The setting sun dyed the fields gold.
Smoke rose from the chimney of the Andres home. Inside, Luna set a pot of stew on the wooden table. The potatoes and cabbage had been cooked until soft, and it was a little too salty, but Sander and Aeternus ate heartily without complaint.
"That pheasant Busch brought over today was nice and fat." Sander chewed a large mouthful of black bread, smacking his lips in satisfaction as his rough palm ruffled Aeternus’s messy black hair. "Eat up, boy. You need to build up your strength in autumn if you want to make it through winter."
Aeternus looked up and gave the shy smile of an eleven-year-old boy.
Yet his eyes carried a weight far beyond his age.
Annie’s words—"The final strategic simulations and infiltration tactics training have begun"—hung over his heart like storm clouds that would never disperse. He knew that some calamity was counting down toward its arrival. And there was too little, far too little, that he could prepare.
In the dead of night, that helplessness became concrete action.
When his parents’ snores settled into an even rhythm, Aeternus opened his eyes.
Lying flat on his hard plank bed, he held his breath and focused, extending his consciousness like a feeler toward that dimension. Entering the [Accelerated World] no longer required Historia’s touch or a violent emotional fluctuation. Through day after day of secret practice, his connection to [Paths] had become clearer and more obedient.
Bzzzz—
His soul trembled.
The dim ceiling and the chirping insects outside the window faded away like ripples on water. Beneath his feet spread boundless, frigid white sand, while above him hung a sky of eternally frozen twilight. Time was stretched here—an instant in reality became a period of focused refinement.
He no longer merely observed.
Within his consciousness, he repeatedly broke down and simulated every movement Annie had once demonstrated. The angle of a kick, the force exerted in a grapple, shifts in his center of gravity, the movement of his feet... every detail was dismantled, reconstructed, and tempered thousands of times within his accelerated thoughts.
He created crisis scenarios: being surrounded by enemies several times his number from every direction, weaving through rugged mountain forests to evade them. In this realm of accelerated thought, he repeatedly worked through possible responses, assessed their advantages and flaws, and sought the optimal solution.
Such deep connection and high-intensity simulations came at an immense cost.
Whenever he withdrew, the familiar needle-like swelling pain in his temples arrived right on schedule. His brain felt as though it had endured an overloaded calculation, and his mind was drained to the point of exhaustion. All he wanted was to fall into a heavy sleep.
But he could feel it—that "membrane" preventing him from entering more deeply and remaining longer was gradually thinning beneath this near-self-destructive training. Some form of resilience was quietly growing as well.
He began attempting even more dangerous exercises: while maintaining his connection to the [Accelerated World], he split off a tiny thread of thought to sense his body lying in the real world—the rhythm of his breathing, the beat of his heart, the faint tingling in his fingers.
Within the gap between the two dimensions, he tried to find a more stable, subtler point of balance.
It was extraordinarily difficult.
Several times, the violent sensation of his consciousness being torn apart nearly made him faint on the spot, and the connection almost broke off completely.
He gritted his teeth and did not give up.
Every secret, painful effort was for a single purpose: when the coming storm swept over everything, he would seize a little more initiative and a little more chance at survival—for himself, and for those he cared about.
At dawn, he woke with exhaustion impossible to conceal, pale shadows beneath his eyes.
But before his parents, he remained the sensible farm boy gradually growing up, hiding his worries deep within himself.
"Dad," Aeternus said at breakfast in a childlike, worried voice. He scooped up a spoonful of stew but did not eat it. "Yesterday, Uncle Busch said the animals in the mountains have been acting restless... like something’s wrong. Wild boars keep running into places they normally avoid, and the flocks of birds are flying all over the place. Do you think... something major could happen? Like a huge earthquake, or a terrible rainstorm?"
He could not mention the world beyond the Walls. He could not mention Titans or the plan to breach the Wall. He could only cautiously guide them through ominous signs in nature, planting a seed of vigilance.
Luna smiled gently and stroked his head. "Silly child, autumn is here. The animals are just busy preparing for winter. Don’t worry."
Sander set down his bread and rubbed his rough chin, wearing the thoughtful expression distinctive to a farmer. "Busch really said that? He spends all year running through those mountains, so his instincts are sharper than ours... Sometimes the mountains do give you signs of what’s coming."
Aeternus’s heart lifted slightly, and he immediately pressed his advantage, pleading in his voice. "Then... should our family store more food as well? There’s still room in the cellar. And could we get a sharp knife like Uncle Busch’s, too? An old one is fine, as long as it works. In case... something unexpected really happens, having a weapon in hand would keep us from panicking, and we could defend ourselves."
Sander stared blankly at his son’s little face, so full of worry. Then he burst out laughing and gave his shoulder a firm pat.
"All right! Good boy—you’re already thinking about the family. You’ve grown up! We should stock more food anyway. We’ll need it for winter, and it never hurts to be prepared. And the knife is easy enough! I’ll ask Busch later, see whether he has a spare, or trade for one!"
The first step had succeeded.
Aeternus felt slightly relieved. At the very least, the most basic supplies and some small means of self-defense had been secured.
He gathered his courage, swallowed, and made a bolder suggestion.
"Dad... I’ve also heard people in the village say that the royal capital near Wall Sina is especially safe, and its walls are the tallest and thickest... Could we... find a way to move there? Even somewhere closer to it would be fine."
