Ultimecia
From Final Fantasy Wiki
- "Time... It will not wait...No matter...how hard you hold on. It escapes you...And...I...can't...disappear yet."
- —Ultimecia
Ultimecia (アルティミシア, Arutimishia in Japanese, Artemisia in Italian and German, and Artemisa in Spanish) is the main antagonist of Final Fantasy VIII. A powerful Sorceress from a future many generations ahead of the game's time, Ultimecia intended to compress time into one single moment with a form of magic known as Time Compression. She used a time-machine like device called "Junction Machine Ellone," as a means to send her consciousness into the distant past. In the past era, Ultimecia manipulated world events, and utilized her ability to possess other sorceresses.
The first sorceress known to have fallen under Ultimecia's control was Edea Kramer of Centra. Ultimecia resided within Edea's body for a long period of time in order to enact her plan of Time Compression. In her final confrontation with Squall Leonhart, she attempted to absorb all that ever had and ever would exist, including all time and space, in order to become "a living god." However, her ambitions were ultimately thwarted at the hands of Squall and his friends.
Contents |
[edit] Appearance & Personality
- "A sorceress trying to change the world by compressing time and taking power from all sorceresses."
- —Scan description
Ultimecia dons a skin tight red satin ball-gown with a plunging neckline that ends just over the crotch, exposing her neck, chest, stomach and abdomen; only partially obscuring the breasts. A black fur ruffle travels the edge of the bodice to travel along the collar, the ruffle is largest behind the neck, resting over her shoulders and covering the junction of her black feathered wings (it is unknown wether the ruffle is attached to her wings or just rests upon them). The hemline extends to drag along the floor behind her. Red long-blouse sleeves join with her taloned hands, which are colored purple.
Her shoulders are padded to extend just beyond her hip-line. Exposed skin (face, torso and legs) are moderatly tattooed with lined patterns. Jewelery is present with a gold necklace around her neck. Additionally, there are earings and hair jewelery amongst a headdress designed to pull her hair up to resemble horns while silver bangs are left free to hang down past her hip as they frame her face. The most striking feature of which are her yellow eyes set amongst purple eye shadow, the afore-mentioned tattoos and deep-red lipstick. She wears no footwear, instead walking (or perhaps flying) barefoot.
Ultimecia is a manipulative force who acts through the bodies of other sorceresses for much of the story. She has been described as a malevolent sorceress from many generations in the future; filled with anger and hate. She is capable of sending her mind back through time with a special Junction Machine. Additionally, she can influence the minds of other people, completely altering them into mere agents of her will. Ultimecia is also aware of the fact that she is destined to face a "Legendary SeeD." According to the Final Fantasy VIII Ultimania, Ultimecia's actions may be a means to escape her destined defeat at the hands of this Legendary SeeD. Her knowledge of this fate could be the main instigation for her desire of bringing about the phenomenon of "Time Compression," by which all time would merge. Through her spell she could absorb all time, space, and existence, and become "a living god," incapable of dying. With this power, she would be completely omnipotent, and could control all time, space, and existence, effectively preventing her demise.
It is made clear from her inauguration speech in Deling City that she has suffered through intense persecution. Future generations were aware of the coming of Ultimecia because of her failure to complete Time Compression. They likely reacted by targeting all sorceresses for persecution and isolation, because of the fear that any one of them could eventually become the "cold-blooded tyrant" that Ultimecia speaks of. Ultimecia was condemned for crimes she had not even committed yet. This prejudice and condemnation (and perhaps the actions that spawn from such states) is perhaps what prompted her into becoming a wrathful sorceress. Sadly it is Ultimecia's desire to alter time and escape this fate that fulfills the terms of her destiny. Her downfall at the hands of Squall Leonhart and his comrades perpetuates the cycle that will lead to the formation of SeeD and the continued persecution of Sorceresses unto her era.
