A rare period of calm settled over the group, a welcome respite from the chaos.
With Barret off to play with Marlene and Cloudia at the training grounds, the common room felt unusually quiet.
This was Arthur's chance to get to know them better, especially now that his relationship with Aerith was official.
He decided to take Tifa and Yuffie up on their unspoken invitation to spend some time together.
"Let's go monster hunting,"
Arthur suggested, a smile on his face.
"We can get some gil and some experience. We could probably use some new equipment, too."
Tifa's eyes lit up.
"That's a great idea! It'll be a good way to blow off some steam."
Yuffie, never one to miss an opportunity for profit, clapped her hands together.
"Count me in! More gil for me means more materia!"
Aerith, still holding onto Arthur's arm, beamed.
"I'll go too! But I'll be in charge of healing, so don't get hurt, okay?"
The group set out from Wutai base, heading toward the mountainous terrain where higher-level monsters were known to roam.
Tifa and Yuffie were a well-oiled machine, their movements synchronized as they navigated the craggy paths.
Arthur, however, felt a newfound sense of protectiveness.
He stayed close to Aerith, his hand resting on the hilt of masamune, ready to intercept any attack that came her way.
"You're being a little too protective, you know,"
Aerith teased, leaning her head on his shoulder.
"I'm a powerful healer, remember? You're the one who should be more worried."
Arthur just chuckled.
"I know, but I'm just… glad you're here with me."
Their first encounter was with a pack of imposing, reptilian creatures.
Tifa and Yuffie immediately went on the offensive, Tifa's fists a blur of motion as she landed powerful combos, while Yuffie spun and darted around the monsters, unleashing a flurry of shurikens.
Arthur joined the fray, his strikes a precise and powerful counterpoint to their relentless assault.
The monsters fell quickly under their combined might.
After the fight, Yuffie eagerly searched the bodies for drops, a wide grin on her face.
"Score! Cores and some rare fangs! This is going to be a good day."
Tifa wiped some sweat from her brow.
"Good job, everyone. We make a pretty good team."
As the day went on, they continued their hunt.
Arthur noticed a change in Tifa. She wasn't just happy for them; she was also genuinely curious about his life and his plans.
She asked him about his fighting style, his past, and his goals, and he found himself opening up to her in a way he hadn't before.
It was a comfortable, easy conversation, and he realized he valued her friendship more than he had ever admitted.
Yuffie, on the other hand, was all about playful teasing and mischievous jabs.
"So, is this a date or a monster hunt?"
She'd ask with a wink.
"Because if it's a date, you guys are doing a terrible job of it. You haven't even held hands!"
Aerith, always quick with a retort, would simply reach for Arthur's hand and lace her fingers through his, smiling serenely at Yuffie.
"Better now?"
The easy banter and shared challenges brought them closer.
They were no longer just a group of allies; they were friends, a small, tight-knit family forging bonds in the heart of a hostile world.
As the sun began to set, they decided to head back to Wutai, their pockets full of gil and their hearts full of a newfound sense of camaraderie.
On the way back, as they walked side by side, Yuffie's mischievousness took a more introspective turn.
"So, what are we going to do after all this is over?"
She asked, her voice uncharacteristically soft.
"Once Shinra is gone, I mean."
Tifa glanced at Arthur.
"I don't know. I guess we'll just have to figure it out when the time comes."
Arthur looked up at the stars beginning to dot the sky.
He had a lot of things to do, but he had a feeling that he would be with these people for a long time.
The mission, the dungeon, and Sephira—all of it felt less daunting with them by his side.
They had each other's backs, and that was all that mattered.
As they reached the outskirts of Wutai base, Tifa, and Yuffie peeled off to sell their loot and get some rest.
Arthur and Aerith continued toward their room, their hands still intertwined.
The air between them was quiet, but it was a comfortable silence, filled with an unspoken understanding.
As they entered their room, Aerith turned to Arthur, her smile radiating a warmth that filled the entire space.
"You know,"
She began,
"I'm really glad we're doing this."
"Me too,"
He replied, pulling her into a gentle hug.
He didn't know what the future held, but he knew for sure that he was happy at that moment. He was content.
…
Sephira's planning was meticulous, fueled by a rage that had festered for eons.
The Time Whisperer's insult—calling her a mere fragment—had been the final straw.
She wouldn't just correct the timeline; she would shatter it and forge her own.
She began to observe Arthur from a distance, not with the intent of striking, but to understand his power.
She noted the unique quality of his life force, a blend of disparate energies that shouldn't coexist.
It was chaos, and in that chaos, she saw an opportunity.
She needed to learn his weaknesses, but more importantly, she needed a way to sever his connection to Aerith.
The girl's presence was like a lighthouse, a beacon in the Lifestream that drew Arthur's power closer.
Sephira decided her first move wouldn't be a direct confrontation but a subtle manipulation of the Lifestream itself.
She would create a "glitch," a temporal ripple that would exploit the bond between Arthur and Aerith, twisting their newfound connection into a weapon against them.
"You will face despair."
Rufus, meanwhile, was playing a different kind of chess game.
