Previously:
Seventeen hours after the titans were spotted…
Other members of the Survey Corps were riding their horses through the darkness, carrying torches. Moblit rode right next to Hange, holding the torch so that Hange could read while riding.
"This tower should give us a good view of the wall," Hange said, checking the documents in hand. "It's an old castle near the southwest part of the wall… Yes… we're heading to Utgard Castle." Eren furrowed his brow as he rode alongside Mikasa and Armin.
Chapter 30: Soldier
The titans were gathering outside Utgard Castle. An abnormal titan ran up and pushed another titan of similar size over and ripped its ear off with a smile. It pulled the downed titan's hair, and the downed titan bit its other hand. If only the rest of them were so easily distracted. The others, big and small, converged on the tower. Gelgar swooped down on the large titan that had body-slammed the tower with his blades drawn. The titan twitched and reached up to grab him with one of its hands.
"You can't catch me! You dumb… piece of shit!!" Gelgar shouted, slicing off all its finger so it couldn't grasp him. Nanaba flew past him and sliced out the nape of the titan's neck. The large titan fell and crushed a few of the smaller ones trying to bust down the tower's door. "Look at that…! It crushed the little ones too…! Heh! The big moron! I'm impressed as ever, Nanaba. That was another deep cut!"
"Gelgar… That was a risky move," Nanaba said. "Couldn't you have dodged it without wasting blades on its fingers…?"
"That's just how I fight… I don't back down easy," Gelgar said. "You better count that as an assist!"
"You're so stubborn… Fine, got it," she said. One of the smaller ones that was only partially crushed tried to crawl its way out to attack the base of the tower. Lynne was on it in instant, slaying it before it could get to the door.
"Ugh…!!" she grunted as she sliced through its neck. She landed on the ground and saw that the door had already been broken, and the splintered thing was hanging off its hinges. "… We're too late…!" she told Henning, who killed another titan and landed beside her. "The door…" She popped back up to address Nanaba and Gelgar. "They broke through!" She popped up again to land on the roof to speak to Heidi and the other recruits. "Titans have entered the tower! Get back inside, and put up barricades to stop them!" she ordered them. "Our maneuvering equipment will be useless inside. If you can't stop them… then… worst case… escape to this rooftop. Just remember… I can't promise that we'll come save you. I don't even know if we'll be alive or not… We can't tell how many titans are left… or whether our gas and blades will last long enough… but do what you always do. Give it all you've got, as long as you're alive! Got that?!"
"Yes, ma'am!" they shouted back, immediately moving to carry out the orders. Reiner reached the stairs first and took the lead. He grabbed a torch and carried it with him.
"I'll see how far the titans have come!" Reiner said. "The rest of you, gather up everything you can! Boards, poles, whatever you can find!"
"Reiner!" Krista called as he dashed off before they could discuss it.
"H-Hey…!" Connie said, worried for him.
"Don't go alone, unarmed!" Heidi shouted from behind Connie at him as Bertolt rushed past them.
"Reiner, wait!" Bertolt yelled, chasing after him.
"!" Connie said.
"Wait!" Bertolt shouted.
"Reiner...!" Heidi called, pulling ahead of Connie and Bertolt. "I'll get him! Look for some tools we can use!" she told the others over her shoulder as she ran.
"They're the same as they were in training… Always the first to rush into danger… I'd never be able to do that..." Connie said as he and Bertolt also tried to pick up the pace even more.
"Yeah… It's a bad habit of his..." Bertolt said, furrowing his brow. Connie looked at him, wondering what he meant by that.
Reiner reached the next door first. He opened it cautiously, and breathed a sigh of relief. But the stairs continued on, and there was another door at the bottom
'Even farther down?…" Reiner thought as Heidi caught up to him. She stopped next to him and they both stared down at the door. They looked at each other and started slowly descending the stairs together. They could see that the door was locked by a long piece of wood.
'Locked or not, it'd be easy for them to tear through wooden doors this old...' Heidi thought as they approached the door with caution. She could tell Reiner was thinking the same. They had come this far, they might as well check it out. 'I'll have to be ready to 'activate' in the blink of an eye...' Although, it would be best to avoid engaging them at all, if possible.
'Damn it… How should we stop the titans…?' Reiner wondered. Reiner handed Heidi the torch and carefully removed the piece of wood locking the door. Heidi braced herself, getting ready to pounce.
KREEEEEEEEK.
The door creaked open as Reiner opened it slowly. Their eyes widened. There, only six feet away from them, was a titan. It looked disturbingly happy, as if it was glad to see them. Heidi immediately kicked the door shut, and Reiner locked it again. He and Heidi leaned against the door to try to brace it.
