Throughout the years

Throughout the years
"DON'T LOSE YOUR WAY!"

5/16/2014

Bleach Fantasy Round 11: Tier Harribel vs. Lightning (K!ck@$$ #ero!ne$)

VS.

Look into their eyes and you'll find that you don't want to cross them ~ they will kick your @$$ and probably not think twice. One is the heroine from Final Fantasy & the other became the heroine of Hueco Mundo in Bleach. Anyways, these two women are strong, brave, confident, calculating, and remain calm in the midst of confrontation. Both have someone they care for ~ Lightning genuinely cares for her sister, Serah's wellbeing and Harribel genuinely cares for her fraccion's (Apacci, Mila Rose, & Sung-Sun) wellbeing(s). And, dare I say this, BEEWBS! Let's end this week right by comparing these two k!ck@$$ Hero!ne$ ~ Harribel vs. Lightning. The following will be compared: Backstory/Role in Story, Powers/Abilities, and Verdict (By MechG2994). FF currently lead 6-4 against Bleach. As said before, my portions will be noted in Blue and MechG2994's in Purple. The titles are noted in Yellow.

Backstory/Role in Story (Tier Harribel)
Before Harribel was the 3rd Espada under Aizen's tutelage, Harribel was trying to stay alive in Hueco Mundo as a Vasto Lorde-class Menos. When Apacci (later would be one of Harribel's fraccion) is being attacked by 2 male Adjuchas, Harribel steps in to save her. Afterwards, Apacci introduces Harribel to Mila Rose & Sung-Sun ~ a fated meeting of the 3rd Espada and her underlings. Harribel brought up the idea of working together as a group not only to survive together, but to defend themselves from any threat that may come to them. Harribel's philosophy on power is that she'd rather work in a group than to sacrifice others for her own benefit (this means she's a team-player). It wouldn't be long before Harribel & her new comrades were faced with a new terror - the King of Hueco Mundo, Barragan Louisenbairn. Her refusal to yield to the King only made things worse as Baraggan's underlings, one by one, attacked Harribel & her new comrads. Baraggan personally was tired of Harribel's rebellious attitude and refusal to yield to him. Since then, Harribel & her comrades had to stick close since Baraggan was after them. A henchmen of Baraggan's appeared and tried to do away with Harribel only to have her own life saved....by Aizen Sousuke. Aizen gave Harribel a choice to join his ranks ~ to protect not only herself, but the lives of her own comrades. Hearing Aizen's concept of sacrifice, Harribel & her Fraccion joined him.

Harribel isn't formerly introduced as of yet, but is briefly seen at the birth of Wonderweiss Margela and at the debriefing of Ulquiorra & Yammy's visit to Karakura Town. She is rightfully seen and introduced when Aizen summons the Espada about the intruders in Hueco Mundo (Ichigo, Uryu, & Chad). She is seen bickering with 5th Espada, Nnoitra, about the intruders. Just as Nnoitra asks her if she was scared, Harribel was quick to turn angry, but is stopped when Grimmjow decides to leave the meeting in order to pursue the intruders. When Grimmjow & Ichigo finally have their anticipated match, Harribel & her Fraccion are seen watching from a distance, but Harribel notices something? The opponent Grimmjow was fighting, to her, didn't feel human ~ it felt like it was an Espada vs. Espada fight. She is in shock of how Ichigo's strength was on par with Grimmjow's & that it was, as I said before, inhuman. Tier Harribel shows up later on alongside Starrk & Baraggan to fight the resistance in Fake Karakura Town. She, alongside her Fraccion, fight the 10th division. Hitsugaya, Captain of the 10th Division, is surprised that Harribel is strong and is only the 3rd Espada. An expert iswordsman and being highly perceptive & tactical in battle, she was able to discern all of Hitsugaya's attacks. It wouldn't be long before Harribel releases her Resurreccion - Tiburon (Imperial Shark Empress). However, she didn't ascertain the full extent of one of Hitsugaya's abilities and is frozen-in place temporarily by this attack (Hyoten Hyakkaso). However, it seems that Harribel has yet to face defeat as Wonderweiss appears and breaks Harribel from the ice that imprisoned her ~ ready to face Hitsugaya once more. All seemed to be in Harribel's favor up until the Visored showed up to back the Shinigami in their confrontation against the Espada. Lisa, Hiyori, & Hitsugaya triple-teamed her, but Harribel was able to tactically and carefully maneuver her way out of each and every one of their attacks. As Starrk & Barragan fell, Harribel is seen being the only remaining Espada. Seeing that it was futile and that they served their purpose, Aizen betrays and mercilessly cuts down Harribel. Angered by this sudden betrayal from her savior, she retaliates only to be struck down by Aizen & his Kyoka Suigetsu. After Aizen's imprisonment, she becomes the new ruler of Hueco Mundo. However, a new threat shows up known as the Wandenreich and Yhwach quickly dispatched Harribel. Harribel is last seen being held captive.

