Chapter 3
"A family curse?" Levi asked, confused. But he knew Erwin was as confused as him.
"We'll learn about it at some point," was all Erwin said. They may know a lot about titans, but they knew very few of Adira. A 'family curse' was something they had never heard about.
"So, are we going or what?"
Speak of the devil. Adira, riding on her black hound which she called 'Hunter' came in, stopping beside them. "Daylight is going to break, and I know you know well that Titans just love the sunshine. If you want more of your soldiers to be alive when we get there, I think you would like to start now."
"How far is it?" Erwin asked.
She thought for a while.
"How far is the sea?"
Which gave them the answer loud and clear because they knew she knew very well they didn't know where the sea was: how should they know? And she, or most likely, Hunter, started leaving and Levi and Erwin started getting their things along with the others of the Survey Corps.
"What do you think the sea will look like?" Armin asked excitedly, like he was a child on a vacation to the beach.
He forgot the fact that 1) he, like the rest, were outside the walls, which led to 2) Titans could kill him, and the most feared 3) Adira could trick them anytime and leave them out in the middle of nowhere, farther away from home than planned. But hey–since when did the Survey Corps not take a risk? They trusted Eren, so there wasn't a legit reason to why they couldn't trust her.
"Probably like the description in your book–blue, big and salty," Eren answered, not exactly as excited as him, but already on the edge of his seat (that was a figure of speech–he's on a horse) too. "But of course, we should focus on surviving our way there, remember?"
"Surviving? What do you mean surviving? Surviving from wha–oh… Right," Armin said, his mood changing quickly from an excited one to a nervous one. He remembered he was outside the walls. A vulnerable one. Even everyone else was closer together. Not in the 'hi, you are my friend' way, but the 'hey, you come closer and get a better chance of seeing each other and not eaten by titans, kay?' way as insisted by Adira. He still thought of all the possibilities though. If for her it was natural to be outside the walls, then it was still dangerous for everyone else in the Survey Corps and they would not be in perfect ease.
"Guys, a titan coming our–"
Jean cut himself short when he saw the white hound, Legion as Adira called her, kill the titan smoothly and go back to her usual pace like it was a normal thing to do for fun. For fun, not survival. Jean looked as if he feared Adira more than ever. She glanced back at him as though she knew what he was thinking and went back to looking up front to lead them to this so called 'home by the sea'.
It took about two days of travel, only a few hours of sleep since Erwin insisted to Adira they arrive there as soon as possible, and it only a few soldiers' death–fewer than usual, to be optimistic. When they reached their destination, they passed a strange line with what looked to be ancient writing and some meters away they saw the buildings. But they were not expecting to see ruins. It looked just like what Wall Maria looked like when the Colossal Titan had broken the wall and all the other titans had come in and destroyed the place. It looked just like that. Before anyone could argue to her that she just lead them to a death trap she cut them off.
"It's only the outer part of this place. As you go inside, everything will look more and more less destroyed. When you walk some meters, you will see nothing has been destroyed. I don't care where you go or what you do. But if you step outside of that line–" she pointed at the lining on the ground they'd passed earlier "–remember titans are able to get you. So don't be stupid." Then she just left off to somewhere near the center of the place.
"I don't get how some line can save this place," Connie muttered, though loud enough for his friends to hear when Adira was out of sight. "If we're supposed to trust this girl, we're putting a lot of risks here..."
"I want to go home," Sasha said, obviously not believing her at all. She sounded as if she was near to tears.
"Don't worry about it," Erwin smiled. "We'll get answers before dawn will reach us. It's morning, so we'll have plenty of time to hear her story."
"But how?" Eren asked. "She is like the most secretive person I have met in my life! She barely talked to us and tends to end the conversation short! She–"
The voice of Hanji inside a building some place away from them but easy to hear when she screamed disturbed Eren. They listened closely to what she said until they could make out the words, "I... A library." She'd found a library. And most likely, they had at least one history there.
"T-This is going to take days!" Christa said in shock, starring at the who-knows-how-many shelves full of books. They thought it was supposed to be a normal library. They saw the building was tall, but they didn't think about it. They went inside and started to be negative.
"There are more soldiers than I can count here, it'll take only a few days!" Hanji said, though it wasn't making them feel at ease.
Titans were out there and they didn't believe a single round line surrounding the village was going to help them. They thought this was all a trap by Adira. Maybe she hated the in-walled people. Maybe she was from Wall Maria and went along with the people who were to fix the wall and failed. Maybe she survived and didn't come back. Maybe she sought revenge to those from the inner walls so she planned to wipe out the Survey Corps. Maybe she never really had this so-called 'family curse'.
Maybe it was possible she might be telling the truth.
"Corporal," Erwin called out to Levi. "Let's go."
There was no question. They didn't want to spend all day reading books. If the Commander said he'd get the answers by sunset (was it already dusk?!), he would be determined to get them. They would find Adira and some answers too.
A/N: I don't own this story. It rightfully belongs to I'm pregnant Onii Cchan from Quotev.