BOOM!
"Whoa…!!" they cried as the door heaved against them when the titan slammed into it. Heidi dropped the torch.
"Down here!!" Reiner shouted up to the others. "Bring something!! Anything!!"
KRAK!
The titan thrust one of its arms through the door right above Heidi's head.
"…?!" they gasped. Heidi had to dodge quickly when it almost grabbed her head.
"This can't be…!" Reiner said. 'This won't hold… If we don't do something… We're gonna be… But… here? Am I going to die… here?' he thought, suddenly flashing back to the day he was almost eaten by a titan five years ago. Back then, he had been saved by a comrade sacrificing himself to save him. 'No… That's wrong. I won't die here.' His eyes widened as the titan's hand closed in, about to grab his face. Before he could dodge, Heidi was yanking him out of the way. The titan was breaking through the door. Heidi was just about to activate, when something stopped her.
"Reiner!" Bertolt shouted anxiously.
"?" They both spared a glance in his direction.
'I have to… go home,' Reiner thought as Bertolt came flying over their heads as he leaped from a step above them, wielding a pitchfork. Bertolt stabbed the titan in the eyes. Reiner and Heidi grabbed the pitchfork too and helped hold the titan at bay.
"Reiner, are you okay?!" Bertolt asked anxiously. "Heidi?"
"Just peachy," Heidi replied, leaning all of her weight on the pitchfork.
"Yeah..." Reiner said, looking at his comrade. "Bertolt. We'll live through this and get home. I swear… we're going home," he stated with determination.
"Yeah… Yeah… We're going back!!" Bertolt said, looking like he was almost tearing up.
'They do realize I'm still here, right?' Heidi thought. 'But… is it just me, or was there something odd—'
"Reiner!! Heidi!! Bertolt!!" Ymir yelled, getting their attention. They looked up in the direction of the sound of her voice and saw that Ymir, Krista, and Connie had a cannon at the top of the stairs.
"?!" Reiner, Heidi, and Bertolt's eyes widened.
"Hey… is that..." Reiner started to ask.
"Powder! … Shells!! We don't have any of that!!" Ymir said bluntly. "We're throwing it at 'em! Outta the way!" Heidi and the guys didn't need to be told twice, they immediately let go of the pitchfork and dashed to safety away from the door.
"Take this!" Ymir shouted at the titan as they sent the cannon rolling down the stairs. With the pitchfork still in its eyes, the titan never saw it coming. The cannon slammed into it and the door, creating and explosion of dust and wood fragments. They waited nervously for the dust to settle, bracing themselves for another attack. But as the dust settled, it became clear that wasn't necessary. The titan was crushed, pinned under the cannon.
"Looks like… it actually worked… Miraculously," Ymir said, walking down to join them, followed by Connie and Krista.
"Yeah… It can't get out from under that," Reiner said, not at its size."
"What should we do?" Connie asked. "All I have is this knife… Should we try to cut its neck?"
"Forget it… It just has to grab you to maim you," Reiner said, turning away from the scene.
"Reiner's right. For now… it's enough that we have it trapped," Heidi agreed.
"I guess you're right," Connie said, turning his back on the titan to face her. It was at that moment that another titan appeared in the doorway behind him. Heidi's eyes widened, and Connie froze when he saw the look on her face. The titan opened its mouth and lunged at him. Heidi's pupils constricted and dilated as she prepared to spring toward them, but something blocked her path.
"Connie!!" Reiner yelled as he threw himself into harm's way, pushing Connie to safety. Connie stared at Reiner with wide eyes, grateful but horrified as he watched the titan's mouth start to close around Reiner's arm. Before any of them could blink, Heidi was landing a flying kick straight in its face, knocking it backwards so that its teeth bit only air.
"Not today!!" she told it, kicking it in the abdomen to send it rolling back down the stairs. Heidi deactivated her berserkergang. The others stared at her in shock.
"You just… You just..." Connie said, staring at her with wide eyes.
"What are you all standing around for?! We have to do something before it comes back!" Heidi reminded them, grabbing the stragglers and pushing them back up the stairs. And not a moment too soon. That titan was already crawling back up the stairs to their level. "C'mon! Heidi said, urging them upwards. She pointed to the large window in the wall. "We'll get it there!"
"How?!" Connie asked.
"How do you think?! We're bait!" Heidi retorted, shoving him forward. She turned around and stopped a few steps above the window and waited for the titan to come to her.
"This is crazy!!" Ymir yelled.
