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Emilio[1] is a minor character first depicted in flashbacks and text in Final Fantasy VII, a background non-player character in Crisis Core -Final Fantasy VII-, and later expanded on in Final Fantasy VII Remake Trace of Two Pasts. He is a childhood friend of Tifa Lockhart's from Nibelheim.

Emilio is the son of the Nibelheim village general store owner, and the store was his home. He was a member of the group colloquially known as the "Four Fiends" with him, Tifa, Tyler, and Lester. Long after leaving the village for Midgar, he continued to write letters to Tifa.

History[]

Childhood[]

Emilio was one of five children around the same age in Nibelheim while growing up, along with the Four Fiends and Cloud Strife. The Four Fiends earned the moniker "Four Fiends" from the other villagers due to how inseparable they were, as they were close since they could work. Though Cloud was invited to adventures with them, he would ignore them, sometimes getting into fights.[2]

At some point, when Emilio was young, he was stuck in Nibelheim's Gunnthra River. It took all of his strength just to stay in one place while he yelled out for help, and the adults had to pull him out with rope, tying it to a throwline to pull Emilio to safety. The result caused the village to ban children under the age of eleven from approaching the Gunnthra without an adult.[3]

Searching for the You of That Day sequence 1 from FFVII
Searching for the You of That Day sequence 2 from FFVII

The group around Tifa during their childhood.

When Tifa's mother, Thea Lockhart, died while Tifa was eight, Emilio and the others comforted her, before accompanying her up Mt. Nibel. Emilio and the others discouraged her from continuing, while Cloud followed. Cloud and Tifa slipped down a rocky slope in an accident that left Tifa in a coma.[4] Emilio and the others rushed back to the village for help, and told them that Cloud had tagged with them and urged Tifa to press on, a story that was inconsistent with the truth but that Cloud never denied.[5][note 1]

In their teenage years, Emilio and the others saw Tifa as a potential romantic partner, showing off to her and inviting her out alone, to which she would respond with vague silence.[2] When Tifa sprained her ankle, her father Brian Lockhart enlisted Emilio to help her on walks to help with the recovery, him bringing a basket of fruit and a thermos of tea. He invited her to the base of the falls, but as they were leaving, Lester arrived, much to Emilio's disappointment. The group began a tradition of holding tea parties, at Tifa's suggestion. Emilio and the others would talk about Midgar in a semi-truthful way, expressing hopes to move there by enlisting with the Shinra Electric Power Company.[6]

Time in Midgar[]

Emilio lied to his parents that he found a job working for Shinra when he left.[7] On his final day in Nibelheim before leaving for Midgar, he appeared at Tifa's house, swearing he would return and pleading with her to wait for him. He then left the village on an old truck that delivered parts and materials for maintenance on Shinra's facilities. As it left, he waved both arms in wide arcs until he and the truck were out of sight.[8]

Emilio continued to write to Tifa. Eight days after arrival, while searching for a job, he wrote about how others from Nibelheim welcomed him aside from Cloud (who they could not get hold of), lamenting that he should have taken over his parents' store.[7][note 2] In subsequent letters, he described the noise, food, gap between rich and poor, and the differences in values, and telling Tifa he would think of her when about to lose hope, dreaming of the day he would return to Nibelheim and "take her away" for a life with him there. This angered Tifa greatly that Emilio would decide her future for him by himself.[10]

Around this time, Zack Fair also met Emilio in the Sector 5 slums. Emilio bragged about a "girlfriend back home" in Nibelheim saying they "handwrite letters to each other", despite Tifa not being his girlfriend.[11][note 3]

Six years after leaving Nibelheim, Emilio had a chance reunion with Tifa after he walked into Seventh Heaven with his new girlfriend. Tifa was surprised to see how much he'd grown since they were children and noted how beautiful his girlfriend was.

Notes[]

Annotations[]

  1. In "Searching for the You of That Day" in Final Fantasy VII, it is unclear which of the three boys is which; depending on which, Emilio could have been one of the two who went with her but cautioned her against proceeding, or could have been one of the ones who ran away early on in the trail.
  2. In "The Tragedy of Five Years Ago" in Final Fantasy VII, the player, controlling Cloud in the flashback, can optionally decide to read the letter in Tifa's room from the "son of the guy that runs the General Store".[7] If he does so, he will bring this up to Sephiroth in "That Which Waits in the Northernmost Reaches".[9]
  3. The man who claims to have a girlfriend in Nibelheim who he writes letters to was confirmed to the son of the general store owner in Nibelheim in the Crisis Core Complete Guide.[12]

Citations[]

References[]

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