Before Chi had ran off with Eren and the others, she made sure to grab a set of 3DMG and strapped it on as quickly as possible—though she fumbled and didn't properly tighten every strap, for she was in a rush.
They climbed onto broad stallions of their own, each grasping a torch to use as sight to make it to the wall. Together they travelled in the dark in complete silence, beads of sweat rolling down the anxious faces they wore. There was the constant fear that titans circled them, as they could see nothing beyond the dim glow of the flickering torches, the night as black as can be.
There was no telling when they would encounter a titan as they trotted through the landscape, though they always had their hands at ready if it were necessary to make a counteroffense attack.
Chi had the unsettling feeling of uneasiness as she quivered with the aching need to go back and take down as many titans as she could, but she knew the others wouldn't have let her in a million years. They knew that she was reckless when it came to things like that. But she couldn't control it, this—this bloodthirst that was like a raging flame.
Because there was nothing else to occupy her mind with, her thoughts kept on flowing back to Levi. She wondered what there was set for them in the future. There was no denying it—she loved him with all her heart. But what was to come?
What would happen if she were eaten? The thought horrified her as she imagined a scene of Levi standing over her mangled body with a look of pure horror on his face. She, above anything else in the world, did not want something like that happen to her beloved. Shaken, Chi shook her head and sighed heavily.
"Chisaki Rivaille," she murmured, testing out the sound on her tongue. "...Hm."
"What?" Hanji asked, turning her head toward her. She rode next to Chi and heard her remark . "Chi? Wasn't your last name Matsumoto?"
"Oh, yeah." She reddened.
"Who's this Rivaille guy? Are you cheating on Levi?" Hanji's brows arched.
"N—no!" Chi exclaimed, nearly falling off her horse in shock "Rivaille is Levi's last name. I'd never do such a thing; I highly doubt I would ever find anyone else who could love me like he does."
"Rivaille?" Hanji scrunched her nose as she fell into thought. "That's not Levi's last name. Who told you that?"
"I—it's not? I learned that it was that way; I've called him Levi Rivaille since the day we met..."
"It's not Rivaille," Hanji chuckled, pushing her glasses up with her forefinger. "It's Ackerman, or so I heard."
"Ackerman?!" Chi repeated, shocked to hear that what she had thought was true all along was really a lie. Moreover, she was even more astonished that he shared last names with Mikasa, of all people.
"Yeah. I overheard some Military Police officers talking about him and they addressed him as 'Levi Ackerman.' He's never corrected you or anything?"
"No. That's strange."
"It is." Hanji averted her attention back to the ground in front of her, her brown eyes shining. "I wonder why..."
Chi sighed heavily and let the silence resume, the only sound being the clopping of the horse's hooves clattering on the ground. When she glanced over at the nervous Eren, she nearly chuckled. She was thinking about the first time she'd seen him—and boy, was he nervous.
It was a shining day, the sun beaming down harshly on the 104th Trainee Squad below, adolescents of all ages shifting nervously on their feet as the Sergeant stomped up to certain soldiers and tore into them.
The first person she remembered he walked up to a petite blonde boy with shoulder-length hair and sky blue eyes.
"You! Who are you?!" Keith shouted.
"Armin Arlert, from the Shiganshina District, sir!" the boy replied with a nervously-pitched voice.
"I see! What a ridiculous name! Did your parents give it to you?!"
"My grandfather did, sir!" The Sergeant bent down to get a closer look at the quivering boy.
"Arlert! Why are you here?!"
"To help humanity achieve victory!"
"That's wonderful to hear! We can feed you to the titans! Third row, about face!" He grabbed Armin's head and twisted his body around to face the others who stood behind him.
Next was a blonde boy with a stone face. "And who are you?!" Keith asked once again.
"Sir! Thomas Wagner, from Trost District!" he answered, slamming his right fist above his heart.
"I can't hear you!"
"Thomas Wagner!"
"Go practice in a barn!"
"Yes, sir!"
He broke soldier after soldier.
The scene was both entertaining and a bit pitiful as Sasha Braun had even offered to share half of her hot and steamy potato—fresh out of the oven—with the Sergeant, but it only angered him even more.
Though he had gone over to Sasha, the "Rite of Passage" was not over yet. The boy next to her, a brunette with emerald eyes was sweating and fidgeting with his fingers—it was obvious he thought he was going to get spoken to. Unfortunately, right after Sasha's small incident, Keith decided to show her the true meaning of shame.
"You!" he addressed rudely, towering over Chi like a titan itself. "Who are you?!"
"Chisaki Matsumoto, from the Shiganshina District, sir!" she answered, placing her fist on her chest.
"Shiganshina?! And why are you here?!"
Chi's expression darkened as a shimmer flashed in her golden eyes. "To kill all of the titans." The boy next to her seemed as he was going to rock off of his feet; his eyes widened to the size of saucers.
"Kill them?! You won't be able to do anything with a weak body like this!" Keith raised a fist and aimed it directly towards Chi's stomach, but she stopped his fist with hers before he could pummel her.
"My body is not weak," she insisted, furrowing her brows.
"How dare you disrespect a former commander to the Corps!" Keith roared, another strike aimed for her head. She tilted her head to the side, dodging his fist and grabbing his wrist as it passed her face.
"Hey," she snapped with a fierce intensity. It was obvious that this girl was not anything like the others. "I came here to train so that I could kill. I didn't ask for you to treat me like this. But if this is what it takes to get into the Corps, yell all you want. I'll yell the hell back!"
