Disclaimer: Square-Enix Incorporated owns all copyrighted material this fanfiction may include. All other materials, such as characters, events, dialogue, et cetera, all belong to Zeshin-kun.
Author's Note: So, as I said previously, this is going to be the final enemy and this segment most likely becomes the last one, too. Before we can finish it, though, just having Rikku explain some of what Shuyin discovered wouldn't be enough. Why not take a step back and see what really happened to Shuyin after Rikku pushed him into the chasm. In this chapter, you'll get to see when Shuyin decided he needed to show Areth his heart and what else occurred that they will now have to handle.
Before we get to that, though, for all my readers thinking to themselves that this has turned into another "Sin returns" fiction, I hope there'll still be more surprising twists in store for you. To haboo, if you thought Sin X was worthy enough, just wait for this story's Sin to have a go.
Now, without further ado, I present the fortieth chapter and the start of a new segment of -
Spira: The Eternal Discord
Chapter 40: Forever Fooled
Shuyin
"Be careful alright?"
"Ha, you have to wake up pretty early to get at me."
"Yea, nothin' like a good victory in waiting to get the blood pumpin', am I right?"
"You gonna be in the startin' line-up wit us or are you gonna let me get all the glory to myself?"
The pyreflies began circling closer now, my senses clearing as more of my body began to reform. After the Den of Woe collapsed, it created this canyon that stretched a great distance underground. I fell all the way down, smashing into the jagged rocks below. I should've been shattered, long since dead, but I had these tiny creatures saving me. My physical body was shielded by them, any impact absorbed and redistributed. What should have killed me only sapped my strength and stamina, but those were both recoverable. As the pyreflies finished their job, I shook myself awake and found I was staring up at the sky.
Sitting up, I patted my head and made a grunt, whispering to myself, "Rikku did good."
When I gathered enough consciousness, I began surveying the new area, testing my body to determine its present condition. Seeing no permanent damage, I moved on, unsheathing my sword to test my coordination. As I had fallen quite a long way, my swordplay suffered some, but it would regain itself with time and rest. Lastly, I called forth the shadow's pyreflies and went about manipulating them as I had done during my tenure as an unsent. At first, it felt like the beginning all over again, my capabilities with them infinitesimal compared to how I used to be with them. However, where it took me months to figure out everything I was capable of then, I needed only several minutes to reclaim the base levels of my abilities. Once I felt confident enough in the stability of my new existence, I concentrated the pyreflies, turning them into a large pike and having them drill into the rocks below. After only a few moments, they had breached the surface of the Farplane's outermost shell, allowing me access. Separating my form into pyreflies, I streamed into it, moving alongside their pure counterparts in the planet's core and arriving at the Farplane's Glen.
Once I reformed, I noticed that much of the area had deteriorated since I was there last. The purple flowers from my past were gone. The autumn growth of Yuna's present were missing, as well. In fact, even the pyreflies that should've swarmed the area seemed scant. Using my pyreflies to influence them, I brought back some of the beauty of the Farplane that it should've possessed, localizing the greatest amount of change on the platform I currently stood.
"Now what?" I called out into the darkness, "Rikku told me about you. You might as well come out. I'm not going anywhere."
For the next few minutes, I sent some of my pyreflies through the viewable Farplane and analyzed it, discovering that a great deal of it was missing. I contemplated Areth having been the culprit, but thought against it considering our interactions previously telling me he wasn't capable of something like this. Even with a millennium behind him and intense hatred for me, he didn't have reason enough to let him take hold of all the pyreflies no longer present. There was more to the situation that had presented itself thus far and only one person would know now.
As I turned back towards the center of the platform, I saw her, standing amidst the flowers with the dress I had buried her in. She had an ethereal glow, the mark of the dead, but the light exuding from her didn't feel like an unsent's force of will. Standing there, she only looked at me, an unusually stern expression on her countenance.
"Kirin…" My mouth uttered as I moved over to hug her in my arms.
Before I could, she lifted a hand to me, holding me back, "Sorry… You still have work to do."
Nodding, I asked, "What kind of work? Areth isn't the one behind any of this, that much I know."
"Yes… We are… I'm so sorry. I didn't think…"
"What do you mean?" I enquired of her, "We? Who else is there?"
From the ether, figures appeared, their faint forms solidifying and revealing their identities to me. Coming to stand beside Kirin were Jurama and my best friend, Rothel. Next to him, our other lost teammates, Vena and Kion arrived and from behind Jurama came Damusa. As I released a shocked and unbelievably overjoyed gasp, they neared, Rothel patting me on the shoulder just like old times. Moving to Vena and Kion, I took them each by the hand and gripped them tight, happy to see them again after all this time apart.
