Aerith Gainsborough

"Young, beautiful, and somewhat mysterious, Aeris met Cloud while selling flowers on the streets of Midgar..."

Aeris Gainsborough is the heroine of Final Fantasy VII. She uses a staff as her weapon and wears a pink ribbon in her hair. Due to a mistranslation in the original English translations, she is also known as Aeris Gainsborough.

Having lived in the slums of Midgar for years, she has become street-smart, and has had to evade the Shin-Ra many times.

Final Fantasy VII
Aeris was born from one of the last remaining Cetra, Ifalna, and her father was Professor Gast. When her mother managed to escape the Shin-Ra who tried to capture her, she made it as far as Midgar. Ifalna was badly wounded, and gave the baby Aeris to Elmyra Gainsborough just before she died.

Aeris lived with Elmyra in Sector 6 in the Midgar Slums for a long time. Being a Cetra, she could hear the words of the planet. Even though people claimed nothing could grow in the slums, because the Mako Reactors drained all the life out of Midgar's surrounding areas, she managed to grow flowers in a nearby church.

She then met Zack, a First class SOLDIER from Gongaga Village, who she fell in love with. When Zack was killed by the Shin-Ra, she never found out about it, but she felt in her heart that he was dead.

She sold flowers on the street for one gil, when she met Cloud Strife, who bears a striking resemblance to Zack. Later on, Cloud winds up in the church, where he introduces himself to Aeris and becomes her "bodyguard". When Cloud sees Tifa, and decides to break into Don Corneo's mansion, Aeris helps him disguise as a girl.

Later on in the game, the party goes to the Temple of the Ancients to obtain the Black Materia. Cloud obtains the Black Materia, but is controlled by Sephiroth, and gives it to him. Aeris then runs after Sephiroth, and claims that by using the White Materia, Holy, which she has in her ribbon, she can stop him.

The party arrives at the Forgotten Capital, where Aeris is praying for Holy. Sephiroth gains control over Cloud again, and he nearly kills her. Cloud is stopped by his friends, but Sephiroth appears from above, dealing a fatal blow to Aeris. Cloud is enraged, and after a battle with Jenova*LIFE, he takes her down to the water, and lets her go.

Aeris appears again in the ending, where she helps Cloud. She is the last character to be seen before the ending.

Advent Children
Aeris is in the CGI-movie Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children. She appears, at a few points of the movie, to Cloud in a vast space of light, usually without background (presumably the Lifestream.) She eventually convinces Cloud to forgive himself via these meetings---she even manages to leave a message on his cell phone telling him that his coming for her was all that really mattered (the message is the last one on the phone before it hits the bottom of the lake.) Throughout these meetings the audience can only see the bottom half of her face, and it is not until the ending sequence that her full facial features are revealed.

Level 1
Restores a partial amount of HP to the entire party.
 * Healing Wind

Casts the silence and stop status temporarily on opponents.
 * Seal Evil

Level 2
Restores bad status alignments cast upon the party.
 * Breath of the Earth

While sacrificing her own limit Aeris grants the two other party members a full limit gauge and the Fury status.
 * Fury Brand

Level 3
Temporarily makes the party invincible
 * Planet Protector

Fully restores the party's HP and cures bad status alignments.
 * Pulse of Life

Level 4
Aeris' final and ultimate limit break fully restores HP, clears status ailments, and makes the party invincible for a short time.
 * Great Gospel

Other Information

 * Aeris is the first and last person to be seen in the game (before the credits).
 * Aeris is famous for saying the wrongly translated line: "This guy are sick". This was fixed in both the PC release and Greatest Hits release.