individual comprised of Darkness as well his former natural born darkness.

 

[KeyToDestiny]

Darkness spoke of themselves as a separate entity when it was expelled from Ven's body, wherein they claimed that the two were now pure darkness and pure light. Ven wasn't born of pure light, so the only conclusion is that they took his own darkness along with them during the exit. When Ven assimilated them again, he was taking in an individual comprised of Darkness as well his former natural born darkness.

I mean that's still essentially Vanitas at the end of the day. The same "Darkness" who did all that to Ventus to maintain being a willful pure darkness which would leave Ventus a pure light after that darkness used him to reshape itself. I guess yeah Ventus wasn't always a pure light(presumably) but given KH3RM's new scene, Vanitas is still basically that same "Darkness". On top of that, we don't even know how much darkness Ventus even had on his own before that "Darkness" got to him. If it wasn't that big, then it might not have mattered as much. All "Darkness" did was add on that darkness Ventus might have had onto it's own being. Which would still result in the same "Darkness" but with just a little more darkness than before. That's why I still don't see how Vanitas' situation is anything like Roxas'. Vanitas was an already pre-existing being all on his own from what he said unlike Roxas came into existence because of Sora.

 

[Noivern]

I mean that's still essentially Vanitas at the end of the day. The same "Darkness" who did all that to Ventus to maintain being a willful pure darkness which would leave Ventus a pure light after that darkness used him to reshape itself. I guess yeah Ventus wasn't always a pure light(presumably) but given KH3RM's new scene, Vanitas is still basically that same "Darkness". On top of that, we don't even know how much darkness Ventus even had on his own before that "Darkness" got to him. If it wasn't that big, then it might not have mattered as much. All "Darkness" did was add on that darkness Ventus might have had onto it's own being. Which would still result in the same "Darkness" but with just a little more darkness than before. That's why I still don't see how Vanitas' situation is anything like Roxas'. Vanitas was an already pre-existing being all on his own from what he said unlike Roxas came into existence because of Sora.

You're just running in circles here. Vanitas can be Darkness, but Darkness is not necessarily Vanitas.

The amount of Ven's Darkness he took in clearly mattered because his personality is different, he has the whole emotional baggage going with Ven, as well as the physical appearance. If we go into the journal stuff about how Vanitas originally did not have a face behind the mask, the plot thickens as his connection to Ventus (and the later's own strenght of heart) clearly mattered.

Back to the thread, I'm just going to flat out ignore the official translation because of the mistakes other people already mentioned. It's not only unprofessional but flat out disappointing as I don't think I can ever truly trust the script of the english versions of the games from now on.

Nomura already has a unique style to his writing that makes everything confusing, but you can understand it if you think long enough about it. If we add the inconsistences from the script, though, then it just becomes a huge mess.

 

[Sephiroth0812]

Except Vanitas has quite literally said that he's not really part of Ventus at all. He quite literally said that he was hidden inside Ventus for a really long time and all Xehanort did was just drag him out of Ventus. IIRC, the JP dialogue even had him flat out state he was a separate being from Ventus entirely. The point is, it's not really pointing towards a hybrid situation at all. More like Vanitas was just a foreign invader who would hide himself inside Ventus before Xehanort dragged him out. From what we've seen of UX, it just falls in line with what Ventus did with one of those darknesses at the end and forced it back into his heart and forging their connection. So yes you can maybe say Vanitas did take something from Ventus when Xehanort took him out(and that was a part of his heart) but Vanitas' situation doesn't sound like Roxas' situation whatsoever.

What Vanitas actually did is contradicting himself in KH 3 when looking at all his statements in vanilla KH 3 and Re:Mind together. Not to mention he talks about "black masses" inside Ven which he doesn't know the origin of and can't confirm if they belong to Ven, to himself or a third being entirely in the character files.
Just because he says something doesn't mean he's right nor that he knows all the facts.

This points towards Vanitas himself not being entirely sure and him taking/having a part of Ventus actually would be quite a big deal because the sum of all the parts (one of the six "lesser" darknesses + part of Ven's heart) would be bigger and thus different than the original.
"Vanitas" as the being presented in BBS and onwards didn't exist until Xehanort created him as it was stated he's a "newborn heart" and that heart was shaped for four years by Xehanort.

The developments in Union X confirm that the sources from which Vanitas was created were not solely from Ventus, but it does not confirm that he's unrelated or unconnected to Ventus completely.

The parallels to Roxas are there even if they are not 1-to-1 as Roxas is also more than the sum of the parts (Sora's and Ven's hearts) that originally created him.

 

[korr4k]

What Vanitas actually did is contradicting himself in KH 3 when looking at all his statements in vanilla KH 3 and Re:Mind together. Not to mention he talks about "black masses" inside Ven which he doesn't know the origin of and can't confirm if they belong to Ven, to himself or a third being entirely in the character files.
Just because he says something doesn't mean he's right nor that he knows all the facts.

This points towards Vanitas himself not being entirely sure and him taking/having a part of Ventus actually would be quite a big deal because the sum of all the parts (one of the six "lesser" darknesses + part of Ven's heart) would be bigger and thus different than the original.
"Vanitas" as the being presented in BBS and onwards didn't exist until Xehanort created him as it was stated he's a "newborn heart" and that heart was shaped for four years by Xehanort.

The developments in Union X confirm that the sources from which Vanitas was created were not solely from Ventus, but it does not confirm that he's unrelated or unconnected to Ventus completely.

The parallels to Roxas are there even if they are not 1-to-1 as Roxas is also more than the sum of the parts (Sora's and Ven's hearts) that originally created him.

I don't really think it matters much in the grand scheme.

The bottom line is that there were once 13 dark beings and there will be another 13 by the end. As MoM said, this is the way of the world: 13 opposing 7, it's a cycle that will always repeat until you break it somehow.

It doesn't matter who are those 13 Darknesses, only that there are that many, and IMHO it's only natural that during the entire process the final 13 aren't going to be an exact copy of the original ones.