Ultimecia has a definitive sense of style, and she demonstrates it very often. The interior of her castle is filled with faux-Victorian opulence, even containing an impressive art collection. While possessing Edea Kramer she dresses in a skin-tight violet evening gowns with luxurious feather collars and accessorizes with ornate headdresses and a large golden ornament on her back, bedecked with floating strips of rose-colored gauze. Every time the player encounters her within Edea, her decorative touch is in plain sight. In Deling City her waiting room is draped with silk curtains while in Galbadia Garden she reclines on a throne designed to look like a translucent flower, with white lights visible through the crystal, similar to the fronds of luminescent sea kelp.
[edit] Story
- "This is reality. No one can help you. Sit back and enjoy the show."
- —Ultimecia
Some thirteen years before game events Ultimecia time travels to the past, having been defeated by SeeD, arriving at Edea's Orphanage she passes her Sorceress Power to Edea Kramer before passing away. Twelve years pass until one year before the main events of the game, Ultimecia takes possesion of Edea. She uses Edea's body to infiltrate the government of Galbadia; quickly rising through the bureaucracy until she was appointed to the position of Ambassador of Galbadia by President Vinzer Deling himself.
When she was appointed, President Deling went to Timber to announce her appointment in the first worldwide televised broadcast since the entombment of Sorceress Adel. However, President Deling's broadcast was interrupted when he was taken hostage and nearly killed by Seifer Almasy, a renegade SeeD cadet. Due to a slip of the tongue by Zell Dincht, it was revealed that Seifer was from Balamb Garden. Because of this revelation, Seifer was unable to finish off the President, and was forced to escape instead.
During his escape Ultimecia, within Edea's body, surfaced from a teleportation spell. With her hair ornament concealing her face, she charmed him and made the effort to gain control over him by offering him her assistance in saving him from the "predicament" he now found himself in. By the time she was done Seifer was completely under her control. Quistis Trepe ran after Seifer and was soon followed by Squall and Zell, but when the three tried to approach Ultimecia they were paralyzed by her magic. They were then forced to watch helplessly as Seifer willingly allowed her to teleport him away to Galbadia.
Although it was publicly announced that Seifer would be executed for attempting to kill the President, this did not happen. Instead Ultimecia turned Seifer into her Sorceress Knight, making him her personal guardian. It is unknown whether or not President Deling knew about Ultimecia's actions. Nonetheless, he continued to publicize his new ambassador and planned a massive parade in Deling City to honor her appointment.
Unbeknownst to Ultimecia, General Caraway and SeeD mercenaries had formulated a plan to assassinate her at the parade in order to prevent her from seizing power across the world. Before the parade began, General Caraway's daughter, Rinoa Heartilly, attempted to trick Ultimecia into taking a bangle created by Dr. Odine that could seal away her Sorceress Power. Ultimecia recognized the bangle for what it was and telekinetically attacked Rinoa, beating her senseless. She then took control of Rinoa's body and led her to the balcony. Ultimecia ascended the podium of the balcony to give her acceptance speech to the people of Galbadia. It was a speech of hatred for the people who would create the generations that would condemn Ultimecia in the future.
After her speech, Ultimecia impaled President Deling through his chest with her bare hand in front of the entire city and threw his corpse off of the balcony. Shortly thereafter, Ultimecia declared herself ruler of Galbadia and brought two Iguion statues on the side of the Arch of Triumph to life and ordered them to devour Rinoa as a sacrifice for the celebration. Leaving Rinoa to her fate, Ultimecia boarded her glowing parade float which glided out into the street parade. As she passed underneath the Arch of Triumph she found herself in the middle of a second plot, this one not an attempt on her powers, but instead on her life. The skilled sniper Irvine Kinneas shot a bullet at Ultimecia from the top of the Clock Tower. After effortlessly blocking the bullet with a protection spell, she was confronted by Squall, Irvine, and Rinoa (who had just been rescued from the iguions).
Eventually, Ultimecia became annoyed with the three and activated Edea's natural Sorceress Power over ice, and used her Ice Strike Limit Break to stab Squall through the chest with a large shard of ice, nearly killing him. However, instead of killing Squall and his friends, Ultimecia had them imprisoned. She ordered Seifer to extract information about SeeD from Squall by torturing him with high voltage electricity. As Galbadia's new dictator, she declared Garden to be her enemy, because of the attempt on her life, and ordered that missiles be aimed at both Balamb Garden and Trabia Garden. Balamb Garden was able to avoid the missile attacks thanks to Squall and Selphie Tilmitt (both of whom had managed to escape from imprisonment). However, Trabia Garden was almost completely annihilated by the missile strike.