Backstory/Role in Story (Lightning Farron)
The eldest daughter in the Farron family, Claire had a tragic upbringing in her early life, losing both her mother and father from unknown circumstances, leading to raise her only family in her little sister in Serah. Though the loss of the parents greatly affected her, she believed she had to become an adult quickly in order to ease the pain and that’s when the legend of “Lightning” was born. After finishing high school, she enlisted in the Guardian Corps Security Regiment in Bodhum under the wing of Lieutenant Amodar and was promoted in the ranks as sergeant. Though she did this to support Serah as well as support herself, Lightning began to stray away from staying close to her sister and found less personal time with her as she worked long term hours. On her 21st birthday, Lightning learns that Serah has been branded as a Pulse L’Cie and accepted Snow’s proposal to be his bride, leaving Light infuriated and scoffing the couple out of the house. After opening the survival knife as a birthday present, Lightning watches the coverage of Sanctum officials putting the city of Bodhum on quarantine after the vestige containing the Pulse Fal’Cie, Anima was founded; she realizes the danger Serah is put into. With PSICOM enforcing the Sanctum rule for people to be “purged” into the world of Pulse out of Cocoon, Lightning volunteers, resigning from the Guardian Corps, and boarding one of the purge trains.

How to sum up Lightning’s role? Well she played a major part in XIII (she is the protagonist duh), took a back seat in XIII-2 (fanservice to develop her sister, Serah’s character), then regained the poster girl role in LR (Lightning Returns). So in the beginning of XIII, Lightning along with another purge volunteer in Sazh hijacked a purge train near the Hanging Edge, bypassing PSICOM soldiers (majority were fighting against Snow and his rebellious group, NORA) to reach the same vestige that branded Serah. Inside, Lightning and Sazh unexpectedly rendezvoused with Snow, Vanille, and Hope and bringing them together put Serah in a crystallized state in an indication that Serah completed her focus. With Serah crystallized, Lightning and Snow would bicker back and forth with Snow taking a side that Serah is alive and there’s a way to save her, but Lightning insists Serah’s dead, she lost her only family. Lightning took her anger on attempting to slay a dormant Anima with her gunblade, but that woke up the Fal’Cie and branded all five of them while transporting the vestige to Lake Bresha. Light along with the group now have to try and find out their focus before they become Cieth since they were branded and the group chooses to leave out Snow, since he was too hell bent to free Serah from her crystal state and they split into two: Vanille with Sazh and Hope with Lightning. Lightning helped Hope’s character development because out of all the FFXIII characters, Hope was the only one Lightning was open to talk to and she was like a mother-figure/older sister to Hope considering Hope’s mom died in the beginning of FFXIII during the purge. Lightning and Hope would eventually reunite with Snow and newcomer, Fang in Palumpolum and board the Lindblum the Calvary’s (lead by Cid Raines and Rygdea) ship to pinpoint Vanille and Sazh’s location. They find their location onboard the Sanctum ship, Palamecia and they encounter the Sanctum Primarch, Galenth Dysley, who transforms into the Fal’Cie, Barthandelus. After defeating Barthandelus the first time, Lightning and the group were casted off into Gran Pulse, they encounter Barthandelus