#iifa tree

“The tree is so beautiful! Its beauty becomes the great mother tree that lives among the stars!”

IIFA TREE

      Many think that the top of the Iifa tree looks like a brain. It does, doesn’t it? A little. But... I think it also resembles something else.

      The Iifa Tree was planted on Gaia by Garland shortly after the failed fusion of Terra and Gaia. The roots of the tree extended down into Gaia’s core (now replaced with Terra itself), wrapping around Gaia’s crystal. Later on, after Gaia’s civilization had restored itself, he created the Soulcage inside the tree. The Soulcage acted as a sort of filter, capturing the Gaian’s souls as they returned to the crystal, and filtering out their memories, their will, and diverting the remainder to Terra’s waning crystal, half fused with Gaia’s. The excess product was mist, which was expelled through the roots of the tree all over the Mist Continent.

      You can see here how deep the tree really goes. It’s also worth noting that Terra seems to be inverted inside of Gaia. Terra appears blue because Gaia’s crystal, serving to illuminate Terra’s sky, is very blue indeed.

“While the moon still shines blue, by dawn it will turn to scarlet hue.”

     The purpose of diverting Gaia’s souls into Terra’s crystal was to give Terra’s crystal enough strength to overpower Gaia’s and complete the fusion, thereby converting all of Gaia into the new Terra. A very long and slow process, which was why Kuja and Zidane ( and later Mikoto ) were created in hopes to speed things along.

      The tree itself has a weirdly visceral design (a lot of Terran places do, Pandemonium, for instance, is full of eyeballs and fleshy bits). Winding paths inside resemble the tangled, moss covered roots of rainforest trees. Which are, at least to me, oddly vein like. Especially at the tangled top of the tree.

      The roots, like an umbilical cord send souls to nourish Terra’s crystal, filtering away the waste to eventually rebirth a new world.

I’ve abided by a certain rule for over 15 years now. It’s pretty simple.

1: When life goes to shit, you play FFIX

Life has most definitely gone to shit.  In fact, shit was a month ago.  We’re in sub-shit strata that’s a little beyond description.  Not even going to try giving it words yet.

However, there’s a second rule:

2: When you get to the Iifa Tree, you draw the Iifa Tree.

This has been going on since at least 2005.  My last save on my last file was at Conde Petie.

I can’t really explain the way my mind works, but I spent hours on this until my wrist hurt so much I had to stop.  Didn’t even erase, just penciled and inked and then colored.  Colors are actually with Crayola Twistables colored pencils, and full image is a 9″ x 12″ sketch page, right up to the edges.  It’s not accurate, and perspective isn’t even attempted.  I’m a little in awe of the fact that it came together with little planning on my part.  Just textures and colors and knowing what I might have to think about if I stopped.

I got a brush pen in Japantown in LA (sometime I need to make a post about our odd, impromptu trip to Los Angeles and how I am now the proud legal owner of four plush versions of Trico from The Last Guardian and the more dubiously acquired NO ENTRY sign from E3)