Shortly after the missile strike, Ultimecia took control of the remaining Garden, Galbadia Garden, and set out to find Ellone, the sole person known to possess control of time in this era. Galbadia took over the towns of Balamb and Fisherman's Horizon at her order and the army searched every house to find her, but the search was unsuccessful. She then set out to attack Balamb Garden directly, resulting in the Battle of the Gardens. Her invasion ended with Squall leading his allies into Galbadia Garden where she was confronted in the Garden Auditorium.
Within the Garden Auditorium, Ultimecia ordered Seifer to dispatch the SeeDs, but when he was unsuccessful, Ultimecia was forced to do battle once again. The encounter ended with Ultimecia being bested inside Edea's body. This defeat gave Edea the opportunity to break free of Ultimecia's control. After banishing Ultimecia from her body, Edea gave up her sorceress power to Rinoa. Ultimecia then proceeded to possess the newly awakened Sorceress Rinoa. Ultimecia used Rinoa to revive Seifer and ordered him to salvage the Lunatic Pandora from beneath the ocean. After giving Seifer the order, Ultimecia forced Rinoa's body into a coma.
Searching for a means to awaken Rinoa, Squall took her comatose body up to the Lunar Base. Ultimecia then seized the opportunity and brought Rinoa out of her coma to unlock Adel's tomb. She then abandoned Rinoa's body in space to die. During all this, Seifer had taken control of the Lunatic Pandora and completed the Lunar Cry, which brought an astonishing amount of monsters down to Earth from the Moon. Adel's unlocked tomb came down with the monsters. Seifer then managed to capture Ellone, and bring her to the Lunatic Pandora for Ultimecia's use.
Ellone's unique power to send the consciousnesses of others into different time periods had been used and copied by the Dr. Odine of the future to create the Junction Machine named Ellone. Ultimecia was using the future Junction Machine as a means to reach back to Squall and Edea's time. However, the Junction Machine could only send a mind so far into the past. Ultimecia needed the real Ellone in order to go even farther into the past, so that her consciousness would exist in the past, present, and future. With her mind present in all eras of time, Ultimecia would be able to cast her Time Compression spell.
After Ellone's abduction, Squall and his comrades, having saved Rinoa, were able to figure out what Ultimecia was planning to do with her. So they acted quickly to construct a plan that would halt Ultimecia's calamitous scheme with the Esthar scientist, Dr. Odine. They would allow Ultimecia to possess Adel. After defeating Adel, she would pass her powers onto Rinoa, making her the only sorceress left in the present era who Ultimecia could control. After Ultimecia takes over Rinoa, Ellone would then send both of their consciousnesses into the distant past, allowing Ultimecia to initiate Time Compression. Ellone would then bring back both of their minds, preventing the completion of the spell. In order to survive the compression, Squall and his friends would have to keep their bonds strong. Through the strength of their bonds they would be able to wade through the compressing timelines and reach Ultimecia's era.
Ultimecia as planned possessed Adel, but surprisingly ordered Seifer to capture Rinoa, and bring her to Adel's tomb. Ultimecia then junctioned Rinoa to Adel's body in order to use her as a source of power for which Adel's own powers could be fully restored. After engaging Squall in battle, Adel was defeated, ending Ultimecia's control over her. Before her death, Adel passed on her powers to Rinoa as planned. Ultimecia proceeded to possess Rinoa, allowing Ellone to send both of their minds to the past. Ultimecia then cast Time Compression, only to have it temporarily halted when Ellone sent their consciousnesses back to their respective eras. Squall used this partial compression as a way to enter Ultimecia's future.
After finding a world ravaged by Ultimecia's powers, Squall and his allies managed to enter Ultimecia Castle. Unexpectedly, Ultimecia had cast a sealing spell upon her castle, completely sealing the powers of Squall and his friends within her most powerful minions. After getting past the various traps and puzzles of the castle, Squall and his friends managed to defeat Ultimecia's minions, and regain their powers. They then climbed the large clock tower, and Ultimecia was personally confronted in her Master Room.
