Archie Sonic the Hedgehog's Cosmology (Pre-SGW)

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Introduction

The following page is intended to be a comprehensive outline dedicated to the Cosmology of the Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Continuity), primarily presenting each cosmic layer in hierarchical fashion. It is recommended that this page be read multiple times.

It should be noted, besides Archie Mega Man and Archie NiGHTS, Archie Sonic's cosmology is connected to other cosmologies like Spawn, X files, Image Comics, Riverdale, and Sabrina the Teenage Witch but at what capacity is still debated, due to the Chaos Emeralds being stated by Doctor Eggman and Doctor Wily to be limitless while they are effecting both Sonic and Megaman's bubbles of realities at the same time.

Source of All

The Source of All is the building blocks of existence. Described by King Maximillian Acorn, all life began as a speck of cosmic matter that flows from the Source Of All. Simply put, the Source of All is "everything". Being "everything', it is presumingly time itself, as it sees the past, present, and future alike,, granting individuals it has a bond with knowledge of things to come.

The Prime Zone

The Prime Zone is the center of the multiverse from which all alternate realities are derived from.

All Zones of the multiverse deviate from the Prime Zone. It's Zonic's job to keep an eye on all Sonics on all Mobiuses.

Its Size

The size of the Prime Zone is something that's implied several times.

Enchantra gazes through the cosmos, witnessing "infinite galaxies" each containing "countless worlds".

During Knuckles' journey to find the Sword of Acorns, Knuckles encounters is sent to The Ancient Walkers by his great grandfather Athair. There, while Knuckles and Tails are shooting through space, The Ancient Walkers imply that the cosmos is infinite.

There is said to be "countless planets" that hold an "endless array" of different life throughout the cosmos.

When adding these pieces together, we can infer several things. For starters, the size of the universe is infinite. Second, there is said to be "countless planets" in the same vein that Enchantra refers to there being "countless worlds" after seeing "infinite galaxies". Therefore, in an infinitely-sized universe with "endless" life, life throughout it can be inferred to be infinite as well.

But there's more, the Zone of Silence. Now you may be thinking, "But Shake! It tells us the Special Zone is a pocket dimension!" (For those who don't know - Ixis merged the Zone of Silence with The Void, but it would later become the Special Zone)

To that, I have two supergeniuses for you: Doctor Robotnik states the Zone of Silence is not of finite proportion, while Rotor refers to it as a universe. A smaller infinity, as we all know, is still infinite.

The Multiverse

The multiverse within Archie's Sonic Comics is that stemming from branching timelines, most often said in the fashion of "infinite variations of infinite universes". Coupling the fact that each Zone is infinite in size, this indicates that both spatial or temporal differences between Zones branches into.

Ian Flynn states that there are infinite variations of infinite possibilities.

Dr. Eggman tells Dr. Wily that there exists infinite variations of their worlds.

The No Zone is the headquarters of Zonic the Zone Cop, where he can dutifully watch all other Zonics in the multiverse.

Sonic Live reveals other realities exist that are disturbingly similar, entirely different, varied by simply an action or decision, by their placement in time, and/or by their position in physical space.

There are some inferences we can make using the scans above:

• 1. As we know, there are infinite variations of infinite universes within Sonic's world. Because of the various statements revealing how more Zones are created, it can be inferred that these variations themselves produce infinite amounts of other Zones ad-infinitely due to the
  • Because there is endless life within the infinite universe and that each Zone has infinite variations of itself (2-A branches for each timeline). With an infinite amount of life in the universe, the combinations for decisions made and actions taken that splinter off lead to an infinite number of possible combinations that then spawn other universes ad-infinitely due to the next point.
• 2. Spatio-temporal variance creating other Zones explicitly leads us to each snapshot of time within a Zone producing an infinite amount of timelines by default due to the fact that the universe is infinite in size (and thus eternal) within Archie. In contrast to the point above, this is a passive splintering of universes compared to the splintering caused by chosen actions/decisions.

Cosmic Interstate

The Cosmic Interstate, also referred to as the Interdimensional Highway. It is a secret zone that can led anyone, anywhere on Mobius and it's vast expanse of sparkling white, or concrete, roads connects to all realities within the cosmology.