"Then get to the other room and start finding things to shore up the next door with!!" Heidi shouted back, not taking her eyes off the titan. She waited until it was right in front of the window. Then she hopped down, activating her berserkergang on the way down. The instant her feet touched the step in front of the titan, she dodged its attempt to grab her and sent it flying out the window with a powerful kick. She deactivated her berserkergang as she watched it fall.
"Whoa..." Connie said, too amazed for words.
"How long have you been able to do that?" Reiner asked her.
"What…? You've never heard of emergency strength at the scene of a fire?" Heidi asked, wiping the sweat from her brow. That was totally nerve-wracking.
"I've heard of that," Krista said. "Something to do with adrenaline, right?"
"Something like that…" Heidi replied cryptically. "Seriously, though… let's focus on making sure the next door isn't so easy to break."
—∞—
Fortunately they found supplies in the next room that aided them in that task. They nailed planks of wood to the door to reinforce it vertically and horizontally, and they wedged wooden poles between the steps and the door to shore it up.
"What do we do when the next one gets in?" Connie asked, knocking the last pole into place with a brick. "Emergency strength at the scene of a fire… I doubt we'll get that lucky again..."
"Yeah… I agree," Bertolt said.
"Are you okay, Reiner?" Heidi asked.
"Yeah… Thanks to you..." Reiner replied. "Shouldn't I be asking you that?"
"You didn't injure yourself kicking it... did you?" Krista asked Heidi, concerned.
"Hey, Krista. My hand got skinned, too," Ymir said, trying to get her attention.
"Huh? Just spit on it," Connie told her.
"Ah, no… I must've lucked out..." Heidi said, a bead of sweat sliding down her face. She didn't really want to lie to them, but it hardly seemed the time to be launching in lengthy explanations of her unique lineage.
"I'm sorry about just now," Connie apologized to Reiner and Heidi. "It's like… you're always saving my ass. Yeah… now that I mention it, Annie risked her life to save me, too. I need to repay you someday..."
"For… that?" Reiner asked, remembering when someone else did the same thing for him. "It was my duty… We're soldiers."
"Really…? I'm not so sure that I could risk my life like you just did. Without even a second of hesitation..." Connie said, glancing from Reiner and Heidi to Bertolt. "Hey, Bertolt? Has Reiner always been like this?"
"No. Reiner used to be… a warrior," Bertolt replied. "He's different now."
'… That's an odd thing to say... isn't it?' Heidi thought, furrowing her brow slightly.
"… What? What do you mean, 'warrior'?" Reiner asked, evidently finding it just as strange as she did.
"..." Bertolt stared at him.
"Anyway… Let's gather up anything that seems usable," Ymir said. "So we can die with no regrets. Of course, our lives mostly depend… hup!" She put one foot up on the ledge of the window on that level. "On how skilled our officers are… Whoa..." Heidi joined her at the window. Dead, evaporating titans were strewn all over the place. "… That's the Survey Corps for you. Other soldiers don't even compare to them..."
Gelgar sliced up the achilles tendon on the leg of a large titan Nanaba was facing and maneuvered himself up from behind it to attack its nape.
"That takes care of most of the big ones..." Nanaba said as they landed on the tower, suspended by their grappling hooks. "We have this tower to thank for that, You rarely get to fight in conditions this favorable…."
"Yeah… Looks like we might be able to pull through this," Gelgar said.
"I'll check on the recruits," Lynne said, flying up past them with Henning.
"Roger," Nanaba said. "Hm?"
WHNNNNNNNNNNN.
"What's that sound?" Gelgar asked.
BOOM!
"Kh…?!" Gelgar exclaimed when something suddenly crashed into the stable.
"Wha…?! A horse…!" Nanaba said, startled to see one dead.
"Huh…?" Lynne said.
"..." Henning didn't know what to make of it.
"?!" Lynne gasped when she heard a strange sound.
WHNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN.
"Again!!" Lynne said.
"What is that noise…?" Henning asked. Neither of them noticed the huge boulder that was sailing in their direction through the darkness.
BOOM!
Gelgar and Nanaba looked up when they heard and felt the boulder slam into the top of the tower. They watched in horror as the broken bodies of their comrades fell through the air.
"Lynne!! Henning!!"
Nanaba and Gelgar did what they could for Lynne and Henning, but they were already gone, They carried their bodies up to the roof of the tower and had only just finished laying them out when the recruits came running up to see what had happened.
"What was that?!" Connie asked, reaching the top first. They all fell silent when they saw a chunk of the roof was missing and the two bodies.
"It's hopeless… They both died instantly," Gelgar said. Nanaba closed her eyes and bowed her head. "Be careful… A boulder came flying from over there, toward the wall. That's what got them..."
