Of all the 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Final Fantasy villains to exist, 🦹Sephiroth is up there as one oཧf the most iconic, though simultaneously far from the most evil (in intent, at least). He is a character that has become the face of the franchise just as much as any of its heroes. He is inseparable from the story of Final Fantasy 7, and Cloud as its protagonist.

Yet if you've spent any time with the Final Fantasy series, you'll know that, somehow, we still don't know Sephiroth, and he has taken on quite an intriguing personality as a result. He's as much formed by what's said in the games as what people in reality perceive him to be. So let's break down exactly who the games say Sephiroth is.

Sephiroth And His Association With Jenova

The entire basis of Sephiroth as a character is framed around his connection with Jenova, and his supposed Cetra ꦑheritage. It is a birthright thrust upon him, and one he feels he must act upon for the better of his extinguished people. As much is said to the player in the original Final Fantasy 7 - The 🌊Cetra have gone extinct, and it is entirely possible Humans were the ones who did it.

A natural disaster caused by a meteor, such as that seen in the North Crater is also possible, but Sephiroth's motives go deeper. Shinra is clearly trying to take advantage of Jenova, his mother, and the supposedly only known ancient Cetra, to advance their own greedy goals. Goals he associates with Humanity as a whole due to their complacency. So he chooses to wipe them out entirely.

Except Jenova, and Sephiroth by extension, is no Cetra at all.

Hidden away in the Icicle Inn, where Professor Gast of Shinra fled to, was research with an actual, living Cetra - Ifalna, the mother of Aerith. Through Ifalna, Gast learned that Jenova was an alien lifeform, a parasite that sought to wipe out all life that it encountered and could take the appearance of others to lure them into a false sense of security.🐎 Shinra had no awareness of this as Gast feared the experimentation that would be enacted on Ifalna. In their corporate eyes, Jenova truly was a Cetra.

Thus, Sephiroth's very existence becomes paradoxical. He seeks to enact vengeance against Shinra, and Humanity as a whole, for the extermination of the Cetra, his believed ancestors. Yet through Shinra's own folly, Sephiroth acts out the original will of Jenova - to wipe out all life on the planet of Gaia. It is impossible to know how much of Sephiroth's actions are even his own or pushed by Jenova itself.

With the Remake continuity seemingly featuring a Sephiroth much more aware of his own parallel existences, it remains to be seen how much even he is aware of Jenova's influence over him.

Sephiroth's Life With SOLDIER

Raised from birth as the property of Shinra, Sephiroth was enlisted in SOLDIER from a young age. Spliced with Jenova genes while still in the womb, he was trained as a super soldier, the perfect candidate for Shinra's global expansionism. Told only that his mother was Jenova and that she died at birth, he had no parental figures but Professor Hojo to guide him, and so SOLDIER became the only family he knew.

Made explicitly clear in Dirge of Cerberus and heavily alluded to in the original game, Sephiroth is the biological child of Lucrecia Crescent and Professor Hojo, though C༺rescent disappeared after never being allowed to see her s🅘on.

As shown in Ever Crisis, Sephiroth rose quickly through the ranks of SOLDIER, but never quite felt like he fit. He longed for a more permanent family, one that loved him. Instead, his fellows in SOLDIER were doomed to eventually be disposed of by Shinra as soon as they outlived their usefulness. Years went by like this, unlike the routine became his life, and Sephiroth became the poster boy of SOLDIER.

Over time, he became close friends with fellow SOLDIERS Angeal and Genesis, though even this would be short-lived. Angeal and Genesis both were born of experiments like Sephiro꧙th, though through more dilut꧃ed means. We see all of this come to a head in Crisis Core, where Genesis learns of his own experimentation and strives to destroy Shinra for it, only to be thwarted by both Sephiroth and Angeal.

Genesis is played by and 🦄modeled after famed musician GACKT in Japanese, and humorously is still a character with unanswered questions in the greater plot.