Ultimecia's final confrontation with SeeD was an epic and protracted battle that destroyed part of her castle. She attacked with an array of abilities in order to win, and gave life to abstract thought by reaching into Squall's mind and creating Griever, her own Guardian Force. After Griever's defeat, she junctioned herself to him, greatly amplifying her power. After Griever's body was completely destroyed, Ultimecia transformed into her ultimate form, and declared that all existence would be denied. Ultimecia then started absorbing all of time, space, and existence into her newly transformed body. While in this process, she attempted to kill the SeeDs by destroying their stocks of magic, casting some of the most potent spells in existence, and even reaching into her own mind to create Apocalypse, the ultimate Black Magic spell.
Despite her extensive powers Ultimecia was unable to overcome her fate, as the links that bound Squall and his friends together protected them from her Time Compression spell. The final encounter ended in UItimecia's defeat and her final form fell in a massive explosion. However, Ultimecia was not dead yet. As time began to decompress, Ultimecia traveled through the time warp she had created, and appeared in Edea's Orphanage thirteen years before the beginning of the story. She tried vainly to live, but was too weak. She then passed on her power and essence to the Edea of the past, unknowingly perpetuating the cycle of her defeat by SeeD. Ultimecia fell to her knees and faded away in a cloud of purple smoke.
[edit] Manifestation
Through entering their minds and forcibly imposing her own will upon them, Ultimecia can effectively turn people into vessels for her to either exist within or simply control externally. The people under her control lose their own will, and are diminished into helpless observers as Ultimecia controls their bodies. As such, it is revealed throughout events within the story that most of the pivotal antagonists of Final Fantasy VIII are either directly possessed or manipulated by Ultimecia as she works towards completing her machinations.
[edit] Controlling Edea
Sorceress Edea is the first known victim of Ultimecia's possession powers. Edea is forced to watch powerlessly while Ultimecia uses her body to begin her time-altering scheme, which culminated when Edea/Ultimecia was promoted to Ambassador of Galbadia by President Vinzer Deling. During her acceptance speech, Edea/Ultimecia murdered President Deling and seized his place as ruler over the country. Soon after, she began an extensive search for Ellone as well as a worldwide extermination of all SeeD. However, after being defeated inside Edea's body twice, Ultimecia was forced to give up on this possession. Edea then relinquished her Sorceress Powers to Rinoa in order to protect herself from any future possessions.
[edit] Controlling Rinoa
Rinoa falls victim to Ultimecia's control immediately after Edea's second defeat. After awakening Seifer, Ultimecia forces Rinoa into a coma and keeps her in this state until her admittance to the Lunar Base. Upon entering the Lunar Base, Rinoa/Ultimecia awakens and immediately sets out to free Sorceress Adel from her tomb and begin the Lunar Cry.
[edit] Controlling Adel
A short-lived possession, as by now SeeD has caught on to her plan. Ultimecia possesses Sorceress Adel shortly after the mighty tyrant awakens from years of entombment by rebel usurpers. Moments after Ultimecia junctions Rinoa to Adel's body, Adel/Ultimecia is confronted. After an intense battle, Adel is killed by SeeD operatives, ending Ultimecia's possession of her.
[edit] Strength
Ultimecia is an immensely powerful and highly developed Sorceress with her personal power focusing on time and space manipulation. This power is shown in the final battle, where she will often cast spells that involve bending space, such as Bio, Quake, and Meteor or absorb fallen party members into time in the battle against her. Furthermore, she has a devastating magical attack that is similar to Heartless Angel called Hell's Judgement. With Hell's Judgement, Ultimecia can reduce the entire party's health to one point, and she employs it very often in the final battle.
Ultimecia also has the ability to manifest and give life to subconscious thoughts and inanimate objects. This includes giving life to Guardian Forces and powerful monsters that did not exist before she created them. For example, Ultimecia manifested and extracted Griever from Squall's subconscious mind. She found Griever to be Squall's conception of the most powerful force that could exist and brought him to life for battle against Squall himself.
