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The memory continued, dragging viewers deeper into the nightmare that forged the Founding Titan.
Of the twenty-some children gathered by that riverside, only two escaped the massacre.
Eren and Ada plunged into the dark water, the gunfire above them creating deadly ripples. They swam desperately, lungs burning, until the current separated them—Ada swept downstream, Eren forced to surface alone in a different section of the river.
He called for her. Screamed her name until his throat was raw.
But the soldiers were already tracking along the riverbank, their rifles raised, and Eren had no choice but to run into the forest and hope—pray—that Ada had escaped too.
The boy fled into the wilderness surrounding Flevance with nothing but the clothes on his back and a heart full of rage.
Behind him, the White Town burned black.
The beautiful buildings that had sparkled like silver in sunlight were now charred ruins. The streets where children had played were corpse-filled killing grounds. Everything the people of Flevance had built—everything they'd been—was being systematically erased.
You rise by this, and you must fall by this.
The amber lead that had brought Flevance prosperity had been their doom from the start. The poison had been in the ground for a hundred years, accumulating in generation after generation until the debt came due all at once.
And the world had decided the price was genocide.
[Day One: Hunted]
Eren spent the first two days hiding in the dense woods northeast of the city, moving only when necessary, always listening for the sounds of patrols.
The soldiers came in rotating shifts. They used lies and false promises to flush out survivors—offering food, medical treatment, safe passage. Some people were desperate enough to believe them.
Eren watched from the underbrush as a soldier called out to a family hiding in a hollow: "Come out! The quarantine has been lifted! It's safe now!"
The father emerged first, hands raised in surrender. "Thank God. My wife is sick, she needs—"
BANG.
The father collapsed. The wife screamed. Two more shots silenced her. The children didn't even have time to run.
After witnessing it twice, Eren learned his lesson: Trust no one. Believe nothing. Survive.
[Day Two: Starvation]
By the second day, hunger had become a physical presence—a gnawing emptiness that made his limbs tremble and his vision swim. Eren didn't have much fat on his body to begin with. Street orphans rarely did. But two days without food had left him gaunt and weak.
He didn't dare search for food during daylight. The soldiers swept the forest in coordinated patterns when the sun was up, their protective suits making them look like monsters from a nightmare.
Night was safer. The darkness was his ally, his protective cloak against the executioners.
Under the pale light of a waning moon, Eren crept through the underbrush on his third night, desperately seeking anything edible. Berries. Roots. Bird eggs. Insects if he had to.
But he found nothing.
No berries. No nests. No mushrooms. Just leaves and bark and emptiness.
In desperation, he tried chewing bark from a tree. It was like putting splinters in his mouth—rough, dry, painful. He spat it out immediately, gagging.
"I can't... I'm going to die here..." Eren's legs wobbled as he walked, his thin body swaying with each step. His stomach had gone from growling to silent—a bad sign. The pain of hunger had given way to numbness.
This is how I end? Starving in the woods like an animal?
The injustice of it burned in his chest alongside the hunger. He'd survived the massacre. Survived the soldiers. Survived two days of pursuit. And for what? To die alone in the dark from simple starvation?
I can't accept this. I don't want to. If I ever get the chance—if I ever get power—I'll make this world pay. I'll make everyone feel the pain I'm feeling now.
The hatred sustained him when his body had nothing else to run on.
He stumbled forward, one foot in front of the other, no destination in mind. Just movement. Just—
THUD.
Eren tripped over something and crashed to the forest floor, too weak to catch himself properly. Pain flared in his palms and knees.
What the hell—?
He looked back to see what had tripped him.
A fruit.
A massive fruit the size of a child's head, half-buried in the dirt and dead leaves. Its skin was bright red with strange swirling patterns etched across the surface—patterns that seemed to shift and writhe in the moonlight.
Eren stared at it, brain sluggish from hunger.
That color... isn't that usually a sign of poison?
His rational mind—the part still capable of thinking—warned him against eating unknown fruits. But his starving body didn't care about rationality. It cared about survival.
Dying from poison is faster than dying from starvation, Eren reasoned. At least it'll be over quick.
He grabbed the fruit with both hands and tore into it without hesitation.
The first bite made him gag.
Oh God, it's disgusting.
The taste defied description—like rotted meat mixed with sewage and chemicals, with a texture like chewing spoiled rubber. Every instinct screamed at him to spit it out, that he was poisoning himself, that this was worse than starvation—
But Eren forced himself to keep chewing. Keep swallowing. Because stopping meant dying, and he refused to die. Not like this. Not when he still had revenge to claim.
He ate mechanically, tears streaming down his face from the horrible taste, gagging with every swallow. The fruit's flesh was dense and wet, filling his shrunken stomach with each agonizing bite.
Ten minutes later, Eren leaned back against a tree trunk and let out a wet burp.
His stomach was full for the first time in three days. The fruit tasted like death itself, but it had water content and substance. He wouldn't need to search for food for at least another two days.
Maybe I can actually survive this.
The thought brought a grim smile to his face. God had closed every door, but apparently left one window cracked open—
Footsteps.
Eren's eyes snapped open, the food-induced drowsiness evaporating in an instant.
No. No no no—
Through the trees, he could see flashlight beams sweeping through the darkness. Soldiers. A nighttime patrol. And they were heading straight toward his position.
After I finally ate! After I finally have a chance!
Eren didn't have time to run. His full stomach made him sluggish, and the soldiers were too close. He could only curl up in the shadow of the tree, press one hand over his mouth to muffle his breathing, and pray they'd pass by like they had the previous two nights.
Two soldiers walked past his hiding spot first, their flashlights sweeping over the ground just feet from where Eren crouched. They didn't notice him.
