Chapter 153: Multiple Playthroughs — Paradise Arc (Part 1)!
His consciousness was submerged in endless chaos. No light. No sound. Only a silence longer than an eternal night. Time had no meaning here. Past, present, and future were compressed into a single point. A repeating prison he could not escape.
He only knew he was back. Carrying the scars of countless cycles etched onto his soul, he had returned to where it all began.
In every loop, he had tried to rewrite the script of fate, sometimes with hope, sometimes with cold resolve.
He had tried responding to malice with kindness, attempting to dissolve the hatred between the Walls and the world through communication and understanding. The result was trampled trust and the fires of war burning even brighter.
He had tried to deter everything with power, attempting to build an absolute safe zone through force. That only invited a more hysterical counterattack from the entire world.
He had tried sacrificing a few to save the many, surgically removing what he saw as "threats." The result was more uncontrollable variables and a chain reaction of hatred.
He had tried joining hands with former enemies, thinking he could unite forces against a greater crisis. But it always ended in destruction, born of suspicion and jealousy.
He had tried hiding his power and existence completely, seeking only to live quietly within the Walls with his friends. But disaster always found a way to strike, in unexpected forms.
He had even tried returning to his most primal impulse, activating the Rumbling, trying to solve the problem once and for all with violence before that white monster could mess everything up…
Countless attempts, countless failures. Countless times watching history repeat itself or spiral into worse endings. The scars were carved deep into his soul.
He didn't even open his eyes. He just felt the damp air, the faint smell of soil and grass, the familiar yet cold touch. He knew where he was. Under that tree. The place he often visited as a child.
A numbness that seeped into his bones replaced all emotion. Anger, sadness, despair—these words felt distant and strange. They had gnawed at his soul for an eternity. Now, there was only emptiness and stagnation, after every sharp edge had been ground smooth. He was like a stubborn rock crushed countless times by a boulder—twisted in form, shattered inside, but terrifyingly smooth on the surface.
The power of magic surged within his Soul Gem, vast and terrifying. It was the "fruit" accumulated over countless loops. His power had grown. But his soul had become more like a walking corpse than ever before. He felt an imperceptible lag in his body. It was as if he were controlling a distant puppet, not his own flesh and blood.
If anyone could look deep into his eyes, they would see an almost solidified weariness and void.
How many times has it been? Ten? Twenty? Fifty? Or has it already passed a hundred? He had stopped counting. Counting had lost its meaning. The only reality was that he was still in the loop. He was still struggling. Still in this currently inescapable prison.
A sense of powerlessness bound him tight. He just lay there quietly, letting his thoughts drift aimlessly like broken threads.
Until a faint but incredibly familiar sensation flickered like a candle in the dark. That sensation carried a faint warmth, a connection rooted deep in his blood.
Mikasa.
He didn't get up immediately. When he finally stood from under the tree and stepped into the seemingly peaceful daily life of Paradis, his eyes still held a detached indifference. The training orders, his comrades' chatter, the island's rumors—everything seemed distant and irrelevant. Just boring background noise repeating in the loop.
Eren's eyes remained empty and numb, as if a switch had been flipped. The extreme contrast between his power and his numbness planted a bone-deep unease in Armin and the others. The boy who was once hot-blooded and impulsive seemed to be pushed step by step into an inhuman abyss by some terrible power and experience.
This prelude to losing control buried deep worry in his comrades' hearts. They couldn't understand what Eren was going through, but their intuition told them things were heading in an extremely dangerous direction.
He wandered alone. Away from the noise of the crowd, along the edge of the island. The sound of the waves was monotonous, like endless friction. He wanted to find a moment of peace, or perhaps just escape those overly familiar yet frighteningly smiling faces.
Back within the inner Wall. In the distance, the sound of childish singing drifted over. A few Paradis children were playing in an open lot, dancing simple steps and singing an old nursery rhyme. The lyrics cut into Eren's numb heart like a sharp key.
"Oh, the high Walls, a shelter given by God—"
"Inside is Paradise, humanity's last Paradise—"
"Outside is ruin, devils have devoured the world—"
"We are the chosen, the only humans left—"
Once, King Fritz's lies. But these lies were still occasionally sung by children. The song tore open the shell of his numbness.
The floodgates of memory burst open. The cruel images of countless loops, the deaths of his comrades, the malice of the world, his own failures—like a raging flood, they crashed against his already broken mental dam.
Deeper, older memories surfaced. From a childhood not yet crushed by the truth of the outside world. Three small figures sitting by the river. Spread open in their hands was a forbidden book.
Armin's eyes shone as he pointed to distant names on a map.
"Look! Flaming water!"
"And lands of ice!"
"Fields of snow and sand!!"
That was the most primal, pure desire for freedom. An innocent yearning for the world outside the Walls, for the unknown.
Mikasa sat beside them, listening quietly, her eyes gentle and steadfast.
Eren clenched his fists, a fire burning in his heart to break out of the Walls. "I'm going! I have to see the world outside!"
The childhood dream of "freedom," clashing violently and painfully with the children's lie of a "safe but closed Paradise," and the cruelty, deception, and betrayal of the outside world he had witnessed in countless loops.
That isn't freedom. That isn't Paradise. That is a massive, endless malice. All resistance, all sacrifice, ultimately leads only to more pain and the death of my comrades. Again and again. Every single time.
After the painful collision, a "clarity" colder than ice sprouted in Eren's heart.
No. This wasn't true "clarity." This was a monster twisted from despair, exhaustion, and paranoia. It wore the cloak of "truth" and whispered in his heart.
The lie of the 145th King Fritz. If the outside world is forever full of malice, if it is a destined abyss that will swallow Paradis and everyone I cherish, then is there only one way to bring true 'eternal peace'?
Completely eliminate the outside world.
Turn King Fritz's lie into a bloody "truth" created by his own hands. Make Paradis a truly isolated "only Paradise." A world without any external threats, without any "devils."
His thoughts slid toward the extreme once again. This wasn't for freedom, nor for revenge. It was a paranoia born of despair and powerlessness. If the malice outside the Walls couldn't be changed, then eradicate the soil in which that malice grew.
But how many more loops will it take… before I gain the power to destroy the entire outside world alone, before Kyubey descends?
He didn't know.
But he seemed to have found a direction again.