The wordless signal issued by Sephiroth's disappearance was followed by the numerous lesser spawns unleashing a volley of ominous beams towards the warriors who had ascended the highest peak in the world.
Tifa took point and raised a Wall with the Barrier Materia, the prismatic bulwark forming as the beams converged onto them. But while they weathered the worst of it unscathed, the cliffside they were didn't. The sheer force of the bombardment hammered away at the mountainside and caused a portion of the rim to crumble beneath their feet, leaving them to fall down.
Cloud quickly grabbed hold of Tifa and drove the Buster Sword into the side of the cliff that was covered in organic tissue and nerves. The flesh itself seemed to writhe in agony as the heavy steel tore its way through while slowing their descent, leaving alien ichor cascading down from the gaping wound. He pushed that fact to the back of his mind before he slammed his foot into the perch, launching them out of the way of the second volley as he triggered the Earth Materia slotted into the blade and threw it ahead of them.
The earth moved as a chaotic Quake 3 spell was unleashed. Flesh and spawn alike were dislodged from the ground, the sporophyte appendages that were giving birth to even more of the lesser abominations uprooted as their foundation was torn asunder and upheaved. It provided a cleared landing zone for the pair as Cloud touched down and took up the blade again.
Several of the displaced spawns rose up again, undulating from their bases and then hunching over in a wave-like motion as they righted themselves. No sooner than they fixed their gaze on the pair did gunshots ring out. Holes burst in their flesh and tenebrous tendrils of malevolent darkness quivered as they fell over and their bodies began to darken and rot.
"Individually, they aren't a significant threat. But their numbers will pose a problem," Vincent said as he landed, cape flaring out as if a pair of wings. Dark energy flowed from his hand into Death Penalty, condensing and converting it into ammunition to be fired. He took aim at another three and fired one shot each with pinpoint accuracy, watching them fall. "We need cover and support before we can significantly trim down their numbers."
No sooner than he stated that fact did an icy wind run over them with the arrival of Shiva, the regal ruler of ice. She wove the air around them, taking the already present chill and enhancing it into a raging blizzard that blanketed the area in fresh, white powder. The snowstorm masked their forms, dampened their voices, and obscured their very presence as every spawn that was capable fired and snow dust scattered in the wake of the converging blasts.
Then the counterattack began as Cloud burst from the thick plume with the Buster Sword in hand and the light of the Limit Break radiating fiercely off his frame. He roared, mist leaving his mouth as he swung the blade and let loose a crescent wave of mako-shaded energy. The Blade Beam carved out the ground as it ran over several spawns, their silhouettes vanishing within the rushing torrent and clearing a path.
Without stopping his gait, he raced for another one that had raised a Reflect to bounce their spells back. That one he lunged at, shoving his Buster Sword into its core and sinking the heavy blade into the alien tissue and fluids until it was buried up to the hilt. Then he let loose a Bolt 3 point-blank though the blade, bypassing the layer of reflective magic as crackling and blinding electricity ruptured the cells that composed it from the inside out. Ripping the blade out from the charred husk, he left it to collapse as he then moved to another.
Frost danced within the snow veil as Shiva followed suit in her own manner, running ice freezing the flammable gas that they spewed out to try and stifle any attempt at immolation. Headed by the regal Summoning, that running ice then shot out as jagged petals that impaled the ones that lacked the luxury of the Reflect spell. Frost invaded their bodies from the inside out, leaving them frozen husks.
Fire churned and pulsated within Tifa's hands before she let loose the Fire 3 spell. The moment the flames met with the frozen gas, the ice itself was ruptured from the inside out. Those ensnared by the hold of the ice were scattered into diamond dust that was trampled underfoot as she kept moving and attacking.
While the other two relied on sword and sorcery, Vincent's approach was far more straightforward. Converting the dark energies of Chaos into bullets and channeling them through Death Penalty courtesy of Lucrecia's notes, he housed within him a near-infinite supply of ammunition capable of instilling death into the living. Each shot that hit its mark drove the cells into entropy, a cascading degradation that rotted them faster than they could possibly regenerate or cast off.
Bringing their might to bear, the warriors wove through the enemy ranks in an attempt to thin them out, waiting for the others to succeed. But the towering pillars, twisted things of flesh and misery, writhed as they cast off bits of their flesh to produce fresh abominations to replace the losses. As long as their numbers weren't culled and the birthing towers remained standing, there was no victory to be had.
The tide would turn against them at some point—whether it was the concussive blasts bringing them low, the gas suffocating and driving them into a rage-fueled madness, or their minds stretching to the breaking point from the use of spells. They needed an opening of some kind. Something to tip the scales while they awaited Aerith's gambit to break through the whirling maelstrom that guarded the path to Sephiroth.
"WE NEED TO TAKE OUT THE TOWERS," Cloud shouted over the snowstorm as he finished cutting through one of the spawns. The longer they waited, the worse the situation would become in the end. So he charged towards the nearest one to take it down himself while the others picked their own to topple.
Opposition rallied to stop him. The spawns that were within range moved as if of a single mind, while those that hung in the distance cast their gaze towards his direction and prepared to unleash their concussive beams. Even for one as strong him, to be hammered down and overrun would be the inevitable result.
However, a bulwark of ice jutted up to ward away the concussive beams courtesy of Shiva at her summoner's behest. A hail of gunfire followed, one shot for every beam fired to snuff out the shooters before they could release a second volley. As for the ones that swarmed him—
"ODIN!"
—they were summarily cut away as the Fell Knight, armored in steel the color of solidified moonlight, stood ready. The demonic visage, from whose maw a grey mist billowed out as the Summoning exhaled, was intensified by the imposing arsenal that it had brought to bear in the wake of such opposition. In one hand was Zantetsuken, a butcher's weapon with an ominous glow that promised death upon all that laid in its path, and in the other was the demonic crimson lance of immense power, Gungnir.
Odin cleared away their foes with a single swing of Zantetsuken before planting his sword into the ground and taking on a throwing posture as he readied the crimson spear. The air around him began to waver as crimson bled off it, taking the magical energy that composed his very essence and devoting it to destruction. Targeting one of the flesh towers that stood tall and continuously gave birth to more abominations that would eventually overrun the world, Odin launched Gungnir as a searing bolt of destruction.
