Seymour Guado

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Seymour Guado
Seymour Guado, painted by Tetsuya Nomura
Game series	Final Fantasy series
First game	Final Fantasy X
Character designer(s)	Tetsuya Nomura
Voice actor(s) (English)	Alex Fernandez
Voice actor(s) (Japanese)	Junichi Suwabe
In-Universe Information
Weapon	Staff
Special ability	Magic and Summoning
Overdrive	Requiem
Home	Guadosalam
Age	28

Seymour Guado (シーモア＝グアド, Shīmoa-Guado^?, formal titles: Maester Seymour Guado or Lord Seymour) is a fictional character and an antagonist in the Square Enix role-playing video game Final Fantasy X of the Final Fantasy series.

Seymour is the leader of the Guado nation, a race of humanoids in the world of Spira. He is also a maester of Yevon. He inherited both positions after the death of his father, Lord Jyscal Guado.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Early years 1.2 Final Fantasy X 1.3 Final Fantasy X-2 2 References

[edit] Biography

[edit] Early years

Seymour is actually half-Guado and half-human, as his father married a human woman in an attempt to foster friendship between the Guado and human races. However, many saw the boy as an abomination and Jyscal's decision to wed a human led to disunity in the Guado tribe. In order to avoid further strife amongst the Guado nation, Jyscal had his wife and son exiled to the island of Baaj.^[1] Afterwards, Seymour's mother — suffering from a terminal illness — gave her life in the Zanarkand Ruins to become the fayth of the aeon Anima, believing that only in sacrificing herself for Spira's temporary peace (known as "the Calm"^[2]) against the malevolent creature Sin would her son be accepted by the people.^[3][4] Horrified, Seymour refused the aeon and returned to Baaj^[5], where he dwelled alone for years, becoming increasingly morose and cynical. In time, he came to believe that death was the only freedom from the suffering of life, and that it would be in everyone's best interests to die and thus developed a Messianic complex.^[6] But to achieve his aims, he had to have a power greater than Anima, whose power he eventually accepted, or even all of the aeons combined.^[5]

At eighteen years of age, during High Summoner Braska's Calm, Seymour's exile was revoked and he was summoned back to Guadosalam, the capital of the Guado nation, where he was then ordained as a priest of Macalania Temple.^[7] Seven years later, he returned to Zanarkand to accept Anima's power, and then had its fayth statue transported to Baaj Temple, which he revisited several times while deciding if he should carry out a plan he had devised.^[8] Due to his years of loneliness and ever growing morbid philosophy, Seymour had concluded that his duty to Spira and release them from the painful prison which he believed life to be. As a result, he knew he would need a power greater than all of the aeons combined; he saw Sin as Spira's only hope. Shortly before and during the events of Final Fantasy X, Seymour set in motion a plan to ascend the hierarchy of Yevon, with his ultimate goal being to become the next Sin, so that he may kill everyone in Spira.^[9]

[edit] Final Fantasy X

Two years later, just before Tidus washed up at Baaj early in Final Fantasy X, Seymour murdered his own father Jyscal, ascending to the position of leader of the Guado nation and inheriting his position as one of the four Maesters of Yevon.^[10][11] In Luca, his eyes fell on Yuna, daughter of High Summoner Braska, and immediately became interested in her. During the tournament, he orchestrated an attack of fiends, which were formed and released into the stadium by Guado warriors. He used the attack as a means to display his power as a summoner using Anima, in order to gain the trust of the people. Later, at Mushroom Rock Road, Seymour was present along with Maester Wen Kinoc to support Operation Mi'ihen, a joint Crusader-Al Bhed offensive against Sin using Al Bhed weaponry (machina), which was forbidden by the Yevon order. The operation failed, and many Crusaders and Al Bhed died at the hands of Sin.

