The Titan Queen - Levi X Reader

Chapter 26 - The Ministers

A week did many things to change a person.

A week ago, you wouldn't have thought it was possible to experience anger such as this, to this extent. It was everything – it was your hands itching to punch the man on the floor again, it was your breaths coming sharp and short.

"I want to abolish the murder game at Assassination Academy," you finished, turning stiffly on your heel to resume shuffling the papers on the table in front of you, your back straight. The people sat around the table were grave, faces carved into stone – so much so that you were almost shocked into silence every time their eyes shifted to look around, or their lips parted the tiniest amount to breathe.

"That's all, then – we'll have a fifteen-minute break until we join to discuss the changes proposed by – by Miss L/N."

The people here were vastly different from Assassination Academy.

At school, you were something along the lines of a celebrity, a princess crowned by the faith and love of her peers. At school, you were undeniable, a force of nature, a blackout, a thunderstorm with a heartbeat.

In the room that was a council meeting, however, you were the enemy.

You could feel it even as you stood to leave it – the hatred. How the older people in this room detested your existence, how they loathed the fact that you had earned the right to be in the same room as them, how they hated the way that you listened and spoke to them as if they were equals.

Erwin held the door open for you and inclined his head in the direction of his office – and both of you were wise enough to stay silent until you'd reached the small room.

"Are they always like that?" You groused, slumping onto Erwin's desk. Erwin huffed an echo of a laugh as Hanji and Levi followed you both in, bickering about something nonsensical.

"Old, stuffy, jealous of youth? Yes. I've never known them as anything different."

"Figures," Hanji said, throwing open a window to abolish some of the heat that stifled the room. "Your first council meeting, and they're intent on ruining it."

"The journey back here was hard enough," you agreed.

Erwin raised an eyebrow, to which Levi punched his arm – and you dutifully pretended not to see, flicking your eyes deliberately over to Hanji to watch her moan about the temperature. Levi and you had travelled back to the city together – back on your respective horses, both human and beast much happier about the arrangement.

"When were you going to tell me about the changes you proposed back there?" Erwin asked, eyes closing. You watched him carefully – if the man didn't need to watch your face, there must have been something that he'd already figured out, that he'd already decided that he knew. "You want to get rid of the midnight game?"

"Of course; it's barbaric. And now that I know how the murderers are chosen every week and what happens to them if they're caught, I'm moral enough to stop it."

Levi watched the exchange with the perfect expression of boredom – he may well have been watching a sporting match. "Y/N L/N preaching about morality – there's nothing that can surprise me now."

"Don't count your chickens before they hatch," Erwin said, eyes still closed. Your heartbeat increased on a whim, picking up on the nearing danger that your other senses hadn't fully recognised yet. You stood firm – you weren't going to let anyone scare you. Not anymore. "The King says we cannot control you," Erwin said, his fingers clasped together and his chin resting lightly on top of the arrangement. "You may now have a seat on the council from being the Ruler, but you're still..."