Was this really it? They had come so far. He still hadn't killed the damn monkey yet. Looking behind him, seeing Connie blacked out and a titan going to eat him, he had to act fast. Not again. He would not lose another again. There have been too many casualties. Hanji. He would not fail Hanji or Erwin. He never once bungled one of his orders. Not even once. Yet, for some reason, his final order is just the one he can't. Their role may have ended in the retaking of Shiganshina. They had gotten those three to the sea after all, if that was the extent of their role.
When they devoted themselves…was that in order to trample the lives and hearts of others? No… when they dreamed of a world without titans…Levi was sure that was an absurdly innocent and idealized world. Because if it wasn't… it won't have been worth what they devoted.' Images of Hanji, Erwin, Petra, Oluo, Eld, Gunther, Nanaba and Miche flashed through his mind.
His fingers clicked, and he zoomed through the air, intent on cutting the titan. 'Erwin. I…didn't pick you…and I have no regrets about that. No regrets about entrusting the future….to that kid who has the same eyes as you.' An image of Armin smiling in the sea came to mind.
Feeling his blade go through the beast, he cursed in his head. He had missed. He still wasn't in top shape. The crunch on his leg was clear. It felt like his bone was on fire; his body was rushing blood to the fracture. Pain, more and more pain. How much longer would they have to put up with the pain? Didn't it know the pain was tiring?
He fell. Mikasa looked as Levi fell. She wouldn't allow it. She couldn't. Connie was bleeding heavily. It was Connie or Levi. Levi was falling, Connie was bleeding out. One or the other, you can't save both. It was never an option for you. Saving everyone was never an option for Mikasa. Mikasa Ackerman is strong; Mikasa can handle everything that is thrown at her and her alone. But Mikasa cannot save those who don't want to be saved. (Eren) Mikasa will never be able to save everyone. So Mikasa has to choose. She always has to choose. It's not fair, not fair at all.
Choose Mikasa…Choose!
She chooses Levi. She chooses family. Family is everything to Mikasa. She can't afford to lose family. Connie's line was bitten off by a titan. Now all three were falling. There was nowhere to grab on to. No one to grab onto but family, so she held him close. Family…family is what Levi desires. He never had a chance to hold Kenny, so he'll hold onto Mikasa instead. They were falling; the steam was getting hotter, the sounds of titans were louder air on their backs. They watched as Falco swooped down and caught Connie and down diving for them.
They watched as a Warhammer titan struck them down.
Mikasa and Levi were not the only ones watching. Eren was watching, too; he had always watched Mikasa. It wasn't till that fateful day that he watched the same titan who ate his mother eat Hannes. That was the first day he saw Mikasa cry; that was the first day when he realized that Mikasa is still that same little girl who watched her parents get murdered in front of her. Mikasa was scared. Just like everyone else and she too needed someone to protect her. It was that day he vowed to himself that he would protect Mikasa: His home.
A demonic roar sounded. Everyone watched as lighting danced all around the founder. Both Levi and Mikasa were separated, desperately reaching out to one another to hold each other once more. Levi watched in horror as a lighting strike came right down on Mikasa. The way her back was imminently crushed and her head was thrown back by the force which he imagined broke her neck. She didn't even have a chance to scream. He opened his mouth to scream out to her but hit a Titans' shoulder and bounced off of it falling without anyone to hold onto. A stray hand hit him as he was falling and sent him crashing into the back of another before sliding down. As luck would have it the titan was struck by lightning. His senses were overwhelmed. His heart rate picked up; it was too much stimulation. His brain felt as if it was being fried. Everything went quiet; his eardrums had probably burst.
It was hot. So hot. The heat drowned out everything else. It was ironic. To die by one of the things he hated most. Heat. The heat of titan blood going all over him, the steam of titans engulfing him, the heat of the fire that he watches his comrades burn-in. Now he was burning too. He hit the floor, but it felt like nothing. There was nothing. Nothing at all but the vague feeling of his body being crushed, but it didn't hurt at all. Like a lingering feeling and nothing more. Levi Ackerman was done.
