Final Fantasy 9: Ending, Explained
Final Fantasy 9 follows the protagonist Zidane as he and the friends he meets along the way attempt to stop Queen Brahne and Kuja from causing war across Gaia. It’s revealed that Queen Brahne is being puppeted by Kuja and the nefarious Garland for their own benefit, using the wars she incites to complete Terra’s failed assimilation with Gaia.
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The game leans heavily into ideas about life and death and what it means to live life regardless of knowing that it will one day come to an end. The ending emphasizes these themes as Zidane and the party uncover Gaia and Terra’s past. The ending features a lot of exposition from Garland that can be overwhelming to unpack, though this is important for understanding the game’s overall story.
Many, many years before the game is set, Terra existed as its own planet, separate from Gaia. The people of Terra were an advanced civilization; however, the planet’s crystal was weak, meaning the planet’s life cycle wouldn’t be able to go on, and the civilization would eventually be lost to time.
Unable to accept the extinction of their planet, the Terrans contrived a plan to integrate with another planet with a strong crystal, hoping to disrupt that planet’s cycle and take its place. To do so, the Terrans created the Genome, Garland. They entrusted him with their souls and the task of finding a suitable planet.
After Garland failed to fuse Terra and Gaia’s crystals, Terra became hidden inside Gaia. To stop the flow of Gaian souls entering the crystal, Garland planted the Iifa Tree on Gaia’s surface. This covered the continent in Mist, which was the by-product of Gaian souls who weren’t able to re-enter the crystal’s cycle.
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