Final Fantasy 7: the Final Pledge is a fanfiction, yet its story is completely different from whatever you have played/watched/read. For those who have no idea what this is all about, I thought I can add a short history of whatever has happened and a definition of what some terms mean.
The back story:
Thousands of years ago in PLANET, a calamity attacked from space and killed many people, especially Cetra. Cetra, or ancients, were the people who could communicate with PLANET and use its Mako energy to produce materia, which had different abilities such as healing people or summoning things. There was one of a kind black materia which could summon a meteor and a white materia which could summon ultimate white magic, Holy. The planet managed to defeat the calamity and buried it.
Many years later, humans found the body of the calamity, thinking she was a Cetra. By the time the number of Catra had been decreased and the humans had only heard of them in the legends. Thinking the calamity was a holy creature, they called her Jenova and decided to use her cells for different experiments. The result of these experiments were monsters and weird creations. But the most successful experiment was done on an infant. The infant, named Sephiroth, grew up not knowing how he was created. He was a war hero and a man everyone looked up to.
In one of his missions in the village Nibelheim, Sephiroth who was travelling with SOLDIER 1st class Zack Fair and a Shinra Force, Cloud Strife, found out about the horrible experiment he was med of. His existence filled with rage and vengeance. He put the village on fire and killed many, including Cloud's mother and his best friend, Tifa's father.
{Side note: SOLDIERs were a group of soldiers working for Shinra Electric Corporation which its job was making peace and people's safety. All SOLDIERs had blue eyes, the result of the Mako bath and Jenova cells in their bodies. Forces were subordinates of SOLDIERS.}
Once he goes berserk, Zack tries to stop him when Sephiroth was going to where they kept Jenova to meet his mother [Jenova's body]. But Zack got injured. Sephiroth gets his hands on Jenova's head and cut it because he cannot carry the whole body. while he is talking to his mother, Cloud, who was their subordinate and Zack's friend, attacked Sephiroth, and even though he was injured badly, he managed to defeat Sephiroth by throwing him in the lifestream, thinking he was dead.
When the scientists found Zack and Cloud's body they decided to do some experiments on them, which was the mako bath, putting mako and Jenova cells in their bodies. Zack was already carrying Mako and Jenova cells as he was a SOLDIER, but Cloud rejected the cells and was called a failed experiment. After a while, Zack manages to run away, taking the weakened unconscious Cloud with him. On the way to Midgar, Shira forces who were looking for them attack them. Zack is killed, after protecting Cloud and killing them all. Before his death, Cloud finds him and Zack gives him the Buster Sword with his dreams and honours, saying Cloud is his living legacy. (you can watch his death scene in youtube, such a fantastic cutscene of the game)
The death of Zack after all he has been through causes Cloud a mental break down where he thinks he was Zack and mixes their memories. He has no idea Zack once existed and calls himself a 1st class SOLDIER.
Shinra Electric Corporation uses lifestream to provide energy for the people in Midgar. lifestream, or Mako, is a source of energy from the PLANET which gives life to everything. An eco-terrorist group, AVALANCH, decides to destroy the mako reactors of Shinra in order to stop the company from sucking up the lifestream. Tifa, Cloud's childhood friend, who is a part of this group, convinces Cloud to join them. Cloud who is now calling himself an ex-SOLDIER, accepts only if he is paid as he is not interested in the planet at the beginning.
After fighting with one of the robots Shinra sends them in to kill them, Cloud falls down to the slums underneath the reactor and meets with Aerith, who was once the love of Zack. This is the first time they have met, but Cloud feels love towards her because of the memories of Zack he is carrying (still lots of debates about it!). Aerith is said to be the last Cetra and has specific powers especially to communicate with the planet. Shinra scientists are looking for her to use her powers. But once they get her, Cloud and his friends manage to save her. At the end of this mission, Shinra, the director of Shinra, is killed by Sephiroth and Rufus, his son, takes over the company.
Because Cloud carries Jenova cells, Sephiroth communicates with him through visions. At some point, he becomes too powerful that he controls Cloud's actions. He takes Cloud to the Temple of the Ancients where the only black materia is kept and the only way to take it is to destroy the temple. To prevent Sephiroth from getting it, the party gets the Black materia first, but Sephiroth forces Cloud to hand him the materia, which helps him to summon the meteor.
To stop the meteor, only the white materia can help, which Aerith is carrying in her hair. She goes to the Forgotten City, once the capital of Cetras, to pray for Holy and summon it. Sephiroth forces Cloud to kill her, but he is knocked out by his friends but before Aerith is done, Sephiroth finds and kills her.
After so many struggles, using Holy that Aerith summoned and diamond weapon which caused the explosion in Shinra, the planet uses its lifestream to stop the meteor from destroying the it. Sephiroth once again is assumed dead.
two years later, a new disease called Geo-stigma is an epidemic which is the result of the planet using its lifestream. It is a black scar on the skin which can hurt and might cause death.
Three remnants of Sephiroth are following Cloud calling him brother, and are looking for the remain pieces of Jenova (Sephiroth used her body pieces to make monsters and attacked Cloud and his party before, so basically nothing much is left.) The boss of the remnants, Kadaj, whose past is unknown in the story, is also in contact with the injured Rufus who is covering himself and is sitting on a wheelchair after the explosion.
During this time, Cloud has many visions from Aerith who is in the lifestream. Cloud is feeling guilty for what happened in the past and Aerith is trying to comfort him and guide him. Aerith also uses her powers to send a healing rain which can fix everything, including the Geo-stigma.
When Rufus shows that he is carrying the remains of the Jenova with himself, Kadaj manages to get a hold of it and uses that to go through reunion, bringing Sephiroth back. Cloud fights with Sephiroth again and gets injured awfully. But after a vision he has from Zack, he continues the battle. After he defeats him, Sephiroth says, "I will never be a memory," in response to Cloud who tells him to "stay where he belongs, in his memories."
{The scene of Cloud having a tack with Zack is in Advent Children Complete. If you haven's seen it yet, book two hours of your time. it has 30 minutes more scene than the 2005 original one and better graphic quality.}
The terms in the story:
Turks: a group of people who work for Rufus. they are not officially a part of Shinra forces but they do "what other people don't want to do".
Fenrir: Cloud's huge motorcycle which has a place for Cloud's sword pieces.
fusion sword: Clous's sword in The last animation of FFVII- the advent children, which is made of 7 pieces and most of the pieces can be used as a separate weapon too as they have a handle. Cloud keeps the pieces in Fenrir.
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The story is really complicated so I tried to summarise it. hope it helps you to understand the story better!
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Final Fantasy VII : The Final Pledge
Fanfiction3 years have passed since the last time I battled Sephiroth. life after that has not been the perfect but calmer, knowing that he will never come back. But recently, I have started having nightmares and hearing his voice again. At first, I wanted to...
