Shinryu, huh.

[SmilingJack]

Ok. He disconnected all the Heros from the matrix or in that case that is what has been going on. Probably since the start of this world there have been dragons/primals mixed in in the same world as the other gods the twelve. The twelve created most of the races on the planet which either angered or infringed upon the primals/dragons. In a never ending battle, each umbral era ending with the Dragons winning but the twelve managing to recreate/save the people of that world. Possible we could consider the people of eorza (/that world) as a manifestation of the sleeping twelve. Which is why they act through a person and don't do so personally. We can maybe say that all tho the dragons have constantly won, each time the twelves side manages to hurt them more. With eventually being able to seal Bahamut before losing again.

So like I said kinda like the matrix. Where the world you are in is not what you think it really is and that everything truly has happened again and again but with variations each time because of outside influence and new Heros to take on the cause. For that matter the dragons and primals could be part of the same dream. Being created by some of the members of twelve. So we now have a potential division among the twelve where some favor prosperity and the other having their own agenda.

If we assume that existence in this world is withing a creation of the twelves dream and that their now might be a possible conflict within the group. We now can explain the powers our characters have, the existence of the dragons and primals, a connection of the (death) looking wraith things to one of the twelve, how and why each Umbral era starts and ends the way they do and why the twelve themselves can't or won't physically manifest themselves. We can then say that each hero (our toons) are in a sense a reincarnation from a previous umbral dating back to before the first.

We now end up having survivors who continue to live on, repopulating the world and special individuals strong enough to be of use in the next era. It now becomes the Secret Wars of the FF14 universe >.>.

I will call it now! We get to the end of FF14 main story. Then bam the twelve wake up in FF21: Shattered Dreams. Then it gets revealed that everything in ff14 happened withing the 5secs of a spell used on that twelve by the main villain in FF21 which is a prequel and the opening CS. >.>