…
"Fine…..heavy burns…leg is….lost eyesight…walk…." His earring was going in and out. Dammit. He really was a stubborn bastard who refused to die. A strange sight lay before him. People dressed in odd clothing. The way they spoke sounded different than what he was used to. What had happened? Wasn't he crushed by the rumbling? And Mikasa…was she alive. He had the luck of it. Was she lucky too? She was an Ackerman, a more stubborn one than he is if he does say so himself.
There is a woman more like a teenager if anything, and standing next to two older people. Her parents, he assumes, and finally one who is dressed in all white. A doctor, maybe? It was too much for his head right now. The teenage woman looked at the man with worried eyes. She had ethnic features that looked like the Azumabito. Asians he remembers they were called. More specifically, Japanese. Had they rescued him somehow? They wore similar clothing as them.
The woman looked over at him. "What's your name?" His response was automatic. "Levi Ackerman." Then his vision went black once more.
…
The next time he woke up, the same woman from before was next to him. She quickly lifted his head and made him drink water. He gulped it down greedily, just like back then…in the underground.
"Where- no…how?" The woman looked confused. "How did you…get me…here?" "I found you deep in the forest. I was-" She immediately blushed and looked the other way. "I-I was just going out for a walk!" She said the last part was super fast. She was lying, and forest? He was crushed nowhere near a forest. "Name?" "O-oh right. Excuse my rudeness." She was kind. Very kind and apologetic. It had been a long time since he had met someone like that. It was refreshing. "My name is Watanabe Satoko" That was definitely a foreign name. "Levi…where are you from, and how did you end up in the forest?" His breath hitched. After everything Eren has done, he can't go parading that he is an Eldian of Paradise where the spawns of the devils reside. Her still being here means that they were able to stop Eren. Therefore the hate would triple- no quadruple for them. "I'm from…Marley." He hoped she wouldn't ask from where. He only knew Libero, Suraba-yōsai, Karifa, Odiha and Rakua. And the majority weren't even considered living spaces, and Libero was destroyed due to the attack of Eren.
It's not like Yelena gave them a geography lesson on all of Marley, just military bases. "Marley? I've never heard of a place called that. Where is it located?" This girl had never heard of Marley. They dominated the outside world. There were too many problems here. First was: How did he, according to the girl, end up in a forest and the second being. Why does she not know what Marley is? Is this place heavily sheltered from the world? Even if her parents kept her sheltered, there would be no way she wouldn't find out.
So he lied. "It's a place far from here." "Then how did you end up so close to our village?" That he did not know how to answer. "I was…traveling, and I was injured. I don't remember how but I was."
She looked sad. It was strange seeing someone so empathetic like her. "Oh, you poor thing. I'm sure it will all be fine soon once you're all head up" She smiled at him. He didn't know what it was about this girl but being around her made him feel uneasy. Someone like her never lasts in the cruel world he lives in.
"Satoko!?" He looked over to see a man with angry eyes not pointed towards him and towards who he assumes is hir daughter. "Satoko! You do not know this man!" He came over and pulled her away. "I- Father, I was giving water as he recently woke up!" Levi didn't blame the man. She was right. He was just some weirdo who her daughter found. He would do the same. After all, the position he was in before certainly made it seem like he was trying to engage something with her or the other way around. His head was on her lap and she was looking down towards him empathetically.
Empathy was not common. It was easy to confuse it for other things. He shook his head. "I apologize. I meant no harm Mr…." He didn't know what to call him. The way the girl introduced herself, he had thought her name was Watanabe, not Satoko. Or maybe it was, and her dad was just calling her by her last name. "What she said is the truth. I only recently woke up, and she gave me water and asked where I was from." The man simply looked at him unamused. "Simply because you are but does not mean you can take advantage of our daughter. To think we even gave you a place to stay. You repay us like this!?"
Levi didn't know what to say. He stared at the man who was yelling at him. "You even have unknown weapons!" That's when it clicked. His ODM gear! Where was it!? He sat up. "My ODM gear…Where is it!?" The man looked at him and didn't answer and continued to yell. Levi did his best to stand up. Finally standing up, the man looked at him more like down but still. Walking, he fell down backward, grunting. His left leg was messed up badly. "I need to know where it is!" The girl Satoko or Watanabe or whatever her name was got out of his father's grip and rushed over to Levi.