Please. Please just keep walking. Please—
"Hold."
A third voice, calm and authoritative.
Eren's blood turned to ice. He recognized that voice. The soldier leader—the man who'd given the order to massacre the children at the riverside.
"Sure enough. There's someone here." The soldier leader's tone was almost casual, like he was commenting on the weather. "From the sound of the heartbeat... it's a child."
He has Observation Haki, Eren realized with growing horror. He can hear my heartbeat. I can't hide from—
BANG.
The bullet punched through Eren's torso before the thought finished forming.
Pain exploded across his chest—white-hot agony that drove the air from his lungs in a soundless scream. Blood filled his mouth, hot and metallic. His vision blurred.
I'm going to die.
But even as his body slumped against the tree, even as darkness crept in at the edges of his vision, the hatred in his heart burned brighter than ever. This world—this cruel, unjust world—would pay. He swore it. If there was an afterlife, if there was reincarnation, if there was anything beyond death, he would find a way to make them all suffer—
"Looks like we got another one." One of the soldiers grabbed Eren's arm and dragged him out of the shadows into the moonlight. "Kid's still breathing. Tough little bastard."
"Survivors of Flevance cannot be tolerated." The soldier leader approached, drawing his sidearm with practiced ease. "Even the children. Especially the children—they carry the most concentrated poison in their blood."
The cold barrel of the gun pressed against Eren's forehead.
This is it. This is the end.
But then—
Something changed.
Golden lightning erupted from Eren's wound. Not metaphorical. Not imagined. Actual arcs of golden electricity that crackled across his skin like living things. His body temperature spiked—steam began pouring from his flesh in great billowing clouds.
"What the—?!" The soldier stumbled backward.
Eren's body convulsed. His bones cracked—not breaking but extending, growing at impossible speed. His muscles swelled and tore and reformed larger. His skin stretched and split, revealing layers of raw tissue that immediately regenerated.
The transformation took less than ten seconds.
When the steam cleared, a five-meter-tall giant stood where the dying boy had been.
The Pure Titan that wore Eren's face had no expression. No intelligence in its eyes. Just mindless hunger and the base instinct to consume.
"Ah... what kind of monster is this?!"
The Pure Titan's massive hand shot out faster than the soldier could react, grabbing him by the torso. The soldier had time for one cut-off scream before the Titan opened its mouth and bit down.
CRUNCH.
The head disappeared. Blood sprayed across the Titan's face and chest. The headless corpse twitched once before being discarded like garbage.
The second soldier raised his rifle with shaking hands and fired. The bullets punched holes in the Titan's flesh—holes that immediately began steaming and regenerating.
The Pure Titan grabbed the soldier with both hands and shoved him into its mouth whole, chewing methodically. Bones crunched. Cloth tore. The screaming stopped.
"Devil Fruit ability..." The soldier leader's voice was steady despite the horror before him. He holstered his gun and drew the sword at his waist. Armament Haki spread across the blade in a black coating. "What a waste. This power could've sold for millions of Berries at auction. Instead it goes to a Flevance brat."
The Pure Titan finished its meal and turned toward the remaining soldier. Fresh meat. Still moving. Still warm.
It lunged.
But the soldier leader was no ordinary fighter. His Observation Haki tracked the Titan's movements before they happened. He sidestepped the grasping hands with elegant precision, then leaped ten feet into the air and brought his sword down in a perfect arc.
The blade, enhanced by Haki, cut through the Pure Titan's neck like it was paper.
The five-meter head toppled from the body and hit the ground with a wet thud. The headless corpse swayed once, then collapsed.
"A Devil Fruit that turns humans into giants." The soldier leader sheathed his blade, disappointed. "Mindless ones at that. Garbage-tier power. Not even worth the effort of retrieval."
He turned his back on the corpse, already thinking about his report—
Behind him, a finger twitched.
The Pure Titan's hand clenched. Opened. Clenched again.
Steam erupted from the neck stump—more steam than before, hotter than before. And within that steam, something was growing.
The soldier leader sensed the movement through Observation Haki and spun around just in time to see—
The headless Titan standing upright, a new head growing from the severed neck at visible speed. Flesh formed. Bones hardened. Features resolved. Within sixty seconds, the Titan was whole again, its regeneration complete.
And its hand was already in motion.
The soldier leader tried to channel his Haki, tried to reinforce his body for the impact—
And found he couldn't.
What? My Haki—it's not responding! The circulation is blocked!
The Titan's grip tightened around his torso, lifting him off the ground. The pressure was immense—ribs creaking, organs compressing. He thrashed and struggled, but human strength meant nothing against a five-meter Titan.
The Devil Fruit power, he realized with dawning horror. It's suppressing Haki inside its grasp. I can't—
The Pure Titan brought him toward its mouth.
"No. No no no—DON'T—!"
The Sky Screen provided a close-up view—crystal clear despite the darkness, ensuring every viewer saw what happened next.
The Titan's jaws closed around the soldier leader's upper body. Teeth like gravestones punched through armor and flesh. Blood erupted from the wound in a crimson fountain, spraying across the Titan's face and chest.
The lower half of the soldier leader's body fell to the ground, legs still twitching.
The Pure Titan chewed once. Twice. Then swallowed.
Under the pale moonlight, the five-meter giant stood bathed in blood—a creature of pure instinct and hunger, born from trauma and injustice and the desperate will to survive.
Steam rose from its body in ethereal wisps. The blood covering its skin seemed to glow in the moon's light. There was something almost divine in the image—a dark angel of vengeance emerging from the ashes of genocide.
This was Eren Yeager's first transformation.
His first kill as a Titan.
The beginning of the monster who would one day unleash the Rumbling upon the world.