SSS Talent: From Tra Chapter 540: Secrets in the Room

Chapter 540: Chapter 540: Secrets in the Room

Trafalgar and Bartholow rode the circular platform together while it rose toward the highest floor of the dormitory building.

Bartholow kept glancing around during the ascent, as if the platform itself had beco more luxurious just because it was carrying them toward that part of the building.

"It’s been a long ti since I ca up this far," he said. "It still surprises

that all this space is reserved only for the heirs of the Eight Great Families."

Trafalgar gave a small shrug.

"When you think about it, it’s normal enough." He did not sound especially impressed by it, which made sense. He had lived in that part of the tower long enough for the excess to fade into routine. "Forget the building. We’ve got sothing else to deal with."

When the platform reached his floor, the two of them stepped off. The corridor was quieter up there, wider too, the kind of silence money and status always seed to buy. Trafalgar led the way, opened the door to his room, and stepped aside.

"Co in."

Bartholow entered and stopped almost imdiately.

Trafalgar had already crossed the room by the ti he noticed Bartholow had not moved past the threshold yet. He turned and saw why.

To soone like Bartholow, the room was absurd.

The bed alone looked softer than anything he had probably ever slept on. The furniture was heavy and polished, the windows tall, the curtains thick, the desk large enough to hold half a library, and the decorative pieces scattered through the room were the kind of things most people would not dare touch without permission. Even the mana lamps gave off a cleaner, warr light than the ones in the lower floors.

Bartholow stared around as if he had stepped into a noble suite in so royal estate rather than a student room.

Trafalgar set the hand-case on the table.

"Sit."

That seed to bring Barth back to himself. He crossed the room quickly and sat down opposite Trafalgar, still looking a little unsure about where he was supposed to place his hands, as if the furniture might accuse him of being poor.

Trafalgar remained standing for a mont, one hand on the case. When he spoke again, the lighter edge from the corridor disappeared.

"I think you rember what we agreed on before. About the notebooks."

Bartholow looked up at once. "That it stayed between us."

"Mhm."

Trafalgar pulled out the chair across from him and sat down.

"I want the sa thing now." He kept his voice even, but there was more weight in it than before. "I trust you, Barth. That’s why you’re here. What I brought back is important. More than important." He tapped the leather case lightly. "It’s tied to the void creatures. That part I know for sure. So if you’ve ever wanted to learn sothing real about them, this is the best chance you’ll get."

Bartholow’s expression changed with every sentence. The timidity stayed, because that was woven too deeply into him to vanish, but sothing steadier rose under it.

"Is it about sothing that happened in the war?" he asked.

"Yes."

Trafalgar did not look away.

"It ca out of the war, and that’s why discretion matters. You cannot speak about this to anyone. Not even to your sister." His tone stayed calm, which sohow made the warning harder. "Anyone who knows this right now would not be safe. Maybe in so months. Maybe in a year. At so point, the world may have to hear parts of it. But for now, if this spreads, it could bring chaos with it."

Bartholow listened without shrinking from it.

For once, he was neither timid nor overwheld. He understood the seriousness and t it properly.

"I understand, Trafalgar. You can count on ."

That was enough.

Trafalgar opened the case and began taking the sheets out carefully, setting them on the table between them. So were notes in Icarus’s hand. So were the pages in that strange script Bartholow had already seen before in the earlier notebooks Trafalgar had given him.

The mont Barth saw those characters again, sothing lit up in him.

It was always like that.

The shy boy who tripped over his own words had a habit of disappearing when old texts appeared in front of him. In his place ca soone sharper, more absorbed, soone who forgot how awkward he was because his mind had already run ahead to the work.

"Do you know how long this could take?" Trafalgar asked.

Bartholow leaned closer, already scanning the first sheet. "I’m not sure. Working with it before helps, so it’ll be easier than the first ti. But there are a lot of pages here." He hesitated, though only because he was estimating honestly. "I’ll still need a few hours."

"Fine. If you find anything important, tell ." Trafalgar rose from the chair. "I’m going to ditate."

Bartholow nodded absentmindedly, already half-lost in the script.

Trafalgar pulled his shirt off and left it draped over the back of a chair before moving to the open space near the window. He sat down cross-legged, closed his eyes, and let his breathing slow.

Mana gathered around him with familiar ease.

By now he was close. Very close.

Everything that had happened over the last stretch of days had left him too busy to focus on it properly, but the pressure inside his core had been building for a while. He could feel it now more clearly than before, the way a reservoir knows it is one storm away from overflowing.

Pri Core.

The fifth rank.

He had almost reached it.

’Not much longer now.’

The Primordial Body made the process smoother as always his unique talent helped too. Mana moved toward him more readily, drawn in and guided inward with a rhythm his body had begun to accept as natural. The room faded. The sounds of paper shifting and Bartholow’s breathing at the table drifted farther and farther away.

Ti lost its outline.

Hours passed.

At so point, Bartholow’s voice broke into the room.

"I have sothing! I have sothing, Trafalgar!"

Trafalgar did not answer.

He was too deep inside the current of his own concentration, fixed in place with the kind of stillness that made him look almost carved rather than alive.

Bartholow looked over from the table and stopped.

For a while, he simply watched.

It had been so ti since he had ditated seriously himself, and seeing Trafalgar like that stirred the idea in him. His own talent made the process slower, heavier, far less gratifying, but that did not stop the impulse from rising.

So, after a brief and highly questionable line of reasoning, he decided to imitate what he was seeing.

Bartholow took off his shirt, folded it with awkward care, sat down nearby, and began trying to gather mana as well.

The room returned to Trafalgar slowly.

When he finally opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was Bartholow sitting a short distance away, shirtless, eyes closed, doing his very best to cultivate with a seriousness that might have been admirable if it were not also faintly ridiculous.

Trafalgar stared at him.

Then he turned toward the window.

The sky was no longer dark. Dawn had begun to seep in through the glass, pale and cold, carrying the first thin light of morning.

’...Looks like I overdid it.’

He rose, rolled one shoulder, and called out softly, "Barth."

No response.

"Barth."

Still nothing.

Trafalgar walked closer and saw the truth imdiately.

Bartholow had fallen asleep while ditating.

His posture had survived longer than his consciousness.

Trafalgar exhaled through his nose, half amusent, half resignation, and left him there for the mont. He went to the table instead.

The pages were spread out in careful clusters now. Originals on one side. Bartholow’s translated notes on the other, written in his own hurried hand. The first few pages had already been worked through more thoroughly than Trafalgar expected.

He picked one up.

"Good work, Barth."

That much was true.

Whatever else Bartholow lacked, he made up for with obsession the mont old texts were involved.

Trafalgar drew one of the translated pages closer and lowered his eyes to it.

This ti, at last, he was about to see what the void creature had written.