Lavos, Mammon Machine, and the Time Devourer

[USD1]

I am going to assume a few things as I can't remember exactly everything so if I get a few facts wrong help me out.

My theory. (In accordance with others, such as the pocket dimension.)
Lavos decends from the sky at 65,000,000 BC

Lavos buries deep within the earth.  It was probably usuing a heat shield for entry that was disintegrated upon impact. No pocket dimension is made, Lavos has no control over the timeline at this point in time and only wishes to gather sustenance from the core of the planet while aquiring genetic information from the beings on the planet. It does this through a "Frozen Flame" which it detached in its descent. This gathers data about the beings it transforms and sends it back to lavos. Lavos "reproduces" asexually and instead of using wholly its own DNA it intends to use ours.

My assumption is that this is the true form of Lavos, whether or not he is a weapon or a normal evolution is not really what I'm trying to decipher. He has absolutely no control whatsoever over the flow of time, ever. It is never shown that lavos can control any part of time except when he has learned how to get himself out of the pocket dimension and is promptly confronted by the heros.

The frozen flame however may have caused the time crash, as it was the only part of lavos not destroyed and it was around to witness the efforts of Crono and friends. It could do nothing about this and it infact saw what happened to its counterpart when it was used by chronopolis. It could have used the power of the Counter-time experiment to crash time in a futile attempt to mess up the timeline in which lavos is defeated.

The frozen flame eventually manipulated the human genome into demi humans, magic users, and generally more intelligent beings. To the great unfortune of Lavos, these beings learned of its existence within the earth and began to siphon its energy through a creation called the Mammon Machine. The Mammon Machine being something unique to this world as it is made out of dreamstone which may be itself unique to a world that can dream.

The Mammon Machine was siphoning energy from Lavos at a low rate, taking less power than the sun stone. Until Queen Zeal moved it to the Ocean palace and turned the influx of power to its maximum Lavos probably thought it expended more energy to return to the surface, destroy its own work, and burrow deep again than to let the machine take a small amount of its power.

Once the Mammon Machine was fully active it was draining a signifigant amount of the power needed by Lavos to sustain itself and it needed to do something about it.

Lavos burrowed to the surface.

The entity used its powers for some reason. This maybe be the first time the entity used its powers if you think of the entity as outside the normal flow of time. It may have been awakened by the disruption and attempted to stop Lavos by drawing him into a separated dimension entirely. It could have been a direct attack on Lavos, an attempt to send him to he darkness beyond time. It failed, but managed a peice of him. Others were caught in the wake, and the Mammon Machine itself was severed, one in two places, whole in one, broken in another.

The Mammon Machine malfunctioned. (An extra conduit of dreamstone was added) Dreamstone may be a physical manifestaion of the entity's power.

The end result being a huge explosion in the 4th dimension that Lavos was forced into a pocket dimension, a situation totally new for it. Schala and a peice of lavos were "thrown" together at the furthest point in the timeline, the darkness beyond time. Gaspar was "thrown" to the end of time. Janus, Melchior, and Balthazar were "thrown" closer.

Since Lavos is still being sucked into the Pocket dimension created it unleashes its wrath upon Zeal.

The reason it emerges at 1999 is simply because it happened to figure out how to get out of the pocket dimension and that is where it ended up in the timeline. It doesn't know what could happen now that it escaped, so it destroys the planets surface and procedes end its experiement early and reproduce.

Every time you choose to fight Lavos you are drawn to seconds before he emerges in 1999. The Black Omen is a hodgepodge of timelines, drawing from the Mammon Machine that is whole within another dimension. The only real opening to Lavos dimension is in 1999, and the power supplied to the Black Omen is through the exremely convoluted Mammon machine in another dimension, which is the only thing still able to draw power from Lavos because of its situation. This power is accessed through the conduit of the ruined Mammon Machine since they are really both one and the same but divided.

Any questions or comments on how this fits in with everything since I couldn't address everything? I can add more specifics if questions arise, but this mostly about how lavos got in a pocket dimension and that was somone elses theory. I also hope I didn't steal too many peoples ideas as I didn't look around this forum to much.

[ChibiBob]

You make some pretty good points, but others I'm not quite sure about.

It is never shown that lavos can control any part of time except when he has learned how to get himself out of the pocket dimension and is promptly confronted by the heros.

