Chrono Cross

**Chrono Cross** is a 1999 sequel
to chrono trigger. While chrono trigger focused more on the concept of time
travel, chrono cross focuses on the idea of multiple universes.
Although time travel is still featured in its plot to a smaller
extent. Thematically, it has a large focus on environmentalism and oppression, as
well as the concept of alienation told through the lens of the sci fi
concept of alternate realities.

The main theme of the game is the idea of relationships. This idea of relationships is not limited in scope to a specific kind of relationship, but rather is about the concept of relationships in general in all the forms it takes. This scope ranging from your relationship to yourself, your relationship (or lack thereof) with other people, the relationships between different groups, your relationship to the planet, and even ultimately your relationship to the transcendental reality. The music likewise is used to convey and strengthen these ideas, with the themes it was trying to convey being stated to be "burning soul, lonely world, and
unforgettable memories." And to drive the points of the game home, in the end of the game, to convey
the idea of the story pervading real life it switches to using real
actors for part of the credits. Using the concept of parallel worlds
to highlight how your world and it could be connected.

The story is told through the lens of a series of increasing
existential quandries, ending by veering into borderline existential
horror. It begins with a darker take on the ideas of things like its
a wonderful life, showing what would be different in a world without
you, and the reality of it marching on all the same. But the other
side of the coin is that it is more specifically a world that has no
place for you. You wake up one day only to find that in this world
you died long ago, and your village doesn't accept your existence.
Even your house is lived in by someone else.

The second arc raises the stakes. Asking what it would be like to
be in an antagonistic relationship with everyone you come in contact
with. You wake up in the body of an enemy, only to have their crimes
and identity placed on and blamed on you. What's more, they are a
race that is treated with suspicion by the residents. Now even the
residents of your own home in your own universe consider you an
outsider, treating you with hostility. So it veers into a first
person exploration of both warranties antagonism and racism, and how the latter is often tied to the former.

The final arc gets into a much darker take on the combination of
the aforementioned themes. Asking you finally what if it wasn't
simply better if you didn't exist. This is asked in three different
ways. First, addressed to you as an individual, who is now blamed for
leading the future to destruction. Though you don't understand what
your role was in such events. The second is aimed at humanity in
general. Asking whether saving humanity and saving the world are
really compatible goals, or whether humanity is not simply too
environmentally destructive. And the final, though less explored
version is a big picture sense. Whether life in general is worth
living, or whether it wouldn't be better for reality to end as a
whole. And each of these is challenged in turn, highlighting a claim
to having value in life, and a right to exist.

## Alienation

Alienation is the state or experience of being isolated from a
group or an activity to which one should belong or in which one
should be involved. This has various possible manifestations, each of
which are generally seen in a negative light. Sociologically it has
to do with a low degree of integration into your community
environment, or being disjointed from being able to approach parts of
it in a natural way. It is often associated with feelings of
powerlessness, or even a sense of meaninglessness of normlessness in
terms of feeling like one has no purpose or place to exist.

Alienation can manifest in various ways. One potential way stems
from racism. People who are native to a community, but treated as a
perpetual outsider can find themselves feeling like they lack a place
in it. It can often lead to a struggle to find themselves as feeling
like they really have a home there. Another concept of alienation
comes from marxist class analysis, in which it talks about how the
mode of production can lead to a worker feeling alienated when they
lack control over their work or its outcome, and rather than
producing things they can identify, are merely a small part of a
system in which they lack power.

Alienation does not necessarily always have moral connotations
however. Sometimes people can feel alienated by situations that
aren't necessarily the cause of any individual, merely the result of
some form of disjointed outcome. Children sometimes feel alienated
from a parent if their spouse dies and they remarry, giving the
children a feeling of that parent now being involved with
relationships the child is not involved in. Or returning soldiers
from difficult warlike situations can feel it if their identity is
too heavily shaped by a situation that they now no longer find
themselves in, and so they have difficulty adapting to normal life.
In all these situations, the threat of feeling lost in life is
present, and work is done to discover how to best approach and
resolve these issues.

Chrono cross begins by expressing this metaphor literally. At the
beginning of the game you wake up one day to find that you suddenly
have no place in what you thought was your home. This alienation and
the feelings tied to it often relate to the idea of finding that you
are not really integrated properly into the community, either through
something like ostracization or simply some type of inherent
difference from it. But the game chooses to express it literally. You
wake up to find out that you have been dead for ten years. No one in
your home recognizes you or is willing to accept you, and even your
family is gone, with someone else living in what you thought was your
house. And so with nothing else to do, you simply set off away from
your home due to the lack of anything that binds you there. In a new
world you are forced to have new relationships and a new identity.

This sense of self exploration is both presented as literal, and
as a metaphor for self discovery in terms of finding what your place
in this world is. In game there is a literal element to it in that
you sense that there are people who know who you are who can solve
the mystery for you. But it also ties to how those who feel alienated
often go on a journey of self discovery. One that ties to finding
their place in the world. This place may either be a metaphorical or
literal one. Sometimes it involves finding an entirely new community
where you will be more integrated. And sometimes it involves self
searching so as to find a sense of identity that will allow one to
more naturally exist in their home. Sometimes it may even involve a
tangible struggle, such as with the case of racism fighting to be
seen as a more naturalized member of a community.

Later in the game, this sense of alienation is explored from a
different angle, in that even once you find your original universe
again, now you are in the body of another person, and so are both
rejected by people who don't see you as yourself, as well as
experiencing the racism that stems from being a race that your
community did not approve of. This also highlights the reality of
different perspectives of the same community, showing the different
ways one can be treated based on how you are seen.

Switching bodies has other connotations of alienation. Dark serge
tells you when he sees you that as your roles are reversed, so are
your problems. A common feeling of alienation stems from situations
where it feels like when people react to you, they are reacting to a
version of you that doesn't actually exist. Because their
expectations differ from your actual self. Here expressed literally
through the medium of you ending up in another body, and having to
fight to be treated in accord with your mental content. Which has
relevance for various other thematic applications. The themes of both not being seen as yourself, and of racism are related in that both are an external projection of an identity onto you that does not accurately reflect you.

In the end you return home as if both the literal and symbolic journey were completed, and some of this sense of alienation was overcome. But it leaves
it open ended what is going to follow in terms of how the player is
meant to project on the character. The game strongly highlights how
there isn't one single straightforward narrative, so a situation is
never necessarily fully resolved. You return home and are told that
now you can live your own life with it once again feeling like home.
But it calls you to look forward to the future to see where a
following journey might lead you. So while you may resolve it to some degree, there will always be more going on.

A large way that the game explains this is through the lens of
loneliness. Loneliness was also stated explicitly to be a major theme
of the game. And loneliness ties heavily to alienation, especially in
its ties to your community. and being alone in the world. It
highlights a sense of how you have trouble relating even to yourself,
much less others. And so there is a sense in which the journey of
life is an isolated path where your steams may converge and diverge
with others. Sege wakes up in a world where he now knows no one, but
even at the end of the game, time shifts and so his adventure and in
a large sense his memories of it are once again erased. But this does
not end on a totally pessimistic note, since the final scenes of the
game are an indication that despite this, kid is going to once again
seek him out. And so while loneliness and the lonely world are a
pervading reality, and there is a constant struggle against it, it is
not a fruitless one.