The air howled as the spear rocketed towards its target. The moment the crimson lance struck the first tower of warped flesh, sound and color were eclipsed by the thunderous roar and crimson-toned explosion. The snowstorm that had taken hold under Shiva's power was blown away by the sheer force of the detonation, and the remnants of the rising pillar, that had been erected as if to make a mockery of those who survived the initial slaughter, rained down.
The destruction of the first pillar in Sephiroth's plan to infect the world had come at a cost. Odin's Materia cracked, and his figure followed suit. The fissures spreading across the Fell Knight's body made it seem like ceramic on the verge of shattering. But the Summoning picked up its blade with the intention of continuing until self-destruction, fighting until the last ounce of its existence was wiped away.
Cloud would do the same, the light of another Limit Break flaring up as he continued towards the second spawning tower as the argent-clad knight cleared a path with the butcher's weapon. He called forth the image of the ultimate destructive magic once more and sent burning comets from the sky raining down on the stalwart, macabre tower. The air screamed as they flew forth, molten rock leaving the world to tremble as the explosions that followed chained and brought low the second keystone to Sephiroth's ambitions.
Exhaling as he felt the rush of energy left him, a sudden bloom of frost washed over Cloud and left his sword and Odin's armor draped in crystals of heavy ice. As he slammed his fist into the flat of the blade to break the ice, he turned towards the third pillar to see that the entire thing had been devoured in the crystalline, permafrost tower. And at the base of was Shiva, the lone flower of beauty in a frozen wasteland.
The Summoning reached out and made a rising gesture, causing a pillar of ice to abruptly erupt from further behind. Tifa, who had been there, was sent flying towards the frozen keystone. Fire trailed behind her from both her hands—wreathed in the hottest flames that she could conjure.
Cloud read her lips as she gave an apology to one of their former neighbors before she slammed her fists into the tower and triggered the Fire 3 spell within it. The next thing he knew the entire thing ruptured, bursting from the inside-out with enough force that resulting shockwave nearly knocked Cloud off his feet. Lacking the brute strength that the others possessed, Shiva froze the cells as deeply as she could and Tifa used the strongest Fire spell she could to flash evaporate the ice inside and expand it in a similar manner to a cryovolcano.
With no natural opening, the pressure within it skyrocketed as the steam had no escape. The heat simply expanded, killing the cells in the process until the hollowed vessel couldn't contain it. The crystal tower was blown away, leaving behind only the summoning and her summoner, who was shielded from what happened by the barrier that draped her skin.
Before the fragments finished falling, there was surge of ominous energy that spouted up in the distance and drew Cloud's eyes next. It was Vincent, wreathed in an aura of crimson malice and stygian despair as he called forth the power of Chaos to a greater degree. Compressing it into an orb of intertwining red and black that swirled within it like a nebula at the tip of his gun, the moment he pulled the trigger a beam of pure destruction and entropy eclipsed the fourth tower at the base and left it to collapse as rot settled in to decay the remnants.
Four down, two to go, Cloud counted as the Odin's form dissipated as he recalled it. The Summoning needed to be preserved for the final battle and, even though the two birthing towers that were meant to produce more of their kin were well-protected, he was confident they could get through them... or at least that was what he believed before the two towers of flesh and meat began to swell.
Then the screaming began. The faces that were once people began to writhe in pain, their voices strained and warped bodies bloating to the point that they leaked pus that cascaded down over the spawns that were protecting them. There was next to no warning as the walls then contracted in on themselves, the pulsating sacs of grey shifting downwards as if they were in labor.
A wet, squelching noise sent shivers down Cloud's spine as the base of the towers forced out a surge of meat wrapped in purple blood vessels and sickly green nerves. It was nothing more than a shapeless mass being expelled out of the orifices that were stretched thin at a speed akin to an explosion. But the sheer force behind the expulsion left the fresh layer of meat to blanket the lesser spawns that had rallied around the point of their birth and engulfed them before continuing on.
All six together had been needed to layer the entire crater to the rim with alien tissue, but the remaining two alone had still managed to reach the warriors as they closed the distance. It left their feet stuck, half-covered from the ankle down in a freshly-birthed layer of alien tissue. Sections of the nerves and blood vessels peeled themselves off of the meat and coiled around their bodies to keep them in place as more meat grew over them.
They were being swallowed whole.
Cloud found being covered in visceral fluids as the hot and pulsating flesh throbbed around his ankles and crawled up his leg to be a sickening feeling. The scent was abysmal and even with his enhanced strength he was finding it difficult to pull himself free as the tip of the Buster Sword was swallowed and left pinned to the ground. Eventually, he triggered the Bolt 2 spell and wrenched himself loose after the tendrils of electricity burst the cells and broke down their cohesion. "Everyone okay?"
His answer came in the form of shattering ice as Tifa punched through the frozen layer of flesh that encased her. Shiva had frozen the encroaching meat that she had been trapped within, leaving her own raw strength to do the rest of the work. Vincent emerged unharmed as well, sloughing his way out of a greyish slurry of decaying meat as the ominous power of Chaos wafted off his body in dark waves.
Freed, they turned their attention to the mounds that surrounded the remaining towers to witness that they were writhing. Thrashing against the surface layers, pushing against the elastic surface for an orifice to emerge from as they grew larger and expanded, eventually they tore open the membrane to get free. It was a pair of monstrous abomination that eclipsed any other spawns they'd encountered so far.
They had no concrete shape. Not even the abnormal, sinuous appearance of the other ones that made up their core after they were all meshed together. Hundreds of dots that represented their eyes peered at everything from slivers from which pus ran. Countless grasping tendrils groped for anything else that could be pulled into themselves. A pair of expanding mounds of misshapen, lumpy meat with an endless hunger to assimilate everything.
A grimace spread across Cloud's face as he stared past them and saw the shriveled towers slowly swelling after giving birth, readying to do so again. They'd used a good portion of their fighting strength to take down the others and now they had to kill these things. Would they be able to kill them before another set was born? Would they still have the strength to fight against Sephiroth afterwards?
