With the discussion of Time previously, why not touch on time travel? And settle this issue once and for all? We will look at the Saving of Saint-14, the mysterious looping resets of Elsie Bray and how the shotgun Perfect Paradox ties them together and defines time travel and how paracausality is the key. Starting with Saint-14. [b]Summary for saving Saint-14[/b] [spoiler]Saving Saint-14 involved altering the death of one individual who died under in the Infinite Forest; by using Light, Ahamkara bargains and Vex tech tailored to interact with the Infinite Forest and take advantage of its relation with normal space/time. “But the corridors of time refuse to give way to the moment they need: Saint and the Martyr Mind in the depths of the Infinite Forest…” https://www.ishtar-collective.net/records/the-sundial?highlight=Saint+14+forest[/spoiler] [b]Why it had to be the Forest and what makes it special[/b] [spoiler]Like the Vault of Glass, it is a throneworld like space made of its own rules to enable certain paracausal-scale functions. Two examples of these functions. 1. Making the simulations real, physically and mentally. real enough to kill us inside and want to physically escape. 3. Controlling time within the Forest to run them concurrently within while likely manipulating time variables within them for their tests, as you’d have to run them faster than real time relative to the outside to make them useful. https://www.ishtar-collective.net/transcripts/beyond-infinity?highlight=Vestibule https://www.ishtar-collective.net/transcripts/tree-of-probabilites?highlight=Valus+Thuun+ A pocket of special space/time that exists in a separate yet still connected. The Forest is housed within the interior of the planet, akin to Oryx having his throneworld moved into the interior of the Dreadnaught. And then I believe the other component is the Network itself. Specifically the gateway system, which make bridges between two points of space/time for instantaneous travel. Don’t confuse that with time travel per se, it’s saving time by not traveling. A technicality, yes and that’s the point: Vex exploit technicalities.[/spoiler] [b]How Time Travel via Infinite Forest likely works[/b] [spoiler]The separation of the two sets of time, the nature of the Forest and the combined magics. The power of Light is the power of Creation. That means the cosmos, aka space/time. This power is channeled into the Sundial, effectively granting it the space magic power needed to manipulate time. But the Sundial can’t finesse time well enough and damages it. That’s why it damages time. The Sundial was a brute force method and caused damage. And it would have destroyed time if not for a space magic army powering the remedy. Light, the power of space/time.[/spoiler] [b]As an aside, let me address man made Time travel in general[/b] [spoiler]To me, this casts doubt on man made time travel being feasible throughout most of Destiny’s cosmic timeline. What little space magic the Traveler gifted was in the form of weaponry and devices, after the Hive became a menace. Not raw power. It took an army of Guardians to power the device and the damage mitigators working together and even then, it was close. If such a system has never existed, then what species could of ever time traveled besides us? So the only way man made time travel could be possible is if we somehow subjugated the Traveler/Gardner and used it ourselves. Which again still limits time travel to the Golden Age era of humanity-onwards in the whole timeline. So only humanity has had the chance to do it besides the Traveler itself. I’m only familiar with Golden Age Clovis going to alternate timelines. So doubtful it ever happened until Sundial. [/spoiler] [b]Clarification/Summary for Elsie Bray’s Time Loops[/b] [spoiler]When it’s said that Elsie goes back it’s an sort of inaccurate oversimplification. The whole cosmos rolls back, everyone and everything. It all goes back to Caydes celebration parade. It’s just that only she remembers. Because remember, we are in the primary timeline and time moves forward. For a loop or reset, everything must move back into a past state. And it’s not a natural function, that’s why it requires unnatural power from a god-tier entity. It isn’t designed to do it. This is true time travel here.[/spoiler] [b]What is actually happening[/b] [spoiler]The Dark Future: The Return “Ana attacks and stabs me in my side, disconnecting core components. My left arm goes limp. "You have bigger problems," I say, looking to the sky. A piercing noise emanates from the Traveler. Its brilliance begins to swell. I see the Traveler, getting brighter as the Darkness encapsulates it. …In an enchanting explosion, the Traveler's Light enshrouds all in totality. Then darkness. n
