"I never imagined the heat would come before the pain," Kael thought as he squeezed his eyes shut.
At first it's just hot air brushing against my skin, like when the sun beats down too hard in summer. Then the smell… wood, hay, oil. The fire is already here. I hear it crackling, advancing, breathing.
I'm lying on Gale's bed.
In his clothes.
In his place.
I don't have the strength to move.
My lungs wheezed every time I tried to breathe. Each breath was like swallowing hot glass. But I wasn't afraid. It's strange… I thought death would be dark, but it's full of light.
The flames dance on the walls, and as I watch them, I remember the first time I saw Gale.
I was shivering with cold in the market, coughing blood into a dirty rag. Everyone walked past. No one wants to look at a child who already looks dead.
He did.
He didn't ask my name first. He gave me bread.
Then water.
Then he sat beside me as if he didn't care that I stank of illness.
"You shouldn't be working," he told me, then said helplessly, "Children are supposed to study."
I didn't know what studying was.
Then he started talking to me about strange things. He said there was something called "science."
That not everything had to be solved with prayers or swords. That one day people could cure diseases, make food enough for everyone, build things that seemed impossible.
I laughed. I coughed blood and laughed.
But he didn't.
He told me he would change the world.
That children wouldn't have to break their backs on farms. That my brothers would go to school. That no one would die just for being poor.
When he spoke, his eyes weren't like those of adults. They weren't resigned.
They burned… like these flames, but without destroying.
Over time, he started helping me more.
He protected my brothers. Gave us money. Talked to the soldiers so they wouldn't beat us. He got me useless medicines, but at least he tried.
One night he told me, barely looking at me, "Kael… if one day I disappear, I need someone to take my place."
He didn't say "die."
He didn't say "burn."
He didn't say "substitute."
But I understood.
I'm poor, sick, and I've been dead for a long time already. I knew it when I started coughing blood every morning. My life wasn't going to last long.
But his would.
I saw something in Gale. Something big. Bigger than the walls, than the titans from the stories, than this small and cruel world.
So I decided.
If my life could become his path… then it was worth it.
When he asked for my help, I didn't hesitate.
Not because I want to die.
But because I want him to live.
I want him to fulfill everything he promised without ever promising it.
My brothers are safe.
They have jobs.
They have food.
They have a future.
That's thanks to Gale.
So as the fire draws closer to the bed, I feel no hatred.
I feel gratitude.
The roof begins to creak. Sparks fall like stars. My skin burns, but I close my eyes.
I think of my brothers laughing around the turkey. I think of Gale riding his horse.
I think of a world where children don't die coughing blood.
If anyone can do it… it's him.
I take one last breath.
"Gale…" Kael whispered, even though no one could hear him. "Change the world."
…
Gale managed to escape unharmed, without being pursued by the Military Police.
When they began counting the bodies, they found Kael's corpse in the bedroom. To them, Gale was already dead.
Without wasting time, he mounted his horse and plunged into the grasslands and forests, enduring a journey without incident throughout the entire night.
After two days and two nights of forced travel, the mountain paths became almost impossible to cross. Neither he nor his horse had rested during that time; it was all a desperate attempt to put distance between himself and the farm, and that troublesome place.
When he looked back, there was no familiar landscape left.
Exhausted, Gale decided to stop. He tied the horse to a fir tree, sat down cross-legged, chewed his dry rations, and unfolded the old map he carried with him.
…
Year 845.
Wall Maria had been breached, and the survivors were fleeing toward Wall Rose. The massive influx of refugees would cause a brutal shortage of resources and food, and the government would soon impose measures to maintain social stability.
Gale clearly remembered what would come next.
Nearly twenty percent of the population would be sent back toward the lost territory of Wall Maria under the pretext of "reclaiming it."
At first, they would try to cultivate barren land to ease the food crisis, sending mainly young people and children to pioneer zones.
But the plan would fail.
In the end, the government would use the so-called "reclamation operation" as a pretext to sacrifice the refugees. They would call it a battle, but in reality it would be a suicide mission. Tens of thousands would die in the jaws of the titans just to save food within the walls.
An absurd tragedy.
