Chapter 859 - 858: A Tragedy Staged to Force the Villain's Hand."

Observing together with the others how the colossal body of the Whispering Harbinger was gradually crumbling, turning into myriads of green fireflies of the Lifestream that scattered throughout the space, Alex decided to mentally discard regrets about the fact that this boss fight had turned out far less epic than he had initially expected.

In the end, he had not even received the opportunity to properly test the brand-new, still untested Red Materia that he had received from Rufus as payment for his small services—but right now even that seemed secondary.

A far stronger question occupied him: what exactly did the farewell gesture of the Harbinger mean when, right before its destruction, it had pointed a finger straight at him? Thoughtfully running a finger along his chin, Alex arrived at a rather absurd at first glance assumption—this gesture had been a direct warning.

Logic suggested that the only reason for such a warning could be the following: if the immutable original Canon fell, then Sephira would automatically free herself from the chains of Fate that had bound her, gaining absolute, unlimited freedom.

At first Alex considered this thought complete nonsense. And he could not help thinking about what holy Canon could even be spoken of when Jenova was brazenly parasitizing on the body of this world, who by her essence was yet another "avatar of Nyan-Nyan"?

Even now, when her true mind and essence were reliably sealed and she herself was incapable of acting directly, her deep roots launched into the Lifestream continued to remain mindless, voracious monsters whose sole goal was to greedily suck the blood of the planet like gigantic leeches.

Continuing to absentmindedly stroke his chin and not taking his eyes from the crumbling ashes of the defeated Harbinger, Alex suddenly froze. At that very moment it was as if he had been burned from the inside: the true, hidden-from-all understanding of exactly what grandiose goal Sephira had actually been striving for finally dawned on him.

As if the missing elements of the most complex mosaic had fallen into place, in a single instant giving exhaustive answers to absolutely all the questions that had given him no peace throughout this entire insane week of stay in this world.

"So that's what it is… What an entertaining picture is actually taking shape here. This turned out far more interesting than I could have imagined at all," Alex muttered with a cheerful predatory spark in his eyes, immediately covering his mouth with his palm so that none of those around would notice the sharp teeth that had flashed for a moment.

Barely restraining the laughter ready to burst out, Alex mentally admitted that the true plan of Sephira had turned out not to be a banal villainous undertaking at all—everything had turned out far more interesting than he could have imagined. Of particular interest was the question of why Sephira had suddenly turned into such a bitch precisely in this timeline, which stood out at least in that both she and Claudia were girls here.

Moreover, Claudia had not a single cell of Jenova inside her, and all her sufferings boiled down only to painful attacks of emerging blocked memories and the obsessive images that the Lifestream stubbornly continued to send her.

Still covering with his palm the broad smile distorted by a cunning grin, Alex thoughtfully shifted his gaze to Claudia, who was standing with all the others and observing the final dissipation of the Harbinger. And the moment he turned his head, he immediately met eyes with Dean, who gave him a rarely dry, expressive glance. Slightly nodding with his chin, Dean mentally inquired what the reason for such a creepy facial expression was this time.

Catching this mental question, Alex likewise mentally answered that he had just understood something exclusively entertaining. At these words Dean's eyebrows slightly crawled upward: he perfectly understood that if Alex was smiling in such a way, it meant only one thing—the real problem had turned out to be times more unpleasant and larger-scale than the recent discovery that ancient Jenova was in fact yet another "avatar of Nyan-Nyan."

Noticing the genuine interest in Dean's gaze that demanded immediate details, Alex was already opening his mouth to share his guess when a new strange crack sliced through the space around them. Sharply turning their heads back to the epicenter, Alex and Dean saw that practically nothing remained of the Harbinger's body—only pitiful fragments of black chest armor and a colossal, blindingly shining purple crystal in the very center, from which thick electric discharges continuously struck in all directions. And a moment later the last scraps of the Harbinger finally dissolved into the green fog of the Lifestream, leaving only this sinister purple crystal floating in the empty sky, surrounded by dancing lightning.

"And this is supposed to be everything? Only why the hell hasn't anything around changed? We're still stuck in this damned hole," Barrett said with a dissatisfied grimace, suspiciously looking around and examining the same surreal locality and the newly formed platform of debris on which they had all crowded.

