Sephiroth is the main antagonist of Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy VII Remake and one of the primary antagonists in its extended universe. In spin-off appearances, Sephiroth is depicted as Cloud Strife's archenemy and is seen as a symbol of Cloud's troubled past haunting him. Sephiroth is a former renowned SOLDIER who became twisted.
Before his fall from grace, Sephiroth was one of the most lauded success stories of the Shinra Electric Power Company's SOLDIER program. His successes in the field of battle during the conflicts surrounding Shinra's bid for global domination led to his status as a celebrity war hero and the poster boy for both the Shinra Military and the company's SOLDIER program. Learning of his true origins made him insane, causing him to be driven by a desire to destroy the world.
Sephiroth is briefly a party member during a flashback in the original Final Fantasy VII, and is both the penultimate and final boss.
Sephiroth was born to Professor Hojo and Lucrecia Crescent approximately twenty-seven years before Final Fantasy VII. Hojo and Lucrecia were working as assistants to Professor Gast, Shinra Electric Power Company's top scientist, on the Jenova Project that studied the remains of an extra-terrestrial entity. Jenova was mistaken as one of the Cetra, an ancient people who had the power to "talk to the planet". Hojo injected cell samples from Jenova into the pregnant Lucrecia and her unborn baby. She carried Sephiroth to term, his fetal form merging with the Jenova cells as he developed. After the baby was born, he was taken by Shinra scientists and Lucrecia never had a chance to hold him.
Sephiroth never gained the ability to talk to the planet, as he is not a Cetra descendant, but his exceptional physical prowess was noticed by Shinra, who raised him to be a super soldier. Sephiroth's success still advanced the Jenova Project, leading to the creation of SOLDIER. Shinra told him nothing of his true parentage, and he grew up believing his mother's name was "Jenova". Sephiroth felt different from other children, but didn't know of the experiments that had created him. Sephiroth came to respect Professor Gast, deeming him a great scientist, but despised Professor Hojo, considering him a hack scientist compared to Gast and a "walking mess of complexes".
During the Wutai War Sephiroth was instrumental in ensuring Shinra's dominance. He rose to the rank of SOLDIER First Class and was admired and respected as a great war hero, while those in Shinra considered his strength unequaled even by other First Class SOLDIER members. Many young men, including Cloud Strife and Genesis Rhapsodos, idolized Sephiroth, and sought to join SOLDIER to become heroes like him, making Sephiroth useful for Shinra as a propaganda tool.
Near the end of the Wutai War Sephiroth had two close friends within SOLDIER, Angeal and Genesis, the three being the most famous SOLDIERs in First Class. They would visit the training room when the Second Class SOLDIERS were off to access the virtual reality Junon for training purposes. Their training sessions involved one of them having an apple on their head while the others would throw their swords to pierce the fruit, with Sephiroth always winning. In one particular training session, Genesis challenged Sephiroth one-on-one, using powerful magic to enhance his weapon, but Sephiroth remained stronger. The fight ended inconclusively when Angeal intervened before either hurt the other too badly. The small wound Genesis took did not heal and Sephiroth offered his blood for a transfusion, but was told it was not compatible.
In the months after the war the anti-Shinra group Avalanche intensifies its actions, raiding Junon. Sephiroth engages the Avalanche leader, Elfe, who asks if he fights for a reason, which has a profound effect on Sephiroth; the results of Sephiroth choosing to fight for a reason would one day threaten the planet's existence. During the assault on Fort Tamblin, Sephiroth saves Zack Fair, Angeal's student, from Ifrit, dispatching it with one blow, and discovers Genesis has defected with a Shinra scientist Hollander, creating an army using copy technology to graft Genesis's cells onto other traitor SOLDIER members with which to rebel against Shinra. Angeal goes rogue torn between his loyalties, and Angeal and Genesis are both declared killed in action.
