Response: The Struggle for Trost, Part 6

Morale among the soldiers on standby has collapsed. Daz draws his own blade in despair after watching comrades be devoured, and Marco Bodt talks him down while Sasha Braus wails about a stomach ache nearby. Jean Kirschtein, pressed by Christa and Ymir for news of Eren and Mikasa, keeps quiet under Garrison orders, reasoning that word of Eren's secret would spread panic through the ranks. Then a cannon blast echoes from inside Wall Rose, and Reiner, Bertholdt, Annie, and Jean race toward the sound.

Behind the smoke of the cannonball, the skeletal ribcage of Eren's half-formed Titan shields him, Mikasa Ackermann, and Armin Arlelt from Captain Kitz Woermann's artillery. Emerging as the carcass steams away, Eren lays out two options: flee to Wall Maria as a Titan and seek the answers locked in his family's basement, or gamble everything on Armin's tongue. He tells Armin that the choice is his, reminding him that his quick thinking sent Hannes to save them five years earlier. Realizing his friends never once saw him as dead weight, Armin steps out of the smoke alone.

Facing the rifles, Armin argues that every soldier present watched Eren's Titan strike down other Titans, and that the monsters treated him as prey rather than kin. Woermann, gripped by terror, orders the attack anyway, and Armin answers with a salute, shouting that Eren's power combined with their remaining troops could actually retake Trost. The signal to fire never comes. Commander Dot Pyxis halts the execution, remarking that he wants to hear the boy out, and dispatches Woermann to organize reinforcements. Atop the Wall, Armin explains his plan: have Eren carry the giant boulder in the city to the gate and plug the breach. Asked if he can do it, Eren admits he barely understands his own power, but one look at the streets that would be lost settles it, and he accepts.

Marco prevents a despairing Daz from taking his own life while the cadets wait on standby.

Eren survives the cannon shot by triggering a partial, skeletal Titan transformation to shield his friends.

Eren entrusts his fate to Armin, revealing that Armin's judgment saved all three of them during the fall of Shiganshina.

Armin's salute and defense of Eren's strategic value stall Woermann's firing order long enough for Dot Pyxis to intervene.

Pyxis takes command of the situation and adopts the boulder plan, setting up the operation to reseal Trost's gate.

This is the tenth episode of the first season, a Wit Studio and Production I.G production adapting the manga chapter Response. Hiroyuki Tanaka directed the episode from Hiroshi Seko's script.

It first aired in Japan on June 9, 2013, and in the United States on July 12, 2014. Crunchyroll carries it under the title Response, The Battle for Trost (6).

The included information segment describes a preservative yeast produced only inside Wall Sina, seeded along supply routes so stockpiles of grain and fodder can support a future push to retake Wall Maria.