"Maybe it's still about this strange crystal?" Tifa said thoughtfully, stretching out her hand and pointing a finger at the pulsing purple crystal hovering in the very heart of the dead dimension.

"I propose we just take and knock this thing down! It sparkles so suspiciously, especially all these horrible lightnings… What if it blows up if we don't do anything right now?" Yuffie proposed with unconcealed excitement, with cheerful whistling spinning her gigantic throwing shuriken above her head.

"Seriously? And by exactly what method are you going to do that? And most importantly, what makes you think that something like that is destroyed by a couple of hits?" Claudia drawled slowly, heavily rolling her eyes, turning to Yuffie and giving her an extremely dry, skeptical gaze.

"Claudia is right. This crystal is clearly not one of those things that break from a simple blow…" Red began with a frowning look, raising his muzzle and evaluatingly examining the anomaly floating in the center of the dimension.

"Yes-yes, of course, as you say, Red. Right now we'll just check whether that's really the case," Alex tossed out with a carefree grin, lazily bending down and picking up a hefty brick from the concrete floor.

"Do I need to help you with this problem?" Aerith inquired, tilting her head to the side and looking at Alex with curiosity.

"Make me that acceleration thing… Well, you understood perfectly," Alex tossed out mysteriously, winking and expressively wiggling his fingers in the air, pointing with his chin straight at the crystal hovering in the sky.

Catching Alex's thought on the fly, Aerith nodded encouragingly and gracefully swung her magic staff. And following this motion an neat white magic circle appeared right above them, which in the current situation looked exactly like a shooting-range target. Intrigued by exactly what Alex had planned at that moment and why he needed Aerith's support, all the members of the group silently stared at him, holding their breath in expectation of further actions.

Alex tossed the heavy brick a couple of times in his hand, narrowed his eyes aiming at the very center of the white magic circle, and took a wide step back, preparing for the throw. Briefly smiling at his thoughts, he sharply leaned his body forward and hurled the brick straight into the center of the magic target. The moment the projectile touched the plane of the circle, it lit up with a blinding flash, and in the next second the brick shot out of it with such monstrous speed that a bright-white glowing trail of red-hot air remained behind it.

Everyone watched enchanted as the brick at extreme, cannon-like speed raced toward the purple crystal floating high above—and slammed with full force into its smooth surface. For several seconds absolutely nothing happened. Barrett already snorted skeptically, preparing to declare that for such machinations it was worth using something far more weighty and explosive than construction debris.

But before Barrett managed to propose his signature idea of shooting the crystal from a gun, a dry, unpleasant sound of cracked thick glass sliced through the space. And immediately a dense network of deep cracks ran across the ideal facets of the purple crystal, from which with a whistle the already familiar multicolored rays of pure energy began to strike.

"Um… Did you really succeed? The crystal isn't about to shatter into small fragments right now, is it?" Tifa asked with anxiety in her voice, turning to Alex and for a second interlacing her fingers with his.

"Yes, everything worked perfectly. Only…" Alex answered, coughing with slight embarrassment, automatically squeezing Tifa's fingers a little tighter in response.

"Only—what exactly? What next brilliant detail did you manage to hide again?" Claudia immediately narrowed her eyes and sharply tossed out, giving Alex a burning, irritated gaze.

"Well… Honestly, I have no idea what will happen in the next moment," Alex said innocently shrugging his shoulders, at which Tifa reflexively clutched his hand even tighter.

"In the sense—you, damn it, don't know?! Then what the hell did you even do that for, you idiot?!" Barrett roared, barely restraining himself from strangling the brazen guy with his own hands, to which Alex only carelessly repeated his gesture.

"You're just a walking disaster…" Dean groaned, mentally giving himself a facepalm and with obvious pleasure examining Alex's back for where it would be more convenient to deliver a crushing kick.

Maintaining an absolutely imperturbable facial expression, Alex continued to silently observe the purple crystal whose surface was covering with ever deeper networks of cracks, threatening to shatter into small fragments at any second. He could, of course, declare right now that all his previous words had been merely a stupid joke, but spoiling the upcoming moment—when this artificial dimension would finally shed the imposed shell and return to its original appearance—he did not want at all.

