𝔇𝔢𝔣𝔦𝔞𝔫𝔠𝔢 (𝔏𝔢𝔳𝔦 𝔵 ℜ𝔢𝔞𝔡𝔢𝔯)

LXXV - A Living Myth

"Come on, it's a good thing the moon is out tonight."

***

~Trost, The Next Morning~

Majority of the squad roamed the streets of the district mid morning, having rested the best we could after we barely fled the grasp of whoever dared pursue us. We had left Eren and Historia at a the rendezvous point, a small room tucked away in a building near the edge of town where we had met with Hange to figure out the next plan of attack. The rest of us; except for Jean, had all agreed that we disguise Armin and Jean as Eren and Historia as some sort of bait for our current opponents.

The streets of Trost were filthy, debris and building deformities still visible to everyone and everything, the odd dog with ribs showing through the skin and scruffy fur cross the street and disappear down an alleyway not too far. The sight of such creature made me wonder what Sarj was doing, or better yet who he was with, a frown occupying my face as I realise most other people spend more time with my own dog than I do myself. Market stalls set up on either side of the street managed by merchants who saw us coming, walking around towards us and immediately slandering Levi because of his appearance.

"Hey, aren't you Levi?" One merchant said, the raven soon looking at the man with an expression of such disinterest but such attentiveness at the same time.

"Hm?" He only hummed in response from beside me, the very few merchants in front of us somehow multiplied and the squad soon found themselves surrounded by a bunch of angry old men.

"It is! I've seen him before too, he's humanities strongest soldier!" Another man exclaimed as his eyes stuck to the raven. I furrowed my eyebrows on behalf of him, his stiffened figure standing still as he just stood there and waited for it to end.

"Hey, he's small." Another said.

"Ha! I've only ever seen him on a horse." Snorted another man. I clicked my tongue, quietly enough that only Levi heard it. I wanted to say something, but I knew that if he wanted to, the raven would've done so himself.

"You're in the way." He spoke up, looking dead ahead at nothing in particular, staring straight through whoever was in front of him.

"Come on, Captain! Just hear us out. We humble folk just want a word with you." One guy said as he tried to reason with Levi, who looked like he wasn't interested in whatever was going to come out of his mouth, but he listened nonetheless.

"We lost out on a lot of work because of that evacuation plan you soldiers made all that noise about." A different man said. "It's not just us, people don't come to towns by the wall like this one anymore because of all the uncertainty. Our incomes gone, and we can't eat."

"The Garrison ran off somewhere, and crowds of thieves came in to take their place. But taxes are as high as ever, what are we supposed to do? Why'd things turn out like this? Why do titans keep attacking? I think I know why." Another merchant said, his face distorting into one of hate and quiet anger. "It's because you in the Survey Corps aren't working hard enough. I've always blamed myself if I don't make any money in my business. I work and get nothing in return, but it's not like that for you people, is it? You laze around, get nothing done and yet you still get to eat." He leaned down, reducing the distance between he and the raven haired captain, who still looked like he could give two shits about this random guys financial situation.

"Right? What're you doing strolling through town like this? Going shopping?" Some other guy said, and at this rate I was going to knock every single persons heads together if they continued like this for much longer. I could feel my teeth clench at the thought of these people, seriously blaming the Scouts for their supposed financial crisis when all we did was help save their district.