The question that went unasked was answered by the shaking of the mountainside as a column of radiant light punched from beneath the flesh-layered earth, with the silhouette of the infected dragon turning to ash within it. The radiance was brilliant and scouring, piercing into the dark skies above as a rising castle of steel with gold trimmings gleamed within the light. Then the castle loomed over the battlefield as the bastions that supported it spread wide and the topside of the keep shifted, revealing a mechanical face enclosed within a helmet that had a single shining eye.
"Oh Alexander," Genesis's voice rang out from atop the massive Summoning. He stood straight, hands holding his sword in front of him flat as he pressed his forehead against the rune-covered steel. It was almost as if it was in prayer. "Hallowed abode of argent and aureate, the domain from which the revered Goddess watches over the world and suffuses it with her glowing radiance. Purge those that defile the splendor of her fertile lands with your Judgement!"
A piercing ray burst from its eye at the command, the incandescence cutting through the nightmarish landscape as easily as a white-hot blade would do flesh. It drew a sinuous furrow along the crater, from which an unforgiving light burst from below like a geyser. The luminescence vaporized all it touched with a vengeance to excise the cancerous blight that threatened to spread out over the world.
The masses of meat shrieks were drowned out until the mechanized castle ceased its attack with a whirring noise and the end result was clear as day. The entire North Crater had been rid of the blight infecting it, smoke curdling as the heated earth crackled and popped as it cooled. The only thing it failed to pierce was the swirling energy that covered the nexus of the crater—where the true threat laid.
"My apologies for not coming to your aid earlier," Genesis said as he floated down on a single wing. "I really didn't want to squander Alexander so easily, but the enemy proved to be more resilient than it had any right to be."
"That's not a normal Summoning, is it?" Cloud asked.
Genesis nodded. "Alexander is a sliver of Holy, a fragment of the whole that was forged by Minerva's hands into this majestic creation. No other form of its power exists aside from that which dwells at the heart of the Planet and that which calls it forth. It was meant to be used as a last resort."
Cloud turned his head to see that theweaponized castle was falling apart where it stood. The argent that made up the bulk of its frame was riddled with fissures from which magical energy seeped like steam. The top half of its helmet was melted and warped by the fury of its own attack. It had basically undergone self-destruction in the process of destroying the threat that they faced, fulfilling the sole purpose it existed for.
"I see you still retain your love of theatrics, Genesis." The voice of their enemy rang clear as an illusion of Sephiroth appeared in front of them. "Arriving just in time to save them when their defeat was inevitable, and even going so far as to waste an impressive trump card."
"It wasn't wasted," Genesis said, stepping towards Sephiroth's illusion even as the Summoning Materia finished breaking apart within his grasp and Alexander vanished from existence. "After all, its power is finite, and when carrying out its purpose it would not hesitate to expend every last drop to accomplish its duty. Or have you not noticed that your breeding ground has been cleansed?"
"A minor setback, but one easily overcome," Sephiroth insisted. "My new body is almost complete. I can create countless more once my ascension comes to pass. Then I will take everything this world possesses into me without fail."
"You presume that you'll have the time," Genesis said, brandishing his sword to the sky where a corona of light began to swell and expand. "However, the Arrow of Judgement has already been fired."
With the boom of a thunderclap, charged starfire fell from heaven to earth and its searing light came crashing down upon the nexus of the North Crater. The luminous arrow smashed through the whirling maelstrom of energy where all else failed, ripping the vortex apart and then slamming into the ground hard enough to make the entire mountain shake. The resulting gale deafened Cloud's sense of hearing while his sight was drowned out in lustrous, blinding brilliance.
Yet, simply being within the glow of the light was soothing. It melted away the exhaustion and cleared Cloud's mind. It was as if a gentle healing touch that contrasted the harsh radiance was nestled within, a familiar sensation that offered solace.
As the light died down, Cloud saw the maze at the center of the crater. It was a vast, natural barrier that had a winding path leading to where the upsurge of life energy spouted from, and a cave that went deeper, perhaps sinking all the way down to the core of the world. Sephiroth was there—he could feel it.
Fur rustled as the inanimate doll came to life, Cait Sith rousing as Reeve's mind connected with it. "What's the situation here?"
"The barrier is gone, so we can get through now," Cloud said. "How are the others?"
The doll's mouth opened to speak before closing suddenly. It was as if he was hesitant for a moment before finally answering with, "Everyone is a little banged up, but they... they all made it. I have an extraction team moving in now, so you don't need to worry about anything on that end. Just make sure that you all come back alive."
"Right..." He turned to the others who were listening. "They've done their part. Now we do ours. Let's settle things once and for all."
[-oOo-]
Sephiroth had taken precautions after they'd interfered with his plans time and again because of the Ancient. He had sent Jenova's main body ahead to kill the greatest threat, with an army of his creations at its command. Sending his Mother, who only possessed a silver of consciousness and lingering anger, to eliminate her ancient enemy would ensure that no one could stop them.
As for the others, he had created a battle vessel to defend himself should they manage to get past his barrier through some form of trickery. It was one of his finest creations to date, a massive construct with five interworking parts. Each one was specialized as well, ensuring that it could handle any foreseeable threat.
The arms could cast powerful magic and baleful poisons that could rot a dragon into sludge within a heartbeat. The body could regenerate faster than they could damage it. And together they all wove an energy shield that kept the core, where his body was almost finished being sculpted into a figure more suitable for his ascension, protected. It should have been a perfect, impenetrable defense.
Then the searing, cursed light came crashing down with a burning weight and undid it all. Drilling straight down from the sky to the core of the Planet, the all-consuming light and heat hammered away at the bizarre construct. Instantly the vessel that gently cradled him within was taken apart.
The head was the first to go, crushed by the impact akin to a shooting star crashing down upon it. The arms were next, the mass of cells concentrated within them at their lowest and thus making them relatively more fragile. The body followed, cells bursting from the inside out as the invasive power began to eat away at the densest part.
Sephiroth reacted appropriately, calling forth the power of the Lifestream in order to conjure a Wall spell before the core came under fire. But the Arrow of Judgement's momentum was seemingly endless, backed by integration of the Black Materia turning the ultimate destructive magic into a part of its power. Even with his might, the arrow's power punched through and left the barrier to crack under the pressure like an egg on the verge of breaking.