"What? But..." Krista said.
"A boulder…?" Heidi said.
"From the wall…?" Ymir asked.
"That thing!!" Connie said, pointing in the direction he saw the hairy titan go earlier, towards the wall. "There was just one titan that was walking towards the wall… It was that beast titan that did this—Agh!! Multiple titans approaching…!!" he yelled when he saw a great number of them swarm into view. "More than double the number we just dealt with..."
"What…?!" Gelgar said.
"This timing makes it feel like the titans are conducting some sort of strategic operation..." Nanaba said, standing up. "It almost feels as if… they've been toying with us from the start..."
"OOOOOOO!!!" the Beast Titan roared in the distance.
"M… Maybe they are..." Heidi said, a bead of nervous sweat sliding down her face. "Maybe it's another titan shifter…!"
"?!" the others said.
'It could also explain what happened in Connie's village…' Heidi thought, biting her lip. 'Each titan shifter has shown unique abilities other titans don't have, so maybe this one...'
"What are you saying, Heidi?!" Reiner said.
"Do you have some kind of evidence?!" Bertolt asked her.
"No, but—" Heidi tried to answer.
"Then stop jumping to conclusions!!" Reiner told her. "The situation's confusing enough as it is!" Heidi stared at them, stunned. What was their problem?
"She may be right…." Nanaba said. "But… at the moment…. we have no way of confirming it…"
"At any rate... we can assume it's an abnormal and extra dangerous," Gelgar said.
—∞—
The Beast Titan climbed down the wall on the other side, leaving Rose. It was now twenty hours after the titans were spotted. Nanaba and Gelgar fought desperately against the new, larger wave of titans. Connie was right. There were more than double the last time. Heidi gritted her teeth and looked back at Lynne and Henning. They were still wearing their 3DMG. Heidi furrowed her brow, ran over to them, and started pulling Lynne's boots off.
"Hey! What are you doing?!" Connie said, doing a double-take when he saw what she was up to. "Have a little respect for the dead!"
"Some of this gear is still good!" Heidi said, working as quickly as she could to remove it. "And I don't think she'll mind—help me get it off!"
"Don't tell me you're thinking of fighting with that?!" Reiner said, staring at her with wide eyes. "We're all scared, but… You're being too reckless!"
"There's almost no gas left, and the mechanism is broken anyway..." Krista said, concerned. But Heidi could see that the grappling hooks were still in working condition, and there were two sets of blades left—make that one, since the blades already in use needed to be replaced.
"Going out there with this is suicide!" Ymir told her.
"It can't be helped…" Heidi said, pulling on the gear with slightly trembling hands. She knew how crazy it was, but there was no other choice. This wasn't like the first time, when she had woken up already in the middle of the fight. There were more titans in the immediate area, and she had fewer blades. And she couldn't count on the rest of the Survey Corps coming to her rescue. Captain Levi was injured, and they hadn't heard from Squad Leader Miche in hours. "I don't wanna die today, but… This is something only I can do!!"
Nanaba rested on the side of the tower. There was steaming titan blood on her face. She had to quickly maneuver out of the way when a large titan tried to squash her like a bug.
'Oh no… almost out of gas...' she thought, furrowing her brow and gritting her teeth. She attached a grappling hook to the smaller tower that was attached to and balanced the larger tower everyone else was in, and she swung herself around with a burst of gas to fire another grappling hook into the titan's neck. She reeled herself in swiftly and carved out its nape before it knew what hit it. 'Did it work?!' she wondered. Her eyes widened as the titan fell into the smaller tower, knocking it down. She finished landing on the side of the larger tower. "Gah..." She messed up. Now the larger tower was destabilized.
"The tower won't hold for long..." Gelgar said, landing next to her.
"I'm running on fumes..." Nanaba said. "You?"
"Out of gas, and blades too," he replied, looking at the broken one in his hand. "That blunt thing's all you've got left, right?"
"… Yeah," she answered, wishing it wasn't so.
"… I wonder how many of those things the four of us killed," Gelgar said.
"Who knows… Didn't have time to keep count..." Nanaba replied. They stared down at all the titans that were still left.
"I think I've done a pretty good job here..." Gelgar said. "Only… Before I go… I want a drink. I don't care what it is..."
"Gelgar," Nanaba said, looking at him. Her eyes widened again. She could see blood dripping down his face.
"Sorry… Nanaba," he said a little dully. "I think I hit my head..." His grappling hook came loose, and he fell.