Lavos never leaves his pocket dimension — Crono and company arrive in the pocket dimension from outside, whether through the bucket, the Black Omen, or the Epoch. The only time he theoretically would leave is on the Day of Lavos itself, but such an event is prevented by the time-travelers, and even going through the bucket, they enter Lavos's outer shell which reverts into the PD anyway.

Once the Mammon Machine was fully active it was draining a signifigant amount of the power needed by Lavos to sustain itself and it needed to do something about it.

That and Lavos feared the day Zealian technology would advance to the point that they would no longer be dependent on the energy and could thus destroy him without any ill effect on their own society.

The entity used its powers for some reason. This maybe be the first time the entity used its powers if you think of the entity as outside the normal flow of time. It may have been awakened by the disruption and attempted to stop Lavos by drawing him into a separated dimension entirely. It could have been a direct attack on Lavos, an attempt to send him to he darkness beyond time. It failed, but managed a peice of him. Others were caught in the wake, and the Mammon Machine itself was severed, one in two places, whole in one, broken in another.

I really don't believe the Entity had much of anything to do with the Zeal catastrophe, unless there's a theory I haven't reviewed yet. Lavos never truly left his pocket dimension (choosing instead to reproduce Lavos Spawn whenever such an excursion might be necessary), and there isn't really any solid theory on the Mammon Machine's two likenesses — from what I can decipher, the most popular explanation is that the Mammon Machine contains a pocket dimension within it housing its true form and the Frozen Flame as an extra layer of protection, or that it exists in the same PD as Lavos himself.

The reason it emerges at 1999 is simply because it happened to figure out how to get out of the pocket dimension and that is where it ended up in the timeline. It doesn't know what could happen now that it escaped, so it destroys the planets surface and procedes end its experiement early and reproduce.

Yeah, I don't think Lavos wakes up one morning to his usual breakfast of bacon, eggs, and spiky-haired protagonists thinking, "Hrm, why don't I emerge on 26 February 1999 around, oh, 13:36? I hear those bozos on the surface are planning a carnival, and I'd just love to crash the party!" It's not really an arbitrary date as much as Lavos has absorbed enough DNA and energy from the planet to migrate elsewhere and spread his Spawn across the universe. Then again, the Japanese are more in-tune to Nostradamus and the other philosophers with their year 1999 as the end of the world, so that might have influenced the programmers' decision.

Other than those nitpicky points, it's wonderful how you've managed to pull this all together, especially all the sticking points about the Mammon Machine and Lavos's PD, into an easy-to-read entry. It's not without its flaws, but it's a great step towards making these thousands of theories concise enough to aid in helping the newperson understand the events surrounding the Chrono Trigger plot.

[Durakken]

What we know about Lavos...

He came to earth in 65000000BC
He burried himself deep underground
He was absorbing energy
He was a She or asexual
She is 2 seperate entities (the shell and the humanoid)
She has a lot of power as hitting a planet, surviving, and neutralizing the blast of it would take a lot
Her spawn needs a planet to live on in at least larval state.
She gave birth to several Lavoids in 1999AD

So...Gestation period is around 65001999 years
Landing and giving birth probably require a lot of energy
Lavos itself does no permanent or long term damage to the planet as far as we know
In fact during the Lavos period the world thrived and it was only when humans advanced to dome cities were the forests turning to deserts and Lavos's giving birth probably only speeded up the process by scorching the earth.

The fall of Zeal was a defense of the shell entity most likely... pregnant animals often are very dangerous when threatened
Lavos did not corrupt Zeal. The Power did...Power corrupts. Lavos also did not evolve humans save for the ability to use magic, which is a mutation, not an evolution per say

As far as the humanoid creature... What can be assumed is that it was part of a race that sent it's last chance out into space, or it is part of a race whome are highly animalistic, which i doubt as an evasion taking 65million years is a bit much so i'm betting on repopulating a lost race. The fall out prolly would kill most and the lack of vegitation would slowly kill the rest as the life form grew into it's final form. Not to mention to the race it prolly just looked like a habitable world and wasn't concerned with life on it.

[Zaperking]

The humans did evolve.

Contact with the flame caused their brains to unnaturally expand 3 fold.

