Part 12: Flame Poem Arc - Titan

Titan

Now where were we... Archimedes a traitor, Altera transformed, world-destroying titan awakened... Think that about catches us up.


Flame Poem final stage

Altera! If you can hear me, speak!



She is beyond reach... And that body is only a weapon... Argh, just what is the meaning of this?! What is a Sephyr?! I have never heard of such a thing! Is she Attila?! Is she not?! Which Attila is she? The one from her first life? The one who faced us?

...I wish I could tell her. There's still so much we don't know, especially about Altera. All we do know right now is what's in front of us. ...In all its massive glory. Her roar is tearing everything apart. Compared to this, her army is nothing. She could shred entire territories at will. She's not even bothering with us anymore. She's just destroying everything she sees. She sweeps with her arm, and everything breaks. She sends out her light, and everything burns. As long as she exists, nothing else can.

Praetor, look! On her shoulder... The third Praetor...



...I see the third Hakuno Kishinami standing on her shoulder, in the midst of her fury and destruction. Destruction... Is that really all she has? The scene around her certainly suggests it. I'd expected she'd have broken or consumed the third me by now. Then again, it looks like she still might. Her version of me is drawn to her destructive spirit. But as sure I as I see that, I know that not matter what "I" might feel for her, nothing, not even love, is going to snap her out of it. She'll destroy that love. It's what she does.





Praetor!

I feel a wave. The other me gives a long, horrible croaking sound. I hear it over all the rest of the noise. I've already experienced something similar. I almost thought I was used to it. But here it is again. And now I know the reason for it. The third me, the Body, is breaking down in Altera's presence. Someone said that the Body is an empty shell, a case to hold the Mind and Soul. But even the Body has a personality attached to it. It senses and grows and remembers. The destruction reverberates toward me, into me, and my Mind begins to shake...

Praetor...! I'm right here. Can you hear me...?! You fool! Altera, you...! You promised not to harm your Praetor! Don't you see what you're doing? If you don't stop now, you'll...! Altera! Stop, or I will MAKE you stop!

...I don't say anything. This is her decision. It's up to her if she wants to fight. Or retreat. That last battle drained us both. Is she up for another one now? From a rational standpoint, we're at a deep disadvantage. Would it even be possible to win in our state? I don't answer that, and I don't repeat it to Saber. ...But I do make my own decision. I know what I won't do. I won't give up. Saber didn't give up when she faced Altera's light, and neither will I.



..."Passion and love". You would say such things of me? After all this time, who could have imagined that Nero Claudius could still know of love? Then I most certainly cannot lose. For who else, in any conceivable future, would ever look upon me as you do? Even if I live another 14,000 years, I will never meet another like you. I shall treasure and protect you even more than the world itself. And so, there can be no retreat! Take my hand, Praetor! Let us burn our way through despair and return in triumph!



Unfortunately for you, I much prefer Venus! Allow me to show you why! Defend yourself, Altera the Titan! This will be our final battle!



Ah, this takes me back...

Well now, this is the true final battle of Flame Poem. First off, press R3 and never let go (you don't have to hold down the button, thank god). You will always want to keep your eyes on Sephyr. As you might expect, she'll primarily use her hands to do damage to you. Also as you might expect, she has quite a few attacks.

Also of note is the arena is circular, quite wide, and filled to the brim with low-level goons. They should only be there to build up your Moon Crux gauge. You'll see why soon enough.



Her most basic attack is simple. She'll lean back, roar, then sort of collapse, allowing one of her arms to hit the field. Do you see that cube with the life bar? That's your target. Your objective is to take that out, then we can start doing some direct damage.





When she (can you even use the feminine pronoun with this thing? Hm) roars back like that, she'll bring down her right arm and slam it a few times. Obviously will do major damage if you're in the blast radius, so just quickly dash out of the way, then quickly dash back to start doing damage. Whenever she does an attack, she'll leave one of her hands exposed.

Oh, and I don't believe any of Sephyr's attacks are blockable. If you try, and I'm pretty sure the hits will just go right through and damage you anyway.



Now, Extella Maneuvers will do heavy damage, but be careful where you aim. If you hit one of the goons by mistake and start an EM against them, it will do *very* little damage against the cube. You're better off just letting go of the attack and trying again.





This is easily one of her most dangerous attacks. Following a quick charge-up, she'll do a massively powerful sweep of about half the arena with a laser that does a hell of a lot of damage. How you dodge this depends on where you were when she started it up. The game doesn't much care *what* part of this attack hits you. Does the same amount of damage either way.

If you're feeling spicy, you can quickly dodge underneath the hand she's using and it'll effortlessly pass over you. This is *pretty* dangerous, though. If you're not liking your odds, or you noticed too late, dash in the opposite direction, then jump over her hand when it's level. You could try to outrun it, but keep in mind it is pretty damn fast, even when you're dashing. I'd say jumping is your best bet, either towards or away from it.



Keep in mind, even when she's collapsing from either your attacks or one of her attack animations ending and her hand is coming down, if you're too close, the hand will hurt you on the way down.





No damage. But you know what the Regalia was designed to do? Kick Velber's ass, and the ass of all of Velber's pals. Let's show her what it's really made of.



Once a certain amount of time passes, she'll recover and you'll back into the loop. You should be to chip off ~20% of her HP every time she becomes vulnerable.



I was pretty lucky here. My Moon Crux lasted long enough to not only do some damage to her core, but also destroy the cube in her hand a second time.



She'll also drop a Phantasm Circuit once you've done a certain amount of damage. Let's just keep this up.



Once she's down to half health...







If you're watching super closely, you can see Nero actually dodge out of the way of this hit. Watching the video back to write this update, this is the first I've noticed that happen.



So yeah, welcome to the second half of the fight, now with 50% less floor space. Sephyr will add on several new attacks, all of which are extremely powerful. This is the first one she'll do: she'll roar, throw up pillars of light from her mouth, and cause several magical circles to pop up. These circles will fire out a blast of energy, which does a ton of damage, and there's a lot of them. Now, these blasts last for a few seconds, and if you accidentally dash or run into one that's active, you'll take that damage.

My advice? Run, don't dash. As long as you keep moving, and don't retread your steps, you've got nothing to worry about. Don't get careless now.



Get ready when she brings her hands above her hands and slams them down.



1-3 shockwaves of energy will follow. Of course, jumping over them is a simple matter. Just don't stay in the air too long, as you might come down in time for the next one to come along and get you.



Massive ball of energy coming from a Titan's hands? Bad news, there. When she fires this off, a wave of black icicles will rush at you, and you can't block this. Only in a limited area, so just get the hell out of there.



There you go.



Just a little more...



Damn. She only has like a shred of HP left.



It's over.