In the end, this distorted space had taken on the appearance of mirrored Midgar exclusively because two neighboring timelines had practically touched each other at this point, and the crystal core inside the Whispering Harbinger had acted as a most powerful stabilizer supporting this mirror dimension. And in the next moment from the cracking crystal a whole storm of multicolored rays poured out with a terrible whistle, which scattered in all directions with such force as if they had finally gained the long-awaited freedom.

The whistle grew into a deafening hum, and then the first explosion thundered, generating a powerful white shockwave—from its blinding radiance everyone except the carelessly standing Alex and Dean had to instinctively close their eyes. They had not managed to properly come to their senses when a second, far more powerful explosion rang out, in the epicenter of which the purple crystal finally cracked and disappeared. Together with its death a blinding pure wave of bright-white light poured in all directions, for a moment plunging everything around into absolute whiteness and forcing everyone to confusedly cover their eyes with their hands.

When the blinding flash finally faded and they were able one after another to open their eyes wide, a completely different picture appeared before them. No ruins, no purple fog and fragments of asphalt—they found themselves in the middle of a place that had come off the pages of some fairy tale. Around them stretched a boundless, mirror-quiet lake, lonely white clouds floated unhurriedly in the sky, and above the very surface of the water green fireflies circled serenely.

The very atmosphere of this strange expanse radiated such deep, all-consuming peace that it contrasted with the nightmare they had just experienced to the point of complete surrealism. Confusedly looking around, each tried to comprehend exactly where they had been carried and what this reserved corner was.

"Hey… Where are we even located right now?" Claudia inquired puzzled, sharply turning to Alex and Aerith in the hope of hearing at least some explanation.

"Honestly? No idea," Alex answered, spreading his arms to the sides and smiling guiltily, while Aerith only silently shook her head, sharing their common bewilderment.

"What worries me right now is not the geography of this resort at all, but by exactly what method we're supposed to get out of here now," Barrett grumbled, frowning and suspiciously examining the boundless surface of water stretching somewhere to the distant horizon.

"Actually getting out of here is simpler than simple… Cough… Whoa, and this was already truly unexpected," Alex had begun the phrase cheerfully and was already raising an index finger upward when he suddenly sharply cut himself off, and his voice suddenly broke off mid-word.

The moment Alex's voice sharply broke off, everyone instantly stopped looking around, instinctively raising their gazes in his direction. And in that same second the blood froze in the veins of each of them, and their eyes widened from primordial shock and sticky horror. Straight from Alex's chest a long, sinisterly gleaming blade of Masamune was sticking out with full force, and behind him Sephira silently towered, her face adorned with a painfully familiar, soul-chilling smile. From this horrible picture time for the group seemed to stop.

Aerith's legs instantly gave way, and she collapsed right onto her knees, unable to support her own weight. From her wide-open eyes a stream of tears poured, and her mouth silently opened and closed, trying to push out a cry of despair. Standing nearby, Tifa stepped back in fright, convulsively clutching the fabric on her chest with her fingers as if trying to calm her own broken heart. Claudia almost dropped the massive Buster Sword—her fingers trembled so much that the hilt slipped in her palm.

Yuffie in horror covered her mouth with both hands, letting out only a dull, suppressed sob, and the stern Barrett went numb, completely falling into a stupor before the face of the sudden catastrophe. Only Dean stood with a gloomily frowning face. He knew perfectly well that killing Alex with something like that was a task from the realm of fantasy; he was worried about something completely different.

Only one thing gave him no peace: exactly what insane adventure Alex had planned this time and what this staged drama had been for. Carelessly leaning against Alex's back, Sephira cast a long, contemptuous glance over the frozen group, slowly strengthening her grip on the hilt of the katana.

"His meaningless death so easily broke you… How pitiful and insignificant you all look right now," Sephira spoke with icy, haughty superiority, twisting the blade even deeper in Alex's chest.

"You'll answer for all of this, Sephira! Do you hear me?!" Claudia cried hysterically, convulsively gripping the Buster Sword with both hands and taking a step forward.

"You've already spoken these words, Claudia… Remember? Exactly five years ago, when you lost absolutely everything. That day you screamed exactly the same. But look: here we are again, and you're once more helplessly watching the death of the one who was dear to you," Sephira parried with frightening calm, looking at Claudia as if they were old, good acquaintances.

