The Marleyans had never witnessed anything this terrifying—so many Titans, so many savage, menacing figures, standing right in front of them at this very moment.
They knew those were Eldians who could turn into Titans, and that only made their hatred for Eldians burn even hotter.
They had never reflected on anything they'd done in the Eldian internment zone. Now, they felt even more certain that everything they'd done was "right"—that wiping out Eldians as a people was the world's mission.
To them, the world and Eldia were antonyms. There was no way they could ever coexist in harmony.
Just like how Titans ate people, and people could only run.
When driven into a corner, killing Titans was simply the best choice for humanity.
Only now, the Marleyans were in chaos. They wanted to kill these Titans too—but they had never known how.
Not even Marley's soldiers and artillerymen had the confidence to kill two Titans in a single day.
The first one was only ever killed because the Titan itself made a mistake and died by accident.
The second was only killed because they threw absolutely everything they had at it—so weak and unimpressive it was barely worth mentioning.
That was the reality: soldiers who had fought human wars on land for years had plenty of experience killing people.
But against Titans dozens of times taller than them, they had no room to resist at all.
Being slapped to death.
Being crushed in someone's fingers.
Being stomped flat.
All of that was normal.
Yet Roger Eikam didn't do any of that.
He hadn't come to slaughter.
He had come to change.
He wanted to change all of Marley. He wanted Marleyans and Eldians to live together.
And only if that proved impossible—only as the very last, worst option—would he wipe out every other race.
Eldians didn't want their descendants to keep hating the world, to keep fighting forever, never even understanding what they were fighting for—only hating one another, simply because one side had overwhelming power and the other didn't.
Once that kind of power existed, the gap between them could never be bridged. Even when children grew up, they would still hate each other, still want to gnash each other's heads apart with their teeth, burn each other's bodies to ash with fire.
And who could you blame for that?
Not Eldians.
Not the other peoples of the world.
It wasn't a matter of "race."
It was a matter of fairness and unfairness.
The world's people had no weapons that could truly deal with Titans. From the beginning, Titans seemed like the kings of the world.
They rampaged wherever they pleased, appearing in every corner of the earth, devouring healthy humans in every place, swallowing them down into their bellies.
From the start, they had defined themselves clearly—
Humanity's natural enemy.
And as a natural enemy, they wouldn't do anything beyond their "role."
For example, they wouldn't help humans build homes.
What they did was simple: keep devouring humans, until every last person in the world was gone.
That might have been the Titans' ultimate aim, but the Parasite that controlled the Titans had an even grander end goal:
To turn all Titans back from humans—by turning all humans into Titans.
It would also serve reproduction. Its kind would continue living, perfectly intact.
Yes.
It was an alien organism.
It didn't belong to Earth.
As humans fought each other, it saw hope for breeding.
There were no thoughts in its mind—only the urge to give birth and reproduce, to raise its offspring to adulthood.
Just like every other creature in nature: it didn't dream of lofty visions, or grand beauty, or picturesque splendor.
It only thought about how to kill its enemies, how to reproduce the next generation, and how to make the next generation stronger and tougher—so they could survive better.
That seemed to be an attribute of life itself.
Every life event—every living thing—was a unique individual.
They could freely choose to live.
Even death—how to die, when to die—could be a choice.
But the one thing they could never choose was to rewrite the traces they had left behind in this world. That was something no one could change, no matter what.
Roger Eikam understood humans clearly. He had no hope for them.
And he had even less illusion about the Parasite.
It wasn't that the Parasite was some purely vicious, irredeemable existence—it was that humans, if they wanted to stop monsters from being born, had to stop it.
Preventing another being from living, in a sense, wasn't "following rules." It was breaking the agreement between living beings.
No human wanted to watch a contract-breaker live freely and happily in the world.
So humans devised ways to target their enemies, invented all kinds of death sentences, and used them to torture those who were just like themselves.
Roger Eikam had ordered the Rumbling to sweep across the entire globe, to trample every inch of land in the world—
But when it reached Marley, he halted the march and commanded all Titans to encircle the nation completely, turning once again into walls made of living people.
The Parasite was deeply confused by Roger Eikam's decision. It couldn't tell if Roger Eikam was a fool or a madman—why not kill them, and instead surround them?
What did it mean?
Was he going to kneel down and beg them—move the Marleyans with kindness, make them willingly confess and kill themselves?
"Moving" Marleyans—what a joke.
Roger Eikam had stopped believing a single word from Marleyans a long, long time ago.
Back then, when his studies weren't going well, he had even wondered whether Holos was just a fabricated figure Marley invented for other people—
That in truth, there had never been such a person at all.
Only politics required his existence.
A scapegoat to clean up Marley's mess.
Now, Roger Eikam didn't care about any of that nonsense.
He only ordered the Rumbling Titans to surround Marley—seal it in the middle.
And then he watched from above, staring down at them, doing nothing more. No punishment. No attacks.
Hardening.
That was Roger Eikam's command.
The Rumbling Titans responded at once—loud cracking sounds bursting from their bodies as blinding light flared.
Roger Eikam had completely encircled Marley.
No Marleyan could get out.
Every airship was destroyed by Roger Eikam.
Now, the people trapped inside the walls—
Were the Marleyans.
They could no longer expand.
They could no longer act arrogant.
Faced with this reality, Marley fell into panic, and the rest of the world was left utterly baffled.
Then the thousand-meter Titan—Roger Eikam's form—spoke:
"Let this be known to all Marleyans: you have been penned in by me, Roger Eikam.
"Because you must repay the sins of your fathers, you will be imprisoned inside forever.
"Not killing you is my mercy.
"If you try to escape or resist—
"What awaits you will be utter ruin."
At those words, every Marleyan's face twisted in shock.
Because those words weren't spoken by anyone else—
They were the exact words Marleyans had once spoken to every Eldian in the internment zone.
Now, everything had been turned completely upside down.
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