SSS Talent: From Trash to Tyrant

Trafalgar grew even more confused.

The boy had said it plainly. He had seen him with his father a long time ago, and there had been another man standing beside him. Since hearing it, only one thought kept circling in Trafalgar’s head.

’When? What moment is he talking about?’

He had no idea what the child meant. None at all. His mind searched on its own, dragging up scraps of memory, old scenes, anything that could give him even the smallest clue about what the boy had just said.

Nothing came.

At last, Trafalgar lowered his voice and asked, ”When did you see me, and who was with me, kid?”

The boy pressed a finger to his mouth as if that might help him think. He took his time before answering, his brows pulling together with the effort.

”I don’t know very well,” he said. ”But I remember being with my father. It was cold. There was snow, and we were near the base of a cliff.” He paused, trying to hold on to the memory. ”My father was already hurt because of a fight he had with a strong man.”

Something about that description tugged at Trafalgar.

There were not many places that matched it. Snow. A cliff. Open land. Harsh, hostile ground. If there was a cliff, there had to be rock, and if there was snow like that, then it had almost certainly happened in Morgain territory or close to

it.

His expression did not change, but the thought tightened around him.

He asked the next question more carefully. ”Do you remember the man who was beside me? Can you describe him?”

The boy nodded.

”He had a scary aura,” he said. ”And you could feel the bloodlust coming from him. His hair was blond, maybe platinum blond. It was hard to tell because of the snowstorm, and the wind kept moving it. He had cold gray eyes.” The boy wrinkled his nose after that. ”And he had a very ugly face, in my opinion.”

’Oh, no.’

That was the exact thought that crossed Trafalgar’s mind.

He knew who it was.

His mind had already connected everything. The snow. The cliff. The storm. The injured father. The man beside him.

Valttair.

That was the man the child had seen standing beside him.

And the father the child kept talking about...

’It’s the son of the Gluttony Dragon.’

It was the only explanation that made sense now. Every detail the boy had given pointed in the same direction. The child standing in front of him was the son of the creature that had killed Trafalgar’s uncle, and the man of gray eyes and platinum hair had obviously been Valttair, the one who killed it in the end. ’Shit...’

The thought came heavy.

Valttair had killed this child’s father. Granted, that father had been the Gluttony Dragon, and Trafalgar felt no pity for that thing’s death. The creature had wanted to eat him. Worse, it had already killed people close to him and would have kept doing it without hesitation.

That did not change what stood before him now.

A child.

One who had somehow ended up in an orphanage.

Trafalgar looked at the boy more closely, trying to imagine what path had brought him here. He did not know what had happened after that battle. He had never even considered that a dragon like that could have left a child behind.

The boy broke the silence first.

”Do you know that man who was with you that day?”

Trafalgar nodded.

”Yes. That’s my father.””

The child fell quiet for a moment, taking that in with a seriousness that felt older than eight. When he spoke again, the question came out in a small voice.

”Did our fathers fight? Is that why my father died?”

Trafalgar did not know how to soften that. He had no clean answer for a child like this, and pretending there was one would only make it worse. So he told him the truth in the simplest form he could.

He nodded once and said, ”Your father had killed my uncle, and he wanted to

kill me too.”

The boy lowered his head.

His mouth moved a little, like he was tasting the shape of the answer before

accepting it.

”So he was a bad person.”

Trafalgar was caught off guard by how quickly the child reached that

conclusion.

There was no tantrum, refusal or angry denial. Just a sad little thought voiced aloud, as if he had already known it somewhere inside and only needed someone else to say it plainly.

’Maybe the dragonic bloodline matures the mind faster, Trafalgar thought. ’Or maybe he’s just had to understand ugly things earlier than he should have!

The boy spoke again, quieter now.

”I’m glad you’re okay, big brother. My father wasn’t a good person.” He

swallowed. ”He ate mama too.”

That one struck harder than Trafalgar expected.

For a breath, he said nothing.

Cruel did not even begin to cover it. The Gluttony Dragon had been exactly

what his name suggested. A thing of appetite and violence, taking what it wanted because it could. But hearing it laid out in the voice of a child made it

filthier than before.

The boy continued, words coming more easily now that they had started.

”He made me watch. He said if I didn’t listen to him, the same thing would

happen to me.”

Something in Trafalgar’s chest pulled tight.

What had begun as a simple game with a ball had opened into something ugly

enough that even the evening light in the yard seemed out of place. He crouched without thinking, bringing himself down to the boy’s height, and

pulled him into an embrace.

The child went rigid for the briefest instant.

After that, he melted into it.

Warmth from Trafalgar’s body reached him in a way he probably had not felt in

a long time. The boy’s small hands clutched at him as if he did not quite know how to answer comfort but did not want it taken away either. His face pressed against Trafalgar’s chest, and the first tears came a heartbeat later. Behind them, Cynthia had been watching everything without understanding a word of it. The moment she saw the child start crying, she hurried over.

”What happened?” she asked, alarm already rising in her voice. ”Don’t tell me I

actually hurt him.”

Trafalgar turned his head toward her and shook it gently.

”No. Don’t worry. I think he remembered something bad, and it all came out at

once.”

That eased part of the fear in her face.

The boy’s crying did not last long. It had the exhausted, emptied-out quality of something held in for too long. By the time Trafalgar rose with him in his arms, the child’s hands had gone loose. His breathing had softened. He had fallen

asleep there.

Cynthia’s voice lowered automatically when she saw that.

”He passed out?”

Trafalgar adjusted the child slightly against him. ”More like he finally let himself

stop for a while.””

They took him inside and found one of the smaller rooms. Trafalgar laid him

down carefully on the bed, pulling the blanket up without waking him. Cynthia stayed near the doorway at first, watching in silence before stepping closer.

The child looked far younger asleep.

Less guarded. Less like someone who had already seen things no child should.

Cynthia stood beside Trafalgar and looked from the sleeping boy to him. ”It seems you know how to deal with little kids.”