"Guys…" I uttered, looking at them all, one by one.
"Heya T." Rothel was the first to speak, "Ever think we'd be here right now?"
"Seems like someone's convoluted plot to a fantasy, doesn't it?" I replied.
"Tell me about it. I've been stoned before, man, but ouch." Kion gestured, allowing all of us a laugh.
"And I thought my ring had a big rock." Vena added in.
"But it did have a big rock." Kirin suggested, causing us all to let out another laugh.
"You seen Larea around recently, eh? She fused with her Aeon's fayth, ya know? Said she'd be the third of them to join the Magus Sisters." Rothel added, explaining to me just how her special became her.
"The trinity, huh? Reminds me of all those passing girl bands back in the day." I said, snickering a little.
"Different trinity, ya know?" He replied, making note of our old myths.
"Who can keep track?" Ju interjected, "Might as well be a girl band."
"At least we'd get a better view, yea?" Kion jested.
"About what's happened…" Vena interrupted, bringing us back on topic.
"I'm sorry, guys. I tried my best, but I was so stupid and stubborn back then. In the end, I couldn't save anyone and almost tore this world apart in my bitterness." I solemnly stated.
"Wasn't like it was your fault, Shuyin." Kirin came over, putting her gentle hand on my cheek.
"No, I'm not going to head back in that direction anymore. Whether or not the blame falls on me is immaterial; what matters now is fixing this mess."
Rothel smashed his fist into his other hand, "Time for a good ol' blitz, ya know?"
"What did you have in mind?" I asked.
"My buddy could use a friend now, for sure." Another voice emerged, his hand placing itself on my shoulder from behind me.
"Kai." My mouth voiced as I turned to greet him, "It's been a while."
"Sure has. For Areth, too."
"That guy needs to relax, take a breather." Damu added, popping his head in between us.
"Help me set him straight, Shuyin." Kai requested of me.
"Don't worry. I think I can chance a guess at what he's after now. This world's been so unfair, hasn't it? At first, all he cared about was getting revenge on me for his brother. He couldn't and died a villain for all his efforts. It must have been hard." I said.
Kai nodded, "The guy had all the right intentions. He wanted justice. The only problem was that he was willing to go too far to get it. Even now, he doesn't get it. He threw away his heart when his mission needed it most of all."
"I'll save him, Kai. You have my word."
"That's not all." Kirin interjected, the light pouring from her body growing brighter.
"Who ever would have guessed the old coot had it in him." Ju added.
"You'd think he was just a figment of your imagination like those rainbow-coloured shoopuffs." Kion said, using his hands as if comparing the two.
"Kion, lay off the happy weeds." I told him with a smile.
"This really isn't the time to be joking." Larea's voice echoed, her form taking shape beside me.
"Sorry." I replied, taking a breath to get back to the situation at hand, "So, what's with the unsent collection?"
"We're… not unsent." Kirin told me, lowering her head.
"What?"
"They're new fayth." Larea answered, walking to Rothel, "Reborn recently."
"Never thought, eh?" He said to her.
"We were created to be the fayth that would bring about the second Age of Sin." Kirin told me.
"Why would you agree to that?" I asked her, my eyes growing wide.
"He told us we could save you then. If we allowed ourselves to be converted into fayth, we would have the power to revive you and give you a second chance." She said.
"In return, you'd use your control over the pyreflies to collect him enough of them to rebuild Sin." She nodded.
"The old coot's got one better this time. As an unsent, he doesn't need to morph into a parasite mind to keep his hold over the pyreflies. He learned that one from you when you altered the Farplane to your liking. You could say, that's when we all reawoke in here." Ju explained in further detail.
"Yu Yevon turned them from scattered pyreflies waiting to be reborn into his new fayth and, while they were gathering in the pyreflies, he pulled some from the ether in the form of the fallen Maester Seymour Guado. He and you are the same." Larea said, making additional elaborations.
"We're dreams of the fayth, aren't we? Before you could make me, he made you revive Seymour as a test. Eventually, you revived me in hopes I could stop everything else he was doing." I concluded.
"Yea, his plans started to sound more and more deranged and, after we saw what Seymour had done, we knew Spira needed a hero. I thought you were the best bet. We were all close to you. We could make a real you, not just a dream; well, at least as close to the real you as a dream could get." Kirin stated, moving away a bit.