Moreover, there is her ability to cast Time Compression, which she used to begin absorbing all existence. She additionally has the ability to invade, possess and control an individual's mind; allowing her to steal thoughts, knowledge and magic. She is also able to use this ability on herself. For example, after she transforms into her ultimate form, Ultimecia reaches into her own mind, and manifests what in her mind is the ultimate Black Magic spell, Apocalypse. Her ability to manipulate objects and matter has also led to some interesting Junction forms.
Ultimecia has also demonstrated a keen strategic and diplomatic mind, such as being able to convince the President of Galbadia to employ her as the nation's diplomat as well as enticing Seifer Almasy, normally a hostile youth, to devote himself to her. In Dissidia Final Fantasy she also casually manipulates Kuja into performing for her ends. She is then seen trying to convince Sephiroth to join her and Emperor Mateus in their quest of taking control of the world from Chaos and Cosmos. Her intellect is also demonstrated by her sheer ability to conceive time paradoxes and work within them to attain her goals of a time and world compressed into what she conceives to be a perfect world.
[edit] Battle
- Main article: Ultimecia (Final Fantasy VIII Boss)
- Main article: Ultimecia (Griever Form)
- Main article: Ultimecia (Final Boss)
There are four boss battles at the climax of Final Fantasy VIII. The first phase is a fight against Ultimecia's first form. The second phase is fought with her newly created Guardian Force, Griever. She then junctions herself to Griever during the third phase. The fourth and final phase is fought against Ultimecia after she manifests into her existence absorbing final form.
 Ultimecia's First Form (Phase 1) |
 Ultimecia's Griever Form (Phase 3) |
 Ultimecia's Final Form (Phase 4) |
[edit] Musical Themes
Ultimecia has a wide variety of themes that accompany her throughout the game. Most of her theme songs contain the words, Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec, which are first heard in Liberi Fatali. All of her theme songs invoke feelings of melancholy and terror. Each song is meant to reflect the situations and circumstances of the moment in which it is played.
| ''SUCCESSION OF WITCHES'' | |
|  |
| Trouble with the audio sample? | |
- "SUCCESSION OF WITCHES" is the song most connected with Ultimecia's presence throughout the story. This chilling theme invokes a feeling of fear and unease. It is accompanied by a chorus chanting the words, "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec," which are often heard in Ultimecia's theme songs. This song is usually heard when Ultimecia appears to Squall and his comrades within the body of a sorceress she has possessed.
- "Compression of Time" is an ambient song used when Squall and his party enter the future through Time Compression. It features a synth saxophone accompanied intermittently by a chorus.
- "The Castle" is the dungeon music used for Ultimecia's Castle. It features a baroque organ, and is separated into three sections of varying emotions. The styles of these three sections vary from, light-hearted, dark and sinister, and playful intimidation.
- "The Extreme" is the final battle theme of the game. It is played during the confrontation with Ultimecia's ultimate form. This song is very likely Ultimecia's most recognizable theme. The song begins quietly with a female chorus singing the words, "Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec." Once the initial singing is over, a harp and piano duet begins to play. The magnitude of the instrumentation continues to build until the piece becomes a fast-paced electronic melody that further intensifies into a piano and electronics synthesizer mix. The tempo changes at intervals to turn the focus of the song to a piano solo, accompanied by electronic instruments, and a chorus. This moment in the piece is meant to echo the calmness found in its beginning. After the piano solo finishes, the song will return to its previous intensity.
[edit] Other Appearances
[edit] Dissidia Final Fantasy
- Main article: Ultimecia/Dissidia
Chaos has summoned a combined force of Final Fantasy's ultimate villains in an attempt to gain control of a number of crystals, which would result in total control of the Final Fantasy worlds. Ultimecia is one of these villains, and stands as the villain representing Final Fantasy VIII, opposing Squall Leonhart.
Ultimecia is mostly seen allying with the Emperor in an effort to reign in the more destructive members of Chaos' warriors and break the cycle of war. She also appears to manipulate Squall's chosen path towards his Crystal, and test his resolve to fight her. Her overall goal is to create a new compressed world where everything could exist eternally.
