Standard Issue Disclaimer: Final Fantasy VIII is the property of Squaresoft. Naruto is the property of Shouen Jump. Dragon Ball Z is the property of Akira Toriyama. All characters, locations, and concepts except for original creations belong to them.

Chapter 4: The Great Red Spirit

The Guardian Force was huge, twice my height and, if he were flesh and bone, would have weighed at least ten times my mass. He stood on thick, dog-like, heavily muscled legs. Ifrit's chest was massive, at least six feet wide, and was also heavily muscled. Also powerfully built were his thick shoulders, as wide around as my own chest, along with Ifrit's mighty biceps and forearms. His fingers and toes were tipped with black eight inch claws, and his hide was a dark brown, as if cooked by the hellish flames the Guardian Force commanded. His growling visage looked like that of a hell-spawned lion or panther, and a pair of huge, slender black horns rose from the top of his head and curved back, extending out nearly ten feet. The Guardian Force had long red hair that ran down his back, and also a short red beard around his jaw line. Ifrit's eyes glowed yellow, like molten gold, and had no irises or pupils.

The Guardian Force looked down on Squall and me, and a deep growl resonated within its throat.

"Do you two mortals challenge me?" asked Ifrit in a demonic voice, even though his mouth didn't move. The voice was strangely toned down, sounding like a deep rumbling rather then an ear deafening roar. We both nod.

"Who is first?" Ifrit asked and I realised that it was still going to be a one-on-one battle. I gesture to Squall. "You can go first," I offer. It was then that Squall spoke directly to me for the first time.

"Thanks." …Ok so it wasn't a whole sentence, but it was a start. Squall stepped forward, drawing his gunblade in the process. To the side I saw Quistis talk into something before stepping over to me. "I just stopped your time while Squall takes on Ifrit." I nod my thanks and I step back to give Squall and Quistis space for the battle.

"Are you the one?" asked Ifrit.

"I am," answered Squall. Ifrit nodded slowly. "Then let us start."

Then, Ifrit's mouth opened and a titanic roar came forth, and even as the shout ended, he was airborne. He cocked his fist in preparation.

Squall rolled forward as Ifrit came down, his fist shattering the stone where Squall had been standing moments ago. As the cadet came out of his roll, he spun around, and the Revolver slashed twice across Ifrit's backside, both times drawing a red line across the Guardian Force's brown hide. Heat burst from the wounds, as if the cuts had vented Ifrit's inner fires. The GF spun back towards Squall, attempting to backhand the cadet. He quickly backed away, but not without taking a clubbing blow on his left shoulder that spun him around and left his left side aching.

It seemed that Squall was a strong fighter as Ifrit looked like he wasn't going easy on Squall. The GF could have killed an ordinary man with that single swing. Ifrit growled again and charged, his right leg coming forward in a snapping kick. Squall hopped back, then ducked and scooted forward underneath the leg, slashing upwards into the limb with the Revolver as he did so, and managing to fire off a shot that blasted the GF's leg. The blade and blast tore another reddish hole in Ifrit, and Squall felt the nearby temperature rise even higher as more magical heat energy flowed from Ifrit's torn body.

The cadet skittered backwards, gunblade ready to attack again. It looked like this would be a long battle of hit-and-run if he kept it up with the gunblade, but magic might even the odds. I then caught sight of the wounds that Squall had inflicted on Ifrit. Or rather, lack of them. Even as I watched, the gaping tear in Ifrit's leg was sealing up, the damage Squall had done seemingly reversing. Squall seemed surprised as well.

"He regenerates?" Squall called out to Quistis, glancing back at her.

"No!" Quistis replied. "He's just an avatar. He can't be killed by a human," she explained.

"Then how do I beat him?" Squall shouted back. Even as he asked the question, Ifrit had cocked an arm back as if he were throwing something underhanded. Squall was caught off-guard as the fireball blasted him.

"Just fight him like you would anyone else!" Quistis responded as Squall fell back, but managed to hold his footing. "You can't kill him, but you can defeat him if you deal enough damage!"