## Philosophy of identity

Although related to the concept of identity addressed in
existential concepts tied to finding your place in the world, or the
resulting alienation that stems from it, philosophy of identity is a
similar question, but in a more abstract metaphysical sense rather
than an experiential one. While existential questions address who you
are in terms of how you live your life, philosophy of identity
addresses who you are in a metaphysical sense of continuity.

For instance, what fact about yourself makes you yourself, and makes you persist over time? How
do you know that you are yourself rather than someone else. What fact
about yourself is it that designates that you are the same person you
were yesterday? If anything? While an unreflective response might say that these questions seem irrelevant day to day because there doesn't seem to be any immediate controversy over who is who, aspects of them do actually become more difficult in specific instances, both real and imaginary. And one is forced to call into question how accurate the intuitive sense of continuity even is.

There are various possible things to focus on as the relevant fact of identity continuity is grounded in. The biological approach focuses on you being the same
organism. The brute physical view extends this further by focusing on
being the same physical object in general. In contrast, the
psychological view focuses on having the same mental content. A
different variant of that line of thought is the narrative view.
Which holds that you are not psychological content, but rather a
narrative or story that makes sense of events into a cohesive whole.
And so it is a self told story told about your existence that
constructs this narrative allowing for continuity. There are also
views that say that it is some further unknown fact, or some
combination of the above, being the closest continuer of various
properties.

Further explorations of the idea ask whether the question is even
coherent, or to what degree it might be. Bundle theories say that the
self in the sense we normally think of does not actually persist over
time in an absolute sense. But that despite this fact there is still
some degree of continuity. And so while your identity is not fully
stable, one of the above facts is still enough to make sense of
continuation moment to moment. Many modern theories call into
question the idea of the relevance of the individual to begin with.

In everyday speech people are inclined to see themself as a
discrete stable object with firm barriers. But this may not be an
accurate conception of the self. Modern science calls into question
the idea that people even have a single stream of consciousness
rather than various parts which are added together for a primary
perspective. And so some call into question the relevance of the
individual, saying they are a mere bundle of properties with only a
loose continuity. Some also go the opposite direction, saying that
the world is continuous and it is the individual that is extrapolated
from the big picture, rather than the other way around.

In everyday situations people are inclined to think that these
distinctions do not matter much. But there are scenarios in which
they are relevant. If two bodies have their mental content swapped
fully, we would be inclined to ask which of them is which person. And
if people are not discrete selves, then we can also ask to what
degree they are literally a new person when you meet them later on.
Or if someone has amnesia to what degree they are the same person,
versus if they live a new life don't constitute someone new. We can
also ask whether group minds are not a mere metaphor, but an actual
separate layer of interaction that is tangibly cohesive enough to
count as a separate organism to some degree.

Chrono cross first brings up these questions in an explicit way
when you meet harle for the first time in the body of lynx. You and
lynx swapped bodies. So of course you are inclined to still think of
yourself as serge. But she calls into question how you can know you
were ever really serge when you are in the body of lynx. She asks
what serge is. A figure, a shape, a spirit, a soul? Where is serge?
If you claim to be someone, you have to ask what relevant facts even
make you that person. Are you really serge, or do you merely have the
memories of him now? And she goes on to point out that even if you
think you are serge that other people will not see you this way.

Another time philosophy of identity comes up is in terms of the
idea of fission and fusion. Philosophy of identity tries to address
concerns over whether if it was possible for someone to divide in
half which if either resultant person would be the same as the
original. In-game, kid is revealed to be half of schala. And concerns
over her actual ties to the original person she was created from are
brought up. At first she denies this identity, claiming she is her
own person. Swearing off the idea that her source dictates her
identity. But then later she seemingly merges back together. And the
resultant schala now signs her name with the word kid in the middle.
Implying a preservation of both identities. This is taking a view
that identity is more complicated than direct 1:1 correspondence.
Because to some degree it is preserved and to some it is changed.

Fission and fusion is likewise brought up with the dragon gods.
While for the other dragons this is presented as less relevant, for
harle it provides a bigger context. Since she comes from the dragon
god, and was born to fulfill its goals, she develops an identity of
her own, seeking to want to live a life in association with the new
group she discovered. But ultimately complying with its whims. This
brings up the question of whether if a being could split the fact
that the different pieces might now diverse in interests. And so the
collective being may have a will born from competing lines of
thought.

Another time the game addresses philosophy of mind is with the
concept of group minds. Group minds are minds that are embodied
across several beings, but still seen as having a degree of
integration. For instance, if a country could be said to loosely have
collective intentionality enough to have a degree of collective
integration. This is an important aspect of philosophy of mind even
though to some people it might seem odd, since while even though it
might seem strange how different things can integrate in this way, it
is important to remember that even within a brain the mind is less
integrated that people think, being composed of separate streams of
calculation that are often competing for dominance.

Group minds would not necessarily be intelligent in the way people
are, but may be something much more abstract. The relevant group mind
addressed in the game is that of the world itself. While not
necessarily depicted as an intelligent being, the planet itself has a
type of abstract will of self preservation. As if the ecosystem were
a body that tries to resist the things harming it. At the end of the
game this is personified much more strongly, with the conversation
about how people may only be the dreams of the planet before it is
born. The term for treating the planet and ecosystem as a specific
discrete being of its own is known as the gaia hypothesis. Note that
even though it is something presented as to be protected, that does
not necessarily mean its collective intentionality is always accord
with morality. Since belthasar made use of it to pull the dragons to
the primary universe although for a goal other than that of the
planet.

This extends even further, and goes back to the idea of how
individuals may be derivatives of the big picture just as much as the
inverse. The idea that individuals are derivatives of the big picture is known as open individualism. And while it is a distinct view from bundle theories, there is some overlap. And how a body is simply something that formulates part of
the big picture into having a discrete identity. You are told that
eventually all dreams return to Zurvan, the sea of dreams. What
zurvan is is left ambiguous. But its description implies being some
type of abstract universal repository of thought that people emerge
from and return to.

Taken literally this implies that to some degree individuals may
be derivatives of he big picture, or at least that no direction is
more primary than the other. It also implies that parts of the
identity of individuals can theoretically be recycled. And perhaps
that there is some type of a universal world soul or something
equivalent. Though the word soul might sound too religious, analogues
of this idea are present in philosophical forms in the views of
cosmopsychism or panpsychism which posit an equivalent mental flow to
the physical world. The game ends on a note detailing that to some
degree even after death some aspect of your identity being preserved
when it returns to zurvan.

## Existentialism

Existentialism is a series of philosophies that seek to address
the reality of existing as a being in the world. That is, rather than
beginning philosophical focus with some abstract external absolute, and
build from there to humanity, to start with a focus on your existence
and life as a human, and what can be derived outwards from this.
While some variants of the term are limited in scope to only certain
philosophers, the idea of existential questions in general are
applicable to many of them.

One of the primary posits of existentialist thinking is that there
is not necessarily any inherent meaning to events. That meaning is
not something external and objective, but is created through human
interaction with external things and decision making. This does not
necessarily mean that people can say that the meaning of events is
whatever they want. But that their existence and interaction with it
shapes the meaning. It does not necessarily automatically deny the
connotations of natural meaning in its more abstract sense. But is a
denial moreso of a kind of teleological path to existence that things
inherently are oriented towards.