"I'll tear your head off with my own hand, you vile bitch! And don't even dare hope to leave here alive!" Barrett snarled, spewing curses, with a horrible metallic crunch clenching the fist of his cybernetic arm.

"Leave? Escape? Why would I run anywhere when I've already received exactly what I needed?.. And to be honest, without your help I wouldn't have managed," Sephira tossed out mockingly, with sadistic pleasure immersing Masamune even deeper.

"Run… Fools…" Alex exhaled hoarsely, with both hands convulsively clutching the red-hot steel blade of the katana.

"NO! ALEX!" Aerith cried frenziedly, on the verge of breaking, convulsively stretching a trembling hand in his direction.

Observing Aerith howling in despair, the cold smile on Sephira's face became even wider. This was exactly what she had been striving for all this time—to break the last Cetra not only physically but spiritually, suppressing her will so much that even after death she would not be able to stand in her way. Seeing how the once-bright eyes of Aerith finally dimmed, Sephira triumphed: it remained only to finally finish off Claudia, who, despite a breakdown bordering on madness, still convulsively squeezed the Buster Sword in her hands, exactly as on that cursed day five years ago.

She understood: one more effort—and everyone who could threaten her plans would break. At the same time Dean, experiencing dull irritation from what was happening, mentally cursed Alex for this cheap, brazen farce. He knew perfectly well that the Alex impaled on the blade of Masamune was merely yet another artificial clone, and this entire theater had been staged only in order to lure Sephira into open space.

Deciding not to play along with this circus, Dean vowed to himself not to intervene under any circumstances: after all, he was certain that for such cynical tricks Alex upon return was guaranteed a total, unforgettable thrashing from the female half of the group.

Even the clone himself, quietly standing with the blade in his chest, at that moment mentally cursed the day of his creation. He desperately did not like the prospect of answering for the consequences of this dubious performance. Realizing that delaying further was impossible, the real Alex hiding nearby, silently summoning Yamato into his free hand, stepped toward Sephira, preparing to make his move.

"It's time to finish with this. It was unexpectedly pleasant dealing with you, Opponent of Fate. As a sign of sincere gratitude for your invaluable help… I promise to kill you quickly and painlessly," Sephira spoke with chilling pathos, proprietarily lowering her palm onto the shoulder of the double.

"Don't you dare!" Tifa cried desperately, with tears in her eyes tearing off from the spot in order to rush at Sephira, from which her victorious smile became even more predatory.

"You're slightly mistaken here… Sin by definition cannot finally die. But in one thing you're still right: it's time to wrap this up. Personally, you know, I'm thoroughly sick of playing the role of a hanger for this piece of iron. Am I right, Boss?" Slot said with a lazy, mocking grin, suddenly more tightly squeezing the blade of Masamune sticking out of his chest and turning his head to the stunned Sephira.

"Absolutely. Besides, it's clearly not you they'll thrash afterward," the dry, devoid of any fear voice of the real Alex rang out in absolute silence right behind Sephira's back.

The moment the second voice of Alex echoed over the surface of the lake, Tifa and Claudia who had rushed to help instantly froze mid-step. Even the crying Aerith and Yuffie widely opened their eyes, amazed looking at how the wounded Alex, who a second ago had been hanging by a thread from death with a blade in his chest, was now completely carelessly squeezing the sharpest blade with two fingers. Barrett was completely lost, finally ceasing to understand the logic of the ongoing circus. Only Red surprisingly twitched his wet nose, clearly catching in the air a second, exactly identical smell of Alex—as if the latter managed to be in two places simultaneously.

Feeling the approaching icy anxiety, Sephira tried to yank Masamune out of the chest of the false Alex, but the latter only grinned mockingly, continuing to hold the katana with two fingers as if it were some annoying splinter. The moment she heard the quiet rustle of steps behind her, she sharply turned around—and came nose to nose with the real Alex, whose face was illuminated by a broad, cheerful smile. Sephira did not even manage to blink when the deadly blade of the sword Yamato pierced her chest through.