"Right," Squall replied. I heard slight exasperation in his voice. He focused, calling up the magical energies of a Blizzard spell. A chunk of ice formed overhead and struck Ifrit hard, the cold magic sapping his fiery strength, a counter to Ifrit's Fire spell. Ifrit roared in pain and charged Squall, again leaping into the air. The cadet readied to leap out of his way as the GF went airborne again. Squall dove forward once more, dodging Ifrit's powerful fist and dealing out another slash across Ifrit's side in retaliation. Ifrit spun, and Squall expected another backhand, but none came. Instead, Ifrit once again swung his arm as if throwing underhanded, and a fireball blew up in Squall's face. The wily GF advanced right behind the spell, preparing to smash Squall with another mighty fist. The balled hand came in and slammed Squall in the chest, hurling him back with the force of a wrecking ball.

'Man, I haven't ever seen Ifrit go so out on a human," said Shiva in the recesses of my mind as she watched the battle. Presumably somehow she could see what I could see.

'Never?" I ask. I got the feeling that Shiva was nodding her head.

He landed close to the fire pit, and rolled away from its heat, clambering back up to his feet even as Ifrit came at him again. Another mighty punch swooped in, but Squall wasn't there, instead ducking forward and under the GF's arm and slicing up into his armpit. Squall pulled the trigger, launching the explosive force into Ifrit's underarm, and the Guardian Force howled.

Squall slashed across Ifrit's body again and managed to dive behind the Guardian Force before another powerful blow could send him flying. The GF spun around and faced Squall, respect apparent on its face.

"Hmm, not bad mortal, not bad at all!" Ifrit remarked as his wounds sealed. Then, fire seemed to erupt in his palms as he clenched his fists tightly. Ifrit's arms then moved blurringly fast, in throwing motions, and small balls of flame shot at Squall. The cadet ducked under one, rolled forward to evade another, then smacked a third away with his gunblade. A fourth fireball caught Squall in the stomach and sent him back, but he was up in time to block a fifth and dodge a sixth. A seventh came in, which Squall ducked under.

Then both of the Guardian Force's muscled arms shot up. In either hand formed a ball of magma from seemingly nowhere, and then the great GF let the fires loose, hurling both balls at Squall. The cadet had only a split- second to react, and he threw himself backwards, barely avoiding the roiling balls of lava, though he felt their intense heat easily enough as they struck the spot he'd been standing at.

But the magma balls didn't stop with merely impacting; they exploded, a raging inferno that caught Squall off guard and hurled him back. He landed and rolled, feeling many scrapes and burns all across his body. All the minor injuries and blasts over the course of this battle were adding up, and Squall was feeling weaker. He couldn't keep up the battle at this rate. The cadet began to struggle to his feet, and as he stood up, Quistis cast a Cure spell on him to revitalise him.

"Only three minutes left, Squall!" warned Quistis from her supportive position. He glanced at Quistis and nodded his thanks, then turned back to Ifrit, ready for more. The fire Guardian Force had waited patiently for Quistis to heal Squall so he could resume the battle, as it had with all cadets it had faced before. Now, the GF stood ready as well, and as Squall levelled his gunblade, the Guardian Force charged.

Squall answered the charge with one of his own, gunblade raised for his own strike. Squall's muscles tensed and he prepared to leap aside from Ifrit's coming attack. Ifrit closed in, his fists erupting into flame.

And then Ifrit stopped abruptly and leaped backwards. Squall was caught off guard by the clever GF's manoeuvre, and almost didn't react in time as Ifrit sent more fireballs down at the cadet in mid-air. He ducked, weaved, dodged, and rolled, deflected one fireball away with his gunblade, and felt a number of near-misses sizzle past. Even as the fireballs fell and exploded around him, Squall spotted the GF as he landed in front of his fire pit. Ifrit hurled another salvo of the fireballs, but Squall rolled underneath them. He came out of his roll with his free hand moving. Around Ifrit there formed a solid globe of water, the liquid drowning and dousing Ifrit's flames. Ifrit broke free of the Water spell in time to take a chunk of ice in the face, courtesy of Squall's subsequent Blizzard spell.