One variant of existential thinking, though it is often
differentiated is absurdism or the absurd. In philosophy, "the
Absurd" refers to the conflict between the human tendency to
seek inherent value and meaning in life and the human inability to
find any in a purposeless, meaningless or chaotic and irrational
universe. The universe and the human mind do not each separately
cause the Absurd, but rather, the Absurd arises by the contradictory
nature of the two existing simultaneously. Where it differs from
classical existentialism is that the former posits that meaning is
created by human action, and can be readily perceived, whereas the
latter denies the tangibility of this created meaning, saying instead
that one must simply act as if their actions have meaning even when no
ultimate meaning can be grasped.

Existentialism is not an inherently nonreligous philosophy, and can come in both religious andnonreligious variants. Existentialism in the loose sense began with the religious proto existential
philosopher soren kierkegard who talked about how even god existing
wouldn't be enough to establish meaning to human existence. And that
human actions still have the possibility to orient themselves in
accord with or against its will. And that in a realm of ambiguity
your choice to follow a religious path still derives from an internal
decision. Religious existentialism often focuses on the idea that theism is in a sense relative, and based on a decision one makes in terms of values. And so people are left with a choice what to view as their ultimate value.

A common trope of existential thought is the claim of
radical freedom that comes from the realization that you are
accountable for all your actions. Even if an external authority
pushes you to do them, the choice to comply or not is always your
own. And can never be pushed entirely on external sources. Even if
your cultural situation pushes you to act a certain way, your choice
to do so is still a choice. The term existential angst is used to
express the feelings associated with this responsibility of
decisionmaking. Later philosophers associated with structuralist
thinking have highlighted how the existentialists were too focused on
the idea of self choice, and how external things do come off as
binding in a way. But their insights are still considered useful.

Existential questions begin even in chrono trigger when lucca asks
robo what he wants to do, which prompts him to ask himself what he
wants to do with his life. Something he had never properly considered
before. While existential thought manifests in stories relating to
the idea of choice in general, and of course this features heavily in
chrono cross in various ways there are a few parts where it becomes
more explicit. When you meet sprigg in the temporal vortex, she
highlights an absurdist concept of how a concern of life is the fact
that for all the suffering there is a scary thing about it is the
fact that there is not necessarily any meaning to these events. They
simply happen, and you are bound by the situation. That chance and
chaos are the major players in the world, and no one is watching out
for you. And so you are born into a world forced to make your own
path from the chaos. A large focus of the game in general are the
natural evils that come from the world themselves, and the
unfortunate reality that they see to merely exist as a feature of
life, rather than having any meaning to them.

The paradigm of the game does add a loose religious veneer to the existential format. Since while it does depict a type of death of god moment more than once, and a kind of existentialist need for the individual to be responsible for themselves, it also depicts the fundamental ground of reality as a type of abstract divinity. This is similar to the type of religious existentialism of paul tillich. Where god is seen not as a particular sentient being, but as the ground of being that grounds all value. But which still provides a need for the individual to sort their values within reality. A type of duality exists between this depiction of a world of underlying value, and the conversations about the difficulty ascribing any meaning to events. And so a tension exists there between these perspectives. Though not one that is presented as insurmountable.

But a type of religious reverence for reality itself, and one's place in nature is visited in both games. And the depiction comes off as if part of how this tension is resolved is in one's integrated nature where the collective actions (highlighted as "dreams") of those within reality give tangibility and meaning to what has an underlying sense of emptiness. This veers a bit into radically emergent theism also, which says the divinity is something created through the actions of those within reality. Manifested here in a more literal way in that it shows bot humans and dragonites created a tangible god for themselves. But an existentialist element here highlights your need to be careful and responsible in terms of choosing your divinity, both in the sense of choosing what you value, and in terms of choosing tangible things in the world which may end up with power over you.

One more explicit reference to proto-existentialist thinking that shows up in the game is near the end, a riff of the quote from nietzsche "If you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you" appears. Where the ghost of chrono says that if you stare into the flame, perhaps the flame stares also into you. The implication of the original quote being that your interaction with something can influence you, especially if you spend much time on it. And so a derivative of it is used as a potential explanation for the shift in the mentality of fate. In the game this does not particularly convey much information, but by using the quite highlights some of the themes to be looking for for interpretation.

One focus of existentialist thought in general being the idea of
choosing who you are, and the associated authentic living that stems
from this. While some philosophers have called into question the
existentialist concept of authenticity, in terms of concerns it has
in conflict with ethics, the reality of the need to make choices that
define yourself is still considered present. A path of existential
choice is expressed in the game itself in that while you experience
alienation and even questions of who you are as a person, ultimately
the restoration of your own internal body is shown as a metaphor of
having a grasp on your own identity. Note that you are not even
restored your original body, but are shown being given a new one. And
so it shows the reality that the chaos of the world is not
necessarily something one can totally overcome. Problems of identity
are ambiguous and may have no easy answer. Especially the aspects of
multiple worlds are shown as disorienting. But that despite all this
it comes down to a choice to decide on who you are going to be, and a
path to move forward in spite of the this.

## Ethics

### Environmentalism

One major theme present in the game is that of environmentalism.
Environmentalism is of course concern about protecting the
environment. This can have either a softer form based around doing so
due to the need humanity has to be sustained by it long term, or the
deeper form based on doing so for its own sake out of respect for the
planet and natural life. The latter being known as deep ecology.

Environmentalism as a theme was already present in chrono trigger,
but in a less explicit sense. In chrono cross, miguel describes how
the heroes of chrono trigger fight against the destruction of their
world even though it would not happen until long after their
lifetime, and they were in no immediate danger. In this sense, lavos
presented as a metaphor for environmental destruction. And fighting
against it as a metaphor for environmental protection. This is
further exemplified in how in chrono trigger there are side missions
that involve restoring a forest.

In chrono cross these themes are made much more explicit. Lavos is
not only a metaphor for environmental destruction as an external
thing, but becomes an existential threat. Human evolution was
influenced by lavos in a 2001-like manner to help its parasitic goals
of harming the planet. Humans are designed to have a parasitic
element to them that makes them naturally act in ways that can be
environmentally disastrous. And so it is rooted in the very core of
their being. Something that calls the player to reflect on human nature itself, and it potentially detrimental aspects.

In contrast with humans, other races are shown to be less likely to disrupt the
environment due to their nature of being more in tune with it. This
does not mean that these races are all benevolent though. As the
games show, these races can be violent and dangerous themselves. Just
that their overall lifestyle tends to be less environmentally
dangerous. This has a parallel in some other fiction, such as lord of the rings where elves live in tune with the forest, but are revealed in the backstory to be highly morally dubious.

An element of this parasitic corruption is the casualness with which humans can do
environmentally disastrous things without considering the
consequences. Early-game you can go and kill the last hydra in one of
the worlds in the hope of saving someone. But you are warned that
this could be environmentally damaging. If you push through on this
it harms the forest, causing a minor ecological collapse that sets
off a sequence of events that even has genocide due to fighting over
land. Showing how environmental problems can lead to tangible harms.
At various times in the game this concern is brought up over human
presence harming the environment, with even the pirates saying that
their presence seems to have disturbed the islands.