Chi released the Sergeant's limbs stiffly and returned to her salute, flicking her head to move a stray piece of hair out of her eyes. Keith stared at her with an expression like rock, but an amused glimmer appeared in his eyes.
A small grimace turned upon his lips as he pivoted to leave and take down another Trainee, but not before he annouced, "Very well, Chisaki Matsumoto. Do as you must."
It was at this moment that everyone had realized Chisaki Matsumoto was not going to be a regular soldier.
~~~~~
~Sunrise~
"There it is!" Eren exclaimed, jutting out a finger to point at a large, crumbling castle just as the sun began to peek above the horizon, casting a warm glow over the torturous world. It came to their shock that there were twenty different titans attacking the castle, their comrades defending themselves helplessly without 3DMG of any kind.
It was even more perplexing as they watched a smaller, more agile titan with glittering ebony eyes and razor sharp teeth fighting a disastrous battle with the others. It seemed more intelligent and speedy as it darted under the other titans' swings and grabs, biting off the napes of the other titans necks cleanly off and clawing out many others' eyes.
"Wha—?!" Hanji choked as she and the others broke out into a gallop. "Is that titan—"
"—Attacking the others?!" Armin finished, his cyan eyes widening as they spotted four people standing atop a disintegrating tower. "No... it's protecting them??" Christa, Connie, Reiner, and Bertholdt each watched in awe as the titan attacked the other ones.
Chi was both mystified and fired up as she leapt off her horse and blasted off toward the large creatures on her feet, drawing two swords in preparation for attack. The sudden burst of speed sent electrifying jolts of pain up her ankle and leg, but she ignored it carelessly.
At one point the small titan went to the helpless soldiers and Chi's trapped friends mounted its hair, the titan bringing them to the ground where the rubble laid in mountainous heaps. The tower they once stood on crashed to the ground and completely covered almost all of the titans in debris.
This was definitely not a regular titan.
A titan began to rise from the rubble, but the small titan pounced on it and tore out its nape immediately. Just as she was about to escape harm, a titan grabbed the smaller titan's hair and whipped it upwards, dragging it closer to itself as more titans found their way out of the destruction.
The other titans grabbed a section of the smaller titan's body, ripping apart its jaw then its limbs, setting their own sets of teeth on the flesh and tearing it apart. Sickening rips and crackles were heard as its skin was torn open and snacked upon mercilessly.
"No!" Christa screamed, scrambling over several large rocks toward the dying titan. "Ymir! Ymir! There is still something I need to tell you!" She tripped over and over on the strewn boulders, struggling to reach the peculiar titan. "I have yet to tell you my real name!"
But all of her efforts were thrown away as a curious titan peeked around a large slab of stone wall, its lifeless eyes landing on the petite girl. Connie, Reiner, and Bertholdt stared in horror as all Christa could do was freeze, snatched up in the titan's grimy fingers.
"No! I still nee—" she started, but she was cut off as a sudden blur of color swooped in and slit the nape of the titan's neck. It fell to the ground and Mikasa Ackerman landed, crouched, on the dirt.
"Y—you guys!" Connie cried, his voice full of relief as he cheered. "Why are you here?!"
Mikasa ignored him and turned to the other titans.
"Christa, and you guys," she said, "stand back. We'll take this from here. Or perhaps Chi will."
They were confused for a few moments before they looked at where the smaller titan was getting torn away from the others. The man-eating ones were taken down one by one by a spiraling figure that destroyed everything in its path; they spun as their cords shot out almost nonstop, their blades reflecting the harsh sunlight as blood steamed away on the white and red clothing.
Eren managed to slice off a chunk of one titan's neck, cheering, "HELL YEAH! I did it! My first kill as a Scout!" But he fumbled and jammed his elbow into a stone slab, crying out in pain.
"You moron!" one of the other squad members cried. "You were told to stay back, Eren!"
"Y—yes, sir... sorry," Eren mumbled. "Ow, ow, ow."
"Hey!" Connie called over. "Eren!" Reiner and Bertholdt followed nervously, their jaws dropped in awe.
"Guys!" The other three men rushed over and helped the titan boy stand, easing him.
Soon, all of the other titans had been taken out and everyone gathered around Christa, including the members of the Corps who had stayed behind as Chi took care of the titans.
"Is everyone alright?!" Hanji asked, rushing quickly to the others. There were numerous nods and some nervous exchanges of glances. Chi's eyes were shimmering with excitement and thirst—it had not yet been quenched, even with all of the titans she'd already slayed. Reiner and Bertholdt watched her with wary eyes, anxiously shifting from foot to foot.
"Yes," Christa muttered, cradling Ymir's barely conscious form in her arms. She'd been cut out of that small titan, strange markings decorating her face. "But... Ymir..."
"Ymir's a titan," Connie said, shaking his head and closing his eyes. "I can't believe this..."
"Ymir?!" Armin repeated. "She's a titan?"
"Ymir," Christa said again. Ymir's eyes opened a small crack and Christa let out a shaky sigh. "My name is... Historia."
Ymir let a smile curl upon her lips before her eyes closed and her body fell slack. Her right arm and right leg had been severed; all that was left was bloody stumps, probably sacrificed in the process of Hanji cutting her out in a rush.
"A titan...?" Chi said, her eyes widening. "Ymir is—she's... a titan?"