"Gelgar!!" Nanaba screamed. One of the titans snatched him out of the air, grabbing him by the foot. Nanaba dived off the tower and used the last of her gas to maneuver herself behind it, where she fired a grappling hook into its neck and reeled herself in for the kill. Her blades broke from slicing out its nape. The titan fell against the tower and its hand that was holding Gelgar was knocked against part of the tower that had a hole in it, and he rolled out of its grip onto the floor inside."Gelgar!! Huh?!" She furrowed her brow and gritted her teeth when she tried to use more gas and found it empty. "Damn it… I'm completely out..." Sweat dripped down her face and her eyes widened with fear as she stared back at all the titans that had surrounded her, pressing their ugly faces together as they moved closer.
"Haah. Haah," Gelgar breathed heavily, struggling to pick himself back up again. He raised his head, and through the blood dripping down around his eye, he saw the discarded bottle of alcohol that he had found earlier. "Oh, my… God..." He reached out a trembling hand and picked it up. He pulled out the cork and tilted his head back to drink. As the warm liquid poured down his throat, a titan peeked in through the hole at him. "… Ah…. Is that all?" he said when the liquid stopped coming. He didn't know what kind of alcohol it was, but at least it had tasted good. The titan grabbed him."Aww well, at least I got to have one last drink…!!" he exclaimed, terrified of the horrible fate he knew was coming. But he was spared any further anticipation when his head was hit against the top of the hole on the way out, and he was knocked unconscious.
"Aww… They got him," Krista said shakily, leaning over the side to watch. Krista grabbed a piece of rubble and threw it at the titans. "Nh!!"
"Stop, Krista," Ymir said, pulling her back. "You'll fall."
"B… But… They sacrificed themselves for us..." Krista said.
"For the last time, get out of my way!!" Heidi said sternly.
"We're not gonna let you get yourself killed!!" Connie shouted back. "If that means we have to fi—" Nanaba screamed. Heidi gritted her teeth and used that instant to push past him. She flipped Reiner and ducked under Bertolt's arms when he reached out to grab her. Her pupils constricted and dilated. She activated her berserkergang.
"Nanaba… Gelgar..." Krista said sadly, her eyes widening as Heidi stepped up next to her and took a mighty leap from the tower, soaring through the air as if she was flying.
"NOOOOO!!" Nanaba screamed in agony. She had already lost a leg, and now the titans were threatening to tear the rest of her apart. Another titan had bitten off Gelgar's head. He was already gone. Heidi gritted her teeth and used her blades to lop off the hand holding Nanaba's remaining leg and fired a grappling hook into the bicep of the titan holding her arm. Heidi reeled herself in, missing its snapping teeth by a hair, and rolled, slicing up its arm muscles. It loosened its grip on Nanaba just as Heidi reached her, and she wrapped her arms around the injured veteran and jumped off the head of another titan as she fired another grappling hook. A titan popped up between them and the tower, opening its mouth wide to catch them.
"Reiner!! Catch!!" Heidi shouted and hurled Nanaba at them. As its eyes focused on Nanaba sailing past it, Heidi took advantage and swung herself around and carved out its nape before it could even twitch.
"Wha—?!" Reiner and the others exclaimed, shocked, but thankfully, they reacted on instinct, and Reiner did catch her. Bertolt and Connie rushed over to help him.
"We have to treat her wound!" Krista said, looking around for something to use as a tourniquet. "But Heidi..." She looked back at Heidi, and her eyes widened. Heidi was leaping from titan to titan, using the grappling hooks to swing around them and dodge their teeth, slicing napes everywhere she went. "Heidi…"
"She's flying around… without any gas..." Connie said, stunned.
"Was she… always this good...?" Ymir asked, wondering how strong she really was, to able to make those jumps. "The way she's moving… Isn't that impossible?!"
"I knew she was second in our class only to Mikasa, but this..." Reiner said, watching with wide eyes.
'I have to kill... as many of them as I can!!' Heidi thought, reeling herself in for the kill. 'There's no room for mistakes!!' She was alone in this. One mistake, and she was dead. She was the only one who could still fight. One mistake, and they were all dead.
Connie, Reiner, and Bertolt watched Heidi in amazement while Krista made Ymir help her tend to Nanaba's wounds. Krista ripped her skirt to create a tourniquet. Whether it was from pain or blood loss, Nanaba passed out.
"All right, Heidi! Keep it up!" Connie cheered. He didn't know what was happening, but he thought it was awesome. She was like some kind of super human.
"Don't distract her, Connie," Reiner said. "One misstep, and..."
"R-Right…!" Connie said, gulping.
"I don't know how she can fight like that all of a sudden, but… She's our last chance," Reiner said.