These scenes also highlight the intersection between environmental
and classist issues. Because it is often lower classes, or more
oppressed peoples who suffer more under the disasters of
environmentally disastrous actions. Because often the harmful actions
will be pushed more towards their living spaces, or they will be
unable to as easily offset it. In-game this is shown with the
presence of humans and how it is at times the other races who are
suffering under some human action.

This culminates in an even larger question being asked. that of
whether saving humanity is the same as saving the world, or whether
these two concepts are inherently opposed. The dragons basically
insist that humanity is too inherently dangerous to be allowed to
continue. And so for the sake of the planet humans need to be wiped
out. This is something addressed in actual ethics too, in
extinctionism or certain variants of antinatalism. Whether human
action is not so damaging that it would be morally preferable to lead
to the end of humanity so as that the world can exist without it.

The game presents this as a hard hitting serious question, showing
heavy damage caused by human existence. And that even if humans have
difficulty overcoming this due to being born this way that there is
still the question of how to address this harm, and whether drastic
measures are needed. This ties to the scientific concept of the great
filter. Which is the concern that we may not see any extraterrestrial
civilizations because advanced civilizations may tend to destroy
themselves.

While these dark reflections on humanity are presented as a grave issue, In the end of the narrative, humanity is shown to have moved slightly in the
right direction. It was from humans that a means to combat lavos was
derived. And in a symbolic transcendence of their own nature, it was
humans that destroyed it using some type of mystical ecological
device that harmonizes the environment in some way. This can only be
done by learning the tune from terra tower. Showing that the
complaints and perspectives of the dragons were actually taken
seriously. It is actually somewhat difficult to find out what to do
in the game. Showing that the solution won't come easy. And the
solution comes at great expense, since belthasar's sequence of events
he allows to transpire causes great suffering in the path towards
finding a solution. Even in the end you are told that now that fate
no longer exists humanity has to accept responsibility for its own
actions. So while it overcame the immediate threat, this does not
deny the reality of future dangers.

### Oppression and class systems

A large theme of the chrono games is the idea of oppression and
class systems of various kinds. In chrono trigger in the past people
were oppressed by dinosaurs. Then later, non magic users by magic
users. And in the future humans by robots. And of course the world at
large was presented as something lavos had power over in a way analogous to a form of opression. With the
battle theme against its second form being titled world revolution in
reference to the human response.

In chrono cross however the tone shifts and the shoe is on the
other foot. Now rather than humanity being the victims, humanity is
presented as the aggressors to some of the other races. The other
races in the game are presented in a lower situation relative to
humans, and while humans are not always directly oppressing them,
human actions and apathy towards them leads to many problems they are
forced to deal with. In another world they talk about how the hydras
have been entirely wiped out. And in home world you can accidentally
wipe out the last one, leading the hydra marshes to become damaged, destabilizing the community of those who lived there.

The game highlights a darker form of this. When humans kill the
last hydra the dwarves decide from this to adapt a social darwinist
view, stating that survival is built off of the death of others. And
so in response to their long term oppression they turn to oppressing
others. This highlights cycles of suffering that can be caused due to
interrelated situations. Postcolonialism highlights many topics like
this, and the long term effects that can come from these actions. Notably also, the game highlights how death is a facet of nature and darwinism in general, but that a leap is made from the natural world to a social darwinist take on society itself. With reflections on the nature of this natural suffering, and whether oppression is a natural extension of it.

This shift of humans from the oppressed to the oppressors makes
the tone of the events feel more personal. Not only are humans
involved, but by your actions you can have a hand in it also. With
the game piling on guilt as you are personally blamed for the deaths.
This along with the message of the game to see these stories as
continuous with real life calls into question your place in the real
world, and what situations you might have a hand in that you need to
take a step back and consider how to improve on.

Note that this focus on oppression isn't merely blaming you individually.
You did not personally give rise to the entire process of oppression,
instead only having a tiny part in the events. This ties to how real
life oppression isn't always directly spearheaded by individuals, but
they simply exist in situations where they are inadvertently
contributing to it. Because they do what seems natural to them, not
thinking over the long term consequences of their actions. But even
if they are not the ones spearheading it they are still faced with a
moral responsibility to try to do better.

Racism is a large theme of the game in general. When you return
home in the body of lynx your own ton turns against you. So it shows
how even the same place can give you different experiences based on
who you are when you go to it. This is something that it shows that
serge when first starting out would not ave considered. But it makes
it personal when you become a victim of racism from people you
already knew and did not think negatively of before then.
Highlighting the fact that oftentimes the people who are the
privileged classes do not have an easy time understanding what life
is like for others, since they are limited to their own perspectives.

In chrono trigger a notable focus is the fact that in zeal it
shows how oftentimes the higher classes will even be smarter and more
educated. This may be either since they have more access to
education, or that those more educated are more capable of using it
for the case of exploitation. This can likewise apply in real
situations where you have to address that the oppressed often are
kept from even being educated enough to understand their own
situation. And that the ones who come off seemingly more refined or
proper are only that way because the system is designed to make it
easier for them. And so you can't use this metric of coming off this
way to determine who is in the right in these situations.

### Moral luck

Moral luck describes circumstances whereby a moral agent is
assigned moral blame or praise for an action or its consequences even
if it is clear that said agent did not have full control over either
the action or its consequences. One example being the distinction of
where people are born. Someone born in nazi Germany is unavoidably
more likely to become a nazi than someone from elsewhere. So it
becomes difficult to address whether it is even coherent to be able
to morally compare individuals that come from different situations.

Chrono cross highlights an element of this in the fact that humans
by their very nature were influenced evolutionarily to become
environmentally disastrous by lavos. they are shown harming the
environment. But the question is raised in a way how to view this.
Because it is not entirely about free agency, but a fact
of their nature that is difficult to fight against. As such, you have to address the fact that agency is
not a kind of individual thing, but an unfolding of forces that are
larger than any one individual. The game does not explore this in
much depth beyond the fact of highlighting this reality. But it shows
the need to understand people's place in a more particular slant of
where they come from.

Moral luck also comes up in the game in the situation of killing
the last hydra. You were not the one who did most of the hydra
hunting. And it is likely that someone else would have killed it
after it not you. After all, in another world where you were already
dead they were dead already. But moral luck factors in where you set
off a genocide, even though you were only a tiny part of the
happenings. The concept exists to highlight situations like this, and
address the degree to which one can really hold the individual
accountable for their agency versus the structural unfolding that
detailed their actions.

While many people have different goals in the games, the kind of depersonalized way it often shows the characters highlights the fact that all these events are an unfolding of larger forces they find themselves entrenched in. As if it were a tide that was carrying them. But this does not alleviate all moral responsibility. Because they are still shown being able to affect the unfolding of the tide. Making morality a more particularist thing that stems from your particular location than something comparable as if in a neutral setting. For some, based on the situation, they simply can't do the same goods that are able to be done by others.