"Levi!" The man looked even more enraged. "Are you…you!?" This was turning from bad to worse. Then a woman, presumably her mother, came in to see what the commotion was about. "Hina. This man is probably the reason why Satoko goes out as much as she does!" Her mother looked horrified. "Satoko, this man is too old for you!"
He scrunched up his face. This girl looked to be 15 or 16 at best. Levi was in his mid-30s. There was no way he was going to court someone half his age. "You've been manipulating our daughter! There's no way our daughter would ever love someone as old as you willingly." It has been a long while since Levi has ever been so confused like this. "Sir, Ma'am, I assure you I only met your daughter today and just learned her name a few moments ago!" The parents opened their mouths to shout at him again when a knock came sounding from the door. They stopped and looked back.
Satoko signed. Now introducing Kazumi would be harder than ever. Leaving Levi behind, she left the room to go answer the door. Satoko's parents turned around to see a young man with flowers. "Levi isn't the one I'm seeing. The person I am seeing is Kazumi." He bowed down in a show of respect. Her parents became red in the face as they looked back towards the open room of Levi as he sat looking up at them with a tired expression.
They rushed back, got on their knees, and apologized. Levi sat there, clearly uncomfortable and confused.
…
It had been weeks, and got to know the Watanabe family along with Satoko's boyfriend, now fiance. He honestly thought she could do better. She was kind and pretty, which was rare to come across these days. Her boyfriend was okay. Not much from him, but Levi stayed out of the family affairs. He had learned that he was now permanently blind in his left eye, and his left leg was also permanently damaged. However, there was one person he could not stop thinking about. His only family that was left in the miserable world: Mikasa Ackerman.
Levi Ackerman was never one to hold hope. But for something that he had wanted since he was a child, he couldn't help but hope, even if it was just a little bit.
Getting up, he groaned a bit at the pain but nonetheless stood up. He has started practicing how to walk again. They had given him new clothes which he had yet to adjust to. It was a small and reserved town, so he wore traditional clothing. Which he soon learned was called a Kimono. Men's clothing consisted of hakama pants and an upper loose garment - kimono or haori. Hakama are wide trousers, resembling a kind of skirt. They are sewn from a thick fabric and gathered in small folds. Haori is a type of jacket with a high collar and wide rectangular sleeves, the ends of which are tied with a special cord. Unlike the more elaborate women's kimono, men's clothing tends to be more restrained and conservative.
Traditional clothing also includes footwear. Tabi is a kind of sock made of leather or other dense material and is toe-divided with a special sleeve for the big toe. Zori is much simpler footwear, almost like flip-flop sandals. Traditionally, the most commonly used materials in making zori were rice straw, bamboo, and reeds.
He learned a lot about this place and quickly learned that they knew nothing of titans as it never came up. He even brought up paradise and how they house devils. They didn't understand a single word he said. He had to come up with something to cover up his mistake of bringing it up. Still, it was haunting his mind. But there were a lot of things he liked about the place. Their tea tasted ten times better than the type they served in the crops, their food was wide in variety, and one thing he absolutely adored more than anything else in the world was how much they valued cleanliness. He was introduced to many cleaning products and even stronger deodorants than what Marley had.
But they also lived in peace. This was true peace. It wasn't peace that covered up something ugly like the walls he used to live in and hid the nasty sight of titans.
That was until Kazumi had lost Satoko. He knew it. He knew that someone like her would never last here. Nowhere would she survive no matter the world. It is cruel. But what really had him on edge was how Kazumi described how she had gone missing. There was no way. He had shut himself in his room for the next two days denying it even happened. Forgetting the girl who helped treat him, the girl who, as Kazumi claimed, just disappeared out of thin air. Kazumi was boring, and Levi knew murders just by looking at them. Kazumi wasn't that type of kid. He couldn't have been. If anything, Kazumi loved her. So what was it that took her? A kidnapper, something else? Anything else, something normal. Levi would rather fight humans than another race of human-eating bastards.