'I wonder where he got Water spell charges from.' I wondered as I continued to watch.

Ifrit's shoulders sagged slightly and he began panting hard, and I could see that he had been heavily drained in that barrage attack he threw at Squall. The Guardian Force was close to defeat, and thus, Squall readied the Revolver and charged. The Guardian Force straightened and roared defiantly, cocking a fist at Squall's coming attack. When the cadet was in range, he let fly, the fist flying down at Squall with devastating force.

He hit only the stone where Squall had been standing as the cadet reversed his own momentum, repeating Ifrit's own trick right back on the Guardian Force. By the time Ifrit had even realized his error; the cadet had ducked back under the Guardian Force's outstretched arm and buried the Revolver in his chest. Ifrit tried to grab Squall, but his hands couldn't grasp the cadet, as he pulled the trigger on the gunblade repeatedly and blasted explosive shots into the Guardian Force's chest.

Ifrit's massive body spasmed with each shot, and after nearly a half dozen blasts he pulled away from the unbeatable human cadet, tearing his blasted chest free of the gunblade. Even as Squall prepared to follow up, Ifrit dropped to one knee, gasping and clutching his wound.

"You are strong," Ifrit said slowly. "Indeed, rarely have I fought a mortal this mighty…" Ifrit's wound began to seal up, and the GF shakily rose to his feet, head bowed. The glow in his eyes diminished.

"For me to lose to a human… I must serve, as the ancient rules dictate. Very well," Ifrit rumbled. The GF clenched his fist tightly, and hurled a small red stone at Squall, who deftly caught it. "I will join you. Now…" he turned to me. "Do you think I could have some time to heal up?" Ifrit asked. I laughed. "Of course Ifrit. It wouldn't be a fair fight if we weren't both at full strength." I said. Ifrit nodded and jumped back into the lava pit.

Squall walked over to Quistis. "Good job," she said, clapping. "I don't recall ever seeing Ifrit quite so put to task. Most cadets need to be healed multiple times in that battle," she added. Then the two walked over to me.

I smiled at Squall. "Nice battle Squall. We'll have to have a spar sometime." Squall looked at me for a while. "Only if I see you're good enough in your battle." I smirked, "Why am I not surprised?" I said.

Five minutes later, Ifrit was healed and jumped out of the lava pit. I walk up to him. "After seeing that battle, I think I'll need to use this," I said and gripped Ragnarok's handle. I slowly draw it with my right hand and flick the large blade out to the side, then gripped it with two hands and point the black sword at Ifrit. Ragnarok now had a red glow due to the lighting in the cavern. I activated my voice skill and smiled at Ifrit.

"Prepare yourself, Ifrit!" I said in a demonic voice and charged.

I came in and swiped with Ragnarok, however Ifrit dodged by jumping into the air. Having studied his movements while he battled Squall, I jumped after him before he could get enough momentum for the punch. I delivered a dolphin kick to his face which propelled me away from him. Ifrit, on the other hand, found himself toppling to the ground. At the last moment he righted himself, landed, then charged at me, fist ready. I blocked with Ragnarok but the force threw me back. I slid across the ground for a few meters in a crouched position. I stood up to see the fire demon charging me quickly. I jumped high, flipped forward and executed an axe kick to his head, followed by a downward slash from Ragnarok. The result was a nasty cut over Ifrit's face.

I jumped away to consider what to do next. I didn't want to bring out my special skills yet, such as my wings or clones, so my options were limited slightly. I looked at Ifrit to see that he was charging up large balls of fire, different from the magma balls he threw at Squall. These looked like the Firaga spells that Zack casts from Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII. Ifrit finished charging them up and then threw them at me. These fire boulders were fast as they quickly crossed the distance between us. I quickly rolled to the side and they passed me. Unfortunately they also behaved like Zack's Firaga's as they started to turn and head for me once again.