Moral luck intersects with the ideas of moral psychology and moral
motivation in general, including how it ties with weakness of the
will. The study of morality does not only include what should be
done, but also the understanding of the fact that it will be
difficult for people to do it, including how it is more difficult for
some than others. All of this ties back to the idea of moral luck.

### Ethics and hypertime

Something brought up in-game is the question of the moral
connotations of changing the past. This is brought up in the sense
that if you change the past it will lead to some people from the
present never having existed. This leads into morally ambiguous
territory, since it leaves you with an ambiguous realm of how to see
the future, and to what degree you morally relate to it from the past.

For instance, for a hypothetical person named jane. One
perspective holds that there is a moral difference between the world
in which Jane never existed, and one in which Jane is removed. Even
if the time traveller makes it such that Jane never existed in the
first place, that there is something morally questionable about doing
so. Intuitively, the world containing Jane’s removal seems somehow
different than the one without it. Setting aside time travel for a
moment, suppose that one could push a button and make it so that Jane
never existed. Ceteris paribus, this seems worse than not doing so,
even if one is not technically doing harm to Jane.

This argument leads to an interesting and unexpected result: that
there are ethical considerations that tie to whether or not there is
hypertime. Hypertime, roughly speaking, is an extra temporal manifold
against which the temporal manifold is measured. The idea is that the
passage of time must be measured against something, and the most
natural “something” is another dimension of time. This means a
distinction between whether from the perspective of the present the
future is tangibly erased, or simply never existed. As such,
someone's existence hyper-occurs the first tie around, but does not
hyper-occur the second time. With hypertime, both worlds exist in
diachronic order and can be examined for metaphysical and moral
difference. Without this form of measurement one cannot say they were
removed from existence.

In-game lucca's letter talks about this moral dilemma. How in the
end, changing the future caused many people to never be born. But
they were trapped between the reality of either doing that, or
allowing the world to be destroyed. Her letter acknowledges the
reality of the future, seeing it as something that was tangibly
destroyed. But sees this as simply an unavoidable facet of the
unfolding of probability. The game highlights this as morally
dubious, but does not attempt to answer it as an independent case,
instead focusing on the reality of having to accept that as a
consequence of doing another thing that is good. And so highlighting
the morally grey connotations to all action.

### Nonviolence

Nonviolence is the practice of generally avoiding violence
at times it can reasonably be avoided. It comes from the belief that hurting
others or the environment is unnecessary to achieve a positive
outcome and refers to a general philosophy of abstention from
violence. While as a practice it overlaps with the idea of pacifism,
it is more a term for a specific series of actions rather than a
philosophy. Like pacifism, it can exist in various degrees ranging
from total refusal to engage in any violence to a more moderate form
that leans towards avoidance of it when possible.

Nonviolence is a moderate theme in the game, tying to the larger
themes of environmentalism and interventionism. The game focuses on
reckless human action, often of a violent nature that can have
negative consequences. This is driven home first at the point where
you end up killing the last hydra, leaving the dwarves who watched
this to take up a violent mentality in turn. This mentality of
willingness to engage in violence is revealed to have been something
present from the beginning, shining the events where you hunted
animals for scales at the very beginning in a different more
environmentally dubious light.

Similar to games like undertale, this comes off as in away a
deconstruction of standard rpg tropes which trivialize the fighting
you get involved with, often never really addressing the consequences
of doing so, including to wildlife. Here it shows that consequences
stem from these actions, and people are dying and even communities
being harmed as a result of them if it destabilizes local wildlife.
This can happen even when violent actions are not taken for pure
selfish reasons, but for seemingly heroic intentions. Killing the
last hydra was done under the assumption that it was necessary to
save someone's life. But these sequences of actions stemming from
being willing to run in and do violence can lead to dark outcomes.

Themes addressing violence inherent in the world come up at
various times in the game. The dragon god tells you that in order to
survive all living beings must fight desperately, and devour those
they defeat. Talking about the history of evolution in the planet at
large. And once again addresses the cycle of violence, saying that
the weak torment those even weaker than them in turn. It reflects on
this, and the logic of extending that line to wiping out other groups
entirely. Tied to its goal of wiping out humanity to protect the
planet. It also highlights the concept of judgement, saying that it
is the strong who are sinners and those who are trampled under them
who pronounce judgement. But it asks whether this is an unavoidable facet of nature, or whether there are times that this violence can be avoided in favor of a more nonviolent solution. But leaving it vague to the degree this can be possible.

This principle of nonviolence ultimately becomes the thematic
resolution for the end boss. You get the bad ending by rushing into
it and trying to simply attack it again, theoretically risking killing schala
in the process. But in the end, even that fails because it has grown
beyond the point of being able to be harmed by conventional means.
Even though you have just recently gotten a legendary sword, the good
ending comes from setting down your weapons and finding an alternate
resolution. One that stems from an artifact that helps you harmonize
the dimensions together using a tone of harmony with the planet. This
has a symbolic purpose of showing that you grew beyond the mentality
of reckless casual violence. Showing that it is not always necessary,
and that rushing in at this time without finding an alternate
resolution would not have been for the best.

### Agent neutrality

A moral theory is agent-neutral if it ascribes every agent the same set of substantive aims. if it does not do so, it is agent
relative. What this means is that there is a distinction between
theories in which you are told that regardless of who you are, what is right to do is hypothetically the same, albeit adjusted for context. Versus a
theory that says you should privilege for example those more close to
you. This does not mean however that agent neutral ethics means that
you don't have special duties to say, those close to you. Merely that
those are dictated via proximity rather than fundamental nature, and do not override larger goods.

For instance, both approaches may say that you should prioritize
your family over strangers in practice. But this is because your
family has ties of closer proximity to you, and is something you are
more integrated with / and likely have a position that integrates you into its interests. However, in a situation where all else is equal
they will give different answers. For instance, if given an option
whether to save a family member or three strangers, agent neutral
ethics would say to save the latter, whereas some forms of agent
relative might say to save the former. Note that agent relative
approaches are not the same thing as moral relativism, which is a
different topic.

While the game itself never explicitly sides with agent neutral
ethics, it does aim a critique at the kind of agent relative approach
media often has. Often in media a hero will be inclined to save
someone important or close to them even at great risk to the world at
large. And the media will present this as an inspirational path to
take that validates their connection. Such as in final fantasy 4
where cecil hands over the crystals to save rosa. But here it inverts
this. In order to save kid you risk putting others at risk. and this
ultimately blows up on you in a way that establishes it as having
been a wrong course of events, leading to many deaths. There are
various ways to read the relevance of this scene. And different moral
dynamics to view it through the lens of. But in general it can be
viewed as a kind of criticism of this naive intimacy based narrative
where it is seen as heroic to put others at risk for the sake of a
significant other.

### Moral archangels

Although this is not a well known term, and is limited to the
variants of consequentialist moral theory he dealt with, r m hare
made a moral distinction between the intuitive and critical levels of
moral thinking. He proposed two hypothetical characters, which he called
the archangel and the prole. The archangel has an incredibly high
degree of knowledge, whereas the prole has very little. This was to
distinguish the intersection of knowledge and moral action. What this
means is that those with high knowledge can act based on high degree
of knowledge of situation and outcomes. Whereas those with low
knowledge must act based on more limited information, using useful
heuristics and specific moral rules.

