Trust

Hitch and Marlo comb the woods outside Stohess for fugitive Scouts and corner Armin at a stream, only for Levi and Mikasa to drop on them from behind. Stripped of their uniforms for an infiltration ploy, the two captives expect execution. Hitch vents her fury over the hundred dead from the Stohess operation and mourns the roommate she believes a Titan killed, at which Levi flatly informs her that Annie Leonhart was that Titan. The revelation staggers both cadets, and Levi grumbles that nobody outside the government's core knows anything true about their world.

Marlo volunteers to help expose injustice, so Jean runs a test: leading the pair off under pretense of killing them, he fumbles his knife within Marlo's reach. Marlo grabs it only to tell Hitch to run, then throws the blade away, confessing that he picked the wrong regiment and pledging his trust to the Scouts for as long as their fight continues. Hitch clubs Jean with a branch a beat too late for the drama, but the pair pass, and they steer Squad Levi through the weakest Military Police checkpoint, where Levi bags an Interior Police prisoner.

In Trost, Hange rescues Flegel Reeves from Interior Police pursuers and pushes the terrified heir to stop hiding. Cornered later in a ruined block, Flegel gets his answer: Roger admits the government forced Dimo Reeves into the kidnapping and cut his throat for siding with the Scouts. The wrecked buildings then reveal a listening crowd, Hange and Moblit flatten the pursuers, and Flegel claims his father's company and the city's protection with an audience of witnesses, reporters included, applauding.

Levi's nighttime interrogation of the captured Interior MP yields two things: the man genuinely does not know where Eren and Historia are held, and the name of the operator too careful to leave a trail, Kenny Ackermann. Both Levi and Mikasa register the shared surname. The prisoner taunts them that captured Scouts will hang, starting with Erwin.

In custody, Erwin receives Nile Dawk and learns his sentence will be pronounced before the King. Erwin asks oddly domestic questions about Nile's family, then reveals he has left something with Commander Pyxis; when it happens, Erwin will merely watch, and the decision will fall to Nile and men like him. The nobles, confident the Wall's secrets are safe once Erwin dies, summon him to the throne room and ask for his final words.

Episode 41 overall, fourth of the third season, from Wit Studio and Production I.G with Aiko Sakuraba directing and Hiroshi Seko writing. It aired August 13, 2018 in Japan and September 15, 2018 in the US, condensing four manga chapters: Kenny the Ripper, Soul of a Heretic, Trust, and Reply.

The information segment describes the Chancellery, the royal government's nominally supreme coordinating body whose real authority is perpetually contested. Alongside two other episodes, this one carried a TV-MA rating on American broadcast where the rest of the series aired TV-14.