"Reiner… you don't think maybe… with that red hair…?" Bertolt said, eyes widening slightly. Reiner looked at him.
"It can't be…" he said, looking a little nervous.
Heidi was far too focused on fighting to worry about anything they were saying. It was taking everything she had just to stay ahead of all the titans. Her first pair of blades were already dull, but she kept using them anyway. She planned to use them until they broke. Only then would they be discarded. With only one other set of blades, she couldn't afford to waste them. Heidi carved out another nape, and the dull blades snapped. She flipped, stabbed what was left of them into the eyes of the next titan coming at her and used the opportunity it created to reload and take it out before it healed. She saw two lined up in a row, shoulder to shoulder, and threw herself at them, building up enough momentum to roll along their shoulders and slice up the backs of both their necks as she went. Then she dodged another attempt to eat her and fired a grappling hook to swing herself around and reel in for the kill. On and on, she fought. Until one titan blended with another. Until her last blades broke. Heidi ejected them into the eyes of an approaching titan and leaped onto its shoulder. She ducked around to stand on the nape of its neck.
"What's she doing?! She's out of blades!" Connie exclaimed, confused and concerned. "That's enough, Heidi! You've already killed about half of them!" But it wasn't enough. They all knew that. The remaining titans could still bring the tower down. Heidi waited there until another titan was opening its mouth wide, lowering it to take a bite. She jumped aside at the last moment, and it ate the nape she had been standing on instead. The bitten titan fell to the ground, dead. Heidi landed on another titan nape and repeated the process. She moved on to the next one.
"She's using herself as bait again!" Krista said.
"She's gonna get herself killed at this rate!" Ymir said. She could only keep that up for so long, no matter how strong she was.
"I want… to fight, too," Krista said, furrowing her brow. "If only I had a weapon." Henning's gear was too damaged to use. "Then I could die fighting with them, too..." Ymir's eyes widened. She looked at Krista.
"Krista… are you still going on about that?" Ymir asked her.
"What…?" Krista said.
"Don't use their deaths," Ymir scolded her. "Those officers didn't die so you'd have an excuse to commit suicide. Heidi isn't fighting so you can throw your life away."
"That… That's not what..." Krista tried to protest.
"You're not like Connie or those officers or Heidi!" Ymir said. "You don't really think, 'I don't want to die'. You've always tried to think of a way to martyr yourself so everyone will praise you! Right?" Krista stared at her. Everyone was staring at her.
"I don't..." Krista said.
"Krista," Ymir said, grabbing her shoulders.
"!" Krista said.
"Maybe you already forgot about this, but..." Ymir said.
"..." Krista stared up at her.
"Heidi!!" Connie yelled, gripping the edge of the battlement as he stared out at the hopeless scene before him with wide eyes. Heidi was surrounded by titans. She was poised on the nape of one, with others coming up on her right, left, and front all at once.
"!!" Ymir and Krista gasped. Heidi gritted her teeth. No way was she dying here. No way! She inhaled and exhaled a mighty war cry.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!!"
A chill went up all their spines, and the titans froze. It was a terrifying and amazing sound. Bertolt and Reiner's eyes widened and they broke out in a cold sweat. Heidi took advantage of the moment of weakness and threw herself around the back of the neck of the titan on her right and waited for the others to notice. As soon as the one attacking from the front turned on that one, she threw herself in an arc around its neck, fired a grappling hook, and reeled herself in to land on its nape. The one that had tried to attack from the left turned its attention to her there, and she dodged its teeth and hopped onto its shoulder, heading for the nape. The titan Heidi had started from turned on that one. She dodged again. Heidi came full circle and landed back on the titan she had started from. They all took the bait and the first three went down like dominoes, one after the other.
"That roar..." Bertolt said, looking at Reiner. It actually made the titans stop for a moment.
"Yeah..." he agreed, looking back at him. "Heidi… may just be an Amundsen..."
"!" Ymir said.
"Huh? What's an Amundsen?" Connie asked.
"A clan of monstrous humans… Ultimate warriors with the ability to fight titans one-on-one… They say their hair became a scarlet red… from being died generation after generation with their enemies' blood," Reiner explained, still staring at Heidi as if seeing her for the first time. "It's said that if titans were to have a natural enemy… It'd be an Amundsen."
"An Amundsen… huh? I guess that explains a lot..." Ymir said, frowning as she watched Heidi continue to trick the titans into killing each other, making impossible leaps look easy.
"Ultimate warrior..." Connie said, watching the impressive way Heidi moved and the fierce expression on her face. "Well, she certainly looks the part now… but that's still Heidi we're talking about, right?"