This is not meant to distinguish that everyone was either one or
the other, but rather to highlight that people have variants of both,
and it can change based on situation. But most people are closer to
the prole side. This is to answer criticisms often aimed at
consequentialist theories that consequentialists would often act
erratic based on doing seemingly bad things for a better outcome. But
it highlights that the theory would only allow for this if you have
the requisite level of knowledge. In everyday situations people would
be required to follow useful moral heuristics of a peaceable nature
in order not to cause strife. The flipside is that if someone with
archangel level knowledge really did exist, that they would act in
ways that seem erratic to normal people, based on accounting for a
bigger outcome. In fiction this is often called an omniscient
morality license. Something that the truly wise can act based on, but
which if heroes with normal knowledge tried doing the narrative would
punish them for their arrogance.

In game situations that highlight this shift between modes of
thinking show up in various instances. Most notably belthasar is put
in this position. He sees the only way to save reality from ending as
to allow a sequence of events that includes a lot of suffering and
strife, all to create a way for you to get the required artifacts to
stop the time devourer. Interestingly, the game never really forces
you to agree that what he did was right. He simply says his piece,
and then leaves, leaving you with the need to find out how to
actually make use of what he provided for you. Though in general the
game seems to take a tone that he did what he had to.

This same line of thought also applies to fate itself, which is
part of why it acts like a villain. While fate during the events of
the games is placed in an antagonistic relationship with the party,
in its past it was actually keeping humanity safe for 12,000 years.
While it casually killed people, this was seen as necessary for the
big picture sense of preventing humanity from ending, either from the
dragons or lavos. Something in its position is viewing things from a
big picture lens, and so the life of individuals are seen as
expendable in terms of its larger goals. But it shifts from a
protector of humanity to an antagonistic force at some point. With it
left ambiguous what causes this to occur.

This ties into questions addressing the concerns between more
deontological versus consequentialist thinking in general. The former
think you must always follow moral rules on principle. But the latter
think you have to focus based on consequences. And there are various
moral theories that are between them. Chrono cross shows that in a
big picture sense it may be required to do or allow seemingly bad
things for a larger good. But it doesn't really specify the degree to
which this might be true, or address particular moral theories beyond
this. As such, it can be a critique of total rule based moral
thinking in the ordinary sense. Even while highlighting that for the
most part day to day people might need to operate in this way.

### Moral fallibilism

Moral fallibilism is a subset of larger concepts of
epistemological fallibilism. Fallibilism is the philosophical
doctrine that absolute certainty about knowledge is impossible, or at
least that all claims to knowledge could, in principle, be mistaken.
This does not necessarily apply to all possible knowledge, but
different variants hold it as true for different things. Unlike
Skepticism (the doctrine that true knowledge is by definition
uncertain), Fallibilism does not imply the need to abandon our
knowledge, but rather that there is always an acknowledged difficulty
with considering it absolute. It is an admission that, because
knowledge can always be revised by further observation, then whatever
we are taking as knowledge might possibly turn out to be false.

Falliblism is a common position in moral epistemology, the study
of how it is we come across moral knowledge. Moral epistemology has
the difficulty of trying to make sense of moral knowledge in general,
as well as how humans can come about it, and what constitutes good
evidence. While most ethicists consider that at least some moral
leanings are loosely good enough to constitute real knowledge, there
is the difficulty that it may be difficult in practice, if not
impossible in principle to ever reach a strong consensus. Because
while we can experience value, and morality is seen as tied to it, it
is not particularly clear in what sense it is tied, or how to make
use of this connection information-wise.

This comes up in game, although in an indirect way. A long running
theme of the game is the reality that it is not merely an issue of
willpower, but the fact that you may simply not know what is right.
When serge kills the last hydra, he does it thinking he might need to
do this for a good end. But this not only ends badly, but it turns
out to have not been necessary to begin with. Ambiguity about right
and wrong can apply both in cases of particular instances, or even
what fundamental values to use. When you fight the zombie hydra, one
of your party asks if what you did was right. And another responds by
saying who even knows what is right or wrong. Showing that in their
place in the events they cannot even tell. Ending by saying that
nobody has the right answer. A fallibilist declaration that while
some paths might be better than others, no one can say for an
absolute. And you must necessarily act under uncertainty.

This ambiguity about right and wrong comes up in the game itself.
When the dragons issue their challenge against humanity having a
right to exist, the game leaves this grey, placing you in the role of
a morally ambiguous person for fighting back against them, despite
them having a decent case. Even you fighting against fate was
revealed to have been based on forces beyond you manipulating your
steps. And you did it without really considering that fate was a boon
to humanity much of this time. To the same extent this ties even to
the ambiguity of fate's actions and moral standing. It is left
ambiguous to highlight the grey view the party has in their role in
the events.

This uncertainty even ties back a bit to belthasar's plot in the
big picture sense. Even his actions the game does not force you to
accept. Because you are left in a grey realm of uncertainty. While he
is presented as a light grey figure who helped lead to better ends,
the question of his moral standing never is truly resolved. You are
merely told that he did what he had to. And the final resolution
doesn't provide clarity. Just a resolution of the events, and an
optimistic mentality towards moving into the future.

Another relevant aspect of this element of moral fallibilism is
the idea of learning from your mistakes. A large theme of the game is
the fact that in light of this ambiguity, you will make mistakes. And
people may end up harmed by them. This is not meant to say that the
mistakes therefore don't count. But to acknowledge the difficulty, and
show that it is possible to try to improve after. Across the sense of
the story you get an idea of a growing sense of reverence for the
planet and life in it, and a choice to be more cautious before
recklessly engaging in violence.

### Extinctionism

Excinctionism refers to a variety of positions revolving around
the extinction of humanity. Including the idea that for moral reasons
humanity should deliberately choose to voluntarily end itself.
This is often held for environmental reasons, saying that humanity is
so damaging to the planet that it should willingly remove itself, so
that the planet can flourish without it. This is tied to
antinatalism, which is a variant of extinctionism that does not seek
the active purging of humans, but seeks for them to cease
reproducing. These views can be held for a number of reasons, with
environmental ones being only one of them.

In-game this obviously comes up with the goals of the dragons who
view humanity in a light of a need to erase it for the sake of the
planet. And so a challenge is made of humanity's right to exist in
light of its damaging nature. This has a double sided approach, since
it can be viewed either as the question of whether it is capable of
humanity to improve, or whether even in light of not being able to
humanity has a right to exist. But it takes an optimistic view
towards humanity being able to overcome this nature. While leaving
the other question more ambiguous.

The deeper sense of extinctionism is the idea that life in general
is not worth living. The concept of a life worth living is a
philosophical concept related to what makes it better to have lived a
life rather than not existed. And the required level of value. While most interpretations of this consider a certain rather low degree of value sufficient to have a life worth living, some argue that the standard is so much higher than that that life tends to have that it makes life in general a fundamental net negative.

Concerns of this nature can come from various approaches. Either the
theoretical idea that since plain matters more than absence of
pleasure that life is a net negative, or the more contingent argument
that while it is hypothetically possible for life to be valuable,
that the tangible life that exists by and large would be better off
not having existed. Though this line of thought is not heavily
explored in the game. Being tied more to the backstory of schala
fusing with lavos that is detailed in the re-released chrono trigger.
In chrono cross it is only vaguely explored, with an offhand line
where harle is concerned that kid might think this way. And miguel
talks about how the eternity of nonexistence is a way to avoid the
reality of being towards death.