Even as baneful light and heat flooded into the makeshift womb meant to give birth to the new godhead of this world, the hateful rays already leaving his flesh to sizzle and pop as it slipped in through the cracks with a deafening roar, he refused to be cowed by the power. Straining, Sephiroth concentrated all of the energy that was being used to reconstruct his form to reinforce his defenses against the might of the Goddess who would challenge him. The two forces clashed in a storm of heat and thunder, his battered core weathering an assault that would have punched a grievous enough wound in the Planet to end the world.
Then the inevitable happened. The arrow ruptured against the shield, releasing a flood of light from the explosion shattering his defenses. The unstoppable force and impenetrable wall destroyed one another, leaving space to warp and twist within the blanket of light until the atmosphere became oppressive to a sickening degree.
The darkness that encompassed the space he'd taken root in became what looked to be an expansive sky, with a gentle sunrise on the horizon and clouds spreading far and wide. It was the same magic used in the Temple of the Ancients before, creating a space where the laws were dictated by the ones who wove the magic. His connection with the Lifestream was torn away from him while he was within it, crippling him.
Looking down, fury took him upon seeing what had become of his body in the aftermath of his forced response. His frame was well-sculpted, with his visage befitting of divinity and adorned by a pair of linked halos with on his back. The lower half of his body was a cloud with expansive wings, meant to carrying him through the sea of stars. But his right arm was an ugly pinion of red and purple, a mesh of burned and warped alien flesh done in haste to fend off the attack.
He was incomplete. After years of effort to shape himself into a superior being that would cross the cosmos and visit other planets that he would bring unto himself as his Mother did before him, it was all thrown amiss at the last minute. An imperfect god.
Sephiroth shook with rage, fingers clenching into a balled fist and pinion curling inwards. That forgotten goddess, a relic of an age that had passed by, thought she could deny him what was his. She even defaced the magnificence that was to be his body with her interference.
It was unforgivable.
"Sephiroth!" And right on cue the ones responsible arrived within the sealed space as if breaching the very world. The parasite who survived due to his cells, the puppet of the Goddess, the avatar of Chaos, and the woman who had been lucky to survive his blade before. They would be the first to suffer his wrath.
"Like Mother before me, I will sail across the stars and become one with all," he said with narrowed eyes as he drew upon his power, extending his hand out towards the four rushing towards him. "I won't be stopped by ants like you."
Then from his palm fired a ray of pure darkness. The solid pitch seemed to bleed away every speck of color from the world, leaving it a contrast of white and black. The spell lanced towards them with the intention of condemning the group to oblivion.
"You won't have your way," Vincent said as he took to the front, throwing himself forward as tenebrous tendrils burst from his body and gave rise to his Chaos form. "This world will have a future!"
He then fired out his own beam of shadows that seemed to drink the light and dimmed the world. The two rays clashed, a violent struggle where writhing chaos and stygian oblivion ripped away at each other for dominance. The coalesced evils of man wrestled against the shadow of the stars until they eventually swallowed one another, and color returned to the world.
"You were once a SOLDIER, Sephiroth!" Genesis swooped in with his Rapier wreathed in a fiery radiance. He swung it toward his former peer, only for it to be met the black pinion. "You were meant to protect this world, not consume it as Jenova once tried!"
"As if you have any right to talk." His rebuttal was followed up by a swing of the pinion that met with the fiery steel and knocked the one-winged guardian away, sparks and embers dancing from where they met. "You proclaimed yourself a hero and then plunged the world into war because you were afraid to die."
Sephiroth then cradled a ring of flames in his empty hand and tossed it high into the air. The ring spun into countless smaller ones that burned the very air as it sailed towards them all. Fire danced over Genesis' hand before he flared it out, releasing flaming darts that flew out to meet with the rings, resulting in a chain of explosions that rattled even the sturdiest of bones.
That was when Sephiroth closed in with surprising speed, the wings on the lower half of his body providing him with superior mobility. Genesis himself barely had time to raise his blade to guard, struggling not to let the blade-sharp pinion claim his head. Bracing the flat of his blade with his arm, he was swept along by the full-body ramming.
"Tell me, where was your intention to save the world then, as you led most of our forces to their deaths?" Sephiroth demanded over the howl of the wind as they crossed the boundless sky, his hand growing luminous with nebulous, violet darkness. He then pushed out with the dark wing, knocking through Genesis' guard and flinging him away. "Where was that heroic spirit when you twisted them into lesser copies of yourself to die in your name, all so you could beg a forgotten Goddess to save you?"
The malevolent energy shot out of his hand and encased Genesis' whole body within a dark barrier, where a hellish storm churned violently within. It battered, tore, seared, crushed, and assailed the champion of the Goddess with unrelenting fury until it finally ruptured. Genesis plummeted from the sky with a scattering of black feathers as Sephiroth watched until he was abruptly slammed into by a dark comet, its tail blotting the sky with the shadow left in its wake.
"As long as you exist, Lucrecia and this world won't be at peace." Vincent's voice came out in a guttural tone as abyssal tendrils burst from his body and entrapped Sephiroth within them. The Protomateria burned bright in his chest, its light wreathing his wings before flowing into Death Penalty as he took aim. The moment he pulled the trigger, the sky-like domain was wreathed in a violet flare and howling gale.
Its deafening roar and blinding winds robbed the senses of even the avatar of Chaos as it forced him back. He emerged from the nexus of the explosion with his pinions outstretched, only for a sharp pain to burst from his chest. It had been pierced along with the Protomateria by the pinion that stretched out from the center of the blast zone, behind the fragments of solidified light that guttered out from Sephiroth's hand.
A hastily formed Wall spell had been raised to weather the worst of the blast. Even so, his near-immaculate form had been further defaced under the power of entropy distilled as Chaos' full might was brought to bear. The white wings that made up his lower half were wilted and rotten, decaying from the root and mangled where necrosis had begun to settle in.
"If you desire a peaceful rest, then sleep in coffin of stone for all eternity in the center of this dead planet," he said, lips pulling back in pain and rage as the last of his defenses crumbled. Then stone began to overtake the Vincent's body from the wound where the pinion was lodge, fossilizing flesh and living tissue into solid and unyielding stone. He then ripped the pinion loose and allowed Vincent to fall as the Protomateria shattered into countless fragments.