"With you, it was possible. You got me to come back. You and I went through a lot together. You know everything about me. Not many can say that." I told her, walking to her side.
"That's why we had you find me. You've gotten close to Rikku, haven't you?"
I nodded, "You needed me to get here. Rikku would have eventually led me right here every time. Seymour just became a distraction. All of them, in fact. They were convenient pawns for Yu Yevon. Just send those misfits to distract us and it would take the two of us longer to make the link."
"Obviously, he was too confident." Ju noted, "Seymour was purely a distraction, but because of that, Yu Yevon felt he needed more help. Areth sufficed, but your progress with the Maester concerned him. He never wanted to admit a blitzer like you could trouble him, but he knew not to put his ego ahead of success so he arranged to your abandoned pyreflies to defeat you."
"It was a good strategy, ya know? I mean, if you fell for them before, why not now? Problem was, he didn't expect our little Shuyin all grown up like this." Rothel clamored, patting me hard in the back.
"It comes down to ego again, Rothel." I told him, "He never took us seriously in the past and I nearly succeeded in destroying Bevelle single-handedly. Now, even though I'm the one that showed him how to use his unsent talent, he assumed I'd let my demons get the better of me again."
"Now you know everything that lies before you." Larea commented, "What are you going to do?"
"I'm not sure. If Sin is back, we've got a tremendous fight on our hands. I'm not sure they can handle it so it might just fall onto me. What are its weaknesses? Do you know?"
"It used to be the parasitic Yu Yevon hiding inside the Final Aeon." Kai said.
"Final Aeon? Right, when the bond is strong enough, a Final Aeon will be stronger than any Aeon and will overcome the shell. Where's Lenne? I refused Yu Yevon before, but I'll be her Final Aeon now to face him." I exclaimed.
Kirin pulled in close, taking my arm in hers, "We tried, but we're still new to this."
"Then she should be here."
"She'd only be a memory. She faded away with you remember? We brought you back safe and sound, but…"
"It's okay. I know what I have to do." I assured my dearest friend, "Wait for me…"
"Shuyin," Ju called, "I couldn't protect Kirin. That was my folly and shall stay with me forever. I had hoped to give you the means to save Lenne, but I died too soon. Now, you will find your weapon at the beginning."
I nodded to him, clasping my hand with his, "Let's end this."
As I began to walk off, Kirin called out again, "Shuyin!"
Turning to her, she ran to me, "Yu Yevon's a lot stronger now. His Sin is evolved, too. Whatever you're going to do, you have to be careful. Don't forget us who are by your side always."
"I won't."
"I believe in you, Shuyin. We all do. Break away from the chains of fate and come back home."
Kissing Kirin on her forehead, I scattered myself back into pyreflies and left them. My mission would take me where I hadn't gone in so long, but I knew I had to go back. It was what tied us all together, a single moment in time where our histories all stood still. I could complete my promises and fulfill my destiny. Further along the Farplane's upper spheres, I found myself revisiting the series of tunnels I had created as an unsent, each of the paths leading back to a temple on the surface. Taking one of the routes, I guided myself across it and made it to the Cavern of the Stolen Fayth where the modern day Yojimbo resided. Once I was there, I continued onward, bringing myself outside and into the Calm Lands where, right at the base of Mount Gagazet, I found Areth waiting for me.
"Finished?" He asked, his arms crossed when I reformed before him.
Realizing he had expected the mission at Mushroom Rock to end in my possession or defeat, I replied, "Yea, it's almost all done now, huh?"
"And Spira's a goner. Blow this stink hole a new one." He said, looking up into the mountain.
"After all that with your brother, we find ourselves on the same side, eh?"
"You're putting it nicer now?" He commented, letting me know how the shadow acted, "I'm tired. Sure you know that by now."
I nodded to him as he continued, "This world's full of disgusting vermin. Not to sound like an old fogey or anything, but things made more sense in our day, didn't it?"
I scoffed, "Yea, a thousand years under the oaf."
"Hey, that's Master Oaf to you." He mused, giving me a sincere smile instead of the smirk I'd been used to seeing.