## Fate and structuralism

Fate, sometimes referred to as destiny, is a predetermined course
of events, It may be conceived as a predetermined future, whether in
general or of an individual. Traditional usage defines fate as a
power or agency that predetermines and orders the course of events.
Fate defines events as ordered or "inevitable" and
unavoidable. This is a concept based on the belief that there is a
fixed natural order to the universe, and in some conceptions, the
cosmos. Classical and European mythology feature personified "fate
spinners," known as the Moirai in Greek mythology, the Parcae in
Roman mythology, and the Norns in Norse mythology. They determine the
events of the world through the mystic spinning of threads that
represent individual human fates. Fate is often conceived as being
divinely inspired.

While fate in the classical sense was seen as a tangible
metaphysical force, the term is often used in a modern sense to also
highlight a sense of the flow of events in general. One that
highlights the questions over how free humans are. This ties into
questions of agency, and the question of how much authorship people
actually have over their own actions. Whether or not determinism is
true in an absolute sense, there is a degree to which large scale
events may follow a path that can be unavoidable. If not in the
specifics, at least in generalities. This concept too can feed to
feelings of alienation, and questions over how much power the
individual actually has to alter the course of history.

Structuralism in general is the methodology that implies elements
of human culture must be understood by way of their relationship to a
broader, overarching system or structure. It works to uncover the
structures that underlie all the things that humans do, think,
perceive, and feel. Alternatively, as summarized by philosopher Simon
Blackburn, structuralism is "the belief that phenomena of human
life are not intelligible except through their interrelations. But
since the structure can influence you, it becomes difficult to talk
about the agency of the individual in a structural light. Which can
lead to comparisons of the idea with a fatalitic outlook. This is
especially in light of focault who said that rebellion is part of the
system, rather than a true deviation. And that rebellion and power to
enforce its own whims are part of power. With the rebellious entity
being shaped by these power relations, rather than merely responding
to them.

In-game fate is of course personified as an actual being. A
machine that has power over the unfolding of events. Fate in-game is
also associated with the moirai from greek mythology, with the
entrance machines named after then on the path to chronopolis. This
gives rise to the questions of an unfolding fate, and whether it is
possible to fight against it. The concept of fighting fate is one
that details not just the idea of fate as a metaphysical force, but
concepts of an unfolding of structural events, and whether you can
deviate from where they push you.

However, it calls into question a deeper sense of destiny. Even
though you fight fate, the entire journey you were on was predicted
by belthasar and manipulated for better ends. Miguel even calls your
arrival to him as predestined. And belthasar considers that your
fight with marcy might be fate as well. So even this concept of
fighting fate may be tied to a deeper sense of destiny. When viewing
this through a structuralist light it ties to questions of the agency
an individual even has in terms of fighting a structure they find
themself in. One that tries ascribing a particular "fate"
to them. But even this rebellion may be a part of the unfolding of
the structure, rather than a true deviation. In the end you defeat
fate as a tangible entity, but the question is still left open
whether there wasn't a larger sense of destiny, and your entire
journey was preordained. This especially tying to the fact that the
resolution seems to be something that can come from you, and only
you.

This also ties into structuralist concepts of identity, and how
your society, or even your place in it can be seemingly forcing a
fate onto you. One that can be viewed as overpoweringly unavoidable
from the perspective of individuals. If you live in a heavily racist
society, your race can be seen as like a fate and identity that is
forced onto you. One that no matter what you do it is inescapable.
The game also ascribes fates pushed onto you by fact of your birth.
Humans are born in bodies that inherently push them to disregard the
environment. And the dragons see humans as something that inherently
need to be wiped out. There is a sense of unavoidable identities
ascribed to you. When you are in lynx's body, how you are treated is
different. All of these being things that stem from things outside of
your own actions. Dark serge tells you when he sees you that as your
roles are reversed, so are your problems. Highlighting how external
things are forcing you into situations and roles independently of
your actions.

Note here that the game still highlights the sense of chaos in the
unfolding of the world. So a kind of naturalized social determinism
isn't necessarily pointed to anything. As such it is taking less of a
modernist concept of a linear unfolding and more of a potentially
postmodern structuralist or poststructuralist one where the
structures simply unfold. Despite this, however, it never really
takes a pessimistic stance on the idea of individual agency. Instead
simply ending with a talk about how now that fate is dead people will
have to take responsibility for their lives. This being both about
faith, as well as a kind of death of god moment, and movement on from
the acknowledgement of this.

## Emptiness

Although not as prevalent in some other games, a subtle theme in
chrono cross is a sense of underlying emptiness to events. This sense
of emptiness can have various meanings. Existential emptiness
highlights the meaninglessness behind events. Schala talks about
evolution as a meaningless series of life forms killing one another.
But there can also be a deeper metaphysical sense to emptiness. An
idea that underneath your constructed identities for things, your own
metaphysical identity itself might be in question. This comes up a
bit when harle questions who you are after you swap bodies. Asking
what fact about you makes you serge. And in the end this is never
answered. Leaving it vague if there even is an objective fact
detailing as such.

This sense of concern over the substantialness of events begins
even earlier in chrono trigger. In chrono trigger, doreen brings up
the quote about being a man dreaming they are a butterfly, or vice
versa coming from the taoist philosopher zhuangzi. Pointing out that
different people have different perspectives, and in some sense live
in tangibly different worlds. And so you can never assume that what
you see and feel is real. She highlights the different perspectives
held by different people. This ties to a concept called the
life-world. The phenomenological concept that the "world"
you exist in is not the objective world of the sciences, but an
objective construction of your mind. Because your brain does not
directly perceive reality, but the senses are all internal codes it
creates to keep you alive. As such, while there are intersubjective
crossovers, each life-world is unique to the individual, leading to a
degree of an underlying emptiness to the larger reality.

This is also highlighted in the large emphasis both games place on
the word dreams. Calling reality a dream gives an implication both of
reality being in a sense intangible, and unreal. But in a more
positive sense it ties to the idea of goals. Here it is being used
for both. Highlighting a sense of the world itself being empty, but
given value by people's dreams. The word dreams are emphasized in
many things like the city of dreams in zeal, dreamstone, radical
dreamers, the dream devourer, and zurvan, the sea of dreams. At the
end of the game you are told that maybe all people are just the
dreams of the planet before it is being born. And so there is a
double sided emphasis on this concept of dreams. The world is
described as chaotic and empty, but not valueless, because people
create the world through dreaming. and this constructed world is part
of a golden chain.

In fiction, the concept of the void is often used to highlight a
sense of underlying metaphysical emptiness to reality. The void shows
that the basis of the world is not teleological, but the true
ultimate is nothingness. And that it is being that is contingent. In
chrono cross, the void is present under the name the darkness beyond
time. A metaphysical place of emptiness and deletion that discarded
timelines go to to be erased. Lavos is now present here as well. But
has moved beyond the mere role as a planet eater, but a symbolic
representation of this underlying emptiness and the path of human
life towards death.