Sonic introduces the Cosmic Interstate, simply with the intent to use it to travel from one end of the planet to the other.

The Cosmic Interstate is a network of roads that lead to all Zones in the multiverse. Overtime, it became hard to reach and doing so allows free access to all other Zones.

Perpendicular Zone.

There is something important that should be noted that ties into the Cosmic Interstate, which comes in the form of the No Zone. Basically, the No Zone is a different type of Zone that runs perpendicularly through every other Zone in the multiverse. In fact, others from outside the No Zone become perpendicular themselves to the No Zone's residents unless they have a Spatial Stabilizer. As the Cosmic Interstate is stated to lead to all Zones, this means that the Cosmic Interstate seems to encapsulate 4 Spatial + 1 Temporal Dimension.

Zector, the Zone Cop version of Vector, states spatial rules are more lax in the Cosmic Interstate, followed immediately a warning to Sonic that entering the No Zone will cause spatial adjusting to take over after they leave. Because the Cosmic Interstate operates under 4 Spatial + 1 Temporal Dimension (compared to a normal universe's 3 Spatial + 1 Temporal to make 4-D), that makes it a Low 1-C (5-D) realm.

Note: As all universes/timelines diverge from the Prime Zone, all within would derive from the Cosmic Matter of the Source Of All.

Maginaryworld

Maginaryworld is a realm where the dreams of everyone's dreams gather and take form within reality, functioning identically to how it appears within Sonic's video game franchise.

Maginaryworld is the Zone where all dreams within the multiverse gathers, Lumina being a representation of its positive dreams while Void is the incarnation of its negative dreams.

Lumina explains to Sonic that the Precioustone supports extra-dimensional worlds.

At the end of the tie-in, it's revealed that the reader must play the game to continue the story. As such, we are able to defer to the video game for how the story plays out.

The "extra-dimensional worlds" that Lumina's referring to should mean the dreams themselves in this context, as we know "Fourth Dimensional Space" within Maginaryworld to be Illumina's dream. This indicates dreams in general are extra-dimensional (Specifically 4-D, as each dreamscape has its own space-time). From this, we can piece together several things using scans from each section above.

• Firstly: each Zone is infinite in size (meaning it's eternal with no beginning or end, opposed to our universe and the Big Bang in real life) with endless galaxies, with endless life sprawling within them. That means there are infinite inhabitants of a single Zone that produce an infinite amount of dreams (2-A).
  • However, because there is endless (in this case infinite) life in an infinite universe, there will never be a moment in time that infinite dreams are not being produced. And this is for a singular Zone, when Maginaryworld encompasses the entire multiverse. In other words, each snapshot of time is producing so many dreams that the sheer quantity is comparable to 2-A structures within Maginaryworld.

• Secondly: we know that Maginaryworld itself gathers the dreams from the inhabitants of all other Zones and collects them there. Detailed above is the extensive size of the multiverse (each Zone producing branches of reality on a 2-A scale, with each of those branches further having infinite variations). Within each Zone is an infinite amount of life producing dreams. We get to a point where Maginaryworld begins to show the signs of encompassing an uncountable infinite amount of universes. To hold this, Maginaryworld must be a 5-D structure.

Note:

• Dreams can not exist without life to form them. As all life began as a speck of cosmic matter from the Source Of All, the concept of dreams that makes up Maginaryworld all ultimately originate from the Source of All.
• Sonic the Hedgehog travelled to Maginaryworld without dying. This would only be possible if Maginaryworld was still part of the mortal plane.

Higher Realities

The Source Of All and Chaos Energy have no relation in Archie Comics. While the Source has many statements of being "everything", they were only in reference to the space&time of the mortal reality Sonic, Eggman Robotnik and friends reside, with no connection to Chaos Energy. In fact, the Sword of Acorns was corrupted by Chaos Energy by Mammoth Mogul and destroyed by a weapon, the Sword of Light, created by The Ancient Walkers existing in the Chaos Force. Its noted the Sword of Light was made to counter dark usage of chaos energy manipulation and not the Source of All but the Source fell to chaos energy either way.

While the Sword of Acorns can effect Chaos Energy, such as absorbing Super Forms and dealing the final blow to the Ancient Walkers, the Source appears to not exist any higher than its own plane of existence.

