Erwin Smith

The 13th Commander of the Survey Corps.

Erwin has flexible ways of thinking according to the situation, such as enrolling Levi who was famous as the hoodlum of the capital city, and Eren Jaeger who was regarded as dangerous to have an ability to transform into a Titan.

There are always deep meanings behind the thoughts and actions, Erwin has a ruthless and cruel aspect that he has the determination to give up the lives of 100 companies for the purpose, but his subordinates including Levi say that "We will follow his thoughts even if we can't understand” and they deeply trust Erwin.

In the 57th Expedition, to perform the capture operation of the Female Titan, they have lost many soldiers but still failed, he was held responsible for the operation. After that, he uses his wit and try to recover the situation, then he discovers an unexpected fact.

5 years ago, Erwin was fighting against the Titans under the leadership of Keith Shadis who was the commander at the time. When Erwin returned from the expedition before the invasion of the Titans, he met Eren’s eyes at the time, but he looked away because Eren was using an envious stare of them who returned with no results. Erwin who later joined the Survey Corps have the same experience as Erwin had at the time.

During his trainee period, Erwin was the classmate of Nile Dok and both of them aimed to join the Survey Corps. In the question-and-answer section of the magazine, it was found that Erwin was not married. The reason is that no one knows when they will die as long as they are the member of the Survey Corps. But it has become clear that Erwin had crush on Nile's wife Mary long time ago. (It seems that Nile was aware of that)

Basically, he is not an emotional person. But Erwin changes his first-person pronoun from ‘watashi’ to ‘ore’ in front of the people who have been working with him for a long time like Levi, Hange, Nile, etc., and the tone and expression are somewhat softer.

If that is for human being’s future, he is willing to abandon not only his companions’ lives, but also his own life. But in Volume 13, Erwin has shown the expression of joy when the identity of the Titans got clear, and the personality that seemed somewhat strange was also revealed. Levi described him as a "shitty brat", but he says, "I've been often said that since I was a child." From the words Nile said that "Is it because you still believe in the delusion you said when you were a kid?", it can be seen that his principle of action is affected by his childhood experience. And it seems that there were other real reasons to join Survey Corps.

Erwin's father was a teacher in the area where Erwin grew up, and Erwin was one of the students.

One day, during a class on the history that humanity fled into the walls, Erwin questioned the fact that when the humanity fled into the walls, the documents about the outside world were all destroyed, and asked a question about this, but Erwin's father did not answer the question properly in the classroom, when they returned home, his father then answered the question.

"The history books given by the government were full of contradictions and mysteries. And even if there were no documents left, the generation who fled into these walls would have been able to pass on the history to the next generation, it was originally impossible that the generations held the mouth and did not leave any information of the outside world to the next generation. At the time Humanity fled into these walls, the King had altered his memories to make them easy to rule.", his father said.

The content was the unwavering words from young Erwin, but at that time Erwin could not guess why his father talked about that at home but not in the classroom, and told his father's theory to the children in the street. At that time, after the Military Police Regiment asked for details, his father died in some accident in a faraway town, and he was killed by the Military Police Regiment.

Erwin who caused his father’s death due to his fault lived to prove his father’s theory someday. The reason why he joined the Survey Corps was to prove his father's theory, while other companions were fighting with the heart dedicated to humanity, Erwin fought for his own purpose in the Survey Corps. The irony was that he had tricked his companions and even myself with “for humanity”.

When Erwin knew that Eren temporarily manipulated the unconscious Titans, and the Titans' identity was actually a human being, then he drew a theory that Titans (= humanities) could be manipulated, and Erwin smiled that he was approaching the truth.

Erwin assumed that there must be some clues to reveal the truth of the world in the basement Eren's father has mentioned. Though he has lost one arm, Levi could not stop him, and he joined the operation to retake Wall Maria.

To confirm the correctness of his father's theory was Erwin's belief.

But thinking about the soldiers died in the battles, Erwin had to achieve the role of “commander” rather than his dream...

ErLe / LevEr EreEr / ErEre

ErAr ErJean MikeEr NilEr

ErSasha

During the battle to retake Wall Maria, the Survey Corps had been assaulted with a barrage of stones by the Beast Titan, and they were in a dangerous situation to be killed all. Erwin entrusted Levi to kill the Beast Titan, and he led the recruit himself as a decoy and decided to die for that. He and his recruits went on a suicide attack against the Beast Titan, and a rock flied through the left side of his waist, and then he fell off a horse. He was found by the only survivor [Floch] in this suicide attack when he was mortally wounded.

Floch carried Erwin over the wall and brought him to Levi who possessed the serum, where Armin also laid down with severe wounds. The remaining Survey Corps members were arguing whether they should give the serum to Erwin or Armin. Levi claimed that they should give the serum to Erwin who could bring more chances to the human beings, and he once decided to give it to Erwin.

But when he tried to give Erwin the serum, Erwin shook his arm as if he refused.

At that time, Erwin mutters the words he asked his father when he was a boy in his dream.

How do you know for sure there's nobody on the other side of the wall?

When Levi heard that, what came to his mind was the Erwin's lively face released from the heavy burden when Erwin asked him to kill the Beast Titan and Levi told him that "give up on your dream and die".

To release Erwin from the living hell that he had to carry the burden as a devil-like person to destroy the Titans, Levi gave Armin the serum in a hurry.

"This guy had to be the devil, and that was what we expected..."

"But ... you can rest in peace ..."

Just as Levi said, Erwin died quietly without knowing the truth of the basement. After Erwin died, Hange became the commander of the Survey Corps.

Later, Levi and others found the truth in the basement, and the fact that there are human beings outside the walls was discovered.