"Yeah, and there's a limit even to what the Amundsens can do..." Reiner said. Ymir looked at Heidi, who she noticed slipped a little. She was getting clumsy. Well, she had been fighting them nonstop, all by herself. The sun was rising now. She looked back at Krista.
"… This… is probably the end. Once Heidi can't fight anymore… it'll be over for us," Ymir said, sweating nervously. "Try to remember, Krista. The promise you made me when we trained on those snowy mountains… together…"
«« Flashback ««
The freezing, howling wind blew snow across the mountain. Krista was resolutely trudging through the snow, dragging an incapacitated Daz behind her. Ymir was following along at leisurely pace. They were all bundled up against the cold.
"Krista… just give up," Ymir told her. "Come on..."
"No..." Krista said stubbornly.
"Daz is half-dead," Ymir said. "He had no idea whether he could do it. He took on training he could never finish just to raise his score. This is as far as his abilities can take him. If we keep walking at this snail's pace down to the base… there's no way he'll make it. We'll be in danger, too. We won't see the sunrise. So we have two choices. Leave Daz behind and the two of us survive. Or the three of us die together… Which one?"
"… The third choice,"Krista said. "You're misjudging our situation. I'm going to reach base camp, and Daz will be saved… Of course, you can go ahead to safety… How's that?" she glanced back at Ymir. "This way there's no trouble for you. I know that we'll reach the base, so… Go on ahead." She looked forward again and continued to trudge on in silence. Ymir walked along in silence. "Haah. Haah," Krista breathed heavily, straining to pull Daz's weight. She glanced subtly at Ymir, wondering why she was still there."Hey… What are you doing?" she asked.
"Hm?" Ymir said.
"You'll die if you don't go, right…? Hurry up… Go on ahead," Krista told her.
"… Wha? Why aren't you asking for my help?" Ymir asked. "Your body's like a little kid's. You know I've got a better chance… can't you see it'd be faster for me to pull him?" Krista's eyes widened. Ymir walked faster to close the gap between them.
"Your plan isn't… about saving Daz at all, is it?" Ymir said, looking her in the eye. Krista stopped and stared back at her with wide eyes. "You just said… that I would die. So… you must realize that you're going to die at this rate, too. … You were thinking of dying here like this, weren't you? Right? And you wanted to entrust unto me the legend of Krista the goddess. Or am I just overthinking this?" Ymir leaned closer to her. "This is wrong… You're a good girl, Krista. You've got to at least pretend to be interested in saving this man enough to ask me for help. … Right?" She was talking right next to her ear now. "Just because you want other people to think of you as someone who literally died for another… Dragging someone else to his death just for that… only a bad girl would do that, right?" Krista grabbed her.
"You're wrong..." she said desperately. "I was not… thinking… I..." The wind blew harshly as she fell silent. Krista lowered her head in defeat.
"It's you, isn't it?" Ymir asked. "You're the mistress's daughter who was expelled from the family..." Krista's eyes widened. She looked up at her.
"How… do you know…?" Krista asked.
"So… I'm right. It was you," Ymir said. "I just happened to overhear it… at a church in the interior. Back when I used to 'borrow' people's valuables to survive. What a rough story. You were in line to inherit a real high position… You were a descendant by blood, but there was a dispute over whether an illegitimate child could be heir. They said just killing you would solve everything, but… instead you were sent away to live a humble life under a fake name… and that's how this girl ended up being driven into the training corps… Don't worry… I haven't told anyone, and I won't sell the information."
"So… you joined the training corps in order to find me?" Krista asked. "And if you did, then why…?"
"… I don't know," Ymir replied. "Maybe because we were alike."
"… What?" Krista said. "You mean… our backgrounds…?"
"Well… in general..." Ymir said.
"… You became a soldier just for that?" Krista asked.
"I'm not sure," Ymir replied. "No, it's not that..." Krista stared at her.
"Did you… want to be friends with me?" Krista asked a little hopefully. Ymir's eyes widened for a moment.
"Huh? No way. Definitely not," Ymir said with a slightly rueful expression, furrowing her brow a little. Then she got annoyed. "For starters, you and I aren't on the same level! I happened to get a chance to live a whole new life. I was reborn as a new person! But when that happened, I didn't hide my old name! Denying that I was born as Ymir would be to admit defeat!" I'm keeping my name as I live this new life! Living this way is my way of getting revenge!! I'm going to be living proof that your fate isn't decided at birth!! So what about you?! You're going to kill yourself, the ultimate act of submission. Is that how much you want to please the people who treated you like a nuisance?! Why are you trying to hurt yourself?! If your will is that strong… then shouldn't you be able to change your fate?!"