He had endured a lifetime of being controlled by his father, and he would not be a pawn for the Whisperers.
He understood that their power, while immense, was rigid.
They operated on rules, on corrections, and on a singular, unbending purpose.
Humans, however, were chaotic.
They were driven by emotion, ambition, and a complete disregard for the rules of the universe. This was his advantage.
He began to feed the Whisperers false information, using his company's vast network to create a web of misdirection.
He instructed his researchers to subtly alter the Mako reactors' energy output, making them seem more unstable than they were.
He even leaked fabricated plans of a new super-weapon to Avalanche through his spies, ensuring they would continue their direct assault on the Mako reactors while he focused on his true goal: understanding the nature of the Whisperers.
His collaboration with Hojo was a necessary evil.
He needed the man's unhinged genius to weaponize the Lifestream, but he knew Hojo was a wild card.
"Hojo, this 'summon' you've infused with Mako... it has a failsafe, does it not?"
Rufus asked, his voice calm but firm.
Hojo laughed, a high-pitched, manic sound that scraped on Rufus's nerves.
"A failsafe? That would be a limitation! But I have made it so that the user can control it through... a neural interface."
He tapped his temple with a long, skeletal finger.
"We won't just summon it; we will command it."
Rufus's eyes narrowed.
"Good. And what happens if the summon is destroyed?"
Hojo's grin widened.
"Then the Mako energy explodes, of course. A little bonus for our trouble. It will create a ripple in the Lifestream that will take out anything within a few miles. A nice, tidy little explosion, yes?"
Rufus nodded slowly.
"Perfect."
He didn't care about the collateral damage. He only cared about control.
He would use the Whisperers' own weapon against them.
When the time was right, he would detonate the Mako-infused summon not to correct the timeline but to create a permanent, catastrophic disturbance that would blind the Whisperers and sever their connection to this world.
They couldn't control what they couldn't see.
Sephira's plan was now in motion.
She had found a temporal nexus point, a weak spot where the past and future of the Lifestream overlapped.
It was where Cloudia had been fused with her counterpart, and where Arthur had first felt the full force of this world's memories.
This was where she would strike.
She didn't reveal herself to Arthur, but instead focused on the subtle energies of the Lifestream around him and Aerith.
With a single, dark feather, she wove a complex spell, a temporal knot that began to tighten around their bond.
Aerith, still clinging to Arthur, suddenly felt a jolt.
The radiant smile on her face faltered.
A cold dread, a phantom echo of a past that hadn't happened yet, washed over her.
She saw fragmented images: a towering skyscraper, a bloody sword, a hand outstretched.
She clutched Arthur tighter, her joy replaced by a deep-seated fear.
"Arthur... something's wrong,"
She whispered, her voice trembling.
"I... I can't feel it anymore."
Arthur looked at her, his expression shifting from amusement to concern.
He felt the change too. The warmth of their connection had a cold, discordant edge to it.
He turned his head and scanned the area, his senses screaming at him that something was off, but there was nothing there.
He knew what was happening. Sephira was here.
Rufus watched from his office tower as the Mako reactors in Sector 7 and 8 began to glow with an unnaturally bright, sickly green light.
The Whisperers were reacting to the changes in the Lifestream, and they were preparing to deploy their weapon.
He had to act fast.
"Hojo,"
He said into his comms, his voice as cold and sharp as a shard of ice.
"Do it. Detonate the Mako-summon."
"Now? But the anomaly isn't there yet!"
Hojo's voice crackled back, filled with confusion and disappointment.
"We are not here to obey them. We are here to kill them,"
Rufus stated flatly.
"Do it now. It is time to make our own destiny."
Hojo's hesitation was brief, a mere hiccup of scientific principle before his thirst for chaos took over.
"Ah, I see! Very well, Rufus. Let's give them a proper show!"
He laughed and pressed a button, sending a cascade of commands to the Mako reactors.
The green light intensified, and a massive, ethereal form began to coalesce above the city.
It was a being of pure energy, a Mako-infused summon with a gaping maw and six wings of shimmering light.
It was beautiful and terrible, and it was about to detonate.
The Whisperers felt the betrayal. They couldn't understand.
A human, a mere mortal, was attempting to rewrite their carefully orchestrated reality.
Their timeline corrections began to spin out of control, a furious, silent storm of temporal energy.
Sephira felt it too. The Lifestream, which she had been so carefully manipulating, was now a turbulent sea of chaos. She cursed Rufus, her focus broken.
The temporal knot she had been weaving around Arthur and Aerith's bond unraveled, the spell's energies scattering into the Lifestream.
The fear in Aerith's eyes receded, replaced by a deep, profound confusion.
The connection between her and Arthur was still there, but it felt… different.
It was no longer a single, flowing river but a series of interconnected streams.
Sephira withdrew, her plans thwarted for now by the sheer unpredictability of humanity.
She felt a new, grudging respect for Rufus.
He was a survivor, a man who wouldn't just accept his fate. And now, she had a new opponent on her chessboard, a player who wasn't a hero, but a king in his own right.