Summary: The exhausting final battle against Caius “Triple Bahamut” Ballad. A legitimately unexpected conclusion. The end to XIII-2's main story.
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Valhalla
-We arrive in Valhalla on the other side of the tear.
-Odin rides towards us, giving us a ride. A gift from Lightning.
CAIUS: “Here in Valhalla, the chaos is my ally. Now let us decide the true history!”
-Dang, wiped out. And oh thank god, I start in Valhalla.
-I pace myself more this time, knowing he has an auto-raise on himself.
-Victory again! How many phases does Caius have? Jesus, this is approaching FFVIII-levels.
-The writing here is really solid. Caius recoutns how he’s protected hundreds of Yeuls, and all of them unique. “One who loved to sing. One who collected flowers.” And he’s looking down the barrel of an eternity himself.
“All of them died before my eyes.”
-Oh man, Noel hits back with something I hadn’t thought of. Maybe this wasn’t a curse from Etro. She CHOSE to revive. She knew her life would be short, and still she wanted to see Caius. Over and over.
-This reaches Caius. He falters and Noel lands a mortal blow.
-Caius begins to fade into black smoke. The smoke then comes together, charges and becomes superpowered like a storm. Is this the Unseen Chaos?
-It’s Chaos Bahamut, but I don’t think this is consciously Caius in the same way as before. It blasts us, and we fall.
-We’re sinking deep down into the water of Valhalla, when feathers appear around us. HI LIGHTNING!
GOD SHE’S SO FRIGGING AWESOME
-A platform raises us up into the sky. And three dragons appear around us. Uhhhh.
-Three Bahamuts. Jet, Garnet, and Amber. Garnet and Amber form a first line of defense.
My poor goblin companion is sitting here like, “how exactly did I get corralled into this bullshit?”
*like 20 minutes later*
-OH MY GOD I GOT THE THREE BAHAMUTS,
PLEASE LEET THAT BE IT
PLEASE LET THERE BE NO MORE
HOLY SHIT THAT WAS SO STRESSFUL AND TOOK SO LONG
I was playing more defensively than I probably should have, but I felt like I was just constantly on death’s door. Constantly debuffed and low health and wounded. I’d swap to Relentless Assault for like two seconds, and then BOOM, he Teraflare/Gigaflare/Dying Sun would kill off two party members and put me on the back foot.
I’m proud to say at least that I used my consumable items well. I rarely do it. Went through all my elixirs and unicorn horns (to remove status effects).
[Later edit: That was one of the toughest and most draining fights in the FF series. In terms of taxing me personally, I put it just behind Ultimecia in FFVIII.
Not my favorite fights exactly, just the ones that drained me. I attribute this partly to VIII and XIII-2 having party development systems I never fully understood, making the final test so brutal.]
-Caius drops back down to earth. He demands to be punished. Even claims he killed Lightning with his own hands, to ask for punishment. I don’t buy it for a second.
-I get a cinematic action. And holy shit, I have like two seconds to decide whether to spare or kill Caius. I go with spare.
-LOL NM, CAIUS JUST GRABS THE BLADE AND STABS HIMSELF WITH IT. [Non-rhetorical question: would killing instead of sparing have changed this ending?]
-Caius’s essence blasts up into the air. Does this mean Noel is now the Guardian?
-Either way, he seems as dead as you can be for this place like Valhalla. Which isn’t saying much.
-Noel will go his own way now to search for Yeul.
-With Caius gone, we resolved the final paradox. The timeline is fixed. Lightning’s back in her own world.
-Gates appear all around Valhalla, the timelines reconnecting. Let’s go see what awaits.
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-Hope and the others are the new ark. They seem to have successfully retrieved Fang and Vanille. Still sleeping and crystallized.
-The crystal pillar holding up Cocoon collapses, as voiced music plays. The new ark/Cocoon takes off.
-The new ark is Bhunivelze. A new home for humanity post-collapse. Nice job Hope!
-Noel and Serah fly out of Valhalla and Sazh picks them up in his ship.
-I wonder how much shorter Serah’s lifespan will be now. Hopefully not much. [later edit from like two seconds in the future: LOL]
-The gate to Valhalla closes. This is the end.
(Until just now, I was legit afraid of yet ANOTHER phase. That boss fight drained the life out of me.)
-WAIT SERAH IS DYING, ARE YOU KIDDING ME??
FHJKLFHDSLKFDHSKLFHDSJKL
-This was her sacrifice and narratively it’s fine and makes sense. She’s the seeress, the new Yeul, but HOLY SHIT WHAT A GUT PUNCH
-Noel is getting a taste of Caius’ perspective. Is he gonna become the new Caius to protect Serah?
-No, I don’t buy it. I don’t. Snow is unaccounted for. He’s gonna swoop in with a miracle.
MOG: “The goddess.. she has gone, kupo.” The sky grows dark. Uh oh.
-Noel remembers what Caius said, about the Heart of Chaos. It must now below to Noel.
-oh SHIT, right! Noel basically killed the goddess!
-The chaos of Valhalla rips out. All our actions were for naught because Caius died.
[Non-rhetorical question: I assumed that when Noel killed Caius, he’d inherit the Heart of Etro, not destroy it. Why is this not the case? (As much as can be said based just on what we know in this game, not from Lightning Returns, of course.]
-Everything in this time is getting warped, just like when Lightning saw Etro’s power first.
-We see Etro on her throne in the heart of Valhalla.
I think? She looks pretty dead. Even looked vaguely like Lightning at first, but I don’t think so.
[Later edit, after having seen the end of the Lightning DLC: lol]
“TO BE CONTINUED”
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?? YOU’RE ENDING AN FF ENTRY ON A STRAIGHT CLIFFHANGER? I’m kind of impressed. This is the first time they’ve done this that I can remember.
-Wow. I was not expecting this to lead so directly into “Lightning Returns.” Takl about a set -up. The credits roll.
-Laura Bailey is the voice of Serah! I love her so much as the voice of Jaina in World of Warcraft.
-I’m watching the credits like a hawk to see if there’s a stinger, though I doubt it.
-Got a new fragment ability, the Paradox Scope. “You will find yourself being able to destroy enemies you should have no chance of defeating.” Is this god mode?
-I just unlocked like seventy million new areas, wtf.
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Next time: Checking out the DLCs, but that’s about it. Just gonna poke my head in and wrap this game up. Final thoughts coming soon after, then starting Lightning Returns in mid-July.