As Sephiroth participates in the AVALANCHE Insurgency and Genesis War, his loyalties and emotions continue to be thrown into turmoil, leading to him refusing missions concerning Genesis and Angeal. When Genesis and Angeal attack the Shinra Building, Sephiroth and Zack allow them to escape. Sephiroth searches the Shinra archives for information on "Project G", having learned of it when he and Zack confronted Hollander and Genesis. Before his search amounts to anything, Zack is forced to kill Angeal and apparently Genesis as well, though the latter resurfaces several months later. Sephiroth participates in a mission to "rescue" Professor Hojo who had almost defected with the Avalanche forces attacking the Shinra Building. In September of 0002, Sephiroth tells Zack he is considering retiring from Shinra, and their next mission together will likely be his last.
On September 22nd 0002, Sephiroth arrives at Nibelheim to investigate a monster outbreak near the town's mako reactor. He arrives with a small entourage, including Zack and two Shinra infantrymen, one of whom is the sixteen-year-old Cloud Strife. Sephiroth asks Cloud how it feels to be back in his hometown, as he lacks one. When questioned by Zack about family, Sephiroth explains his mother, Jenova, died during childbirth, but stops short of mentioning his father before proceeding with the mission. In Crisis Core -Final Fantasy VII-, Zack is suspicious upon hearing that Jenova is Sephiroth's mother, having learned about the Jenova Project in the creation of Genesis and Angeal.
At the mako reactor Sephiroth finds several pod-like chambers containing monstrous creatures who used to be human, mutated by exposure to mako. He finds a chamber labeled "JENOVA" containing a feminine-looking creature. When Zack suggests a connection between SOLDIER and the creatures in the tanks, Sephiroth flies into a rage, horrified the reason he is "different" may be because he was created similarly to the monsters in the pods. In Crisis Core -Final Fantasy VII- Genesis plays a part in inciting Sephiroth's madness by revealing Sephiroth was born from the Jenova Project, its goal to produce the "perfect monster". Sephiroth rejects Genesis's request for Jenova cells from him.
Disturbed by the creature in the reactor having the same name as his "mother", along with the once human monsters in the pods and Genesis's words, Sephiroth makes his way to the manor that had been occupied by Shinra researchers. For several sleepless days he pores over the research notes in the basement library, wondering why he was never told the truth of his origins. He comes to believe Jenova is a Cetra, and therefore he, as Jenova's "son", is the last Cetra survivor. He comes to believe the human race had betrayed the Cetra 2,000 years ago leaving them alone to defend the planet from a calamity, and resolves to take vengeance for his "ancestors".
On October 1st Sephiroth destroys Nibelheim, setting the town on fire and killing many of the townspeople, before returning to the reactor to claim Jenova's remains. He is pursued by Tifa's father, Tifa herself, Zack, and Cloud. Tifa, a girl living in the town who had been Sephiroth's group's guide up the mountain, takes up Sephiroth's Masamune from beside her father's corpse and attacks him, but he disarms her and cuts her down.
Shortly after Sephiroth enters Jenova's chamber, Zack arrives to confront him. Sephiroth only keeps talking to his "mother", saying they will reclaim the planet and head to the promised land. He tears off the effigy blocking Jenova's remains and ejects Zack from the chamber, continuing to declare himself "chosen" to rule the planet. Cloud enters with Zack's Buster Sword and impales Sephiroth from behind through the abdomen. The severely wounded Sephiroth decapitates Jenova and stumbles across the room, and is again attacked by Cloud. Sephiroth stabs him with his Masamune, but Cloud uses it as a lever to hurl Sephiroth into a pool of mako below the reactor. Sephiroth vanishes with Jenova's head still in his grasp, apparently falling to his death. In Last Order -Final Fantasy VII-, Sephiroth jumps into the pool of mako willingly, having noted he is unable to defeat Cloud.
Shinra seals the records on Sephiroth, declaring him killed in action, and rebuilds Nibelheim to cover up the incident, populating it with Shinra employees paid to act as the villagers.