again in Oerba and defeat him a second time. In the Cocoon capital of Eden, they defeat the Primarch a third time, awakening Orphan, the Fal’Cie who created Cocoon and its capital. The group defeats Orphan, Fang and Vanille sacrifice themselves to become Ragnarok and save Cocoon from total destruction,  Lightning is awaken from crystal stasis reuniting with Snow, Sazh, Hope, Sazh’s son Dajh, and Serah, Light and Serah embrace a sisterly moment to live happily ever after. But then forwarding to XIII-2, Lightning was dragged away from the surface of Gran Pulse, away from history to the timeless world of Valhalla where she would become the champion of the dying goddess, Etro and dueling against her fated rival, the Immortal Guardian of Time, Caius Ballad (those two would fight in an infinite loop throughout the whole game). So who watches over Serah? Lightning sends Noel, whom she rescues from falling towards Valhalla’s surface and a moogle (Mog) to watch Serah. When Light saw Serah’s death after resolving the paradoxes, it broke the timeless loop, she manages to defeat Caius, and preserve her sister’s memory sitting on Etro’s throne crystallized while Gran Pulse and the revived Cocoon swallow into chaos. 500 years later, in LR, Lightning is awakened by Bhunivelze to become the Savior to save all the souls in what is now Nova Chrysalia within 13 days before the world reaches judgment day and in exchange, Bhunivelze will free Serah’s soul. While doing all the soul saving, she encounters Lumina, a little girl that represents Lightning’s inferior side. So she saves a lot of souls, particularly the souls of Noel, Snow (both despaired from Serah’s death), Sazh, and Caius (under Yeul’s request), reunites with Fang to help her stop Vanille on the last day from singing to the souls of the dead in a cathedral in Luxerion. After doing all that stuff, Lightning encounters the almighty god himself, defeats him a couple times, then merges with Lumina, calls for help from Hope, Snow, Noel, Sazh, Vanille, Fang, and Serah to finish off Bhunivelze once and for all, and lead the souls to a new world where gods won’t intervene.

Powers/Abilities (Tier Harribel)
Being the 3rd Espada, she possesses incredible spiritual power. As said previously above - Harribel is a master swordsman, being able to perceive and tactically maneuver her way from Hitsugaya's attacks. With any Hollow, she is capable of performing Cero, Sonidl, & Descorrer (this allows her to move freely between worlds). However, she is most proficient in her Zanpaktou ~ Tiburon. In her Resurreccion form, not only is her power, agility, and durability enhanced ~ but she has a onslaught of attacks that prove to be devastating on Captain Hitsugaya & her main basis of attacks is based on water manipulation. By garnering her spiritual power onto the tip of her blade, she is able to fire a yellow-colored projectile called Ola Azul (Blue Wave Gun). Harribel is able to fire tridents (infusing her sword with her spiritual power that fires high-force slashes in a series of three shots ~ being able to cut through anyone at ease). Her attack, Hirviendo (Burning Current) ~ she can control and manipulate her boiling water just by pointing her blade in any direction. La Gota (War Drop) allows Harribel to condense large amounts of water around her blade before firing it as a blast that resembles much like a shark tooth (this attack alone was enough to destroy houses). And her last attack, Cascada (Cutting Waterfall) ~ allows Harribel to launch a surge of water at her opponent which is large enough to cover several town blocks.