'Crap!' I thought as I dodged them again by jumping into the air, having no time to roll again. The fire flew up towards me, honing in on my position. Leaving me with no choice, I decide to try something out. If what Sora said was true, that I'm the first male Sorcerer to appear in this world, then maybe I could concentrate my powers through Ragnarok. I focus my Ki energy into Ragnarok and slash out twice, aiming for the fires. Two blue slicing energy blades, like what Sephiroth does, came out of the Ragnarok and sliced through the fire spells. The waves continued and smashed into the floor, leaving gash marks. I land and look at the fire GF. He seemed surprised that I was able to do that. In truth, I was surprised that I could do that. However this surprise didn't last for long and Ifrit came in hard and fast with his claws.

I start to dodge them quickly, but the successive strikes prevented me from counterattacking. And it didn't look like Ifrit would let up on trying to slash the living shit out of me. Though I knew he wouldn't do that. As I continued to dodge I realised that I was getting closer and closer to the lava. I needed to think of something fast. 'Ifrit has the initiative, had mastery over fire… That's it! Oh Shiva?' I called in my mind. She answered straight away. 'I was waiting for you to call me. Want me to come out for a bit?' she asked. I smirk in my head. 'Yeah! Butt heads with Ifrit for a while. I'll work on a new strategy while you wreck havoc.' I then continued to dodge Ifrit's eight inch sharp, black claws until I was ready.

I then jumped over Ifrit's head and landed behind him. The fire spirit turned around and faced me once again. However, before he could do anything, a large icicle shot out of the ground in front of me. The baking heat of the Fire Cavern was gone in an instant, replaced by an absolute, frigid cold. Inside the icicle, a figure moved. The shard of ice suddenly shattered, and standing there was a woman. She was extremely beautiful and had a voluptuous body, with blue skin. She had long yellow and blue hair, and her body was marked with patches of dark blue ice. I blushed as my eyes trailed over her perky D sized breasts and her nice round ass.

"Oh shit! You have Shiva!" Ifrit exclaimed, realizing the power of the ice Guardian Force. Shiva grinned as she waved a hand over her head, and bluish-white energy formed there, the magical power gathering and strengthening. Then, Shiva thrust forward at Ifrit. A shockwave of frozen air blasted into Ifrit, the absolute low temperatures devastating the fire Guardian Force and freezing the surrounding air as it was swept away, creating a line of frozen icicles around the path of Shiva's attack. Shiva turned around to look at me and she smiled, before she faded away, and the ice she had created shattered and disappeared. I felt Shiva's spirit enter back into myself.

"So freaking awesome!" I praised. "That was so cool! No pun intended." She laughed softly. The sound made me feel warm inside, but I shook off the feeling. Now was not the time.

For the first time in the course of the battle, Ifrit seemed truly injured. The GF slumped slightly, but as I raised my sword, Ifrit straightened. He certainly wasn't done yet!

We both charged and met in the middle. Sparks flew from our conflict as we both tried to get the upper hand. Sword and claws collided with each other as we fought in an intense fight. We rained down blows at superhuman speed. I twisted and turned a few times when I couldn't block with Ragnarok. We then jumped apart. I then see that the nine tailed fox etching on Ragnarok was now glowing red. Flipping it over I see the dragon glowing an intense blue. I grinned as a burst of energy surrounded me for a moment. Limit time!

I begin to manipulate two Blizzards together to create a Blizzara spell. However I don't release it. Instead I gather the spell in my hand, creating a mass of ice blue energy to gather in my left hand. Raising Ragnarok, I place my left hand on the hilt and slide the hand all the way to the end of the sword. Ice blue runes appear on the sword, getting brighter and brighter until the sword was shining. Then the light blew outwards like shattered glass. What was left was shocking.