Stunned, widening her pupils, she lowered her gaze to the blade that had pierced her chest, and then again raised her eyes to Alex, refusing to believe what was happening. In that same second Slot, realizing that his mission was complete, crumbled into a dense cloud of white smoke, and the heavy katana Masamune with a ringing splash crashed onto the mirror surface of the water. Seeing how one Alex disappeared and the second with a confident hand held the blade in the chest of their sworn enemy, Aerith with strongly trembling lips slowly rose to her feet, choking on an entire storm of contradictory emotions.

At any other moment Yuffie would certainly have howled across the entire surroundings about how brilliantly Alex had fooled everyone, but right now she could only silently cry from mad, burning-from-within relief. Claudia and Tifa experienced exactly the same: the terrible weight on their hearts was replaced by a colossal attack of joy from the fact that he was completely fine.

"Alex… Are you… Are you really intact?" Aerith pronounced in a breaking, trembling on the verge of a whisper tone, as if panically fearing that all of this would turn out to be merely a cruel mirage.

"I apologize for this small… Cough, theatrical farce," Alex said with light, barely noticeable embarrassment, surveying all those present with a guilty but not devoid of warmth gaze.

"What the hell are you even doing, you idiot?! Why did you need to stage this circus?!" Claudia cried out in a scream, furiously drilling him with a gaze blazing with anger and relief.

"Because… Otherwise this lady would never have approached at such a close distance. Am I absolutely right, Sephira?" Alex answered very calmly to Claudia's angry outburst, slowly turning his head and looking straight into Sephira's eyes.

"Ha-ha-ha… Perfectly played, Opponent of Fate. You really caught me. But do you seriously think that this pitiful scratch is enough to stop me?" A cold, devoid of fear chuckle blossomed on Sephira's lips, and she leaned her body forward, dangerously approaching Alex's face.

"And who even told you that I need you yourself? I need that passenger who has been sitting deep inside you all this time," Alex answered cheerfully with an unexpectedly predatory gleam in his eyes, with one hand tightly seizing Sephira by the collar of her coat, and with the other even more tightly squeezing the hilt of Yamato that had pierced her chest.

Alex's strange, enigmatic words finally deprived everyone of the gift of speech, forcing them to confusedly exchange glances in attempts to comprehend exactly what he was driving at. Even Dean frowned warily, perfectly understanding: if Alex had paid attention to something hidden deep inside Sephira, then the matter was taking an extremely dangerous turn. Just in case more comfortably gripping Cain's Blade, Dean took a smooth step back, covering the others with himself, for he knew perfectly well the properties and capabilities of the blade Yamato.

As for Sephira herself, she answered only with a disdainful, full of arrogance smile, demonstrating with her entire demeanor that killing her now, after the final destruction of the original Fate of this world, was simply impossible. Noticing this haughty gaze, Alex only lazily rolled his eyes and, experiencing not the slightest hesitation, drove Yamato even deeper into her chest. In that same second from Sephira's back with a deafening roar a monstrous stream of dense black smoke burst out, scattering everything around with a most powerful shockwave. The black fog rapidly soared into the heavens, merging into a single black sphere thickened to the density of metal.

And immediately a deafening ring of glass shattered to pieces rushed through the entire space when the blue sky above their heads covered with deep cracks. In only a short moment the celestial firmament finally cracked, spewing from the gigantic breach a gigantic meteorite enveloped in raging flame, flying straight at them. Shaking the earth, the falling meteorite generated around itself gigantic fiery tornadoes that greedily sucked inward the entire surrounding space, instantly erasing the remnants of the location.

No one in the group even paid attention to the fact that they had somehow incomprehensibly found themselves again on the territory of the destroyed mirrored Midgar—all gazes were fixed exclusively on the falling apocalypse. In the next moment from the fiery body of the meteorite dense black streams poured out, rushing toward the black sphere hovering high above.

The blazing mass dissolved right before their eyes, turning into a boundless mass of darkness that was instantly absorbed by the cocoon. And following this the sky was covered with impenetrable leaden clouds, and in the ensuing deathly silence the space froze in expectation.

The silence lasted one short moment, and in the next moment the black cocoon suddenly covered with a web of deep cracks. Following this a colossal explosion thundered, scattering tons of debris throughout the surroundings and raising to the heavens a dense veil of dust. When the stifling haze finally settled, against the background of the gloomy sky a painfully familiar, sinister silhouette of a man with long, flowing silver hair and an icy, haughty grin on his lips froze.