Powers/Abilities (Lightning Farron)
Okay so in the FFXIII trilogy, Lightning is a soldier branded as a L’Cie in XIII, a Valkyrie/knight hybrid goddess in XIII-2 who can see the timeline and the human world beyond Valhalla, and finally she’s a soul savior in LR whose abilities transcends that of a normal human (to this day, I still make this joke that Square Enix “roided” her up through every sequel in the XIII installment). Throughout that, her weapon gets modified from time at first with a gunblade in XIII that is able to specialize in short and long range (sword mode representing short range/melee, gun mode representing long range), then in XIII-2, her gunblade is modified where she can summon it on command during battle, and in LR, she wields a traditional sword called the “Crimson Blitz.” Her fighting style is based on high agility, speed, and versatility and those abilities increase through every sequel, but particularly in LR, she is more technical and stealthy while at the same retaining the high agility traits. In XIII, her strong paradigm roles are Commando, Ravager, and Medic, and she’s also a decent Synergist emphasizing on offensive modifications. She has high physical and magic stats out of the whole party and she can master magic for all four elements: fire, lightning (no pun intended), water/ice, and wind/air. Lightning’s ATB skill, “Army of One” is a Ravager-type skill where she builds up an opponent’s stagger gauge, attacks with her gunblade followed by heavy kicks, and her agility is at an all-time high. She can summon her Eidolon (XIII’s term for summon), Odin in battle and Odin specializes in heavy lightning (no pun intended again)-elemental spells. In Gestalt mode, Odin transforms into a horse and Lightning wields Odin’s sword, Zantetsuken into battle and before Odin can be ejected from the battlefield, Lightning, with the Zantetsuken, unleashes a devastating tornado attack, dealing massive damage to nearby enemies.

Verdict (By MechG)
And the winner is...

Ok after evaluating the two, obviously both are powerful in their own right with Harribel being the 3rd powerful Espada and Lightning being a L’Cie/Knight Goddess/Savior. However to channel my NFL referee stuff, after further review, my ruling on the field stands that Lightning wins this matchup. In terms of story, obviously Lightning had most of the bulk considering she is the protagonist, but what made my verdict stand is that Harribel was a team-player, so she had some company with her fraccion, her fellow Espada, and later Aizen who had each other’s back and will bail each other out when in danger in no time; Lightning had NOBODY. She had nobody other than her sister. I’ll admit Light’s character development has been at times a little boring (we’ve seen the antics of cold-hearted, “do it on my own” FF characters so many times with Cloud and Squall) and a little inconsistent, it doesn’t change the fact that she kinda helped elevated character developments of Snow (hated), Hope (hated), Sazh (funny as f*ck), Vanille (cute, but annoying), and Fang (rawr) in XIII and later with Noel and Caius in XIII-2. Let’s also do a resume head count here, Harribel faced off against the King of Hueco Mundo himself, Baraggan, though he’s the authority, he’s one of the strongest Espadas, 10th division captain, Hitsugaya; Lightning faced off against two of the most powerful Fal’Cie (Barthandelus and Orphan), the strong, immortal, Caius for almost an eternity, and finally the almighty god, Bhunivelze on the eve of the end of the world. She took on an all-powerful god and defeated him and battled one of the most powerful FF villains in an endless cycle (before Serah’s death broke that). Man Square Enix really roided her up good, that’s not fair! I couldn’t even wonder which Bleach character is able enough to fight the same opponent in almost an endless loop and not let up, especially if it’s a powerful Espada like Harribel. I gotta say, I’m probably the most hated guy this week, having hand out a controversial verdict Monday and today, much to the dismay of Bleach fans (sorry again) and some FF fans (Lightning is one of the most hated characters among many legit FF fans), but it’s subjective, I’m sticking to my guns and Lightning is the victor in this matchup.

So who do you think would win a fight? Tier Harribel from Bleach or Lightning Farron from FF XIII/XIII-2? Comment below and let us know. As always, look forward to Bleach Fantasy posts every Monday & Friday all throughout May posted between 8am-11:59pm. The next 2 BF Rounds (12 & 13) will be chosen and decided by yours truly. Until then, stay classy Bleach fans! FF leads 7-4 against Bleach (As of May 16th, 2014). Throwback #40 is down below. 

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