Minerva is the ultimate challenge in Crisis Core Final Fantasy VII: Reunion and as such, takes some preparation before taking her on. You’ll find her waiting in Mission 9-6-6.

If you’ve played any Final Fantasy game before (or any JRPG for that matter), you’ll be well aware that there is usually some optional challenge. Minerva is that optional challenge in Crisis Core Final Fantasy VII: Reunion, you won’t find a tougher enemy than her in the game. For that reason, her reward is a little underwhelming not due to how powerful it is, Divine Slayer is fantastic, but there’s nothing that needs it once you beat Minerva.

Before you start thinking about what attacks to deal with, first you’ll need to know how to unlock the battle and prepare with the necessary Equipment and Materia setup.

How to Unlock Mission 9-6-6: The Reigning Deity¶

As you can see, Minerva’s mission is the final mission in the M9: Great Cavern of Wonders category. You’ll have to go through a lengthy process to unlock 9-6-6, but this is to your benefit as you’ll get a lot of the tools you need to deal with Minerva effectively. Follow these steps below to unlock the mission:

• Walk towards the ladder in the Mako Reactor in Chapter 3 to unlock Mission 8-4-1

• Complete Missions 8-4-1 to 8-4-6

• Complete Missions 8-5-1 to 8-5-6

• Complete the entire category of M9 (all can be unlocked at this point) to unlock M9-6-6

Mission 9-6-6 will put you straight into the battle with Minerva, there is no navigating to her first or any chests to complete.

Best Materia and Equipment Setup for Minerva¶

So, now that you have access to Minerva, you’ll want to make sure you’re adequately prepared before taking her on. Being the game’s superboss, you’ll need to make sure you have as close to max Stats and HP, while also breaking the Damage Limit. Below, you can find our setup we used for Minerva:

Materia¶

Accessories¶

If you take a look at the screenshot, we were Level 78 when we took on Minerva, but you can take her on at a much lower Level, just be sure to add more to each of the stats to get the following: HP - 99,999, ATK/VIT/SPR - 255.

The biggest issue is getting your stats of your Materia high enough, this will require you to complete many Missions to get a lot of the items naturally. Just remember that you can raise a stat on a Materia to +99, then just add a single stat boost item to it to change it to the desired stat.

The Accessories should come naturally as you progress through the Missions. You’ll find the Genji Gloves in a Chest in M9-6-4, the Adaman Bangle as early as completing M7-3-6, the Ziedrich in a Chest in M9-5-6, and the Genji Helm can be purchased from the Online Shop Shade for 1,000,000 Gil that you will unlock in M9-5-4.

Most of your damage is going to come from Costly Punch, but Aerial Drain can chip in with a fair bit of damage while providing some safety and decent HP regeneration (better than the Curaga). You’ll want to keep Wall up at all times and Mug is here purely for the ability to steal any additional Phoenix Downs you may need from Minerva. Finally, you should have plenty of Gil now so consider buying a max stash of X-Potions to use as your main way to heal, rather than using Curaga.

Minerva Boss Guide¶

Once you’re ready to get down to business, select Mission 9-6-6 to get the ball rolling. Minerva has a massive 10,000,000 HP (which becomes 77,777,777 HP on Hard Mode!) so you’ll be in for a long battle, even with Costly Punch dealing 99,999 per hit. You should always have a Phoenix Down active, if you need more, Mug them from her. Minerva has three distinct themes to her battle, which go something like this:

Elemental/Physical attacks such as Thor’s Hammer > Ultima > Judgment Arrow

Her elemental and physical attacks all hit hard, and some, like Krysta will freeze Zack in place and make him vulnerable to follow-up attacks. Still, these can mostly all be easily dodged and healed through.

Ultima, on the other hand, bares special mention as it’s the main reason you’ll want 99,999 HP. You should always have a Phoenix Down active for this very reason. Even with Wall active, Ultima hits hard and each successive time she uses it will increase the damage it does, no matter what you do, until it hits for 99,999 damage, this is where the Phoenix Down comes in play as you won’t survive the attack. After it hits for 99,999, the next Ultima will hit for the lowest amount again.

Judgment Arrow¶

The final piece of the puzzle is Judgment Arrow, you’ll want to aim to get the Ability gauge to at least 75% before she casts it while also making sure you have max HP. Not only will Judgment Arrow deal heavy damage, but it will also drain your MP/AP (which is no worry here due to the Genji Helm) and more crucially, strip you off your buffs.

This means that even your Raise status from the Phoenix Down will be removed along with Wall. Immediately use another Phoenix Down (always make sure you have at least one, so you don’t have to worry Mugging another without Raise) and recast Wall.

Keep hitting Minerva with Costly Punch, remembering to pop an X-Potion once your HP drops below 50% HP. You can use Aerial Drain to close the gap and even avoid some of the attacks such as Krysta by using it just before the impact while restoring some HP. Your Limit Breaks will help chip away at her HP too, especially useful ones such as Rush Assault and Octaslash. So long as you keep Wall up, Raise active (with at least another Phoenix Down in supply) and remember to refresh them after Judgment Arrow, it’s hard to lose to Minerva. Just be prepared for a long battle and you’ll get there!

Minerva Rewards¶

For defeating the ultimate challenge in Crisis Core Final Fantasy VII: Reunion, you’ll obtain the Divine Slayer Accessory. This is one of the best in the game that offers HP, MP, and AP +100%, ATK, VIT, MAG, SPR and LCK +50. Breaks all limits and detects an opponent’s status. Needless to say, it’s overkill and something you won’t need because there is no other challenge like Minerva.

Still, you’ll need to defeat Minerva as part of the 100% Mission Completion Trophy/Achievement, this is just the icing on the cake.