"Sephiroth…" Claudia whispered constrictedly, convulsively opening her eyes wide from the surging horror and completely failing to understand by what incomprehensible means the one she had seen only in a dream had suddenly appeared before them in the flesh.

Claudia absolutely did not understand by what means a person whom she had only once seen in her strange, vague dream had suddenly appeared before them in the flesh. Feeling the entire surrealism and danger of what was happening, she for a moment shifted her gaze downward and saw that the weakened Sephira was still in Alex's hands. Tifa, Yuffie, Barrett, and Red were no less lost than Claudia: exchanging glances, they synchronously lowered their gazes to Sephira, and then cautiously raised them to the sky from where Sephiroth was looking down on them from above.

Only Aerith subconsciously understood what was actually happening and why the black fog that had burst from Sephira's body had materialized precisely into this familiar silhouette. Dean, for his part, finally realized exactly what "passenger" Alex had spoken of, and what had actually been hidden behind this entire anomaly.

In his head a clear picture formed: before them had appeared the true original source and main culprit of all the ongoing shit. Wishing to receive final confirmation of his guess, Dean briefly cast a glance at Alex and with a questioning nod asked whether the bastard hovering in the heavens was really their main target.

Alex barely noticeably nodded and shifted an unblinking gaze to Sephiroth. The solution to why in this alternative timeline Sephira had suddenly gone mad and staged a bloody massacre in Nibelheim, stepping onto the same dark path as her incarnations in other worlds, turned out to be banal in its simplicity.

And this solution was right now floating above them with a mocking grin on its lips. Hovering over the destroyed space, Sephiroth slowly and gracefully raised a hand to the sky—and the gloomy clouds instantly parted to the sides, letting through a sheaf of bright solar rays that illuminated the entire surroundings.

From this careless manifestation of his power everyone instantly reacted and prepared to fight, from which the smile on Sephiroth's lips became even more predatory and triumphant. Claudia did not know the grandiose scales of Sephiroth's powers, but on an instinctive level she was certain: this person was not inferior to Sephira in cruelty at all, and possibly would turn out hundreds of times more dangerous and nightmarish than her. Realizing the deadly threat, Claudia loudly warned the others.

"Well then… Let's begin," the velvet, soul-chilling voice of Sephiroth rolled with an echo throughout the surroundings, and at the same moment the gigantic fragments of Midgar lying around them shuddered from a growing, destructive vibration.

The moment the chilling voice of Sephiroth died down, the gigantic fragments of the collapsed Midgar synchronously tore from their places and began rapidly soaring into the air, hovering in a sinister cloud right above his head. Looking at this avalanche of concrete and rebar looming over them, Alex irritably rolled his eyes, with a quick motion scooping the unconscious Sephira into his arms and reliably supporting her with the scabbard of Yamato. Clearly understanding exactly what was about to happen now, he tossed a short but sharp warning to the others.

The moment the signal rang out, Sephiroth carelessly waved his hand forward—and tons of stone blocks with a terrible whistle crashed down upon the squad. Not wasting time on thoughts, Alex rushed like a whirlwind between the group, literally pushing them aside and on the move unnoticed laying a protective spell on each, with the exception of Dean, for whom such protection was unnecessary. In the next moment the gigantic fragments with a deafening crash slammed into the ground, scattering the raised clouds of dust and scattering the team across different corners of the destroyed location.

Pressing the unconscious Sephira to himself and deftly maneuvering among the falling boulders, Alex gracefully pushed off from a flying slab. With one powerful kick of his leg in a half-turn Alex smashed a huge part of a supporting wall blocking his path to splinters and virtuously jumped forward, landing on a surviving section of the expressway under the roar of the continuing apocalypse.

Quietly sighing, he cast a short glance at the quieted girl in his arms, only with light irony shaking his head. Putting aside extra reflections for later, Alex caught behind him a barely noticeable movement of air and sharply turned around—right behind his back Sephiroth had silently appeared, smoothly floating above the debris.

"One should never treat fate lightly, Opponent of Fate," Sephiroth pronounced in a calm voice, unhurriedly descending from the sky and holding his katana Masamune in his hand.

