Explaining how the Time Rings work

[Draconic]

For some reason I started really thinking about how the Time Rings work and if their existence is an inconsistency, since we know that there should be 4 timelines created during the Artificial Humans arc, however Gowasu only mentions one being created recently, implied to be by Trunks and his travels between time periods. After giving it some thought I think I managed to come up with a pretty solid explanation for why the Time Rings could work without discarding the 4 timelines.

As you all probably know, the four timelines are:
-the original timeline from which the Trunks who was killed by Cell travelled to the past; T1, referred as from now on.
-the unseen timeline where that Trunks arrived; T2
-Future Trunks' timeline which we see in the History of Trunks and now in Super; T3
-the main timeline which is the one we are following; T4

The inconsistency is that with four timelines created during that time, there should be four new Time Rings created, instead of the just one it's implied to be recent. For the sake of simplifying things I will ignore the other three Time Rings we know nothing about and act as if there is only one White Ring and one Green Ring.

How I think this stuff works is that whenever a new timeline is created, in the newly made one a Green Ring doesn't appear. In turn, the Green Ring only appears in the timeline the traveller originated from. For example, the original timeline has only one White Ring. When Trunks travels from T1 to T2, a Green Ring is added to the rings in T1. However, the unseen timeline doesn't remain without a Green Ring, as one is created in the newly made timeline AFTER the traveller returns to his own timeline. So when Trunks returns from T2 to T1, that's when a Green Ring is added to the unseen timeline.

Continuing by that logic, when Cell travels to the HoT timeline, he adds another Green Ring to the original timeline and a fresh new White Ring for that new timeline. From this point on, a Green Ring is added to the HoT timeline, when Trunks travels from T3 to T4, while creating a new White Ring for our timeline. Cell never returns to the timeline he left from so no new ring is added to T1. However, after giving his initial warning, Trunks does return from T4 to T3, creating a Green Ring in the main timeline, which is the ring Gowasu comments was created by "some idiot".

To summrize: A timeline gets a Green Ring only when the time travel originates from that timeline. If a new timeline is created, it creates a new White Ring specific for that timeline and the Green Ring is added only to the original timeline. Between only two timelines, if one travels from one to the other, the first time he returns to the past, a Green Ring will be added from where he left, however, once he leaves the second timeline and returns to his original one, that's when the new timeline gets a Green Ring too. Once a Green Ring between timelines is created, no more Green Rings are added since the timelines are already linked by the first one.

So, recapping how the four timelines with only one Time Ring works:

T1: 1 White Ring
-Trunks goes to the past, warns the guys about the Artificial Humans-
T1: 1 White Ring, 1 Green Ring ; T2: 1 White Ring
-Trunks returns to his time, gets killed by Cell-
T1: 1 White Ring, 1 Green Ring ; T2: 1 White Ring, 1 Green Ring
-Cell goes to the past, burries himself-
T1: 1 White Ring, 2 Green Rings ; T3: 1 White Ring
-Trunks goes to the past, defeats Frieza-
T3: 1 White Ring, 1 Green Ring ; T4: 1 White Ring
-Trunks goes back to his future, leaves warriors to train for three years-
T3: 1 White Ring, 1 Green Ring ; T4: 1 White Ring, 1 Green Ring
-Cell is defeated, the timelines are linked, Trunks returns to the future for good (until Black at least)-
T4: 1 White Ring, 1 Green Ring

Highlighted every new ring created in which timeline to make it easier to follow. Everything is in sequential order, just to be clear.

Thoughts? Errors?

[TheMikado]

The origination method works but if a Kaioshin wants to go from T1 to T3 are they even aware of it existence or is it only by conveyance of a traveler from another directly linked timeline would they know about timelines not directly linked to theirs?

This also does nothing for the multiple 4 Zamasus argument other than the other timelines were forgotten or don't matter.

[Draconic]

The origination method works but if a Kaioshin wants to go from T1 to T3 are they even aware of it existence or is it only by conveyance of a traveler from another directly linked timeline would they know about timelines not directly linked to theirs?

This also does nothing for the multiple 4 Zamasus argument other than the other timelines were forgotten or don't matter.

Since the Kaioshin can tell when a Green Ring is created, they could probably travel to it using it, to inspect it and such, but they don't seem to actually care that much, with Gowasu having 4 and just waving it off.

My point wasn't too adress that as that came to my attention only after reading the post but how it explains it could be like this: From T1 to T4 there is no direct link, so Zamasu from there couldn't visit our timeline and in T1 Goku is dead, so that Zamasu might not get the push to evilness anyway. With Zamasu from T2 is pretty hard to tell, but that's because we don't know much about the timeline itself. Trunks never managed to return so in that everybody could already be dead, or events would turn out different enough that again, Zamasu might not become evil. Why should we care either way about that timeline? It only exists to fix the problem with Cell's story and is never seen.

[ChronoTwigger]

My usual approach of such arguments is:
if not stated, everything's speculative

That's mean any kind of explanation is both true and false (if logical) until retcon.
I could come with even more complex theories, that can't be proven to be false.

The whole system you illustrated could be good if someone want to create a new series about time and rings. So far, what you see is what you get in Super, and believe me: NO ONE sit on a desk at Toei or Studio Bird to reach that quantity of explanations and reasons you try to give.

Anyway, I appreciate the clever outcome.