[Durakken]

That's hardly evolution really it just means that a larger percentage of the mind is used, but the mind is never used to capacity anyways... Basically it accelerated evolution which would have happened regaurdless. And if i remember right that comes from a myth in the universe. It has no basis in actuality. the only benefit from lavos is magic.

[Zaperking]

That's hardly evolution really it just means that a larger percentage of the mind is used, but the mind is never used to capacity anyways... Basically it accelerated evolution which would have happened regaurdless. And if i remember right that comes from a myth in the universe. It has no basis in actuality. the only benefit from lavos is magic.

No....

The evolution caused the humans to be able to think outside the "Win and live. Lose and die. Rule of life. No change rule." type speaking and simple minded consept.

The flame evolved their minds, which made their philiosophical side advance, and make them understand magic, and the consept of time and such. Remember, Ayla couldn't comprehend it, Lucca and Gaspar and Belthasar and the gang can.

Sure, the acceloration may have happened, one day, but by 2300AD, it's doubtful. Even in 3,000,000BC, the humans still hadn't evolved mentally, and not until the flame was touched, they did not mentally evolve. That's 62,000,000 years without mental evolution. I bet they evolved physically, but mentally omg.

[Durakken]

If Lavos did evolve them it was in an attempt to evolve them into himself slowly. It's even possable 1999 wasn't spurred on by Lavos' giving birth but rather another defense mechanism. Humans would have advanced enough to find and use Lavos' energy and this could have caused Lavos to give birth to his few seeds.

It is likely Lavos never wanted to endanger humanity, destroy it, or kill the planet as it seems he did in 2400AD. Either way 2400AD would be a pretty much dessert planet from the way it looked in 1999. The only thing that may change this fact is Fiona's forest.

[ChibiBob]

It is likely Lavos never wanted to endanger humanity, destroy it, or kill the planet as it seems he did in 2400AD. Either way 2400AD would be a pretty much dessert planet from the way it looked in 1999. The only thing that may change this fact is Fiona's forest.

I seriously doubt Lavos didn't want to wipe out humanity completely. Considering he attacked Zeal partly because of what might possibly happen in the future (Zeal's becoming advanced enough to actually dare attack Lavos, even knowing the magnitudes of power at his disposal) and how he basically nuked the entire planet on the Day of Lavos (which would probably be unnecessary if all he wanted to do was release the Spawn into the universe), there's really not enough leverage to argue pacifism over complete domination of the planet.

And, unfortunately, Fiona's forest doesn't change a dang'd thing in 2400 AD, or 2300 AD, or anything past the Day of Lavos for that matter. You can't even see the remnants of the forest, and since the seed that the man in the storage facility would have nurtured was (assumedly) used by Fiona, there wouldn't even be any hope left of regrowth.

Wow, Greenpeace should blacklist Lavos ASAP. Tree-killer.

[AuraTwilight]

Lavos itself does no permanent or long term damage to the planet as far as we know
In fact during the Lavos period the world thrived and it was only when humans advanced to dome cities were the forests turning to deserts and Lavos's giving birth probably only speeded up the process by scorching the earth.

Um...he ends up destroying the WORLD. >_>

[Durakken]

The desert look of the planet was mostly caused by humans, not Lavos as shown in the day of Lavos Fiona's work and much more had all been decimated.

It doesn't show ANYWHERE that Lavos was afraid of Zeal. They were becoming dependant on him/her and thus would never attack him. Think about it in realistic terms...You're a fox mother and you just killed a rabbit for your cubs expending most of your energy to do it... suddenly a rat tries to eat peices of it...are you gonna let your children die and possably yourself so the rat can eat something to big for itself or ar you going to kill the rat and have more food? it an obvious answer and that is the situation Lavos is in.

After 1999AD it can be assumed that Humans were killed either to cull the number to make it easier to feed or as a byproduct of something else. Nothing is really answered as to why Lavos is there because the humanoid part is seperate and seems to be setting up permanent residence, but why without more of its kind? most likely that's what the lavoids would be for to grow and then bury themselves under ground and produce a small genepool before emerging and that is also possably why he stays underground.

[Zaperking]

I agree on the point that Lavos would not be afraid of the Zealians. Heck, I doubt Lavos was every afraid of everyone. What I think is reasonable is that he didn't like his energy being drained, when he's trying to gather it. What the Zealians drained could have been equal to 1 million years of gathering energy or such. And the Mammon Machine incident woke him up enough to realise WTF was going on.

