SSS Talent: From Trash to Tyrant-Chapter 496: A Truth for Aubrelle [II]

Aubrelle straightened slightly in her seat.

Even without seeing them through her own eyes, she could feel the change in the room now. Trafalgar had gone quieter in a way that did not belong to ordinary conversation. Mayla’s hands were still in his hair, but the lightness from before was gone. Rhosyn had not moved much at all, yet there was something in the way she was watching that made the whole space feel tighter.

Aubrelle rested one hand lightly near her cane. "I’m listening, Trafalgar. It seems important."

Trafalgar exhaled through his nose. For a second, he said nothing. Then, "It is."

His voice came out lower than before.

"This is something I need to tell you. If I’m asking you to stay beside me, if you’re going to keep walking with me through all of this, then you should know it." His eyes stayed on her. "I wouldn’t feel right hiding it from you any longer."

Aubrelle’s fingers tightened slightly over the fabric near her lap. "Then tell me."

Trafalgar gave a small nod, though there was no ease in it.

"You know there were rumors after the war," he said. "About a Primordial appearing there. About some presence people noticed."

Aubrelle frowned faintly. "Yes."

He held her gaze through Pipin’s red eyes. "That happened partly because of me."

Her brows drew together at once. The answer did not fit cleanly in her mind, and that alone made it worse. "What do you mean partly because of you? Trafalgar, I don’t understand."

Trafalgar looked at her for another second, then said it plainly.

"My bloodline is mixed. Human and Primordial." His voice did not shake, but the weight in it was obvious. "I belong to the Primordial bloodline, Aubrelle. My mother was one of them. My father was human."

The words seemed to empty the room.

Aubrelle went completely still.

Then, almost by instinct, she raised both hands to her blindfold and untied it. The cloth slipped free, and with Pipin already perched close, she looked at them properly through the bird’s sight for the first time since Trafalgar began.

Trafalgar was watching her far more carefully than usual. There was tension in him she almost never saw so openly, something close to dread under all that restraint.

Mayla was serious.

Rhosyn even more so.

Aubrelle’s lips parted, but no words came out.

Because now she understood something else.

This was not new to them.

Mayla knew.

Rhosyn knew.

And she was only now being brought into something that had already existed between the three of them for some time.

Aubrelle looked at Trafalgar again, her red eyes unfocused but fixed on him through Pipin’s borrowed vision, and for a brief moment she did not know what to do first, speak, breathe, or simply keep staring.

Aubrelle was the first to move.

She drew a slow breath, then another, as if forcing her body to remember how to do something as simple as that before trusting herself to speak.

"When you told me about your SSS Talent," she said at last, her voice quieter than before, "that already felt like something enormous. I remember thinking that very few things could be bigger than that." Her fingers closed lightly over the blindfold still in her hands. "But this..." She stopped for a moment and looked at him again through Pipin’s sight. "This is on a completely different level, Trafalgar."

Silence followed.

Not a broken one. Just the kind that had to exist after words like those.

Then Aubrelle asked, "Mayla and Rhosyn already knew, didn’t they?"

Mayla answered first. "Yes. I’ve known for a while."

Aubrelle turned her face toward her.

Mayla held that gaze calmly. "He told me because I’ve always been by his side. He already knew how I would react, or at least he had enough reason to trust that I wouldn’t turn this into danger for him."

Aubrelle listened, then looked back at Trafalgar. There was no anger in her face, but there was something that stung more quietly than that.

"So you didn’t trust me?"

The question caught him off guard.

Trafalgar frowned slightly. "No. That’s not it." He held her gaze and answered without trying to escape it. "I do trust you, Aubrelle. That’s exactly why I decided to tell you now. It just wasn’t easy."

Aubrelle lowered her eyes for a brief second, then lifted them again. "I can imagine that." Her voice stayed controlled, but there was hurt in it now, soft and very real. "Still... I would have liked to know earlier. It doesn’t feel good to realize I was standing outside something this important while the others were already inside it."

