The World that the Girl Saw

"F...Fight! Fight, dammit! If you don't fight...we're gonna die.... If you win, we live.... If you don't fight, we can't win...."

- Eren urges Mikasa to fight

The World that the Girl Saw (少女が見た世界) is the 2nd chapter of the 2nd volume and the 6th chapter overall of the Attack on Titan manga, written and illustrated by Hajime Isayama.

Overview
Eren and Grisha Yeager find Mikasa's parents dead. Grisha instructs Eren to wait downstairs while he calls for the police. Meanwhile, Mikasa slowly gains consciousness in her kidnappers' hideout but is tied up.

A few hours before, three men locate Mikasa's home and kill both her parents right in front of her eyes. She is then knocked unconscious and kidnapped. Suddenly, the kidnappers in their hideout hear a knock on the door and Eren comes in, acting lost. One of the kidnappers approaches him but Eren slits his throat with a dagger. Eren also kills the second kidnapper as he attempted to attack him. He then frees Mikasa from her binds but the third kidnapper appears and lifts Eren up as he strangles him. Eren frantically yells at Mikasa to fight otherwise the both of them will die. Mikasa comes to a realization that the world has always been cruel and that she has to fight. She immediately stops shaking and stabs the man squarely in the heart, saving Eren.

The police arrive hours after the scene along with Grisha, who hugs Eren and scolds him for his recklessness. Mikasa asks Grisha where she can make it back home, although she has nowhere to go. As a token of acceptance, Eren gives Mikasa his scarf and Grisha adopts her into their family.

In the present, Mikasa thinks about Eren.

Summary
Finding the dead bodies of Mikasa's parents, Dr. Yeager instructs Eren to wait for him downstairs as he calls the police.

In an unknown location, Mikasa is shown tied up and laid out on the floor. Turning her over to get a good look at her face, her kidnappers discuss the prospect of selling her in an underground market. Taking note of her Asian ethnicity, they imagine the price they could receive. Recalling the events, they remember Mikasa is not a pureblood because only her mother was Asian. One of the assailants reprimands the other for killing the mother, saying they could have gotten a higher price for her because she was the last pure-blooded Asian. The other defends himself by replying that he had no choice because she was resisting and he had to kill her.

The missing chain of events that occurred before Eren and Dr. Yeager's arrival are then revealed. Expecting the doctor, Mikasa's father opens the door when they hear someone knocking. Opening the door, one of the two men stabs him in the abdomen. Immediately grabbing the closest available weapon, Mikasa's mother lunges at the two men and tells Mikasa to escape. Too frightened to move, she watches as her mother is struck with a hatchet and drops to her knees. With the parents dead, the men close in on Mikasa and threaten her not to give them any trouble. She wonders to herself where she could have gone if she had fled when her mother told her to.

Meanwhile, Eren opens the door of the kidnappers' hideout. Surprised, they ask what he is doing here. He explains that he was walking in the woods and got lost. One of the men squats down and appears to be attempting to console him. Before the man can finish his offer to escort him out, Eren slits his throat with the knife he would be concealing. Mikasa stares in disbelief, wondering if this is reality. With one of the men now dead, the other rushes toward Eren who is now behind the door he just entered from. As the man opens the door, Eren reveals a makeshift spear he has created from a broom handle and a knife. Charging towards the man, he thrusts the spear into the upper right side of his chest, laying him flat on the floor but still alive. In a rage, Eren jumps on top of the man and using the knife from earlier, stabs him repeatedly, yelling that he had it coming.

With the second man bleeding out underneath of him, Eren now gains his composure. Wiping his face, he walks over to Mikasa cutting her ropes and trying to comfort her. He introduces himself and explains that he came with his father for the examination. Interrupting him, Mikasa reveals that there was a third man who then appears in the doorway. Shocked and angry at the sight of his friends, he attacks Eren, kicking him in the ribs and pinning him against the Wall by his throat. Struggling to get the words out, he tells Mikasa to fight, otherwise, they will die. Mikasa grabs the nearby knife, but can not bring herself to take a life. However, seeing Eren gasping for air triggers a flood of memories that lead her to realize that the world is a cruel and callous place. With this, she stops shaking and calms herself, gaining perfect self-control. Now knowing what she needs to do, she rushes toward the man with such force that she twists and breaks the floorboard beneath her feet, piercing his heart from his back.

With the police now at the scene, they are astonished at what the children were able to do. Eren's father, however, is less than pleased. Hugging and chastising him, he asks him if he realizes what he is done, to which Eren replies that he "stopped dangerous beasts" who "only happened to resemble humans." He tells Eren that he was lucky; the police might not have made it in time. When Dr. Yeager tells him that he threw his life away so easily, Eren tells him that he only wanted to save her as quickly as possible. Still traumatized, Mikasa tells Dr. Yeager that she needs to go home, asking for directions. Feeling the gravity of the situation, Mikasa says that she is cold and that she has nowhere to go since she is now homeless. Eren responds by wrapping his scarf around her neck with Dr. Yeager extending an offer for her to come live with them.

Back in the present, Mikasa is shown dispatching Titans with relative ease and wondering when the withdrawal signal will sound. No sooner had the thought crossed her mind, the bell rings. As her teammates prepare to climb the Wall, Mikasa heads to the front, thinking of Eren.

5. Wall-mounted Artillery
''Shell: The goal is to kill the Titans with these. If the Titans' weak point can be hit, it's possible to bring them down with one shot. However, when firing at a moving target with an unrifled cannon, accuracy is low, so aiming and hitting the creatures at a precise spot is very difficult. The outcome is usually unsuccessful.''

''Grapeshot: Soldiers mainly use this for artillery support before it comes to close quarters combat. It's not very effective at killing the Titans, but it does slow them down to an extent.''

''The rail cannon must be secured firmly when firing or else the whole battery itself will be blown backwards. Once the target is locked on, the battery is secured to the rail. These necessary actions diminish the speed of firing.''

''Before the era of vertical maneuvering equipment, cannons were the main anti-Titan weapon, but they lacked mobility and were extremely difficult to use in a ground war. On the other hand, the Wall's defense had been improved through the installation of mounted cannons.''

''The difference between these and traditional mobile cannons is that the mounted model has the ability to fire vertically downward. Their structure also mitigates recoil.''

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