Chapter 8: Fierce Battle, First Encounter with a Giant

“Yes, the wall has been breached… The Colossal Titan from five years ago has appeared once more…” Hanging from the wall, Si Kongxu spoke with a chilling tone. Although he hadn’t truly experienced the events from five years ago, nor did he retain any memory of them, he could still keenly sense that overwhelming despair gripping the people now.

“Mikasa, don’t worry! As long as I’m here, those Titans won’t dare act too wildly! Haha!” Si Kongxu burst out laughing. With his ‘Infinite Martial Tempering,’ did he really need to fear those dim-witted Titans? Hadn’t he noticed that his engraved evaluation had already reached the pitch-black level?

“Let’s hope so…” Mikasa glanced at Si Kongxu, her expression betraying her unease. “Xu, when the time comes, you must stay by my side.”

“No problem, no problem.” Knowing Mikasa was simply worried about him, Si Kongxu didn’t bother to explain. With a press on his vertical maneuvering gear, he and Mikasa leapt up onto the city wall.

“Die—!”

No sooner had the two reached the top than they witnessed Eren, employing his maneuvering gear, charging directly at the Colossal Titan. Using the gear’s grappling hook, Eren latched onto the Titan, deftly dodging its attacks by leveraging centrifugal force and inertia.

“Too slow!” Twisting through the air, Eren shot past the Colossal Titan’s defenses, bringing his twin steel blades down upon the nape of its neck.

“Got him!” Just as Eren thought he’d succeeded, a blast of scalding steam erupted from the Titan’s skin, forcing him to halt his attack.

“Eren!” Upon seeing Eren locked in combat with the Titan, Mikasa wasted no time preparing to rush forward.

“Mikasa, calm down!” Seeing her panic, Si Kongxu immediately stopped her. “Stay here and await the garrison’s orders. I’ll go support Eren.”

Without giving Mikasa a chance to argue, Si Kongxu launched himself toward the Colossal Titan using his maneuvering gear.

Familiar with the original story, Si Kongxu knew that once Eren attempted a second assault, the Colossal Titan would take advantage of the steaming distraction to shed its Titan form and escape as a regular human.

Though he knew the Titan would likely flee, Si Kongxu was eager to test how far his ‘Infinite Martial Tempering’ could truly take him.

Swish!

Reaching the edge of the wall, Si Kongxu pressed the device on his blade’s hilt, controlling the maneuvering gear to fire high-pressure gas and extend the grappling hook at will.

As the Colossal Titan began to emit searing steam, ready to dissolve into human form and vanish, a sudden grappling hook shot forth, striking precisely at the Titan’s eye!

Whoosh! Using the pull of the gear and the thrust from the expelled gas, Si Kongxu hurtled straight toward the Colossal Titan. Since the steam only covered the Titan’s back, the front was exposed, giving the Titan no cover to safely revert to human form. After all, if its identity as a human were revealed, it would spell trouble for certain parties.

Thus, the Colossal Titan swung its massive right hand, casting a shadow over the airborne Si Kongxu, intent on swatting him from the sky.

Despite its immense size, the Titan’s movements were lightning-quick. Had Si Kongxu reached it a moment later, he’d have been reduced to pulp by that colossal hand.

“Haha! Too slow!” Thanks to his ‘Infinite Martial Tempering,’ Si Kongxu’s reflexes had reached the pinnacle of human potential. Seeing the giant hand sweeping toward him, he instantly retracted the hook embedded in the Titan’s eye and dropped downward in a swift parabolic arc.

Buzz!

The roar of displaced air from the Titan’s mighty swing was deafening, like air being violently compressed then unleashed. Though his eardrums ached from the shockwave, Si Kongxu’s arcing descent allowed him to perfectly evade the attack.

“Let me show you the terror of being at the mercy of the perpetual underachiever of the Cadet Corps!” As he descended to the Titan’s waist, Si Kongxu swiftly pressed the device on his blade’s hilt again, firing another hook to anchor himself to the Titan’s chest.

Swish! Propelled upward by a fresh burst of gas, Si Kongxu shot rapidly toward the Titan’s neck.

Meanwhile, Eren, whose vision had been obscured by the steam, had recovered.

“Eren! Flank him!”

“Right!” Eren, ranked among the top ten cadets, quickly assessed the situation and launched himself toward the Titan’s nape once more.

“Roar!” The Colossal Titan, possessing intelligence equal to any human, immediately understood the danger. If Eren and Si Kongxu managed to attack from both sides, its chances of survival would be slim.

Thus, the Colossal Titan twisted its massive body!

The sheer force of the Titan’s movement generated a powerful wind, the pressure distorting the air itself. Both Si Kongxu and Eren, anchored by their maneuvering gear, were at the mercy of this tempest.

The result was inevitable: as the Titan spun, both attackers were violently thrown aside. Their gear, designed to grip flesh, was no match for the titanic force and swirling wind.

Boom—

A blast of air exploded outward, and under the force of the whirlwind, Si Kongxu and Eren were flung mercilessly from the Titan.

“Damn it!”

“Crap!”

Neither could truly fly; their only means of approach was the maneuvering gear’s gas propulsion and grappling hooks. But faced with the gale produced by the Titan’s spinning mass, neither propulsion nor hooks could keep them anchored. They were helpless before the storm and could only be thrown aside.

“So the Colossal Titan can fight like that too!” Si Kongxu reflected. He hadn’t seen such a maneuver in the original story, but in hindsight, it made perfect sense: such a vast body, when rotated, would naturally create a powerful vortex.

Fortunately, both Si Kongxu and Eren were thrown in the direction of the wall. After adjusting themselves, they landed safely below the ramparts. By then, however, the Colossal Titan had vanished without a trace.

“Eren! Si Kongxu! Did you two defeat it?” The new cadets, still gathered on the wall, snapped back to their senses and called out to them.

“No!” Eren clenched his fists, teeth gritted. “Just like five years ago, it appeared suddenly and disappeared just as quickly!”

“Alright, alright!” At that moment, Si Kongxu was perhaps the most lighthearted of them all. The recent battle had given him a deeper understanding of his ‘Infinite Martial Tempering,’ and he was in high spirits.

Patting Eren on the shoulder, Si Kongxu said, “Next time, I definitely won’t let it get away.”

With that, he scampered off to Mikasa’s side—after all, slaying Titans paled in comparison to courting Miss Mikasa. Priorities, after all!