Will Everything Be Undone in Kingdom Hearts III?

Every now and then, someone brings up a particularly interesting theory for Kingdom Hearts III based on its use of time travel: can Sora undo all of Xehanort’s activities simply by killing Young Xehanort?

It’s easy to see where the theory comes from. Young Xehanort is Master Xehanort’s past self. If he died as a teenager, he’d never grow up into Master Xehanort, and all of Xehanort’s plans would be immediately undone.

The entire timeline would unravel, since so much hinges on Xehanort’s machinations. Ventus might never meet Terra and Aqua. Kairi would never reach Destiny Islands to meet Sora and Riku. They’d never meet Mickey, Donald, and Goofy. Roxas, Naminé, Xion, and many others wouldn’t exist at all.

It would be a bittersweet ending, maybe with some consolation that all these characters’ hearts are still connected.

I don’t think it will end that way, however.

Killing Young Xehanort would cause a time paradox. Now, Dream Drop Distance already edged into this, since it claimed Young Xehanort’s trip to the future spurred his subconscious desire to leave Destiny Islands, which in turn led to him becoming Master Xehanort and setting up the scheme that enabled his younger self to travel through time.

It’s basically a causal loop, but Young Xehanort’s explanation of time travel in Dream Drop Distance suggests that a causal loop is the only time paradox possible from his methods.

According to Young Xehanort, you cannot change events that are destined to happen. The past is fixed; Young Xehanort’s time travel affected his future because it already had and always would. Ansem and Xemnas must return to their own time eventually to be defeated. Young Xehanort must return to his own time to become Master Xehanort.

Young Xehanort cannot be killed.

Time travel invincibility would raise its own set of problems, but most likely defeating Young Xehanort would send him back to his own time, or something else would happen to avoid changing the timeline.

Therefore, I don’t think a bittersweet Kingdom Hearts III ending where all of the series’ events have been undone is possible. But what do you think? Could killing Young Xehanort be the ultimate solution? Share your thoughts and theories in the comments.

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