No sooner than Chaos was quelled did an electric inferno erupted where Sephiroth was, a voltaic firestorm born from a throbbing, pulsing sphere of fire and blinding bolt of lightning that struck him from behind. His already battered body began to scorch and peel away under the searing heat and boring tendrils of electricity as they assailed him. He set his furious gaze upon the ones responsible to see the final obstacles standing in his way from breaking free of this prison.
The swordsman was already lunging for him with the Fell Knight, Odin. Their swords were brandished and ready, closing in towards his body. With a roar, he swung his monstrous arm out to intercept them both, batting their blades away while the wind pressure guttered out the flames and electricity had covered him.
A condensed, frigid sphere of ice slammed into him and then erupted into a crystalline blossom as Tifa rushed in with a sphere of flames cradled in her fist, enwrapped within the protective veil of a Wall spell. She slammed the spell into the frozen coffin and a deafening explosion rang as the flames consumed them both until the scorched frame of Sephiroth came flying out. He halted his abrupt velocity and released a shockwave that stripped her of the protective veil before firing a searing, pale beam that would have killed her on the spot.
"Look out!" Cloud shouted as he took point, throwing himself to the front as the Cover Materia shone and bracing his blade to take the hit with it. The beam itself hit like a rushing train, slamming into the blade and making his arms threaten to buckle beneath it until the light of the Limit Break surged from within him. With a roar, he forced the blade forward and shot out a Blade Beam that rushed towards Sephiroth.
Sephiroth swung his demonic pinion out to meet the crescent fang and severed it in half before turning his gaze above as a chill ran through the air. The skies above darkened as a winter storm swirled overhead at the beckoning of the regal queen of ice and cold, her hands raised as her cold gaze was fixed onto him. Countless icicles formed, sharpened and frozen stakes that were easily the length of a sword and meant to skewer their target before the cold spread out until everything had been turned into ice. Then she gestured downwards, sending the myriad of frozen spears rocketing towards him.
He met the barrage with one of his own as he formed the burning ring once more and flung it out. It split into a myriad of searing hoops that met with the icicles, resulting in a cascading eruption of steam as the two opposite elements met. The intense heat and frigid cold left a muggy, scalding blanket to cover a vast swathe of the battlefield.
Shiva moved to conjure more frost only for sapphire light to spear forth from the veil. The beam fired by Sephiroth plowed through her chest, leaving nothing behind. Her entire body shattered like glasswork, countless shards of crystalline ice falling below.
Then the blanket of steam was abruptly scattered as Odin pressed the attack, the Fell Knight's weapon glowing with an ominous light and leaving a tail in its wake as it moved to take off his head. It met with the bladed wing while Sephiroth's fist thrust through the Summoning's chest before he released a Shadow Flare once more. The color of the world inverted as the point-blank spell seemed to pull the light from the surroundings and eclipse the Summoning, before collapsing in on itself with such ferocity that the air around it jolted.
"Sephiroth!" Cloud shouted as he ran back in, the shards of Odin's shattered materia trailing behind him. He swung the Buster Sword down in an arch, only for Sephiroth to avoid it while bringing wing around to cut him down as well. Cloud barely managed to get his blade up in time to block, his arms jostling from the hit before he lashed out again and again, only to be repelled by the monstrous pinion that was as sharp as a blade.
The weapons crossed numerous times, backed by the inhuman strength of the combatants in a furious exchange of blows. But it became clear that Cloud was steadily being overwhelmed as Sephiroth's attacks became more aggressive. Tears in his outfit were followed by bleeding gashes that were widened as every impact caused the bones in his arms to quake from the force.
"Do you really think that you, who rely on the power of others stronger than you, can really match me?" Sephiroth's voice came out cold as he kept slashing away at him, chipping away at his guard to cut at his body in the process. Eventually, he parried a swing from Cloud and attempted to pierce his heart as he has done Vincent. "Know your place."
Cloud narrowly survived by bringing the broadside of the thick sword up to shield himself, the pointed tip instead deflecting off it with a gong-like sound. It still tore through his upper shoulder as it sent him flying backwards, ripping through the muscle and leaving a gash that trailed crimson until he managed to get himself upright as Sephiroth made to blast him with a budding, cerulean beam.
It instead met by a dome of solidified light as Tifa raised a Wall spell, jumping out in front of Cloud before it could harm him. The impact of the ray alone was enough to crack it as she strained to hold it in place until the beam died out. But not even a breath after the attack ended Sephiroth closed the distance and swung his blade-wing around towards her, shattering her defenses into countless shards of solidified light as the reaper's scythe made for her neck...
CLANG!
Sparks bloomed and illuminated her vision as a metallic sound rang out. The sharpened pinion had come short of her neck as the edge was caught on the Buster Sword's own, Cloud's muscles straining to stall it from completing its flesh-rending arch. Just long enough for her to grab the pinion in a death grip and trigger a point-blank Ice 3 and Fire 3 spell nearly simultaneously.
The explosion blew them apart, separating the three as Cloud and Tifa were jettisoned from the billowing smoke born from the combustion of flesh and alien tissue stemming from the blast-zone. Cloud grabbed her as he willed himself stop, cutting their flight short to see that her body had been battered by the proximity to her own spell. "You okay?"
"Better than him," she answered releasing the death grip she had and unfurling her fingers to let a slush of ashes fall free. Remnants of the wing after the ice had frozen in deeply enough to weaken it before the abrupt heat and force followed. Taking a deep breath as the smoke thinned out and revealed that the blast had claimed the majority of Sephiroth's monstrous arm, she got to her feet and cracked her knuckles.
"I've had enough of this farce," Sephiroth said, glaring at them spitefully with his remaining hand raised above his head, in the palm of which was a molten sphere. Cloud let loose a Bolt 3, the blinding serpentine arc of lightning snaking across empty space in order to stop whatever he intended to do. But the writhing trail of electricity unraveled upon entering into the expanding veil of shimmering air as the sphere swelled to the size of a basketball. "Show me your despair and then perish along with the hope of this Planet."