[edit] Trivia
- The final battle with Ultimecia is often praised for its length and difficulty. The video game website, 1up.com, ranked the battle high on their list of the 25 best final boss battles in video game history.
- As a sorceress, Ultimecia is almost the mirror opposite of Rinoa. For example, Ultimecia is an evil sorceress with black wings, while Rinoa is pure and has white wings. Additionally, Rinoa has black hair and Ultimecia has white-silver hair. Ultimecia also wears a prominent red dress, while Rinoa's sweeper is colored light-blue. Also, Rinoa uses Angelo while fighting and Ultimecia is known in two battles (including the third battle with her) to use Griever.
- Design elements from Ultimecia's Final Form are seen in Anima from Final Fantasy X.
- In Final Fantasy VIII Ultimecia's speech patterns seemed to put an emphasis on the letter 'c', pronouncing it as a harder sound than normal. This is shown through the game text as replacing this letter with the letter 'k', as seen in the line, "Kurse all SeeDs. Swarming like lokust akross generations." Later on however, during and after she evolves into her final form she loses this emphasis. This could be due to a momentary translation error between English and Japanese as Japanese does not have a hard "c", instead using "ka", "ki", "ku", "ke" or "ko" to pronounce such words.
[edit] Etymology
Ultimecia's name differs depending on the translation. As such it is somewhat difficult to conclude an exact origin however the most likely origins of the name are as follows:
- The Spanish translation's take on the name (Artemisa) could be derived from Artemis, the Greek Goddess of the hunt (also goddess of; childbirth, fertility, forests, moon and hills). Artemis was a controversial child of Zeus and the titan Leto, never married and remained chaste for all her days.
- The Italian and German translation's take on the name (Artemisia) calls back to at least three prominant women of history:
- Artemisia I of Caria (About 480 BC)
- Known as the "Tyrant of Halicarnassus", she fought alongside the Persians in the Battle of Salamis, but survived the battle using an unorthodox tactic; the Greeks were about to capture her vessel so Artemisia quickly turned her ship and rammed it into a friendly Persian vessel, which then sank. After seeing this the Greeks figured she was fighting for their side and backed off. Even Xerxes, the Persian king, got a little confused; he saw what happened and thought she had sunk a Greek vessel (something no other Persian boat had managed). He is said to have exclaimed, "My men have turned into women and my women into men!"
- Artemisia II of Caria (About 350 BC)
- The wife (and sister) of king Mausolus; she is known in history for her bizarre way of grieving from her husband's death (She drank the ashes of her dead husband mixed with water every day). To memorialize him she had a huge monument built; the Mausoleum of Maussollos. But she wasted away from grief and died before the mausoleum was finished. The mausoleum is known today as one of the "Seven Wonders of the Ancient World".
- Artemisia Gentileschi (1593 – 1653)
- A female painter, a theme in many of her paintings is female strength and sometimes even dominance over men. She had much success as a painter, but met misfortune early in her life as she was raped by her tutor, Agostino Tassi. Tassi was found out and sent to trial, but during the trial Artemisia was forced to undergo a vaginal exam (to check her virginity) and was also tortured to make sure she was telling the truth during her testimony. Some historians believe that these events played a major part in her works.
- She made multiple paintings of: the biblical Susanna being sexually harassed by her elders (Susanna and The Elders), the biblical Judith beheading General Holofernes (Judith Slaying Holofernes), and of Lucretia, the legendary noblewoman who was raped by a Roman prince and had committed suicide afterward.
- The English translations addition of 'Ulti' to the name (the only translation to do so) could be derived from the word, "ultimate". A definition of "ultimate" is to be the furthest or farthest away. Since Ultimecia was assumed to, once Time was compressed, possess every Sorceress Power from every Sorceress, effectively becoming 'the Ultimate Sorceress', this definition is also a possible origin for the meaning of her name.
[edit] Gallery
 CG Render of Ultimecia from Dissidia Final Fantasy. |
 Ultimecia on her throne in Final Fantasy VIII. |
