In a remote village northeast of Karanis, near the ruins of Wall Maria, silence ruled.
The life that once filled the streets and farmlands had long since vanished. All that remained was the slow, uneven shuffle of Titans.
Some wandered clumsily between houses; others pressed their massive forms against walls, their upper bodies wedged deep inside structures they could never have entered as humans. A few stood frozen—half buried in the wreckage of their own homes—their twisted faces mimicking humanity in a grotesque parody of life.
Then—
Clang.
A grapple hook struck stone, slicing through the still air.
A figure shot upward, propelled by the hiss of compressed gas and the pull of taut cables. The Three-Dimensional Maneuver Gear whirred, and in a blink, the soldier landed atop the roof of an old windmill.
Swish.
The flash of a blade—and the Titan clawing at the windmill's side collapsed, its nape sliced open cleanly. It hit the earth with a sickening thud, steaming into nothingness.
The nearby Titans turned their heads in eerie unison. Their empty eyes sharpened with hunger as they lumbered toward the lone figure standing against the wind.
Before they could close in, streaks of movement cut through the air. More Survey Corps soldiers descended from above, their blades carving clean arcs through flesh and sinew. Within moments, five Titans lay dead around the base of the windmill.
The squad regrouped on the roof, the smell of burnt steam thick in the air.
At their center stood Lock, now leading his squad on a reconnaissance mission in the northeastern region.
From the top of the windmill, they could see everything—the ruined fields, the half-collapsed homes, the Titans littering the streets like scattered shadows of a massacre. The scene was wrong. Deeply wrong.
Oluo broke the silence first, voice strained with disbelief.
"What the hell is this? Why are there so many Titans here all at once?"
Eld's gaze swept across the landscape, sharp and uneasy.
"It's not just the number," he said. "Look at them. They're… off. According to the reports, lightning struck somewhere near this area not long ago. This village was right on that path."
Gunther adjusted the grips on his blades, his brow furrowed.
"I've had a bad feeling since we got here. It's not just them—it's this place. The air feels… wrong."
Lock's eyes followed the sluggish Titans moving below. His expression hardened.
"You see it too? The ones stuck halfway into buildings?"
The others looked closer. Realization hit all at once.
Some Titans weren't outside trying to break in—they were inside, jammed awkwardly through walls and doors. Their mangled torsos jutted from ruined homes, arms flailing in blind confusion.
Eld's face tightened.
"That's impossible. Titans don't shrink. They couldn't have fit through those doors. Unless…"
He stopped, the thought too grim to finish.
Lock finished it for him, voice cold.
"Unless they came from inside."
The squad fell silent.
The truth hung heavy in the air.
If Lock was right, these weren't Titans that had wandered in from beyond the Walls. These were the villagers—men, women, even children—transformed.
Lock exhaled sharply.
"Don't dwell on it. Our mission is reconnaissance. Record everything you see. I'll scout from above."
The others nodded, though the weight of his words lingered. They all knew what it meant.
And they all knew Lock's strength was unlike theirs. Fighting beside him was both an honor and a risk. Protecting them slowed him down, yet he refused to abandon his squad.
Within the Corps, only two others matched him: Captain Levi and perhaps Mikasa Ackerman. Together, they were humanity's sharpest blades.
Lock launched off the windmill and soared across the rooftops. The world blurred beneath him as he moved silently through the ruins, scanning the village from above.
The truth became undeniable.
Everywhere he looked, Titans bore remnants of their former lives—clothes half-torn, hands still clutching the objects they'd once owned. A mother's shawl. A child's toy. A ring.
Lock's jaw clenched.
So it's true… Forced injections. They turned them all.
His mind pieced it together quickly. The Warrior Unit's mission—their infiltration—had all begun like this. Reiner, Annie, Bertolt… mere children sent to commit unspeakable acts, turning innocents into Titans to breach the Walls.
Lock had once thought himself beyond their kind, untouched by their cruelty. He had believed he could change the world through will alone. But this village was proof—proof that the world cared nothing for will or hope.
Reality was merciless.
And yet, it demanded clarity.
Reiner, Annie, Bertolt—they weren't demons. They were victims of their own twisted cause. But sympathy was a luxury the battlefield didn't allow.
They are enemies. And enemies must die.
As a soldier of the Survey Corps—as someone born in Shiganshina—Lock could not afford hesitation.
Even if those warriors carried sorrow in their hearts, as long as they threatened humanity, they had to be destroyed.
His hand brushed the vial of Titan spinal fluid hidden beneath his uniform. Its faint weight grounded him, a grim reminder of what power meant.
Next time I face Reiner and the others, I won't hesitate. Titans… must belong only to those we can trust.
A low rumble shattered his thoughts.
Crash!
The windmill behind him exploded outward as the Titan trapped inside finally forced its way free. Half of the structure collapsed in a storm of wood and dust.
The sound carried across the entire village.
Dozens of Titans turned their heads in eerie synchrony—their necks twisting unnaturally toward the source. Then, with horrifying speed, they began to run.
Oluo, Eld, and Gunther barely had time to react before the horde was upon them.
Lock's voice tore through the air.
"Damn it!"
Without a second thought, he fired his grapples and launched himself forward. The rooftops streaked past as he flew toward his comrades.
They were already fighting, blades flashing, ODM Gear hissing with gas bursts—but the Titans kept coming, faster, hungrier, some moving with the erratic bursts of aberrants.
Lock dove into the fray.
Steel met flesh. Steam exploded around him as he carved through Titan after Titan, his movements fluid, precise, merciless. He didn't hesitate, didn't flinch, even knowing what these monsters had once been.
Pity was a weakness they couldn't afford.
All that mattered was survival.
And so, amid the chaos, Lock fought—each swing of his blades carving a path through despair itself. The windmill's remains burned faintly in the background as the corpses of Titans dissolved into vapor.
Far from the carnage, hidden in a patch of dense brush beyond the fields, a pair of eyes watched.
Cold. Unblinking.
Calculating.
They observed every motion, every kill, every flash of light from Lock's blades.
And they did not move.
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A/N:
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