"There are rules", the judges said. "You can't have access to your most powerful gear and skills, because they require things everyone can have and not things that are unique to you", they said. "All you have to fight with are your weak, generic abilities. No job combos for Ramza, no ultimate dress spheres for Rikku", they said. "We don't care if versatility was what made you such effective adventurers. Find another dueling league if you don't like it", they said.
Ramza and Rikku had had just about all they could take.
"Yunie was lucky enough to land summoning abilities no one else following her can have, you know? And because of that she has multiple godlike championships, while the two of us are stuck fighting in middle for the right to face some oversized plant and probably lose to it... AAAAAAAAGH! Why did this have to happen to us!?"
Ramza wrung his hands angrily in response. "I didn't save Ivalice from the Lucavi by allowing myself to be pushed around by people who think it's their right to tell me what to do. I defied. I became an outcast. I saved myself and an entire country from oppression by learning many different trades, gaining many different powers, and flawlessly combining them." He started pacing. "People in this league elevate themselves to 'godlike' because they had the right things handed to them on a silver platter. No doubt they are as decadent as those I overthrew.... enough. Rikku. Let us teach these people a lesson. We won't be unfairly bound by their arbitrary, self serving rules. We'll tear them down, and then we'll have a good clean fight with our true strength unfettered."
"Yeah.... YEAH!" Rikku exclaimed. "We'll show up to the arena fully decked out. No one will dare tell us we can't fight how we want! No one will have the guts! And we'll set an example to everyone in our situation, like those people from Balamb. We'll show 'em!"
And so, Ramza showed up with a golden escutcheon backed by abandon, maximized brave, minimized faith and the strongest weapons and armor Ivalice could offer, and stared down Machina Maw.
"Don't try to tell us we can't do this!" Rikku called out to the judges's box. "We have more than enough strength to-"
13 knights descended on her from the judges box and tore her to bloody shreds. Ramza looked up quickly, saw a yellow flash followed by a red one, then the knights came for him.
Sephiroth, in his black-caped human form, stared grimly and lowered his arm. On it was a bracelet containing three materia: Sneak Attack, Knights of the Round, and W-Summon. "That's not the kind of plan you can keep secret in a place like this, especially not when you yell it as loudly as Rikku yells things. Or did you think only you had access to that kind of power?"
Conformity pays sometimes.
