How to beat Mindflayer in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth

The Mindflayer in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is the The Whisper in the Darkness Classified Intel boss in the Junon region.

Unlike Quetzalcoatl in the Grasslands, the Mindflayer doesn't have an elemental weakness, so it's a bit tricker to work out how to take it down. To help you out, we've explained how to beat the Mindflayer in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth below, which includes how to avoid the Mindflayer's Psychotic Break attack.

For more help on your travels across Gaia, check out our weapon locations, Tifa romance guide, and Fort Condor guide.

On this page:

Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth Mindflayer location

The Mindflayer is located in the southern area of Junon, on the peninsula between a lifespring and Junon Cache location, just above a Protorelic Fort Condor match. However, you need to visit and complete all four Lifespring locations in Junon before you can summon the Mindflayer at this location. The Mindflayer will then be marked on your map as 'Classified Intel: The Whisper in the Darkness'.

To find Lifesprings quickly, we recommend activating Remnawave Towers, as these show more World Intel locations when you press their red switches. Some of the Junon Lifespring locations are tricky though, so remember to look out for the springseeker birds that lead you to them if you're getting a little lost. You might need to swim or use the Junon Chocobo to reach them.

How to avoid Mindflayer's Psychotic Break in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth

The only way to avoid the Mindflayer's Psychotic Break attack in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is to hide behind the boulders that drop right before the Mindflayer uses Psychotic Break. The rest of your party will follow whoever you're controlling during Psychotic Break, so you only need to focus on placing one of your characters behind a boulder.

It's important you do this every time Psychotic Break is used, as the attack can instantly kill your party, unless their health or defence is very high. Even then, it's going to take away a huge chunk of health.

We've got more details on how to beat the Mindflayer below:

How to beat Mindflayer in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth

The Mindflayer has 20,856 HP on normal difficulty and no elemental weaknesses. Instead, you have to use Synergy Abilities to Pressure the Mindflayer. Not to be confused with Synergy Skills, Synergy Abilities are unlocked in battle after enough special abilities, skills or items are used by multiple characters. Look out for the two black and white lines that look like the pause symbol next to an action, to see if it counts towards unlocking a Synergy Ability in battle.

If you're in a dire situation, you can also use Backline Commands by pressing Triangle from the Commands Menu when it appears, to use a Synergy Ability from party members not currently in battle. These count as regular Synergy Abilities, so will also Pressure the Mindflayer.

Keep in mind that the Mindflayer has resistances and immunities to things like Sleep, Silence, Slow, and attack and magic reduction spells, so the best thing you can do until you unlock Synergy Abilities is to attack it normally and don't use any magic. For this reason, unless you need her for healing, we recommend not adding Aerith to your party.

Preparing for the fight

We recommend you bring a team consisting of Cloud, Barret, and Tifa, so you have lots of physical attacks, strong Pressuring abilities, and can use Barret for your long-range needs. Equip the trio with all the HP Up and Vitality Up Materia that you have, instead of spells. You can use healing Materia if you think you'll need it, but the Item Economizer Materia can work better a lot of the time, as it lets you use items like Potions without taking away an ATB charge - but it does take a while to refresh its usage.

You can also equip the Auto-Unique Ability or Auto-Unique Weapon Materia on everyone, as they allow characters to use their special and weapon abilities without you having to manually command them to do so. This means your other party members can build up Synergy Abilities without you having to control them.

Mindflayer boss strategy

With all of the above information in mind, your strategy for beating the Mindflayer in Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth is to use Cloud, Barret, and Tifa's abilities and items until they built up Synergy Abilities, then unleash Synergy Abilities to Pressure the Mindflayer, as this is the Mindflayer's only weakness.

To stay alive to do this, you should hide behind a boulder right before the Mindflayer uses the Psychotic Break attack. Your party will follow, so you should all avoid instantly dying. However, all is not lost even if you don't get to a boulder in time as long as one of your party survives Psychotic Break, as you can use a Backline Command by pressing Triangle on the Commands Menu to use a Synergy Ability from an inactive party member to Pressure and possibly Stagger the Mindflayer to finish it off, if you're quick enough.

Apart from Psychotic Break, the Mindflayer has projectile and AOE (area of effect) attacks. Roll away with a fast character (like Tifa) during the projectile attacks, and try to continue to attack from far away while controlling Barret during an AOE attack, but don't forget to dodge when necessary.

Lastly, unless the Auto-Unique Ability or Auto-Unique Weapon Materias are doing all the work for you, don't forget to switch between characters and use their abilities and items to build up Synergy Abilities, or you won't be able to Pressure the Mindflayer, which makes it a lot harder to defeat.

When Pressured and Staggered, use your most powerful attacks to take off as much health as you can before the Mindflayer recovers to finally beat it.

Good luck taking on the Mindflayer!