But Gale knew there was still an opportunity to alter that fate: increase food production before everything collapsed.
Chaos also meant opportunity. Newly opened lands implied a new order. If he used the right methods, he could secure a place on the frontier and change the course of events.
After the fall of Wall Maria, there would be a few years of relative calm. That time had to be used to develop, and above all, to find a way to reach key figures within the government.
Gale took a piece of charcoal and wrote three names on the map:
"Erwin Smith… Nile Dawk… Dot Pixis…"
Commanders of the Scout Regiment, the Military Police, and the Garrison.
Basic information was easy to obtain among soldiers. Among them, Nile was the most constrained: the Military Police did not truly answer to him, but to the inner nobles.
The Garrison was also heavily controlled by the central government.
Only the Scout Regiment retained a certain degree of independence. They operated outside the walls, received fresh blood every year, and that made it difficult for corrupt nobles to fully extend their influence among them.
"Erwin Smith…" Gale murmured, fully understanding the importance.
A famous name even within the walls.
Gale felt that Erwin was the priority. If he wanted to change the system, he would need the strength of the Scout Regiment to overthrow the false royal family and cleanse the internal corruption.
Then there was Historia Reiss, the true heir of royal blood. By supporting her, he could gain the backing of the people. Gale was sure he could approach her when the time came: if he revealed the truth, the indecisive princess would have no reason to reject him.
But everything began with Erwin.
He had to show him something real, something that would give him hope.
At the same time, he couldn't forget the ticking time bombs within the walls: Reiner, Bertholdt, Ymir… and the titans who would attack again from outside in the future.
Gale's head began to ache.
He had escaped, yes, but he had no money and no backing. Even with his knowledge of the future, he felt small before the magnitude of what he was planning.
After all, he was preparing to face the entire world.
Paradis Island faced both internal and external threats: Marley watched from afar, while within the walls spies and corruption slowly consumed the people. Gale only knew part of the board, and even so, he was already trapped in it.
It was not a simple problem.
He rubbed his temples and decided to move forward step by step. First sleep, then blend in with the refugees and assess the real situation.
…
Three more days of walking.
During that time, he dreamed once of John Deere, an American blacksmith who in 1837 invented the first commercially successful cast-steel plow.
His plow allowed farmers to till heavy, sticky soils, facilitating agricultural expansion in the Midwestern United States.
He also discovered that the intervals between dreams were shortening: before they were thirty-three days, now they were around thirty. The duration remained the same, about fifteen to twenty minutes.
He asked him for advice on agricultural tools, and to his surprise, John knew far more than he had imagined. He showed him the incomplete design of a water wheel. Gale expressed his desire to learn the complete blueprint.
Although John was harder to convince than the others, in the end he agreed.
"You already know the basics. If we meet again in this strange dream, I'll teach you much more."
For him, tomorrow meant just another encounter.
And for Gale, who knew when he might meet him again, a month would be the perfect opportunity to blend in among the refugees.
Finally, at dawn on the fifth day since his escape, Gale lifted his head and saw the wall.
The impact was indescribable.
As if the sky and the earth had been split by an abyss. Wall Rose, fifty meters high, blocked everything beyond it.
Before it, Gale felt like a grain of rice.
Small. Insignificant.
But within his chest, a different strength surged. Even if he was small, he possessed a vision that those giants would never have. One day he would rise above them and look down on them from above.
The titans were not invincible. They were not the end, only an obstacle to overcome.
He took the reins of the horse, took what he could from the baggage, then removed the saddle and threw it into a well.
"You're free." Gale patted its neck.
"Go. No one can stop you anymore."
The horse neighed and galloped into the forest.
Gale slung the bag over his shoulder and headed toward the inner gate. After five days of travel, he looked more like a refugee than a traveler.
He silently blended into the crowd of empty faces, filled with fear of the future.
Amid shouts and fallen bodies, he moved forward with steady steps.
He broke the last rations he had left and gave them to a woman with a baby. Then he took the hand of a crying girl and led her to the church where the refugees were staying.
This was not just a camp.
It was humanity's suffering concentrated.
And Gale decided, in silence, that he would change everything he was seeing.