Sephiroth fell into the lifestream, his willpower too great to allow himself to be consumed. Over the next several years Sephiroth traveled the lifestream, the planet's life energy and the afterlife for its spirits that contains the summation of the cognition its inhabitant have accumulated. Growing in power and knowledge, the fragments of his body congregate at the Northern Cave inside the North Crater, joining to recreate Sephiroth's physical form in a cocoon of mako. Sephiroth's new goal is to merge with the lifestream and seize control of it to become a god.
Though his physical body is encased in mako, Sephiroth can control Jenova's cells as an extension of his body and thus act out his plans through the remains of Jenova's body. Hojo has injected Zack, Cloud and the other survivors of Nibelheim with Sephiroth's cells, turning them into Sephiroth-clones: people whose wills have been over-ridden with Sephiroth's will. Hojo believes the Jenova cells within Sephiroth would call for a "reunion" of those who share its cells, and wishes to see his theory put to test.
Approximately five years after his supposed death, in December 0007, Sephiroth enacts his plan and puts out the call for the reunion to summon the Sephiroth-clones to the North Cave. Jenova's remains, which had been moved to the Shinra HQ in Midgar, shapeshift into Sephiroth's form and break out of containment. Jenova/Sephiroth releases Cloud and the members of the second reincarnation of Avalanche, who were being held prisoner. Sephiroth kills President Shinra after declaring Shinra should never acquire the Cetra's fabled promised land. Cloud, seeing Sephiroth's Masamune left at President Shinra's murder site, surmises Sephiroth is alive, and sets out with Avalanche to find him and settle the score for what happened to Nibelheim. However, what Cloud doesn't know is that his drive for pursuing Sephiroth is compounded by the Jenova cells calling him toward Sephiroth to reunite with the main body as per Hojo's "Reunion Theory".
The party finds Sephiroth on the cargo shipheaded to Costa del Sol, where he alludes to the reunion and leaves Jenova's arm behind that transforms into Jenova∙BIRTH. He appears some time later in the Nibelheim Shinra Manor basement, where he mentions the reunion and calls for Cloud to follow him. At the Temple of the Ancients Sephiroth reveals the full extent of his plans - the planet relies on the lifestream to heal itself when wounded, and the North Crater, where the lifestream is abundant, is where Jenova fell two thousand years ago.
Using the Black Materia, Sephiroth plans to call the Ultimate Destructive Magic - Meteor - to injure the planet and place himself at the center of its impact zone as the lifestream emerges to heal the planet's wound. Sephiroth plans to merge with the lifestream, becoming a god.
Cloud acquires the Black Materia first, but Sephiroth exerts his influence over the Jenova cells within Cloud's body and takes control of him, forcing Cloud to hand the Materia over. Aerith Gainsborough, the true last survivor of the Cetra and a member of Cloud's party, uses the White Materia to summon Holy, the only power able to counter Meteor. During her prayer Sephiroth impales her with his sword, killing her. Though Aerith had successfully called Holy, Sephiroth holds it back within the planet. Cloud and his allies continue tracking Jenova's remains in Sephiroth's form to the North Crater.
Cloud and his party kill Jenova in Sephiroth's form and reclaim the Black Materia. Cloud entrusts it to a party member for safekeeping while he and Tifa continue deeper into the crater and find themselves in an illusion of Nibelheim's destruction that Sephiroth conjured. Sephiroth wants to break Cloud by making him believe he is but a simulacrum created by Professor Hojo with false memories. Sephiroth deceives Cloud into thinking he is a mere cluster of Jenova cells that assumed the identity of a boy named "Cloud" from Tifa's childhood. Tifa tries to tell Cloud Sephiroth is lying, but cannot deny that she never saw Cloud at Nibelheim during its destruction.
Tifa's words along with Sephiroth's manipulations take their toll and shatter Cloud's fragile mind. Sephiroth projects an illusion of Tifa before the party members left behind to bring the Black Materia to Cloud. Once Cloud takes back the Black Materia he hands it over to Sephiroth's true body residing within a mako cocoon. Sephiroth summons the Meteor, which awakens the planet's defense mechanism, the Weapons. The walls of the area crumble as the Weapons, colossal monsters, arise from their slumber, and Sephiroth's mako cocoon falls into the crater. Cloud's allies flee with Rufus Shinra, the new president of the Shinra Company, on the airship Highwind while Sephiroth erects an energy barrier over the crater to keep the Weapons from detecting him.