As expected, this touched upon a deeply rooted belief.
Sander immediately shook his head. His tone was decisive, even carrying a trace of displeasure.
"What nonsense are you talking about? Our land is here, and our roots are here! Our family has lived within Wall Rose for generations. With the goddess’s protection, where could possibly be unsafe? The royal capital is where important people belong, not something for us to think about. Don’t say such things again! A hundred years of peace inside the Walls is the best proof there is!"
Aeternus fell silent and lowered his head, quietly eating the stew that had gone cold.
A century of peace within the Walls had long since rendered the three walls sacred, binding most people’s minds tightly within this designated land. Comfort had blunted their vigilance, and legends had replaced crisis.
He could not convince them.
He could not drag them out of this gentle cage and point out the distant beacon fires.
Knowing the iron hooves of disaster were drawing closer step by step, yet being unable to lead the people he loved away from danger—this sense of powerlessness weighed a hundred times heavier than any fatigue after training.
At the pasture during the day, while driving the cattle, he also seized those brief intervals when no one was paying attention to use the [Accelerated World] to train his instantaneous reactions and powers of observation in reality.
He would abruptly enter that state in which all things slowed.
In a fraction of a second, he observed the cattle’s slightest movements, the rises and dips of the ground underfoot, and the angle at which blades of grass leaned in the wind, predicting their routes for the next moment or possible accidents.
Or, in the instant he tripped over a clod of earth and lost his balance, he would swiftly adjust his center of gravity and footing within that elongated instant of perception, turning danger aside.
This extreme application in reality was brief, but it demanded tremendous mental concentration and imposed a severe burden. Often, after one successful attempt, he had to lean against a haystack and rest for a long while before recovering.
Still, he persisted.
He turned this familiar pasture into a secret training ground as well.
Historia keenly noticed the exhaustion that often showed through him, an exhaustion beyond ordinary physical labor. It was not the soreness after farmwork, but a depletion of the mind that came from deep within.
"Aeternus," she called softly one afternoon. As Aeternus rested against an old oak tree with his eyes closed, she gently sat beside him, her azure eyes brimming with pure concern. "Lately... you seem very tired. Even more tired than when you used to chase away those bad children for me."
Aeternus opened his eyes. Looking into those clear eyes that reflected his own image, he felt a sharp stab in his heart.
The crushing secret left him unable to breathe. He desperately needed an outlet, even if he could only ask for an answer in the most indirect and obscure manner.
"Historia," he said after hesitating. His gaze turned to the rolling sea of grass in the distance, and in a low voice only the two of them could hear, he asked:
"If... I mean, if there were a friend who was very, very important to you. She might... be far away, doing something dangerous, something she has no choice but to do. She wants to protect you, or achieve some goal that must be accomplished, but... during that process, she may hurt many other innocent people... What would you do? Would you still... stand by her side? Would you think she was a bad person?"
Historia froze.
She blinked her long lashes, trying hard to understand those complicated words. She remembered the causeless malice of the children who threw stones at her and called her a "bastard." She remembered the eternally cold look in her grandmother Krista’s eyes whenever she looked at her, as though she were looking at something filthy.
What did innocent mean?
Those who hurt her had never believed themselves to be wrong.
She lowered her head and looked at her mud-stained fingers. Then, in a voice as faint as a mosquito’s hum yet astonishingly clear and resolute, she said:
"I... I don’t know whether other people really are innocent... But I know that Aeternus is the only one who stands in front of me, who smiles at me, who holds my hand and takes me to see the stream. If that friend... is protecting you the way Aeternus protects me... then I don’t think she is a bad person."
She suddenly looked up. A nearly obsessive, burning fire blazed in her eyes, driving away her usual timidity.
"If everyone in the world says she is wrong, if they all want to hurt her... then, then I would stand with Aeternus against the whole world! Because... because I was never a good child to begin with. Grandmother and the others all say so. As long as it is to protect a friend who is kind to me, I... I would do anything!"
That unhesitating declaration, so much like an oath, shook Aeternus deeply.
He looked at Historia’s little face, faintly flushed with emotion, and a scorching warmth surged through his chest. He reached out and tightly clasped her small hands, always a little cold, as if he wanted to pass his own warmth and resolve on to her.
That heavy, pure trust, together with the life-or-death promise made beneath Annie’s ice-blue eyes, became a stronger force that flowed into every part of him.
He looked toward the storage shed—where the old hunting knife his father traded for would be kept.
He looked toward the cellar—where their stores of food were steadily growing.
Within his mind, he sensed the subtle growth in his control over that sea of white sand, born from relentless training that pushed him to his limits, and his delicate grasp of the fleeting moment to enter the [Accelerated World].
Supplies prepared in plain sight; abilities honed in secret.
The protection of family; the oath of a friend.
Perhaps all of it was still nowhere near enough to face the storm that would overturn the entire world inside the Walls.
But it was the only path he could see, the only one he could walk.
He had no other choice.
Before the storm truly descended and tore apart every ordinary happiness, he had to become faster, stronger, sharper.
Faster than the Titans’ footsteps.
Stronger than the crushing weight of fate.
Sharp enough to seize every chance to escape death.
The autumn wind swept across the pasture, carrying a chill—and with it, the invisible yet encroaching presence of something distant that would change everything.
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