Tongues of fire leapt across the surface of the sphere as if alive and a tremor began to thread the very fabric of reality. That thing he was forming wasn't something as simplistic as a Fire spell, but instead a mesh of lava, gas, and pressure pulled from the memories of Jenova as she crossed the darkness of the cosmos. It was a swelling star that would grow until it reached the point where it could no longer be contained. Then it would rupture with such intensity that it would destroy the sealed space in a single, cataclysmic explosion—a supernova.
The entirety of the sky rumbled with the growing threat. Cloud moved to try to stop him before he could unleash the attack, but the moment he got close to the wall of superheated gas he pulled back as it threatened to burn the very flesh from his bones. Tifa's Fire and Ice spells that followed fell short of the miniature sun that had grown to the size of a building now.
"I won't let... you snuff out the hope of this world..." A voice rang out a moment before red light appeared in front of them. It expanded, taking on the imagery of an intricate crest filled with interconnected shapes and circles.
Cloud recognized the spell that was taking shape and spotted that Genesis Rhapsodos lived, albeit barely. His wing was shredded, his coat was in tattered, crimson streamed from the innumerable gashes torn into his flesh by the maelstrom of chaotic energy that it had been subjected to within the cage of darkness. It was miracle that he even drew breath with injuries as grave as those.
"Even if my life itself burns out, I will..." Despite all of that, rearing back a shaky hand as his blade burned with the very flames of his life to fuel his ultimate attack, he flung the sword as if it was a flaming spear that crossed the space between them. "CREATE A PATH TO A SHINING FUTURE FOR THIS WORLD!"
The flaming blade slamming into the center of the crest was a key opening a lock. The gates of Apocalypse were thrown open and out came a flood of light that washed over the Sephiroth. It choked the flames and smothered the heat in an attempt to blot out the miniature sun, creating a path for them to take to victory.
I believe in you both as well. Do your best.
No sooner than a soft, bell-like voice rang out and they realized whose it was did a surge of energy bubbled up from deep within Cloud and Tifa. The radiance of the Limit Break shrouding them was dyed in a prismatic hue and felt like a gentle embrace compared to the furious energy that was born of desperation and survival. It melted away their aches, pains, and exhaustion as it stitched close the wounds and mended their flesh. The two then shared a single glance with one another and the wordless message carried.
Raising his blade to the sky, Cloud channeled the energy that swelled within him into the blade. The energy swirled as it grabbed the very air around them, churning it into a violent windstorm laced with the prismatic hue. With a shout, he then twisted his body as he swung the blade and unleashed the wrath of a storm forth.
For the first time, Sephiroth screamed as the hurricane force winds barreled through the flood of light and blew out the dimmed sun like a candle as it encased him within a twister. Laced with Aerith's blessing, the swirl of razor-sharp winds sliced into him countless times, alien ichor spraying out from the countless gashes and mixing with the shredded remnants of his rotten feathers.
Next was Tifa's turn as Cloud presented the flat of his blade for her to mount once she'd gathered all of her natural and bequeathed strength into her fist until it crackled with power. The moment she touched down on it, he launched her towards the cage of shredding winds that would have killed anything else caught within it by now. Without hesitation, she barreled through the raging windstorm like a shooting star and drove her fist into Sephiroth's face—unleashing all the compressed energy in a blast so powerful that it scattered the clouds and threatened to shake apart the fabric of the artificial reality they were in as Sephiroth's body disintegrated within the nexus of the blast infused by the power that was Jenova's anathema.
"It looks like you got him," Cloud told her as the light faded and the roar of the wind petered out to a whistle. "It's over."
Tifa didn't respond as she stared at the spot that was now an empty sky until tears trickled down the corners of her eyes. Cloud moved to set a hand on her shoulder, only for her to abruptly turn around and press her forehead against his chest. Then she put her arms around him in a hug.
"It feels hollow, Cloud," she began, her voice coming out hoarse as she hid her eyes. "I knew that killing him wouldn't bring anyone back. I knew that we were doing it so he couldn't hurt anyone else. But even though I finally got rid of him with my own hands... it feels so hollow."
"...Yeah," Cloud agreed, grasping very well what she felt as the world began to unravel around them now that the threat to the Planet had faded away. The years she had spent harboring thoughts of revenge only to finally achieve it didn't give her more than it took. There was no satisfaction in killing him. Not after everything they'd lost. "But we should look ahead now to the future."
She nodded as she pulled away from him and wiped her eyes as the spacious and seemingly endless sky shrank down. The pair found themselves in a cavern that was illuminated with a viridian glow that softly reflected off the damp stone surrounding them. Vincent and Genesis were both present as well, laying on the ground and unmoving.
"Holy will go off now, won't it?" Tifa asked as she looked Vincent over. He was still breathing. Unconscious, but alive. "Now that Sephiroth is gone, I mean."
"It should," Cloud said. "At the very least, we did all we could. The rest is up to the Planet."
Then he turned his attention to Genesis, though he already knew the result even before he made note of the lack of a pulse. It really did cost him his life to buy them a chance to succeed, a fact that was only reinforced when pale-green streamers of light rose from his body and scattered about until the corpse faded from existence. He had been returned to the Planet, just like Kunsel.
"So, you didn't have any regrets, either?" Cloud guessed. If it was Genesis earnest wish to protect this world and atone for his actions in the past, then he was prepared to die for it this time. Even so, Cloud couldn't take any solace in the fact that another peer of Zack's had sacrificed themselves for his sake in the end. He picked up the man's sword with the intention of bringing it back to create a memorial alongside the Buster Sword now that they finally achieved the peace they sought—
I won't be reduced to a mere memory.
—and that was when he felt a sharp, lancing pain shooting through his skull. It was as if he had been stabbed, the agony so strong that he dropped the sword to grab his skull. The clatter of steel on stone was so loud that it that resonated throughout the cavern.
Have you forgotten that you are already a part of me?
Cloud's head snapped back. His world began to blur as he felt an immense pressure pushing against his mind, battering away at his psyche with an intense ambition that he thought had been snuffed out. His physical body had been destroyed, but the echoes of his mind were still there.
It's time for this puppet to be placed back on its strings.