Sephiroth is mentioned frequently in Hoshi o Meguru Otome, as the deceased Aerith's spirit observes the effects Sephiroth's actions are having on the lifestream and the planet.
Sephiroth begins shapeshifting his body into a form befitting a god, awaiting Meteor's arrival. Cloud recovers upon discovering the truth about his past. In late January 0008, Shinra fires the Mako Cannon, known as the Sister Ray, at the North Crater, piercing Sephiroth's barrier and allowing Cloud and his allies to enter the crater and reach Sephiroth.
They find Sephiroth at the planet's core, blocking Holy. Emerging from his Bizarro∙Sephiroth form upon defeat, Sephiroth becomes the angelic Safer∙Sephiroth, a being with seven wings. Cloud and his allies destroy him, but his mind endures. Pulling Cloud into a metaphysical final battle, Sephiroth attempts to take control of him, but Cloud's mental defenses have grown, and he defeats Sephiroth who dissolves into the lifestream, seemingly destroyed. With Sephiroth gone, Holy is released from the planet's core and Aerith helps the lifestream emerge and keep the Meteor at bay for Holy to destroy it.
Sephiroth is the focus of the On the Way to a Smile "Lifestream: Black" chapters where he uses the lifestream's emergence to fight Meteor to infect the planet with Geostigma, dispersing his memories among the lifestream to spread the disease. Sephiroth avoids dissolution into the lifestream by focusing on his hatred of Cloud, which allows him to maintain a core sense of being and remain separate from the other spirits. With his peripheral memories, including those of his personal appearance, stripped away over time, he uses memories of how others in the lifestream see him to craft his avatars and sends them to find Jenova's remains to reform a true body for himself.
During the events of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children in 0009, Sephiroth remains an active force terrorizing the planet. Geostigma has spread throughout the world, afflicting many with extreme fatigue and skin sores. The plague is caused by Jenova's remaining consciousness in the lifestream, and primarily affects children due to their weaker immune systems. Cloud has also contracted the disease and experiences visions of Sephiroth.
The now-reclusive Cloud finds himself confronted by a trio of silver-haired men who are physical manifestations of Sephiroth's will. The three, Kadaj, Loz and Yazoo, believe they are guided by their "mother" Jenova, but rather, it is Sephiroth himself who forces their actions. The three seek Jenova's cells to be reunited with her, unaware of Sephiroth's ultimate plan to recreate a new body for himself using Jenova's last remnants.
When Kadaj absorbs Jenova's cells Sephiroth exerts his power over Jenova to shapeshift Kadaj's body into his own visage, restoring him to life. Sephiroth faces Cloud and, disappointed his adversary was cured of Geostigma, reveals his plan to taint the lifestream with those dead of the disease to the point he can control it. Sephiroth plans to use the planet as a vessel to travel space and find a new planet to rule.
Sephiroth and Cloud fight in the ruins of Midgarthat was never rebuilt after being ravaged by the Meteor, with Sephiroth dominating and severely injuring Cloud, but Cloud is reinvigorated by memories of his friends and family and destroys Sephiroth. When Cloud demands he stay in his memories, Sephiroth only replies "I will... never be a memory." His black wing folds around him and he fades away leaving a weakened Kadaj to die and fade into the lifestream as Aerith's spirit calls healing rain to cure the planet of Geostigma.
Chronologically, Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children is Sephiroth's final appearance in the Final Fantasy VII timeline, and his current status is unknown, though it is likely, given his past tenacity, that he continues to exist within the lifestream.
Although Sephiroth himself does not appear during the events of Dirge of Cerberus -Final Fantasy VII-, he is mentioned in a flashback with Lucrecia, who, while pregnant, experienced a vision as to what her child would become. The second mention is from Weiss the Immaculate, when explaining he is actually Hojo possessing his body. In another flashback when Lucrecia is trying to save Vincent Valentine, she demands that Hojo give back her baby.