"You know, this rule also applies to uninvited guests with messiah airs," Alex tossed out carelessly, carefully lowering Sephira onto the cold concrete in order to fully free his hands.

"Uninvited guest? Ha-ha… I've never been called that before. Why such thoughts all of a sudden? She and I are one whole. We are absolutely identical," Sephiroth said with a soft smile, pointing the tip of the katana at the unconscious Sephira.

"I would almost even believe all this complete nonsense if you weren't standing in front of me in person. It was you who turned Sephira into an embittered bitch. It was your handiwork that the Black Whispers appeared and their tricks with the resuscitation of the dead, including the awakening of Bahamut in Sector Five. And all the rest of the shit that I had to clean up all this week is also your merit. But right now I'm more interested in another question: what the hell did you need the power of the Harbinger for?" Alex smirked, rolling his eyes, lazily lighting a thin cigar and heavily tapping the hilt of Yamato against his own shoulder.

"For the awakening of Mother. Possessing this power, I will be able to awaken her finally—the way I could not do in that other reality. This time Mother will rise in all her glory," Sephiroth answered with an enthusiastic gleam in his eyes, slowly clenching his free hand into a fist.

"Ah, so my intuition did not fail me… Well then, enough of this nonsense. Entertain me a little, offspring of Jenova. Try to show a couple of tricks while the others haven't pulled up so we can thrash you together as a group with the help of the good old power of friendship," Alex drawled, lazily shrugging his shoulders, releasing a ring of smoke and pointing the glowing tip of the cigar straight at Sephiroth.

Waving his hand and proposing that Sephiroth begin the battle, Alex truly wanted to find out what this parasite from another timeline was capable of. Especially because he had managed to penetrate here and force Sephira to follow the same fatal path as he himself.

Meeting Alex's gaze, Sephiroth only smiled slightly and carelessly swung his katana Masamune, sending forward deadly streams of compressed air. Seeing this attack, Alex slightly jerked his index finger, pushing the unconscious Sephira a little back so that she would not accidentally be hit.

For he did not want at all to endanger the one he had saved only a moment ago. Having secured Sephira, Alex took only one step to the side, easily dodging the attack. The wind blades passed by without even grazing him and with a crash embedded themselves into the remains of the destroyed buildings behind.

Hearing this noise, Alex cast a short glance back, noticing how Sephiroth's attack had shredded several already destroyed buildings. Slightly whistling at the spectacle, Alex carelessly raised the hand in which he held Yamato and reliably blocked the blade of Masamune with the scabbard.

Turning back, Alex smiled lightly and with a soft push threw Sephiroth back. Feeling the push, Sephiroth took several steps back and immediately rushed forward again. Continuing to smile, Alex began playfully blocking Sephiroth's thrusts with the scabbard of Yamato, carelessly redirecting his blows to the sides. Deflecting yet another thrust, Alex instantly changed stance for a lightning-fast drawing of the blade and sharply leaned his body forward.

Sephiroth did not manage to react when the hard hilt of Yamato slammed right into his stomach with such crushing force that he was thrown several meters back. Driving the katana into the concrete in order to brake the slide, Sephiroth raised his gaze to Alex, who imperturbably sheathed the blade again and lazily waved his hand, inviting him to continue their deadly dance.

To be continued...

(Well, I'll start by complaining that today has been absolutely terrible—everything I touched went wrong, and I couldn't get a single thing done properly. I honestly thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown before I even finished writing this chapter. Everything just kept going sideways, to the point where, by the end, my head was splitting with pain. Now, onto the plot: remember how I mentioned pulling a little trick out of my magic hat? Well, here it is. Since I've started dabbling with parallel timelines, I figured I could just pull out the *real*, villainous Sephiroth—instead of dragging out a redemption arc for Sephiroth. It's so much easier to just say, "Hey, she wasn't actually the villain; it was this other jerk from an alternate timeline—*he's* the real bad guy, go beat him up, guys!" That's the trick I pulled out of my hat. Now, time to grab some food and try not to drop dead. Peace, love, and a surprise villain hiding inside another villain.)

Early access to chapters on my patreon: p*treon.com/GreedHunter