And, with those final words, Sephiroth threw what was left of his existence at Cloud to take over his mind and body alike.
[-oOo-]
Cloud wasn't sure how long he fell from the moment the world faded away. It could have been a few minutes. It could have been hours. Time may not have even mattered as he was pulled down to the depths of a deep darkness, towards Sephiroth as he stood there in his human guise once more and Masamune in his grasp.
Cloud reached behind his back for the Buster Sword and swung it down with the intention of crushing him beneath its weight and edge, only for that long and thin blade to come up and block it with the flat side. Sephiroth then followed through with a smooth sweep and it ended up sending Cloud sailing backwards. No sooner than his feet touched the solidified darkness of the abyss did Sephiroth vanish from view and was replaced with a flash of silver from that notoriously long blade, leaving Cloud to feel a stinging heat from chest.
"And so it has come to this," Sephiroth said, his sword's tip hovering just over the ground as he laxed his hold to watch Cloud stumble back and clutch the gash on his chest. "That I would have to rely on a parasite that leeches on the strength of others to survive is beneath me. But, even if your body isn't perfect, it'll serve until I spread my cells throughout the world once more and make all on this Planet one with me."
"Even if you managed to steal my body, the others would stop you," Cloud said. "They won't let you take the future from the people who live on this world."
"And how will they do that without their precious Ancient?" Sephiroth inquired with a calm voice. "The only real obstacle standing in my way has been removed… all thanks you being so weak, Cloud."
Shouting in defiance of that claim, Cloud charged with the Buster Sword and swung the heavy steel for his head. Yet, Sephiroth's blade moved like flowing water and parried the attempt before whipping around in an arch for his own. Cloud stepped back and was rewarded with a red streak along his cheek as blood trailed down.
"Does it enrage you to know that she perished because of you?" asked the child of Jenova. "That she was just another person who died so that you could get ahead? Just like Zack and Genesis and the other one?"
The words wormed their way into Cloud's chest, gnawing at his heart like vicious poison. He wanted to believe those words to be a lie. But it didn't change the fact that someone else close to Zack, a dear friend, had lost their lives to help him in the final moments of the battle.
"You are a parasite," Sephiroth continued, flicking his wrist to rid the steel of the blood staining it before pointing the tip of the sword towards him. "You feed off the life of others and take their strength for you own. The world I'll create will have no need for a creature like you."
Cloud didn't even have time to refute it as Sephiroth then came in like a hurricane, rushing towards him while sweeping that long sword around and forcing him on his guard. Sparks padded out the darkness as the sword intercepted numerous blows, but every hit felt like a truck slamming into him and rattling his bones. And when he tried to parry to deliver a killing stroke of his own, Sephiroth managed to circle around to Cloud's back to score a bloody gash across it.
It felt like a hot brand running from waist-to-shoulder as it scrapped the bone and spine, an agonizing sensation that Cloud fought through to twist his body in an attempt to cut Sephiroth in half. It still amounted to nothing as Sephiroth slid just out of range of the blade before thrusting his own between Cloud's broad shoulder and chest until it came out the back. "Aghhh!"
"I wonder if the others will make that same expression right before they meet their end?" Sephiroth mused while lifting his hand. Cloud's body began to rise off the ground with the blade wedged inside of him. "A look of despair when someone they thought to be a friend drives a blade through them just like this."
Just like his mother before him, Sephiroth would repeat the tragedies that befell the Cetra using his body. Wearing Cloud's face and name, he would kill the others one-by-one before starting over with his plans to take everything into himself. And this time there wouldn't be anyone who could stop him.
"I won't... let you!" Cloud said, straining to get free of the sword to no avail.
"And how do you propose to stop me?" He flicked the blade up with the last word, a gout of blood left behind as Cloud was thrown into the air. Then his wing burst from his back and he ascended with Masamune at the ready. "You don't even have the strength to save yourself."
Cloud saw the silver flash of the blade and barely managed to block it from coming towards his throat. But with a flick of the wrist the sword came around again and again, cutting into his flesh. Stabbing into it until blood fell like crimson rain with the intent of drawing out his suffering. In desperation, Cloud brought the Buster Sword around with whatever strength he could muster in a cleaving stroke to end it all.
But Masamune came up, ringing as it blocked the slash with a spray of sparks before Sephiroth knocked the sword free of his grip. The heavy blade was sent spiraling off into the darkness. Somewhere far beyond the smidgen of light that that shone down on them.
"You were never worthy of using that sword to begin with," Sephiroth said he booted Cloud straight down, watching as he hit the ground and the unyielding darkness made solid threatened to break him apart on impact. "Entrusting you with Angeal's sword and ideals was a mistake."
"Aa...hhh..." Cloud laid there for a moment, gasping for breath as the warmth fled from his body along with his life. Left within a growing puddle of his own blood, he stared off in the direction where the weapon he had been entrusted with flew off beyond his reach. And a part of him couldn't help but wonder what if Sephiroth had been right all along?
He wanted to take up Zack's ideals. He wanted to protect the world. Yet, all he'd done was take away everything that was once his—Luxiere, Kunsel, Genesis, and now even Aerith. Was he even worthy of using it in the first place?
Come on, don't start doubting yourself now. Even if things look grim, you can't give up.
His breathing stalled as his dying mind registered the voice. How long had it been since he'd heard it? That voice that would talk to him constantly, only to receive no response until the very end. "Z... Zack?"
Remember where you are, Cloud. Sephiroth as he is now only exists within your mind. His body has been destroyed, so his lingering ghost is trying to take yours. If you drive him off now, then that'll be the end of it once and for all.
Even if that was the case, it didn't change the fact that the gap between them was too large. Time and again Sephiroth was only driven back because he worked with the others. Crimson, Aerith, Tifa, and the others only managed to prevail as a united front against the strongest SOLDIER in history. But here he was alone.
There's nothing wrong with borrowing the strength of others to do what you can't. And you aren't alone. Remember why you fight, Cloud. Let that be your strength.
The prompt stirred the memories that were crystal clear here, within the depths of his mind. Memories of his friends as they fought to survive and make a difference. The moments of peace, the moments of resolve, the moments of joy—even if they were few and far between, they still existed and were precious in their own way.