When Cloud and Avalanche blow up Mako Reactor 1, Cloud sees a black feather, and experiences a psychic disturbance. After Cloud escapes to the streets of Midgar in the wake of the bombing, Sephiroth appears to him and warps Cloud's surroundings to resemble the burning Nibelheim. Sephiroth taunts Cloud over the razing of Nibelheim and Sephiroth's murder of Cloud's mother. He does not deny Cloud's claims of having killed him, even calling it the crowning moment of their time together. He asks Cloud to leave Avalanche and live to fight for the planet. When Cloud attacks him, clearing the illusion, Sephiroth telepathically tells Cloud to hold on to his hatred. When Cloud meets Aerith on the streets of Midgar, Sephiroth returns and mocks Cloud for being too weak to protect anything, even himself.
Later on, Marco - a Sephiroth-clone - is taken over to attack Cloud, with Cloud seeing Marco as Sephiroth. Cloud nearly kills Marco, but Tifa stops him. When Cloud later falls to the slums, Sephiroth appears in his dream and says that he is Cloud's everything, but Aerith wakes Cloud up before he is able to do anything. Aerith takes Cloud around the Sector 5 Slumswhere they run into another Sephiroth-clone, who collapses and attracts Cloud and Aerith's attention. Cloud sees the man as Sephiroth who tells him to not fear the reunion, before the clone walks away. After the destruction of Sector 7, Sephiroth appears to Cloud to mock him for failing again, but encourages him to gain strength from the loss.
Later, Sephiroth traps Cloud, Tifa and Barret in an illusion in the Shinra VR theater where several Sephiroth-clones attack them while a meteorite falls onto Midgar, though Barret is left believing it was an intended part of the presentation. Sephiroth later shapeshifts Marco into himself to attack President Shinra: he walks past a horrified Palmer and then appears before Cloud, Tifa, Aerith, Barret and Red XIII at the Jenova container. Smirking at Cloud who struggles to walk forward, Sephiroth tells him to stop fighting and embrace him. Cutting the bridge down, sending Tifa, Aerith, Barret and Red XIII plummeting down, he blocks Cloud's attack and tells him it is a touching reunion before sending him flying as well.
Sephiroth seemingly lets President Shinra escape. After Avalanche corners the President, Marco - controlled by Sephiroth - kills him and stabs Barret before transforming into Jenova Dreamweaver, a being said to induce hallucinations. After Marco is defeated, another clone appears masquerading as Sephiroth to carry Jenova's body that has been released from the tank, and leaves as Shinra backup arrives. Pursued by Cloud, the clone jumps off the Shinra Building as Cloud is distracted by the Whispers.
After Avalanche escapes from Shinra, Sephiroth approaches them on the Midgar Expressway and explains he plans to "protect" the planet and all of its creatures. He claims Avalanche can see nothing but shadows due to their clouded judgment. As the Whispers create a massive cloud of darkness, Sephiroth cuts it with his sword to create an entrance, and challenges Cloud to enter. Aerith denotes it a doorway that would lead them to breaking free of the fixed destiny that the Whispers are trying to enforce upon them. After Cloud and his friends fight through many monstrous Whispers, they face Sephiroth himself who yet persists and flies off, leaving Avalanche to fight off the Whispers.
When Cloud once again confronts him, Sephiroth takes them both into a metaphysical dimension/illusion that he describes as "the edge of creation". He claims that the planet will become a part of it, but that he will not let himself or Cloud end. He asks Cloud to lend his strength so together they can defy destiny, but Cloud refuses. The two fight with Sephiroth defeating Cloud. He spares Cloud, saying that the latter has 7 seconds left before the end and leaves as Cloud appears back in Midgar. With Sephiroth far from being defeated, Cloud and Avalanche embark on a journey to defeat him, Aerith believing that the future ahead of them is now unknowable.
In the Legacy of Chris Thorndyke,
He is reprised by George Newbern in the English dub and Toshiyuki Morikawa in the Japanese dub.