To Every You I’ve Loved Before

The narrative unfolds across multiple timeframes, from Koyomi's childhood to adolescence, adulthood, and old age within parallel worlds. Parallel Shifts and Optional Shifts move characters between timelines, creating alternate versions of events and relationships. The story treats time as a malleable dimension rather than a single fixed era.

The Showa-dori Intersection is the recurring meeting point where Koyomi first confronts Shiori's Imaginality and realizes the Parallel Shift has occurred. The story also moves through the Imaginary Science Research Institute, which houses the experiments driving the shifts, and familiar domestic spaces like the Takasaki family homes. Key events unfold across a university setting, an exhibition hall, and other parallel-world locales that ground the fantastical premise in everyday places.

🌀 Parallel Worlds

The plot centers on moving between parallel worlds through Parallel Shifts, with different versions of Koyomi, Kazune, and Shiori inhabiting each world. The IP device and the Imaginality concept drive these transitions, forcing characters to adapt to new circumstances and identities. The narrative uses these shifts to explore how love, memory, and fate can persist or change across dimensions.

❤️ Love Across Dimensions

Romance structures itself across shifting realities, including a version of Kazune who is both lover and partner in various timelines. The couple's bond endures despite separations, fake reveals, and the consequences of shifting, culminating in a life together that spans years and generations. The story also shows the pain of loss and the resilience of love across worlds.

🧩 Identity and Memory

Identity becomes diffuse as different versions of the same people diverge, with the concept of 'Original' and 'Numerically Original' characters called into question. Imaginality resides in a consciousness across worlds, complicating self-perception and relationships. The ending emphasizes gratitude and acceptance that life’s happiness can coexist with memory gaps and altered identities.