Trafalgar said nothing for a moment, and that alone told her enough.

After that, Aubrelle asked, "Who else knows?"

"Mayla. Rhosyn. You now." He paused briefly. "And Vivienne."

That made Aubrelle blink. "Vivienne?" The surprise in her voice came more quickly this time. "Why does she know too?"

"It’s a long story," Trafalgar said. "But there is nothing between us. You’ve already seen how Xavier and Vivienne kept looking at each other during dinner."

That earned the smallest laugh from Aubrelle, brief but real enough to loosen something in the room.

"That part was rather obvious," she admitted.

The tension eased a little after that, enough for Mayla to speak again.

"As girls who stand beside Trafalgar, we both know what this means," she said, looking at Aubrelle directly. "This has to remain between us, and from now on we protect him without ever letting something like this turn into a weakness others can use."

Aubrelle met her gaze without hesitation. "I know." Her answer came cleanly. "You don’t need to worry about that. I would never put Trafalgar in danger."

Mayla watched her for a second longer, then smiled faintly. "I’m glad to hear it."

Trafalgar looked at Aubrelle for a moment longer, then said, "There’s still more."

Aubrelle’s expression tightened slightly, though she did not interrupt him.

"Vivienne knows because her master is the Primordial who appeared in the war," Trafalgar said. "He’s the one who wanted to see me. And Rhosyn..." His eyes shifted briefly toward her before returning to Aubrelle. "Rhosyn belongs to the same bloodline too."

That drew another silence from the room, smaller than the last one, but heavier in a different way.

Aubrelle held his gaze through Pipin’s sight. "Why would someone like that want to see you?"

Trafalgar exhaled softly through his nose. "The short version is that my mother seems to have held a very high place among them. From what I’ve been told, I would be considered her heir." He paused, then added, "And there may be something worse coming later. Something tied to the Void Creatures. Another large-scale disaster is possible."

Aubrelle stayed still.

That part took longer to comprehend.

Because now this was no longer only about hidden blood or an old secret carried inside one person. It was larger. The kind of thing that reached beyond him and into the shape of the world itself.

"That is..." Aubrelle stopped, then tried again. "That is far more than I expected to hear tonight."

"No shit," Rhosyn muttered under her breath.

Mayla gave her a look. Rhosyn only lifted one shoulder slightly and looked away.

Trafalgar kept his eyes on Aubrelle. He had told her everything that mattered, at least everything he could place in her hands at once. The silence after that felt longer than it probably was.

Then he asked, quieter now, "Do you hate me for hiding it?"

Aubrelle’s expression changed at once.

"Hate you?" she repeated, as if the word itself did not fit in the room.

Trafalgar said nothing.

Aubrelle lowered her gaze for a brief moment, then looked back at him. "I could say I didn’t like finding out this late. I could say it hurt a little to realize I was outside something so important for this long." Her voice softened, though it never lost its steadiness. "But hate you? No, Trafalgar. I can’t hate you for trusting me enough to tell me the truth, even if it took time."

Something in his shoulders eased, slight but visible.

Aubrelle’s lips curved faintly then. "And besides, it would be very strange to hate my husband."

Trafalgar clicked his tongue softly. "Hearing you say it like that still sounds strange."

"It should stop sounding strange soon," Aubrelle replied.

That drew the faintest trace of a smile from Mayla, and even Rhosyn looked less rigid than before.

A little later, Aubrelle rose from her seat. She tied the blindfold back over her eyes, then stepped toward Mayla first and gave her a quiet, sincere embrace.

"Thank you," she said.

Mayla returned it without hesitation. "Of course."

After that, Aubrelle turned to Trafalgar and leaned in just enough to leave a soft kiss on him.

"It’s late," she said. "I’ll see you tomorrow in class."

Rhosyn stood as well. "I’ll walk with you."

Aubrelle gave a small nod, and a moment later the two of them were heading toward the door together.

Then it opened.

Then closed.

Just like that the house gone quiet again, only Trafalgar and Mayla remained.