The blade had completely changed. The handle was the same; however that is where the similarity ended. The blade had changed shape. No longer did it look like the Buster sword. Now it was shaped like a claymore blade. The hilt was now silver, with a large snowflake in the middle. The blade itself looked like it was made out of cerulean coloured ice. Knowing that the limit wasn't going to last forever, I charged quickly and came down with a hard overhead strike. Ifrit jerked violently as the blade sliced into him. He tried to take a swipe at me, but that last strike had weakened him greatly. But still he continued to try, not giving up. I easily dodged the claws and kept on striking him in quick succession. However ten seconds is a short amount of time and the Ice Sword crumbled apart to reveal the Ragnarok once again. The large chunks of ice fell to the floor and slowly dissolved into small pieces that drifted away on an unknown breeze.

I jumped away and prepared to strike again when Ifrit toppled to the ground. I immediately run over to him. "Hey Ifrit, you ok?" I ask, my demonic influence leaving my voice. He looked up at me and I could see what looked like a small smile on his face. He then turned over and sat on the ground.

"We Guardian Forces have been treated like mindless weapons for a long time. People only saw us as a way to achieve ones ends. However I sense you are much different. You care about your GF's. Shiva and I go way back together, despite our differences in element. I've known her ever since we were created to watch over this world that Hyne created and she's never been happier then when I saw her moments ago. She even smiled and she doesn't do that so often, due to the lack of things to smile at. I don't know who you are, or what kind of powers you have, but I know that she's happy with you. So I've decided that you will be the first mortal to receive rights to summoning my second form." said Ifrit.

"Second form?" I question.

"It's us GF's true form. When you battle us or summon us normally is our shadow, you could say. A clone of ourselves. This is how we are able to have multiple summoners at one time. The stone that's given is no more than a link to the GF. However our second form is different. Each GF's true form is different from their 'clone'. How is shown by our different looks. And with all of us, in our true form we use our complete power. When we are summoned in our second form, we remain until dismissed. So I trust you to not use our true form's power unless you deem it's necessary."

"I promise," I said without wavering. Ifrit nodded and then focused, like he did when he created the red stone for Squall. However, what appeared wasn't the same. In his hand was a spherical crystal the size and shape of what a piece of Materia would look like. Fiery energy crackled inside the crystal. I take it and step away from him. With that, the Guardian Force's corporeal body erupted into golden flames that rapidly covered his entire form. Soon, the raging flames obscured the GF's appearance. I looked, slightly sad, as the Guardian Force vanished, the flames suddenly dissipating and then gone. Carrying the crystal with me I started walking back to Squall and Quistis.

'Hey Shiva, why so silent?' I asked.

'Oh, just thinking,' she said in a thoughtful voice.

'About what?'

'About whether to give you access to my second form too,' explained Shiva.

'…Well I won't force you. You just tell me when you're good and ready,' I thought.

'…Thanks'

'By the way, do you and Ifrit really go way back?' I ask. Shiva giggled. 'We sure do. We would often tag-team and prank the other GF's when we weren't being used as summons.'

I grin to myself. 'I like the sound of pranks…'

I get to the others and they were staring at me. "I have never seen such a battle before between a cadet and Ifrit. I thought he was going all out on Squall, but seeing you and Ifrit fight together just smashed that assumption." Said Quistis with Squall nodding. Squall then asked what I and Ifrit were talking about. I relayed everything that Ifrit told me. Including the second form.

"Could it be the GF's ultimate form?" Quistis wondered. I quirked an eyebrow at her. She saw this and elaborated. "There are a few legends that describe another level of a GF's power. They describe this as the ultimate power. However that was all that was mentioned."

"Hmm, well I might as well merge this with myself," I say and then concentrate on it. The crystal sunk into me and I felt a connection with Ifrit open up. However this connection was much stronger than the one I had with Shiva at the moment.

'Hmm, it's really roomy in here,' came the deep rumbling of Ifrit in my mind.

'Hey there Ifrit,' I welcome him.

'What? How are you speaking to me?' he asked. I sighed.

It was going to be a long trip back.