Attack on Titan: Ymir Does Die & Here’s How

Ymir is likely the Hinedere/Tsundere embodiment of Attack on Titan, and thus, we liked her all the more for it, but as with most anime, you must be prepared to see your favorite characters go and the ones that annoy you (Eren) live. Was that the case with Ymir, and did she die in Attack on Titan? Let’s find out.

Ymir had a secret purpose that was revealed only later

Ymir was a member of the 104th training corps and later a member of the Survey corps. She fought alongside Jean, Mikasa, Eren, Armin, Krista, and many others. She possessed the power of the jaw titan but could never encapsulate the full power of the said titan.

Her secret was revealed in the Clash of the Titans arc. The rookies took refuge in a nearby tower and fought to stay alive or die trying. After a dramatic reveal, Ymir can hold back the Titans, but soon after, the plan fails, and Ymir risks her life to try and save the remaining survivors.

Luckily, the Survey corpse arrives and finishes the remaining titans, saving both Ymir’s and others’ lives. Soon after, Ymir, along with Eren, is kidnapped while regenerating her limbs by Bertolt and Reiner. She refuses to go at first but is then taken under the assumption that they all want Historia to be saved. There is only one more mention of Ymir after that when she sends a letter to Historia.

How she got her powers?

Ymir was a pure titan for around 60 years before she inherited the jaw titan. Well, it wasn’t that she inherited the titan; she ate Marcel Galliard, one of the chosen Eldian warriors for the Marleyan army. Ymir wandered aimlessly during the period when she was a pure titan on Paradis island.

She got there when, as a young girl, she was injected with the titan serum on the edge of the wall. Before being named Ymir after Ymir Fritz, she was no different when she was in her pure titan form. She was a nameless girl living as an Eldian on the streets of Marley. She was picked up by a man later on who named her Ymir.

She was then worshiped as an embodiment of Ymir Fritz, but not long after, she received punishment for the Eldian crime she was forced into and knew nothing about.

How does she die?

Since someone from the Marleyan army had to inherit the jaw titan, it is clear that Ymir died by getting eaten by a pure titan. This way, the Marleyan army regained control over the titan taken away from them many years ago. It is unclear whether she was a prisoner during her stay with the Marleyan army, but she likely was since she wasn’t an honorary Eldian.

How old is Ymir when she dies?

If you count all of the years on the earth, which includes her life as a beggar girl with no home, her life as an embodiment of Ymir, her life as a pure titan, and her life as a shifter, a good guess would be that Ymir died when she was approximately 85 years old. This calculation counts in the fact that she was roughly 13 before becoming a pure titan and died right before her 13 years as a shifter ended.

The thing is, Ymir ate Marcel Galliard around two years from when he first inherited the jaw titan. All of his comrades, Annie, Bertolt, and Reiner, inherited the titan at the same time he did; Ymir inherited the titan later in 845 when Wall Maria fell. In her letter to Historia, Ymir says she’s about to die soon even though all of the other inheriters are still alive and well. This leads me to believe that she was killed long before she was supposed to actually die.

Who gets Ymir’s titan?

The next in line to inherit the jaw was Marcel Galliards’ brother, Porco. After a few close encounters with death, Porco transfers his titan to Falco Grice, a young honorary Eldian trying to inherit the armored titan from Riner Braum. This happened by accident in the War for Paradis arc, where Eren and his half-brother, Zeke, try to combine their powers and use the Founding Titan’s powers to their full extent to wipe out every last nation on Earth except for Eldians.

Were Ymir and Krista a couple?

We can’t talk about Ymir’s tragic story without discussing the tragic love story of her and Krista. There was speculation that Ymir and Krista (Historia) were a couple, but nothing of the sort was confirmed. It was all fan speculation and shipping until Ymir’s final letter to Historia, confirming that Ymir and Historia could have been a couple. Still, it was also revealed that the love story would, unfortunately, end tragically.

This is confirmed in the last part of the letter, which reads:

”It won’t be long till I die. But I have no regrets. That’s what I’d like to say, but there is one thing. It’s that I wasn’t able to marry you.

The Path

It’s hard to explain the path and even understand it, but from what I can tell, Ymir’s spirit carries on in the coordinate and in the memories of all subjects of Ymir. She might not have a physical body, and for us mere mortals, that might not be enough. However, Ymir is still out there, along with all the other subjects of Ymir who have managed to live their lives to the fullest, some in prosperity, some in poverty, some in truth, and some, like Ymir, in lies.

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