Warning!

In this section, I will give you some information on how to defeat the weapons. First, the Flying Weapon (to which I do not know another name), the Emerald Weapon, and the Ruby Weapon.  This section is a major spoiler, so if you want to figure out by yourselves how to defeat the weapons, don't read it, unless you need to. I will also tell you what to do with the Weapon Items.

The Flying Weapon
 

The Flying Weapon is the easiest of all. All it does is flying around, and engage combat only if you collide with it while in the Highwind.  The first time you see it, it hides in the newly formed crater (which is right where were the forest where you're supposed to have recruited Yuffie). Ram it with the Highwind. This time, it will flee. Later in the scenario, it will attack Mideel village and you will have your first fight with it.

When you inflict it about 10000 hp of damage, it will run away. Follow it (if you survived, that is) aboard the Highwind and ram it again. There will be another fight. When it has 10000 (or so) more damage, it will run away again.

You will have to repeat this a few times, like 5 or 6. The last time, the weapon will flee to a spot near Cosmo Canyon (Valley of the Fallen Star, in the Japanese version). When you finally kill it, it will give you the Ultima Weapon for Cloud, then will fall to the ground and create (yet another) crater. If you don't have a Gold Chocobo by then, use it to access the Frog Forest. The Frog Forest is a bonus/candy dungeon, where you will have to solve a couple of puzzles. You will get some materia (Slash-all command materia, the Typoon (was Chupon in FF III and in the Japanese version) summon materia plus a couple of other goodies).

The Flying Weapon must have about 120,000 to 150,000 hp, but it's not an easy kill. When I killed it, it casted Shadow Flare on Cid who had only 6000 hp at that time, therefore killing him. That annoyed me deeply since the Exp and AP (50000 Exp and a couple hundred AP) were greatly needed. I reloaded the game a couple of times, but it seems that it does always cast this spell just before dying (not unlike the Gargoils in the Northern Crater that cast automatically L4 Death just before dying), and very strangely, always on the same character.

The Emerald Weapon
 

The Emerald Weapon lives undersea. Of course, you will have to have completed the sub chase scenario in order to have a sub. Drive the sub and ram it to engage it. There's no big trick to beat the Emerald Weapon, except for the following:
 
• Water and Ice attacks heals it,

• Phoenix equipped with final attack support materia (to survive the Air Tam Attack),
 
• A couple of Speed Plus materia for each character,
 
• The Knights of Round summon materia helps, but is not necessary,
 
• The Barrier or Shield materia,
 
• A couple of Megalixirs and Turbo Ethers,
 
• The Tetra Elemental accessory does not help a bit, since the Emerald Weapon's attacks are non-elemental, and finally
 
• Equip all characters with 4x-cut materia.

 
You will then defeat the Emerald Weapon in no time. When it dies, you will get the Earth Harp, 50000 Exp, 50000 Ap and a certain amount of gold (I didn't care to check). It also dies in a quite ordinary fashion, exactly like the snakes in the marshes in front of the Mithril mines. Spuff, then a red fade-out. I'm disappointed.

I had Cloud, Cid and Tifa to defeat the Emerald Weapon. All were level 99, had 9999 hp and 999 mp (Hey, you're tough or you're not!). All had also their extreme limit skills, but I did not use more than once omnislash and maybe once the Knights. With the 4x-cut materia, you can inflict a lot of damage! Just limiting the damage the Emerald Weapon does to you makes all the difference. I guess that the Emerald Weapon has about 500000 hp, so about four rounds of 4x-cut attacks and it's dead.

The Ruby Weapon
 

The Ruby Weapon is tough. It has around 800000 hp, but that's the least. It has two special attacks that annoy me big time. One is the WhirlSand that it uses to flush one of your party out of the combat. The character does not die, but you can't use him/her (remember that snake that slapped you out of the screen, back in the beginning?). The other is the "Touch and drain Mp" thing. When it sticks its claws to the sand, there will be two snake-like appendages that will appear behind you. A touch will either inflict damage or suck mp. A shield spell will protect you from the appendages, but I have not found anything against the Whirlsand attack, except luck.

Another thing is that it seems to me that the Ruby Weapon is invincible as long as it does not bury its claws in the sand, which in turn it only does when there's only one active character in your party (the two other being dead or whirlsanded). After that, well, you have to use:
 

• Fire attacks heals it (so don't equip with added effect materia and a fire materia),
 
• The Shield materia to protect you against the mp-sucking appendages,
 
• Master Summon coupled with HP Drain materia,
 
• The W-Summon command materia,
 
• Tens of Elixir or Turbo Ether items,
 
• Phoenix equipped with final attack support materia

Since it is relatively impervious to ordinary weapons attacks (4x-cut and the Ultima Weapon inflict about 2000 hp of damage, which sucks) you will have to use the Master Summon materia and call the Knights of Round as many times as you can. Since it has about 800,000 hp, you will summon them about 8 to 12 times depending on how much damage they will inflict. The Hp drain materia will keep you alive, but you will need elixirs and ethers to feed you magic points, because the summonings are expensive (320 points, is it, for Knights of Round?).I had to summon them 9 times to kill the Ruby Weapon. When it dies, you get 50000 exp, 50000 ap, and some gold. You will also get the Desert Rose item.
 
 
 

What are these items for? Well, you will meet in the village of Kalm (north of Midgar) an old man that wants to go on a mystical journey of some sort to mourn his friends killed during the summing of the meteor (or the release of the weapons, I'm not sure), but he needs three items. One is the Guide Book, another is the Desert Rose, and the Earth Harp.

You will get the Guide Book by morphing the ghost ship monster (that you encounter in the undersea passage to the mako reactor). In exchange of the Guide Book, the old man gives you the underwater materia, which will allow you to survive more than 20 minutes under the sea to fight the Emerald Weapon (which you would not need anyway if you are strong enough, since you can kill the darn thing in less than 15 minutes).

You will obtain the Earth Harp by killing the Emerald Weapon. Old man will give you three master materia for it: Master Summon, Master Command and Master Magic. In my opinion, the Master Command sucks, because it does not include the 4x-cut command, which is, I think, quite essential. Anyway the Master Magic and Master Summon are really nice. You can get other Master Summon, Master Command or Master Magic from the three huge materia at Cosmo Canion.

Upon defeating the Ruby Weapon, you will get the Desert Rose item. In exchange for it, the old man will give you a gold chocobo. Useless? Even if you already have one (you must to get the Knights of Round) this one might surprise you.