Next Evolution

The Next Evolution is a layer of its own existence, above the mortal plane.

Mammoth Mogul states there are more than 1 plane, and determines to remove Sonic & Knuckles from the Mortal Plane.

Aurora confirms Knuckles still has a mortal coil that is holding him back from being one with the Chaos Force.

Described by the Brotherhood of Guardians, it is a plane of existence that is equally in the middle between the lower, mortal plane of existence (ex. Prime Zone & Cosmic Interstate) and the higher plane of existence (Chaos Force). Brotherhood members go through a process of evolution, described as transcending and ascending, from their corporeal state of being into their new higher plane that bridge the gulf between time and space and where the concept of time is irrelevant to them.

While they pass away, The Brotherhood of Guardians do not simply die. Due to their connection to the Chaos Force, they simply evolve from their corporeal form to a new state of being existing in a higher plane of existence.

Described by Brotherhood members, they are on a plane of existence beyond the mortal realm, as equally as the Chaos Force is above them.

To those that have evolved to the higher plane of existence, the very concept of Time is irrelevant for them. They are able to inform Chaos Knuckles he too is able to bridge the gulf between Space and Time.

Let's look at something from the FAQ page.

Q: How do I determine if something is "transcendent"?

A: "Transcendence" is a vague term which can be used in several contexts, many of which do not at all align with how it is normally used in our forums, as it simply means "to go beyond the ordinary", first and foremost. For example, statements of "transcending space and time" can refer to things like time travel, dimensional travel, or even agelessness in some cases. Hence, it is very preferable to ascertain the meaning of statements involving this term from background context (If there is any), being especially careful around flowery language or purple prose.

Now, one of the most common scenarios where this question might arise is when dealing with cosmologies involving "higher planes of existence" or similar structures. In such cases, it's very important to note what exactly being a "higher plane" entails in the context of the setting: For instance, it's very common for Heaven and Hell to be defined as higher and lower planes of existence respectively in relation to the normal universe, in which case, "higher" and "lower" tends to simply indicate their relative position in a cosmology, as opposed to any kind of existential status, which is obviously not enough for anything remotely Tier 1.

As shown above, the Brotherhood describes themselves as having equal difference between the Chaos Force and the Material world. In fact, those ascending to the Chaos Force need to transcend twice in order to do so. This realm, by virtue of being on a higher plane beyond all spatial structures and trivializing time, makes the Next Evolution a 1-C (6-D) level of existence at minimum due to being above Maginaryworld.

Chaos Force

The Chaos Force is a plane of reality that is beyond the lower layers of existence. Individuals achieve ascension twice when traveling into the Chaos Force, higher level of reality.

After his “death”, Knuckles transcended into the Next Evolution, which is on a separate plane of existence above the mortal realm, and transcended again into the Chaos Force, existing above even the Next Evolution.

Individuals who have ascended to the Chaos Force rendered them outside the totality of space-time. This includes all locations on the lower planes of reality that are connected to the Source of All (such as Maginaryworld and the Cosmic Interstate).

The Chaos Force is a plane of existence/reality outside time-space, existing beyond other planes.

Being that final and full step to residing above the rest of existence, the Chaos Force transcends all lower levels of existence and lands it at 1-C (7-D).

Off Panel

Off Panel is the final and strangest level of reality yet; one that sees the entirety of the events within the comic as a mere fictional comic book. It first appeared under the official title of Off Panel in Issue #67, but was featured several throughout the series with their own (often gag-related or 4th wall breaking) short stories.

In Off Panel, separate versions of the characters exist. For example, Sonic makes commentary on the release of Sonic Adventure 2 compared to the release of the Archie adaptation while also poking fun at how other adaptations in the comic could be years late. Knuckles questions Sonic on reading the script for the next issue

An Off Panel version of Sally needs to approve scripts of issues.

The Editor and Off Panel Sonic have "plotting sessions", in which they enact various scenarios. Here, Sonic "fights" a 50-foot combot.

Off Panel Sonic and the Editor's Avatar play Sonic Adventure in celebration of the Sonic Adventure tie-in comic

By virtue of seeing all of the events within the comic as fiction, Off Panel caps the verse at 8-D (1-C).

Note: This blog was accepted within this thread (pardon the lack of comments here on their part...)