"… I… I can't… even now..." Krista said, tearing up. "There's no way that the three of us can make it back safely, is there?!"
"There is," Ymir said, walking away from her.
"… What?" Krista said, taken aback.
"That light. I can see the base. It's right at the bottom of this cliff," Ymir said, pointing the light out to her. "We can drop Daz from here to down there..."
"What?" Krista said.
"If he's lucky, he'll land somewhere people can see him, and he'll be safe… If he's lucky," Ymir continued. "That's the only option he has at this point. If we don't hope for a miracle… He's just going to end up here as a frozen bagworm..."
"But he'll die if he falls that far!" Krista argued.
"Shut up!" Ymir told her, picking her up and throwing her so she rolled away down another slope opposite the cliff. "I'll do it! You just go on ahead!"
"Ah…?!" Krista cried as she rolled. When she finally came to a stop, she looked up. She couldn't see anything except the glow of her lantern. "That's..." She grabbed the lantern and scrambled to her feet. "Wait!" She ran back up the slope as fast as she could, She slipped and climbed the rest of the way, but when she reached the top, there was nothing. "?!" she gasped. "They're both… gone..."
—∞—
"Haah. Haah," Krista panted as she ran to the base. She saw the cabins and someone sitting outside in the darkness with a lantern. "Ymir?!"
"Took you long enough… I beat you here," Ymir said. She held a hand to her head. "I really did… something stupid..."
"What about Daz?!" Krista asked anxiously. Ymir led her to one of the cabins and opened the door. Inside, Daz had been tucked into a warm bed and was receiving medical treatment. "..." Krista looked from Daz back to the long, sheer drop he would have had to survive. "From that cliff?" Ymir stepped back outside and Krista followed. "You didn't have any rope… and even if you did… that cliff… How'd you get Daz down from up there. Ymir looked at Krista. She stared back.
"Fine… I'll tell you. Because it's you," Ymir said. "But you have to promise me… When I reveal my secret… you'll go back to living by your old name."
»» End Flashback »»
"Heidi… Come on, Heidi...!!" Connie said anxiously, clenching his fists. "Don't let this be our last sunrise!"
"!!" they all gasped when Heidi slipped again, but she managed to recover in time to avoid being eaten. Barely.
"Connie," Ymir said, facing him. "Give me your knife."
"Here," Connie said, handing it over.
"Thanks she said, smacking him on the top of his shaved head.
"… What do you need it for?" Connie asked.
"As a weapon… I'm going to fight," she replied with a tense expression, sweating nervously as she made a grimace that was probably supposed to be a smile.
"What?!" Reiner said, startled. "Ymir? What are you planning?"
"Who knows? I'm not even sure myself," Ymir replied. "All I know is, if Heidi falls, we're doomed." She looked at Krista. "Krista… I have no right to tell you how to live. So this is just… a wish of mine. Live your life… with pride."
"What…?" Krista said, staring back at her. Ymir dashed in her direction. "Ymir? Wait!!" Krista said anxiously, holding up her hands. The boys watched with wide eyes as Ymir followed Heidi's example and leaped off of the tower, wielding only the knife in her hand. Krista reached out after her, but Ymir was too far away.
'Krista… I'm the same way,' Ymir thought as she fell. 'I thought it would've been better if I'd never been born.' "Grab onto something!!" she shouted at Heidi, who looked up just in time to see her cut her own hand with the knife. 'The world hated me just for existing. To bring happiness to many people… I died. But—' Her hand crackled with energy. Heidi's eyes widened as she recognized what that meant. She quickly anchored herself with a grappling hook and held onto the hair of the titan she was on. 'When I did, I wished for something from the bottom of my heart. If I could be born again… I wanted to live my next life for no one but myself...' There was an explosion of light. 'I wished… so hard.' Krista watched with wide eyes as a titan formed in midair around Ymir. Ymir's titan form was on the small side, but she grabbed another titan and bit its nape anyway, tearing out its flesh. She jumped from that titan to another. Heidi stared at her, so stunned that she nearly let her guard down enough to be eaten, but she quickly maneuvered herself out the way and started making her way over to Ymir. Whatever had just happened, she was clearly on their side.
"No way… Ymir can turn… into a titan…?" Connie said, shocked, breaking out in a cold sweat.
"Ymir..." Krista said, also stunned. But neither of them compared to what Reiner and Bertolt felt. They both stared at Ymir's titan form with wide eyes. The sight of it made their blood run cold.
"Wait…" Reiner said. "That's the titan—" An image of his and Bertolt's comrade being eaten by the same titan flashed through his mind. "From that day..."