Not again. Never again. How much shitty luck does he have to have to make it out one hell only to make it into another?
Here he is walking to the place where Kazumi says she disappeared hoping and praying he's able to find something to prove that it was just another human. He was sick. He knew he was, here he was praying to whatever god there may be out there or if there is even one (After everything that has ever happened to him he seriously doubts that a god exists. If it does it sure as hell isn't their savior. How could god be so cruel as to just sit there and laugh while everyone he has ever cared about is eaten alive? So no, Levi doesn't exactly believe in gods.) that Satoko, the girl who nursed him back to health, was killed by another human being instead of a demon or monster.
So when he finds nothing, no evidence whatsoever that it was a human. He feels like pulling out a sword and challenging god right then and there. While asking- no begging why he never interferes, if it created humanity why doesn't it come back down to help it. The only god he knows of is Ymir Fritz but she is revenge-driven. In the final battle, she brought back all the past titans to interfere with their mission.
But in Marley, he had heard of another god that just simply called god and how one day he came to earth or something like that and impregnated a young girl who was to be married. Levi laughed at a story like that. How stupid do people have to be to believe that? Even so, why choose that girl? Why choose a girl that was to be married? Why not another woman? But that god was weird. He had let his own son be crucified, talk about shitty parenting.
He had also heard that the first-ever human beings were a man named Adam and a woman named Eve. They preached about how they were pure and full of innocence and relied on god and god alone. But one day a snake came and offered Eve an apple. Why an apple? It could've been a grape or something? She eats it and she becomes aware of herself and tells Adam to eat it as well. (did he try to spit it back out once he found out but got stuck in his throat and that's why it's called Adam's apple?) Now they're both aware. God is enraged and punishes the rest of humanity. It was bullshit logic. Why would it even matter that they are now aware of each other? Adam and Eve were stripped of their free will before the snake had offered them the apple.
He supposes it fits Marley and their ideology of suppressing Paradise and holding the threat of titans over all other countries. That story would also fit why God would never come down to help his subjects, those being stripped of their freedom. Because he stripped someone of their own freedom.
Overall he finds the idea of gods foolish. They were nothing more than a coping mechanism humanity had created, and ironically he now too was using the coping mechanism.
Hearing someone behind him he saw a boy with a box on his back sniffing the ground. "A-ah Levi…" Kazumi was a little shocked to see him. The boy stood up immediately. "Good evening. I'm looking into the disappearance of Watanabe Satoko. My name is Kamado Tanjiro!" "Levi Ackerman" he slightly bowed his head.
Levi had realized that people here introduced themselves by their last name then first name. He didn't really understand why but he would continue to introduce himself as always. He would not change that.
Kamado suddenly popped up and started running. Both Levi and Kazumi ran after the kid. He was fast, unbelievably fast.
"The scent has gotten stronger! The demon has appeared!" Levi stopped right in tracks. Demon? A demon….there was no way. His muscles tensed up and his jaw locked. His hands went down to his waist to grab his swords…only to come to the depressing reality that he had left them in the Watanbe residence.
He felt all over himself as he ran faster ignoring the slight pain in his left knee. To make it worse he saw the kid jump onto a roof.
"Levi! I know a way to get to the other side!" However Levi was already on the road. Kazumi was white in the face.
Levi watched from the roof as Kamado stabbed the ground. A dark substance came out of the ground along with a girl. Then to make things worse a demon came out as well. It looked so inhuman which was a relief. It had long dark hair that extended on the sides turning a violet color. Veins on its forehead and prominent horns poking out. Its eyes are a crimson red without pupils, and dark eye bags. As much as it sounded weird, the thing that scared Levi most about titans when he first saw them and even now was how human they looked, yet not human at all. The eyes held no humanity in them, how something that was like them held no humanity of all. They were lifeless as if looking into a reflection of what you are deep down. A monster, titans were terrifying.
But this demon. It looked disturbing but he'd rather look at these things than another titan in his life.