The ephemeral, and death itself is tied to these themes of emptiness, and is a large
theme of the game. With miguel talking about how nothing is as
impartial as death. And schala describes death in various ways. Disappearing life forms, words that are deleted, thoughts that are buried, pools of cells that slowly evaporate, and echoes of consciousness that slowly fade. She highlights that every being from the most powerful to the weakest
eventually dies. Tying to an eastern theme of the unfolding of nature as ephemeral, and nothing as permanent. And using language that describes things as a collection of building blocks that has only a tenuous existence.

Death is tied to concerns over emptiness in that
your life is potentially zeroed at some point. As a threat that
emerges from the void giving rise to a threat of all reality ending,
the tie devourer now also represents a trend towards death, and the
fact of having to come face to face with this emptiness that it
implies. Rejecting it details a choice to go on living and find value
in the world. And the talk of the golden chain and of zurvan gives
context to the idea that death does not erase meaning or even the
value or content of your life. That these dreams are recycled into
the planet and reality, and continues on until
the day that the planet can be born. Though what exactly this means is left ambiguous, whether it is a literal event or a symbolic declaration of purpose. But regardless, it inverts the negative connotations into a more optimistic message.

## Religion

A large facet of chrono cross is its focus on religious themes and
symbolism. An important setup for this is the setting. Fate is
literally venerated as the goddess of fate on the islands. With lynx
later saying that he is the incarnation of fate. And beneath fate there
are the dragon gods. Different people hold different views to the
degree they venerate these beings, but they are seen as overarching
divinities. Beyond this, there are related things. Both the dragon
tear and the frozen flame are seen as religious relics by the
inhabitants. With the frozen flame being described as something that
answered people's prayers. The planet itself is shown an almost
religious degree of reverence by certain figures. And at the end of
the game they describe zurvan. Which is presented as some type of
abstract ultimate source of reality.

Another important note is that the game includes a large degree of
christian symbolism. The one guarding the dead sea is called miguel
after the archangel michael. And the entrance to the sea of eden is
called the pearly gates. Giving it a tone of being a holy ground and
the seat of god. In contrast, fate is in conflict with the dragon
god. Who calls to mind the conflict in christianity against satan,
represented as a dragon. The tower of geddon likewise is short for
Armageddon, which is a christian apocalyptic reference. And sin is
brought up, with the dragon god highlight that it is the powerful who
are sinful because those they trample over are the ones pronouncing
judgement on them. Taking chrono trigger into account there is also
the fact that the sages are named after the biblical magi, and the
mammon machine is named after the biblical mammon. Although those
references were created for the western version of the game.

There is
also some greek symbolism, in the greek fates and prometheus being
associated with chronopolis. Of especially important note is the story of prometheus, who gave humans fire from the gods. In chrono cross, a character literally named prometheus is giving you the frozen flame, taking it from the goddess of fate. And of course in chrono trigger, robo, also called prometheus, is siding with humanity to help them against his own kind. This emphasis on the name prometheus also ties to the themes of standing against the gods. There is even some shinto symbolism in that harle's japanese name was tsukuyomi, aftr the japanese god of the moon in reference to her association with the moon, and deriving from the dragon god.

Something immediately recognizable about the setting of course is
the fact that both divinities are ultimately revealed to not be
literally born divinities, but rather some type of advanced
construction from two alternate futures who are advanced enough that
they have seemingly transcendent powers. Likewise, both forces
ultimately end up as antagonists. So the game opens the question of
challenging religious dogma that you come from. In general this ties
to a larger although subtle theme of anti-traditionalism in general.
At the same time however, the game never really challenges their
claim to divine status. The dragon gods are in fact transcendent
beings whose bodies are in a sense an emanation into the world. And
so in a sense it presents it as if these advanced systems are almost
the creation of quasi-divine forces.

The game seems to take a somewhat spiritual view, despite the call
to challenge existing religious traditions. Back in chrono trigger,
fiona's shrine was created in reverence of the restored forest, and
fiona for restoring it. And robo is housed in it as a revered being
who helped restore it. This shrine is even housed by nuns and is
presented in a positive light. So we are already given a semi
aniistic tone of nature veneration back in chrono trigger. Added to
by the fact that the planet itself is treated by both games as a
higher being in a sense.

Chrono cross likewise maintains that tone. Despite the challenging
of these tangible divinities, their overall presentation doesn't
challenge the nature of a kind of latent divinized view of reality
itself, and the allowance that specific beings are seen as special in
terms of their ability to channel it. This is even worked into the
language used when dwarves call humans heretics of evolution. After
everything, in the final segments of the game, you are talked to
about zurvan, the sea of dreams. A transcendent source of reality,
which all dreams (here meaning consciousness) flow from and return
to. Zurvan here comes from zurvanite zoroastrianism, where it is seen
as the abstract source of even the gods. But the word for zurvan is
derived from the world for time.

And so this reverence and somewhat panentheistic view of the world
is upheld. With elements of transtheism in it as well, by
acknowledging that in a sense there may be beings that channel enough
of reality to constitute claims of divinity. But that you must choose
your divinities wisely, and these beings may be dangerous rather than
beneficial. Although notably, fate itself protected humanity for a
long time before coming in conflict with the heroes. Due to being a
japanese game, the nature reference was likely also influenced by
japanese shinto animism. Which will often build shrines for even
natural outcroppings to show reverence to them.

As such, this leads to a kind of death of god moment. Death of god
is a symbolic realization that comes from realizing you can no longer
rely on the concept of god to give your life meaning. Here it is
represented with the deaths of their literal divinities they saw as
watching over them. But it is a kind of death of god theology in that
it still maintains a spiritual view of the world despite this new
realization of the lack of a teleological end. Death of god theology
addresses the spiritual connotations of living in such a world after
realizing that the world itself is not structured with a teleological
end, or at least cannot be shown to be.

Another major influence seems to be gnostic themes. Which is
likely tied to the fact that masato kato had worked on xenogears
shortly earlier. Lavos in a sense is a partial creator of humanity.
And as the game highlights, was often venerated indirectly through
the frozen flame. Something shown earlier to some degree in chrono
trigger, where zeal in essence started to treat it as a kind of
divinity. Doubly in that once it becomes the time devourer it is a
true transcendental being outside reality placing the entire thing in
threat. But lavos turned humans into literal prisoners by binding
them to its parasitic goals through influencing their evolution in a
sense reminiscent of 2001. So it is a force that is behind various
manifestations of human religion from the past, but which ultimately
is a dangerous force that needs to be overcome. Fate, the dragon god,
and lavos all being forces treated as divinities at different times.
But in the end, after defeating them the tone is not to reject this
spiritual view because of it, but focus on the transcendent absolute
in zurvan. Which has a tone immediately reminiscent of gnostic
themes.

The surrealist tone of the ending itself seems to be inspired by
other works such as 2001 and evangelion. Where the mode of
presentation itself is used to express a kind of looking forward and
transcendence. What exactly is being expressed in the final
conversation with schala seems to be being left deliberately
ambiguous in a way. Because it isn't necessarily meant to be
expressed as a literal plot point so much as this feeling of
transcendence expressed by other similar works. And this ties in with
the overall religious tone.