Flugel der freiheit im literatur {Bsd x Aot x Orv}

Tränen

[This entire chapter is just some characters having mental breakdowns lmao.]

Rubi looked, but her gaze seemed to be stuck at the desolate bodies that she had seen in the battlefield. Among them, were three familiar ones.

Annie, Bertholdt and Nikolai.

Nikolai wouldn't have died, but he died protecting the other two, who weren't saved as well.

Yosano wasn't here to heal them instantly this time.

All these deaths.

Rubi stared. She stared.

"What am I going to say to Fyodor?" Rubi mustered up the words forcefully. She felt like bitter bile would come out of her mouth instantly.

Ranpo, who had cleaned the blood he was covered in, not his own but of others, answered with a dead voice, "There is nothing to say."

Ranpo, when Rubi first came, was one of the brightest boys she had seen. Those eyes that looked like emeralds, always shone brightly with confidence.

But now, it was as if the shine had never existed in his gaze. It was dead. Gone.

"Where is Armin?" Rubi asked, her voice small.
"Unconscious." Ranpo answered with a robotic voice.

"Ranpo, Rubi-kun." Came in a tired looking Fukuzawa. His eyes were drooped.
"Tanizaki?" Ranpo managed to ask.
"........He is not in a good condition. Naomi is crying herself out from the past two hours."
"I can't blame her," Ranpo sighed, heavily, "since Tanizaki got injured protecting her."

Fukuzawa looked at the two guilt ridden people, after all, Annie and Bertholdt were sitting on the shoulders of the female and the war hammer titan respectively.

The titans were thousands in number. There was only so much they could handle without any abilities.

Nikolai died trying to shield them out, instantly teleporting in front of Bertholdt when he was about to get eaten directly by a jumping titan. Ranpo dodged it, but the impact of her speed sent the other lad flying in front, without a guard. And before Ranpo could catch him, bitten they were.

THEY were. Ranpo tried. He tried to retrive their bodies. Even then Bertholdt's lower half was gone, Nikolai's left arm and right leg were gone. Too much blood loss, led them to their death.

Rubi had looked at them for a slight second, in which Annie had been crushed by a bunch of flying rocks sent out by the suddenly reappearing colossal titan.

It was his mistake though. Hange managed to capture him with her omnidirectional maneuver gear. She had come out of nowhere, which made the outcome extremely unexpected.

Armin, in the end, was captured.

But at what cost?

She wanted to break something.

The red. It reminded her of her name. Rubi.

The red. It reminded her of her battlefield.

The red. In their bloody bodies. It reminded her of death.

Of her family, her friends.

The red. It reminded her of the blood in her hands. Of the people she had killed.

The red. It reminded her of sui-

"Rubi-nee!" Ranpo called for the fifth time.
"Huh?"

Ranpo looked at her with his dead eyes, but even then, the concern was visible. Rubi understood she had a very insane look on her face. Like she had gone insane.