Chapter Text
I used to think Dream Zanarkand was an illusory city existing in another dimension, somewhere like the Farplane. Lately, however, I’ve been really hooked on the theory that it actually exists physically in some remote corner of Spira.
An aeon can be summoned indefinitely as long as there are enough pyreflies to sustain it. Sin is essentially the system built to make that possible. While Sin serves as armor for Yu Yevon, its mere existence isn't enough to shape Dream Zanarkand. To secure the massive amount of pyreflies needed as raw material, Sin must bring about death on a massive scale. That’s why it attacks.
It’s sometimes misunderstood, but Yu Yevon possesses the Final Aeon in order to create the "next Sin," not to use its pyreflies to build Zanarkand.
Rather than creating an entirely separate alternate dimension, it seems far more realistic to summon an aeon in the shape of a city at the edge of a distant ocean. If it's possible to reach the "outside" of the world—somewhere so far away that even an airship can't get there—then visiting Zanarkand might be theoretically possible.
If that’s the case, then Tidus and the party's (the player's) resolve to "defeat Yu Yevon for the sake of Spira!" becomes even more brutal. Granted, sacrificing an entire world—even if it's called a "dream"—is already pretty messed up. But it definitely weakens their moral justification. It essentially boils down to: "Let's slaughter the completely innocent people of Dream Zanarkand (not the citizens from a thousand years ago who became the fayth) to save Spira."
As for why this physical existence theory popped into my head, what got me thinking was a conversation while climbing the stairs to Kilika Temple. When Wakka asks, "Are there fiends in Zanarkand too?" Tidus replies, "Yeah, but you rarely see 'em. If one shows up in town, it's a huge deal."
I used to think that was a sort of staged, self-perpetuated scenario orchestrated by Yu Yevon to keep Zanarkand from stagnating—essentially summoning fiends periodically to cause trouble and then having them dealt with as a way to maintain the dream city. A sort of culling, if you will.
But I thought of a different perspective.
Just as previous incarnations of Sin visited Dream Zanarkand, maybe Spira's fiends could also 'accidentally' wander in. And since they wouldn't pose a true threat to the city itself at that scale, maybe Yu Yevon just left them alone. Having a moderate amount of unexpected danger provides some excitement, preventing the dream residents from questioning the unnatural permanence of their existence. In fact, it’s entirely possible that the fiends Tidus mentions are actually Sinspawn or fiends from inside Sin.
It also intrigues me that Tidus doesn't know what a Summoner is.
Given its origins, the history of the war with Bevelle must have been erased in Dream Zanarkand. There are no external enemies in that city. While Tidus knows what fiends are, he doesn't know the concept that people turn into fiends when they die. That’s why Tidus doesn’t know about the Sending, and why the role of a Summoner isn't needed in Dream Zanarkand.
Going back to the staged scenario theory for a moment: if the fiends appearing in Zanarkand were under Yu Yevon's control and the damage they caused was just a fixed game, then a "Summoner" figure (or someone tasked with defeating fiends) should have existed in Zanarkand, even under a different name or role. Yet, Tidus knows nothing of the sort.
In a dream city where anything connected to war has been unnaturally purged, the threat of fiends definitely exists, but a profession to defeat them does not. This implies that fiends don't appear in Dream Zanarkand by Yu Yevon's will. I started thinking that this might be proof that Spira and Zanarkand are actually geographically contiguous. In other words, does Zanarkand physically exist close enough for fiends from Spira to wander into it?
I've also long suspected that Dream Zanarkand lacks the concept of foreign countries, but perhaps Dream Zanarkand itself is as vast as the entirety of Spira. For instance, maybe the original borders were dissolved, turning everything into "part of Zanarkand"—like renaming Bevelle to something like "East District A."
If it were only as large as the ruins of Zanarkand in northern Spira, keeping the dream consistent enough to prevent residents from wondering about the "outside" would be incredibly difficult. After all, a thousand years ago, Zanarkand was a mechanized metropolis even before summon magic was perfected. There would have been no shortage of transportation, and the vast majority of residents likely knew what lay outside the city. Erasing the very concept of the outside from that dream would be tough. But if instead of erasing it, they altered it, things become much simpler.
In any case, I don't think the concept of foreign nations exists in the dream city. Tidus doesn't know about the Al Bhed.
On top of that, when he first meets Kimahri in Besaid, he doesn't even react with something like, "Whoa, a beastman?!" Did he not know about the Ronso either? He probably doesn't know about the Pelupelu or other races either. I highly doubt those races simply didn't exist yet back in the era of Yevon...
Shoopufs, for instance, seem like they would fit right into Zanarkand. It's hard to believe that Zanarkand, the birthplace of summon magic, completely lacked an environment rich in pyreflies like the Moonflow, and similar environments usually breed similar creatures. Then again, given that Jecht mistook a shoopuf for a fiend ten years ago, it's possible they existed in Zanarkand as "harmless fiends."
If the demi-humans of Spira—especially the Ronso living on Mt. Gagazet—had a friendly or at least non-hostile relationship with the original Zanarkand, they probably would have existed in Dream Zanarkand too. Maybe that's why Tidus wasn't surprised by Kimahri.
But looking at the current Al Bhed among the demi-humans, they were likely in bed with Bevelle back then. If the Al Bhed were excluded from Dream Zanarkand as enemies (on Bevelle's side), and Tidus only treats them kindly because he is completely unaware of their history, that narrative dynamic is brilliantly twisted—and I absolutely love it.