For the next few hours, we spoke as if old friends having a regular day together. He made mentions about celebrity gossip during our youth and old hobbies he'd begun to forget given the elapse in time. I was able to talk to him about my childhood and all the moments I had regretted, hoping there was some way to make amends for them. We even discussed openly the event that made us enemies. I apologized for having killed his brother and he not only accepted it, he commented on how several things had gone awry then, no longer holding me wholly accountable for it. He explained that his brother was prone to having one too many and making rash and thoughtless judgements that only came back to haunt him later. I felt as if this was a look into a new life, for both of us, had he not the goal of helping Yu Yevon destroy this world. I wondered if there was another reality out there in which Areth and I had grown up as friends, another life where we weren't at each other's throat. If only that could've been our life. The son of Mikala, friends with the Ace of Zanarkand, imagine the alternatives to war. Areth had been such a proponent to the Machina War, the fighting an excuse to further his own goals. If I hadn't killed his brother, if we had accepted the misunderstanding long ago and grown to be friends, having Bevelle's two heirs as the greatest opponents to the war might have led to not having one at all. At the very least, Zanarkand could have had two tremendous assets on our side. However, that wasn't our life. That was a fantasy that I could no longer hope for. All that was left was to free Areth from his hatred of fate's cruelties and unhook the leash Yu Yevon had bound to his soul. My Lord had gone through an enormous effort to create his pawns and blind them to anything else but his word. Areth had gone from wanting pure revenge for his brother to holding his failures on the whole world. I'd need to remedy that.
"So, Sin up and running yet?" I finally asked him once I turned from the pleasant thoughts of a better outcome to our lives.
"You're awfully talkative now." He enquired, eying me suspiciously.
"Just getting impatient, you know?" I reasoned, "Also, taking out Shuyin… Guess I'm a new man."
"Yea, hope you finally put that crybaby to sleep."
"Don't worry, there's going to be no more tears."
Areth snickered at my comment, turning his face upward to the summit of Gagazet before saying, "The old guy really does have tricks. You know, he's just like us right now. He's just another unsent, but he can do all that. Man, what it must feel like to have so much power and control."
"Still, he can't do it all by himself. He needed those fayth and I thought he needed a Final Aeon as a host to build Sin on."
"Fayth?" He said, telling me he didn't know about them, "Well, if he needs a Final Aeon, he's got one in there. I know that much. He has a host in there with him. I didn't know he didn't tell you about it, but he said it keeps the thing stable."
"So the gravity spells don't do it?"
"Nope, he's been saying how the stronger the host is, the more amplified the tug on the pyreflies becomes. He isn't just making another Sin, after all. This one's supposed to be the biggest."
"Define biggest."
"You already know that story. The original Sin was just to keep Spira under control because Yu Yevon thought technology was what was killing us. Let him believe what he wants." Areth elaborated, "This time, he's been saying those Sins aren't enough. He can't rely on something like that because some idiot might come along and screw up the cycle. This time, Sin has to be under his full control and can't be taken out. Whatever his new host is, it's strong enough to see to that. Not even a month and it's already in the final stages."
"I heard that Sin takes ten years to reach maturity. After that, its feral nature takes over completely and could destroy the planet."
"Isn't that the point, though? Without a host, it takes ten years. With a weak host, it still takes about that long, but with a good host, the story's different. And there's something else now." He said.
"This time, he's a conscious unsent summoner. He knows how to pull in all the pyreflies he's ever going to need. This Sin's going to be a masterpiece." I finished for him.
"Yup, and then this planet's done for."
"All the ones before it, they just won't compare, will they? None of them; nothing can stop it once it's complete."
"Not even that Penance thing can match this." Areth noted, patting me on the shoulder, "This is it. Once the final stages are finished, our mission will be done. How does it feel to know your life meant so much?"
"But is it enough?" My words begged the question for both sides. In keeping with the shadow's purposes, I wondered if Yu Yevon truly wanted the world destroyed like I had wanted. On the other side, I hoped Areth might elaborate our purpose for distracting the group so long with a weapon like this lying in wait.
"He's your leader, you tell me. What is this 'living Farplane' stuff he's been talking about? I'm not sure it'll work, but either way makes no difference to me."
"The living Farplane? That's the core of Spira, what makes life possible in this world. What does that have to do with anything?"
Areth looked at me strangely, "Did Shuyin knock some intelligence out of you? You and the old guy have been talking forever about it. Something about making Sin take Spira into a new planet and start fresh."
A quick scan of the pyreflies I attained from the shadow afforded me no further information, which meant that they had been purified by my claiming them. Areth was waiting for my reply and any poor choice of word gave them what they needed to figure out the truth. I couldn't afford that happening so soon. What was this "living Farplane" stratagem about?
"I meant, is that oaf still on that kick? It'll never work." I chose to say, hoping the idea of starting Spira anew was still against the shadow's beliefs.