Levi watched as the demon made a loud sound like nails on a chalkboard. He scowled and kept observing this new place and what kind of monsters it held. Two more demons came out.
The other two differ from the other based on clothing and horns, however they all share similar shinobi attire. On the upper center of the main body, has a single horn that protrudes. Wearing a long sleeved shinobi uniform with meshes on the wrist and neck. The second body has two horns, and one on each side of the forehead. His shinobi attire does not have any sleeves. The third body has three horns, with a shinobi garment sewn with meshes on the sides of the arms.
He was left in shock, a single slash of a sword made such an impact. This kid was strong physically, but it was clear he was still new at actually fighting opponents. Levi was of no use here, his ODM gear was in the Watanabe recidence and the only thing he had on him was a measly blade that wowuldn't do any good. His knee wasn't in the best shape. He was also sure the demon had intoxicated him because when the Kamado kid swung his sword down he could've sworn he felt the coolness of water.
The demons sinked back into the dark liquid. A demon appeared behind Kazumi who was holding the girl. Getting ready to jump down he saw Kamado slash down. There it was again, the feeling of cool water.
"You Bastard!" His breath hitched as he looked towards the demon. These things could speak!? "Stop getting in my way! That woman will go stale! That woman is already 16 now, if i don't eat her quickly she's going to lose that freshness!"
His face recoilded in disgust at the creature. Another popped out. "Don't fret my duplicate. Oh well, on nights like these, I've already eaten many 16 year old girls from this town. The meat on every single one of them was delicious. I've already had my fill."
"WELL I'M NOT SATISFIED! I WANT TO EAT MORE!"
His eyes were wide. He didn't know what was worse. Titans only ate to regain their humanity. But these things ate to survive but boasted about it.
Kazumi yelled towards the demon to give back Satoko only for it to be revealed she had already been eaten.
Before he could register the movements of his body they moved as they once did so long ago without any hindrances. Grabbing the one-horned demon, he easily pulled it out and placed his knife behind the demon's neck, his blade sliced through its head like butter as Levi pulled his blade towards him and the blade outwards.
Throwing the head elsewhere before the other demon was able to react he too was being pulled out the water. Laying on the ground Levi stepped on the demon's shoulders and ripped the head right off the body splatering himself with blood. But at this moment he couldn't bring himself to care all that much.
Tanjiro and Kazumi both watched in horror as he threw the head to the other disgruaded head that lay elsewhere. "Now for that third one." before Tanjiro could say anything he heard a yell of anger. "YOU BASTARD! YOU CUT OFF MY HEAD!" Levi stopped and looked at the one-horned demon he had cut the head of first. Do these things not die!? His head wasn't fully regrown but his mouth was.
"Levi! They don't die unless their head is cut off by a speical blade!" Levi looked at his blade and clicked his tongue. "Can you guard-" One other demon had come behind Tanjiro when a leg extended behind him and kicked the demon's head. Hard.
"Why is a mere human like you… carrying a demon on your back?" That caught Levi's attention. He saw a girl no older than 13 or 14 at least turn to both Kazumi and the girl then turn to him with an angry expression. She rushed over to him and swiped her claws at him. He jumped away and grunted when he landed. His knee was really messing him up. The three-horned demon came under him, doing a series of backflips to get away from the female demon and the horned demon. "NEZUKO!? WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?"
'She shouldn't be attacking a human. Urokodaki had told me that she would never attack another human, just demons unless…' He looked over towards Levi with an angry and confused expression. 'He had inhuman strength. No one should be able to cut off a demon's head with that small blade. No one of his statue anyways. Could he be…? But he looked normal and gives no scent like that. In fact his scent smells depressing. As if he had lost everything. Someone with nothing to live for. Plus he attacked another demon? What if he was planning to eat them but this other demon was getting in his way! What if he was a human who had hurt another?' There were too many questions with no explanations. The point was that this demon or human whatever he may be was helping them.
"Nezuko! Leave him alone and just go for the ones with horns!" He yelled out to her. She turned her attention from him to another.
There wasn't much for Levi to do right now.