Judgment

Hange and Floch reach the shattered wagon where Levi lies motionless beside a steaming Titan corpse. Claiming the captain is already dead, Hange seizes the moment when the Titan dissolves into a skeleton, disgorging a living Zeke Jaeger, and dives into the river with Levi's body. Zeke tells Floch he awoke in a strange place where a girl rebuilt his body from soil, a realm he takes to be the Paths, and with the Scouts guarding him dead, he and the Jaegerists set out to reach Eren.

In Shiganshina, Marley's fleet of airships arrives under Theo Magath, raining paratroopers and equipment on the district in revenge for Liberio. Galliard's Jaw Titan frees Pieck by clawing off the manacled hand chaining her to Gabi, and she transforms into the Cart Titan, carrying Gabi to Magath's line. Gabi shares two critical facts: Falco swallowed Zeke's spinal fluid, and Eren's plan hinges on a Titan of royal blood, making Zeke the key that must be kept away from him. Magath mounts an anti-Titan gun on Pieck's back, intending not to kill the Founding Titan but to capture it and end two thousand years of malice.

Eren's Attack Titan trades blows with Reiner's Armored Titan, shattering its faceplate before Galliard strikes his back. Skewering both Warriors on massive spikes buys him room, but a shell from Pieck's platform tears through his Titan's head, cutting its motor functions. Marleyan infantry and airship fire scythe down the arriving Jaegerists, and Reiner impales the immobilized Eren, telling him he has lost and that everyone, Eren included, has suffered enough. Fearing the Founder is about to be eaten, Onyankopon frees the jailed Scouts. Conny nearly throttles him, sick of betrayals, but Nicolo vouches that the Marleyan prisoners hid the wine scheme and euthanasia plan from the volunteers. Jean notes the trap in helping: saving Eren also advances a sterilization plan none of them accept. Mikasa admits she wants to save Eren but wonders whether her Ackermann blood, not her heart, drives her. Armin's suggestion that Eren is only feigning cooperation with Yelena to control her is met with silence.

Zeke survives his apparent death, restored inside a Titan's body after an encounter in the Paths where a girl shaped him a new form from soil; Hange escapes into the river with the wounded Levi.

Magath's invasion force lands in Shiganshina, and Gabi's intelligence establishes that Eren needs royal-blooded Zeke to unlock the Founding Titan, defining Marley's objective: keep the brothers apart and capture the Founder.

Pieck's Cart Titan is fitted with new anti-Titan artillery, and its shells disable the Attack Titan's motor functions mid-battle against Reiner and Galliard.

Onyankopon releases Armin, Mikasa, Conny, Jean, and the other detained Scouts, sparking a raw debate over whether rescuing Eren means endorsing the Eldian euthanasia plan.

The episode weaves together the chapters Support, Judgment, and Sneak Attack from the War for Paradis arc. Yuichiro Hayashi directed, Hiroshi Seko wrote the screenplay, and MAPPA produced. Japanese broadcast came January 10, 2022, with the English airing February 13, 2022.

This episode swaps the season's sixth opening, My War, for the seventh, The Rumbling. The in-universe segment covers the redesigned anti-Titan gear, an improvement on the artillery taken from the Mid-East Allied Forces, built to punch through Titan hardening after the Cart Titan's turret was wrecked at Liberio.