I'm awake I see a tower. THE Tower. I'm in the Last City. It's… thriving. Bustling with life. Children laughing…” Mechanically it’s flawless. Unlike the Sundial, there’s no apparent difficulty or issues. And that therein shows this isn’t some man made method being used. No one save Elsie and the one doing it seems aware. That’s Godlike entity tier level. Who in Destiny fits that description AND has the motivation to do so? The Gardner, more often referred to as the Travelee (it’s vessel). The Traveler/Gardner is basically doing a Deus Ex Thanos snap as soon as Elsie becomes mortally wounded. The chosen agent has wholly failed and/or is about to die, reset begins. And it’s to prevent the Dark side winning in general, no one actor. As see in this iteration that Savathun never switched sides to begin with and the Witness isn’t even mentioned. Sending Elsie back over and over until she able to affect things to get the right people alive and thinking a certain way. 1. The inter species alliance 2. Embracing Darkness power positively 3. Keeping certain people alive and their Avoiding corruption/going dark side That’s the purpose of the loops, to get where we are. As Elsie stated in Beyond Light, that’s as far as she’s ever gotten. So the purpose of the loop is being fulfilled.[/spoiler] [b]Elsie’s Memories[/b] [spoiler]Elsie is tied to Darkness by nature of being an Exo and harnessing it. So there are multiple ways her memories could be transferring. The Veil alone, the Traveler/Gardner harnessing Darkness/Veil, her nature alone and simply being singled out by the Traveler/Gardner. There’s several viable possibilities. The important takeaway would be it requires the Traveler/Gardner to harness Darkness. Or else exploit it. That’s the main twist of this angle. [/spoiler] [b]Compare the two[/b] [spoiler]Saint-14 involved a temporary gateway reliant on bending cosmic rules using a combination powers and tech to cheat rules. Vex tech is the most advanced time based tech there is. Osiris If it takes Vex tech and multiple paracausal powers to barely make it happen and almost destroy the cosmos in process, then man made time travel hasn’t happened until we did it. Cause that’s the only time these powers have converged like this. But hey, space magic. Making the impossible possible. Elsie is a roll back of the entire cosmos and all domains within, affecting everyone and everything. Without a single hiccup. This demonstrating the true nature of what lies inside the Traveler: the Gardner. The defacto deity of the Destiny Universe. And notice how both methods rely on Light. Likewise the Vex don’t have it, even with a proper copy of the Veil. Cause it’s a Darkness artifact, the power of consciousness not space/time.[/spoiler] [b]The Perfect Paradox defines time travel[/b] [spoiler]A shotgun with a paradoxical origin, it had time stamps to guide us in how to save him. And that is how it ties in with Elsie’s loops. In her resets, she only goes back so far, well after the point in the past when we met him when he was young and gave him the shotgun. Which means at the beginning of every loop, when we are still dead, we’ve already gone back into the past and gave him the gun. That means in the very first iteration of the timeline, we got at least as far as Shadowkeep-ish. But it also shows that if you go back and alter the past from a point in the future, the alteration should already have existed. Time travel and altering the past will appear fated to happen. Because in the First Iteration, the future had never played out yet, thus necessitating that the future be predestined for the past to be affected. Otherwise younger Saint would of died, Elsie would of then determined he was needed and then devise a way to save him when he was young. And then again a second time when he died in the Forest. But that isn’t the case. Thus any alteration done by someone in the future will have already happened in the present. So we would “experience” only the altered time state. [/spoiler] [b]Conclusion[/b] The scale and scope in the difference between the two is staggering. One is man made and the other is the de facto deity of the universe. And the man made one isn’t some scrapped together device. The Vex are the most time tech advanced species. Osiris has spent centuries studying their tech and used Ahamkara magic on top of it. I don’t see any room for man made tech to get anywhere CLOSE to Elsie’s example without tapping into the Traveler directly. And even then that still shows man made limits, having to piggyback off the creator is an admission of needing that level of power. And this would explain why we don’t see the Vex roll back any defeat they suffer.