After the battle, Seymour returned to Guadosalam in anticipation of Yuna and her guardians. As revealed in Final Fantasy X-2, while waiting, he was visited by Baralai, who sought Seymour's aid after the Crimson Squad incident that occurred simultaneously with Operation Mi'ihen. Seymour agreed to help, allowing Baralai to go into hiding until such a time as it was safe for him to openly reveal himself.^[12] Once Yuna and her guardians finally arrived, Seymour used a sphere containing memories of Zanarkand collected from the Farplane to woo Yuna.^[13] He then asked Yuna to marry him, seemingly in order to further unite Spira, as they both had mixed parentage, being the half breed of a human and another race.^[14]

After Yuna's visit to the Farplane to seek guidance from her dead father concerning Seymour's marriage proposal, the party is shocked by the spirit of Jyscal who follows them out of the Farplane. Yuna sends him and retrieves a sphere that fell from Jyscal's unsent form. When she then goes to confront Seymour, she learns that he has already left for Macalania Temple.

At Macalania, where he expected Yuna to accept his proposal of marriage, Seymour was surprised to find that she had come to stop him. The sphere Yuna received from the unsent form of Jyscal detailed Seymour's treachery and implored whoever saw it to stop him.^[15] Yuna, along with her guardians, then fought and killed Seymour in self-defense. However, Yuna was prevented from sending Seymour's spirit to rest on the Farplane by his Guado retainer, Tromell. As a result, Seymour's spirit was able to remain in the living world and become an Unsent.

Yuna was soon kidnapped on Bikanel Island by a Guado attack squad sent by Seymour to decimate the Al Bhed's base, Home.^[16] They then took her to Bevelle, the capital of the Yevon religion.

There, Seymour forced Yuna into marriage. After she tricked him into believing that she will marry him — a ploy intended to allow her to get close enough to him to send him — her guardians attacked Bevelle in a rescue attempt and were quickly apprehended, leaving Yuna with no option but to marry Seymour or sacrifice her guardians. Yuna and her guardians were soon put on trial and convicted of high treason, sentenced to death in the winding, fiend-infested halls of the Via Purifico. They soon escaped from this fate, however, and confronted Seymour, who revealed his murder of Maester Kinoc and his plans for Yuna — to turn him into the next Sin so that he may kill all living things and grant them what he believes to be the highest favor imaginable. He then assumes the form of Seymour Natus after Kimahri attempted to run the villain through with his lance. After his defeat by Yuna and her companions, Seymour retreated before Yuna was able to send him.

He then pursued them to Mt. Gagazet, slaughtering nearly all of the Ronso tribe who dwelled there, and confronted Yuna and her guardians in battle once again in the form of Seymour Flux. He disappeared yet again before he could be sent, but this time, his component pyreflies were absorbed by Sin while Yuna's party were at Zanarkand.^[17] There, within Sin, Seymour began seeking a means to control the creature from within. During this process, he was confronted a final time by Yuna and her guardians, who had fought Sin directly and managed to break their way inside the creature's body, seeking Yu Yevon, the spirit dwelling within Sin that ensured its survival. Seymour, refusing to allow them to harm Sin, used the monster's power to become Seymour Omnis. However, he was defeated and was finally sent to the Farplane by Yuna, departing with the ominous warning that Spira's sorrow will continue, which came true during the events of Final Fantasy X-2.^[18]

It is debated whether Seymour actually had true feelings for the summoner Yuna.

[edit] Final Fantasy X-2

Seymour's role in Final Fantasy X-2's story is small, appearing only in a flashback cut-scene accessed through the Key Item Baralai's Sphere. It is in this scene that Seymour's role in Baralai's escape from Wen Kinoc is revealed — though it does not fully support the claim that this ultimately led to Baralai becoming the praetor of the New Yevon Party.

In Final Fantasy X-2 International, Seymour can be fought in the Battle Simulator tournament and also be added as a member of your party with the new Creature Create feature.^[19]

[edit] References

v • d • e Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy X-2

List of Final Fantasy X characters - List of Final Fantasy X-2 characters Tidus - Yuna - Auron - Wakka - Kimahri Ronso - Lulu - Rikku Jecht - Seymour Guado - Paine History of Spira - Places in Spira - Blitzball Final Fantasy X Soundtracks - Final Fantasy X-2 Soundtrack - Al Bhed language