[Burning Zeppelin]

I agree on the point that Lavos would not be afraid of the Zealians. Heck, I doubt Lavos was every afraid of everyone. What I think is reasonable is that he didn't like his energy being drained, when he's trying to gather it. What the Zealians drained could have been equal to 1 million years of gathering energy or such. And the Mammon Machine incident woke him up enough to realise WTF was going on.

You never know...

[Durakken]

Interestingly though... When you fight Lavos during the first summoning Lavos is stronger than he is when you go fight fight him in 1999. Not just because you are stronger, but because he is literally weaker and is even marked as "Lavos (hard)" by the developers. Possably the explanation would be the energy he had went into the lavoids. what are there 5 in the game? i forget, but if there are 5...5x4000 = 20,000. 20,000HP + 10,000HP (1999AD Lavos) = 30,000HP (12,000BC Lavos(hard))

Coincidence? maybe... make sense? yep.

And if there are 5 Lavoids guess what... 5+1 = 6... 3 equal couples which would be great to start off a new race.

my problem with the whole race recreating itself thing is the fact that recreating itself doesn't take that much energy. the only thing that I can think of that took that much energy is coming to the planet, stopping the blast, and burrowing into the earth. the last the least of it's worries. So what exactly was it gathering all the energy for?

[Theicedragon]

I posted this before but here i go again, how come we don't give enough credit to the Frozen Flame?  Somebody tell me what the Frozen Flame is?  We all know that it fell (or detached purposely) from Lavos.  If his shell is made up of a whole bunch of these things, how come only one comes off?  How come the others don't act like the Frozen Flame?  This is my theory.  We all think Lavos is the mastermind behind his plans for pregnancy and energy and food .  But what if its the frozen flame that is controlling Lavos.  I always thought that the frozen flame was a parasite that attached itself to Lavos, like a tick.  It changed itself to look like a piece of his shell so that Lavos doesn't recognize it. I believe that Lavos was just an ordinary animal/alien until it came into contact with the "organism" that looks like the frozen flame today.  The frozen flame is what increased the capacity of the brain for humans in CT.  Why couldn't it have done the same to Lavos. For all that we know, the Froazen Flame could be like the One Ring in LOTR.  Only trying to find ways to get back to its master, by any means necessary.  And if Lavos was controlling the Frozen Flame, when he was defeated be Chrono, shouldn't the Flame have lost its power.  It didn't, but in fact it had its own power source and acted on its own.

[Magus22]

If his shell is made up of a whole bunch of these things, how come only one comes off? How come the others don't act like the Frozen Flame? This is my theory. We all think Lavos is the mastermind behind his plans for pregnancy and energy and food.  But what if its the frozen flame that is controlling Lavos. I always thought that the frozen flame was a parasite that attached itself to Lavos, like a tick.

Ok but it's not a tick or anything else. It's a shard from Lavos. A little one of those spiked things off his shell. There could be many more "shards" of Lavos in some places, perhaps in other areas of the world, being worshipped or somewhere in the sea. There could be many more of these "flames" - Chrono Break?

It changed itself to look like a piece of his shell so that Lavos doesn't recognize it. I believe that Lavos was just an ordinary animal/alien until it came into contact with the "organism" that looks like the frozen flame today. Why couldn't it have done the same to Lavos.

When you actually see it, the FF does look kind of wacky, right?The "flame" itself may have evolved over time and possibly started regernerating into a smaller Lavos like form. Lavos's shell is intereting. It's strong enough to survive a full impact into the planet and houses protective defenses. It also has a strange aura that is still unknown to us.

For all that we know, the Froazen Flame could be like the One Ring in LOTR. Only trying to find ways to get back to its master, by any means necessary.

I can't recall the FF going Frodo on me. It's a possibility but I highly doubt it.

And if Lavos was controlling the Frozen Flame, when he was defeated be Chrono, shouldn't the Flame have lost its power.  It didn't, but in fact it had its own power source and acted on its own.

Crono and co.'s defeat of Lavos had no impact on the FF. When the FF broke off of Lavos, it began it's own thing basically. When did Lavos ever interact with the FF?