None of this is before Genesis appears to Sephiroth during an investigation of the Nibelheim Reactor. After seeing Hojo's failed experiments and the body of Jenova, the woman he believed to be his mother, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Genesis confirmed his fears - Sephiroth, like he and Angeal, are just experiments created to serveꩲ. Furious and confused, Sephiroth stormed to the Nibelheim ღManor to discover more.

From here, most of us know the tale. 'Discovering' that Jenova was a Cetra and he was lied to his whole existence, Sephiroth went mad. He burned down Nibelheim, swore to destroy Humanity, and was promptly killed by Cloud Strife, a random low-rank SOLDIER assigned to the Nibelheim mission. With this, Sephiroth's corporeal life ended.

Sephiroth, His Clones, And Shinra Experimentation

For Sephiroth, a corporeal body only meant so much. He was injected directly with the cells of Jenova, and as such could manifest many of her powers. Dropped into the Lifestream after his death, his body was dissolved but his soul was rejected - the Jenova cells were not accepted by the Lifestream. He remained conscious,🌃 able to feel the memories of all in the Lifestream while retaining his own. His plan could still be fulfilled.

A core element of Jenova's cellular structure is its ability to reconvene. The cells strive to be part of a singular whole. Through this, Sephiroth could sense the presence of all others with Jenova cells, but also enact a degree of control over them as well. After the events at Nibelheim, Hojo enacted a new project - Reunion. H♕e inj𓆏ected Jenova cells into people to test if all cells do indeed try to recombine and if this would result in the rebirth of Sephiroth.

Most of those injected with Jenova's cells were survivors of Nibelheim, ex-SOLDIERS, and others that wouldn't be missed from society. A major exception was Cloud Strife. Though experimented on by Hojo after Nibelhiem, he escaped with the help of Zack Fair and eventually subsumed Zack's whole existence as his own after the latter's death. Still a functioning human but with Jenova cells, Cloud began to follow Sephiroth to the North Crater.

In this way, Sephiroth was able to manifest in reality. Through exerting his, and by extension Jenova's, will he could directly control the Sephiroth-Clones. He used this to kill President Shinra and steal the head of Jenova from Shinra HQ. All those times that Cloud thinks he sees Sephiroth, he is really just seeing the will of Sephiroth exerted. Like a nightmare made real.

Why Is Sephiroth Obsessed With Cloud?

This then all leads to how Sephiroth is generally perceived. At large, he and Cloud are seen as inseparable, two sides of the same coin. The dark to Cloud's light, his subconscious versus his reality. In truth, the only thing the pair share is Jenova's cells. So why then are the two drawn to each other?

It's actually quite one-sided. We see the story through Cloud's eyes, someone who is already an exceedingly unreliable narrator. He has taken the memories of Zack Fair as his own due to PTSD, and is now chasing Sephiroth as a form of vengeance. Yet mixed with what he's actually aware of (believing himself to be Zack Fair), why would he want vengeance against Sephiroth?

Ultimately, it might not be his own choice. Though still completely aware of himself and functioning as a person, he is still injected with Jenova cells. Though motivation may have come over time, his reasoning for following Sephiroth began simply. He has Jenova cells, and those cells seek to reunite with the whole. In that regard, Cloud is no different from all the other Sephiroth-Clones. His lucidity is all that sets him apart.

For Sephiroth, however, it comes across significantly more maliciously. Cloud is more of an active threat than other clones, but in reality, 168澳洲🍬幸运5开奖网:Aerith is the one he really needs to look꧙ out for, and indeed does. How he views Cloud is more akin to how a cat views a mouse. There is an end goal here, the cat wants to eat the mouse. But what harm isꦏ there in playing first? No other Clone has a mind left to think. Cloud is like a toy to him.

When looking at the Remake continuity, Sephiroth's obsession with Cloud takes on new meaning. If he is aware that Cloud ultimately has the power to beat him, will he seek to make friends with him, or dissuade him from pursuing him altogether?