And then there was Crimson...
I want you to be happy. He recalled those words he told her their final night together. She was someone he wanted to protect. Someone he wanted to be happy no matter what. If he died here then he was sure that, even if it took years and she shed tears for him, she would eventually smile again.
But, if he lost control of his body, Sephiroth would commit atrocities in his name to fulfill his goal. The hard work she put into having a second chance in life would be squandered. The bonds and friends they made severed. Every sacrifice and hardship she faced for that bright and shining future where there were no more orphans turned into soldiers would be wasted...
Cloud found the strength to prop up his broken and bleeding body, forcing himself to his feet. The pain where that elongated blade had pierced him time and again made him feel agony with every breath as he exerted his will to stand up. But, in spite of it all, he took a deep breath and forced himself to rise up rather than fade away on his back as the one-winged angel of death swooped in to deliver the killing blow—
CLANG!
—only for the scraping of steel-against-steel to ring throughout the darkness with a radiant bloom of sparks as it met with the Buster Sword. The heavy, massive slab of metal was being held up to intercept the curved sword with a single arm by Cloud, recalled from the recesses of the darkness. He then swung it out to repel Sephiroth.
"I won't let you win," Cloud said, meeting Sephiroth's gaze as the torn flesh and muscle began to knit close while the burning pain was replaced with a soothing chill. His racing blood and pounding heart slowed as a calm resolve set into place and he took up a fighting stance as renewed vigor gave rise to a surge of energy that overflowed from his body. "Because the future you'll create will end with just you."
"Such confidence now," Sephiroth said while lowering himself to the ground, a hint of amusement in his tone at the sudden shift in attitude from a once dying man. Then he stood at the ready, his blade pointed at Cloud's throat as their eyes locked. "But let's see if you can actually manage that, Cloud."
Neither wavered, both their gaze and blades steady as they took in the measure of their foe. Then, in the next moment, the space between them was crossed faster than the human eye could track. The elite of SOLDIER went on the attack with gale-like swings of Masamune sweeping out to cut into Cloud's flesh once more.
Yet they were met each and every time by the heavy bulwark that was the Buster Sword until Cloud saw a horizontal sweep coming. He gathered the energy that threaded his body into his sword as he somersaulted over the swing for a counterattack. Using the bolstered momentum, he brought it down in a heavy swing that could crush stone and rend steel—Braver.
Sephiroth slid back, avoiding the downward sweep of the blade as his arm came around to ultimately reap Cloud's head from his shoulders. But it was parried, the edge of the Buster Sword deflecting it as the light continued to flood into the blade. Cloud quickly chambered and swung it even faster than before, forcing him to retreat hastily as three slashes came out nearly as one, meant to sever the arms and legs—Cross Slash.
Before he could go on the attack again, Cloud pivoted into a fourth swing and let the light run free. A surging wave of energy that illuminated the dark shot forth; a crescent fang of power meant to cleave the space between the two—Blade Beam.
It forced the one-winged angel to take flight to escape, but Cloud rocketed from the ground to the sky as the light radiating off the Buster Sword left a tail in its wake as he closed the distance—Climhazzard.
Masamune swept out to block it, only for the sheer impact to knock through his guard. It sent him into an out of control spiral as Cloud continued to ascend and left Sephiroth looking up at him with a subdued fury at the turning tables. "Who did you steal strength from this time?"
"You wouldn't understand even if I told you," Cloud said, still above him as six meteors appeared in the air above him. With a gesture the meteors began to fall towards Sephiroth, burning stone choking the air with heat and smoke as they prepared to crush him—Meteorain.
"I suppose it doesn't matter." Sephiroth's wing tensed before he launched himself towards the attack, refusing to give ground a second time. The long, thin blade swept out in graceful arcs as it cut through the flaming stones that hindered his approach, clearing his path towards Cloud. "It still won't be enough."
"We'll see about that!" Cloud shouted in defiance even as he churned the wind once more and created a rampaging twister of razor-sharp gales that rushed towards the Sephiroth—Finishing Touch. But Sephiroth fought against the very winds as they slashed away at him, forcing himself through the eye and wall of the storm to attack Cloud once more.
Bracing the Buster Sword as the light wreathing him built up into a climax within it, Cloud met him head-on in the final clash as their blades crossed one another in a series of blows. At first it seemed like Sephiroth would win over him as the first seven exchanges had him manage to perfectly ward off Cloud's attack. But he pushed harder and faster, leaving Masamune to warp and bend under the stress of the blows until the fourteenth exchange shattered the long blade, leaving shards loitering in the air.
Time seemingly froze as Sephiroth's expression shifted ever so slightly when Cloud pulled back for the final stroke of the Buster Sword while he was defenseless. Without hesitation or mercy, the fifteenth stroke was delivered. Cloud slashed through his body from shoulder to hip in a single stroke, tearing clean through it. "It ends here!"
There was no blood. No broken bone or scattered viscera as the blade finished its killing stroke. Instead, there was only emptiness where it had plowed through as the last fragment of Sephiroth began to fall apart, scattering into dust and eroding away.
"From now on, Jenova and you will only exist as a bad memory and nothing more," Cloud said, turning his back as the last vestiges turned to dust and disappeared. "The world move forward into peace."
Just like that Sephiroth disappeared from Cloud's mind and the darkness that was around him began to shift as a gentle light bubbled in from beneath his feet. It spread out, painting the world around him a soft hue of shifting colors and a gentle pressure. It felt almost like he was underwater, with the sun shining down from above and creating a soothing atmosphere where all tension melted away.
"Told you he had it handled." Zack's voice roused his mind from the allure of the gentleness that he found himself swaddled in. It was ethereal. Almost as if he was so close and yet so far. "All he needed was a few words to point him in the right direction."
"I never doubted you," a soft, pleasant voice accompanied Zack's own. Aerith. "I'll help you get back to where the others are waiting for you. Tell them that I'll be looking forward to the future you all will create."
Even as he then began to feel himself floating away, he managed to turn behind him to see the two of them there. Aerith stood next to Zack with a gentle smile on her face while the other looked proud. Then light swallowed his vision once more as he felt his body being carried away as Holy swept out to blanket the world…