"He never stopped. C'mon, cheer up. You never know if humanity will surprise you one day." He told me, shaking me with the hand still on my shoulder.
"Enough." I grunted, walking a few steps toward the mountain, "What is he thinking?"
"I know you were always against it, but it makes sense. This Spira has failed us, all of us. Pull the pyreflies all back into pure form and have the beggars start again. Makes sense to me. What doesn't is how stubborn you've been about letting the world burn. It doesn't solve anything."
"Maybe I'm tired, too." I said to him, "Maybe I've grown bored of waiting for them to give me that surprise."
"Hey," He responded soothingly, "You can't expect a polluted world like this to save itself. We have to do it. Let the new one surprise you."
If I hadn't known otherwise, I would've thought found him to be genuine. "Somehow, I feel as if the Goddesses of Renewing aren't in the business of refurbishing human faults."
"You'll see, Shuyin. When the new world is born out of the ashes of this one, there won't be a Zanarkand or Bevelle. No nonsense rivalries and pointless bickering. My brother will have never died nor any of the rest that followed. Everything will be fair or it won't be allowed to exist. Justice." He began saying, allowing his voice to trail before turning himself into pyreflies to head up Gagazet afterward.
"Justice… Fairness… That was all you were after, even back then, weren't you?" I mumbled to myself, "Your juvenile mind lost itself when your brother died and you blamed it on a world that was irrevocably flawed. It made you see Zanarkand, particularly me, its star, as a taint on Spira. You made it your first target, aided by the Machina War to solve your kingdom's economic shortcomings. Now that you've had a thousand years to reflect and grow, the loss of your heart directed you to see all the negative events occurring through time."
Looking up at the summit, I broke myself into pyreflies and followed my partner to meet our master. The moment we reconstructed ourselves, I saw him. He appeared just as he did that night I went to him for assistance in saving Lenne. As I had guessed, by the time he called on me to become his Final Aeon, there was barely time left to anticipate my rejecting him and so Yunalesca had no choice. My pyreflies reacted to his own and I saw images in my head. I saw how he had fooled the masses, including a weeping Larea, of his plan to immortalize Zanarkand. One by one they fell before him, accumulating into what would be the Master Summon engraved into the summit of Gagazet. Using both my sword and the residual force of existence in Kirin as a catalyst, he encapsulated the fayth's dream in a bubble before consuming their remaining pyreflies along with all the dead left in the city, building the first Sin, but as a human, he could not survive the strain on his own pyreflies to maintain them. An auxiliary spell changed him into a creature that can only draw pyreflies to itself, mindless except to that task, which resulted in the next Sin. He needed Lenne as his shield, someone unrelated and unimaginably pure to fool future generations into bringing forth the Final Aeon. She didn't know enough about the truth to jeopardise the plan unlike his daughter and her own siren's thrall made it more possible to convince the doubtful. I had no need to guess at the fact the shadow had seen the same, but he had hoped to merge with me and stop that plan before the end, culminating in one enormous failure that would rip this world apart.
Upon seeing us, Yu Yevon took notice of my return to form, casting curious but satisfied eyes as he remained hopeless in seeing my actual nature. In the end, he still believed he had nothing to fear from a blitzer because he was a blitzer. Informing us that Sin needed more pyreflies before completion, he said we would need to keep the others occupied and desperate. Areth suggested that we would use the coming storm as a distraction, something I hoped they would see through, but I worried my "betrayal" clouded any hope of that. Then, my Lord Yu Yevon took to the sky and turned into pyreflies, passing off into the Farplane's core. Once he made it there, he'd begin casting an ultimate spell, stronger than that of his parasitic incarnation. Exa Graviton's purpose was to pull Spira's surface pyreflies to him. First, he would excite the fiends, provoking them to Oversoul and mutate, their murders releasing more pyreflies into the atmosphere to be drawn down into the Farplane Core where a new Sin could be completed.
Before I could take any further actions, we saw the Fahrenheit looming in the distance and I saw Areth give me a wink before hiding in the dark side of the mountain. Kneeling over Kirin's grave, I nodded to her. I would keep my promise.
Author's Note: In the coming chapters, find out how they will take on the evolved Sin and what price they will have to pay in order to get it done. How strong is this new incarnation and what role will an active Yu Yevon play in creating more of a challenge for them? Once they're done, what will be the condition of Spira? Will the Farplane be affected? Well, probably not. Speaking of which, remember when I said this all happens before Last Mission? Yeah, so I can't do too much permanent damage, but regardless of that, just how will they repair all of the damage already done?