Chapter 64: A Taboo Word in House Augusta

Curiosity got the better of Irvine before he’d even fully decided to move.

His chair scraped back hard against the balcony floor, the sound sharp enough to cut through the ambient noise, and he was already rising, weight shifting forward onto his palms before he’d properly registered standing at all.

From the balcony’s edge, his eyes swept the crowd below in one quick sweep, then snagged, drawn almost magnetically toward a cluster of unusually vivid hair colors cutting through the sea of muted noble finery.

Alicia and Cecilia stood out first, their pale blue hair catching the chandelier light in a way that made them easy to spot from above.

Then his gaze slid past them and landed on the young man beside them, dressed exactly the way Claudia had described.

Irvine’s eyes went wide, his whole body going still for a beat, caught somewhere between recognition and disbelief at the sight of that silver cloak.

He leaned further over the railing, studying the shape of him more carefully, and something clicked into place.

"That boy. Isn’t that the seventh child of House Sarnel?" Irvine said, the words coming out slower than he meant them to, still turning the realization over.

"The seventh Sarnel child? Do you mean the Lucian that Lumina always talks about?"

Claudia leaned in immediately at the name, something in it striking a chord she hadn’t expected.

Her gaze dropped to study Lucian’s build, taller now, filled out in ways that bore almost no resemblance to the boy she vaguely remembered from childhood. She hadn’t paid him much attention back then either, only crossing paths with him whenever she’d come looking for Lumina during one of their old, easy afternoons playing together.

"What’s gotten into you two? Have you never seen a blind man before?"

The word landed wrong the instant it left Amelia’s mouth. Claudia’s hand shot out, gripping her aunt’s wrist fast enough to startle her into silence.

Her eyes darted around the balcony on reflex, scanning every guard and attendant nearby, and only settled once she confirmed each one belonged solely to House Augusta, none of them anywhere near Lumina’s own household staff.

The breath she’d been holding came out slow and relieved. Amelia, meanwhile, watched the whole exchange with open confusion, clearly baffled by whatever had just passed between her niece and nephew.

"Whew. Good thing Lumina isn’t here. Aunt, please, don’t speak badly about Lucian, and especially don’t ever call him blind again."

Claudia’s warning came out clipped, urgent, the kind of tone that made clear this wasn’t etiquette, it was survival instinct.

Before Lumina had risen to prominence as a Saintess, consumed by Order of Lumielle duties, she’d once overheard the head of her own household guard speaking carelessly about a strange rumor tied to Lucian’s name.

The man had gone so far as to advise Lumina directly, urging her to keep her distance from Lucian, lest the rumors clinging to him, the failure, the family disgrace, start attaching themselves to her by association.

Lumina hadn’t said a word in response. She’d simply struck him.

One blow. Bare fist, no Mana Core behind it at all. Eighteen broken ribs. Both arms shattered. One leg twisted so badly it dislocated on impact.

The man’s condition had turned critical almost instantly, and Irvine himself had spent agonizing minutes keeping him tethered to consciousness while a senior healer scrambled to save his life.

Since that day, an unspoken law had settled quietly over House Augusta’s entire staff: never speak ill of anyone, least of all Lucian, or risk sharing that same guard’s fate.

Every attendant and soldier from House Augusta within earshot visibly stiffened at the memory Claudia had just dragged back into the open.

They weren’t the only ones rattled. The idea that a girl under twenty had broken a Golden Core bearer with a single strike, no magic involved at all, made Cedric choke violently on his wine, coughing hard enough to nearly double over in his seat.

He could barely bring himself to believe it, and yet a house as prestigious as Augusta had no reason to exaggerate a story like that for effect. If anything, the fact that Lumina had gone on to become a Saintess at all only confirmed it, someone with strength like that hardly needed rumors to prove her power.

Amelia shifted uncomfortably, sensing the whole exchange had cast her, unfairly, as the one trying to speak ill of Lucian.

"I suppose our current Saintess is a bit more particular than most. I’ll need to watch my words more carefully going forward. Though truly, I never meant any disrespect toward the Sarnel boy."

She folded her hands together with practiced elegance, gaze drifting back down toward the floor below, finding her own daughters first before settling once more on Lucian. A faint smile touched her lips before she continued.

"If anything, House Winter owes him a debt of gratitude. He did us a genuine service, once."

What Amelia meant, and what she went on to explain, was the moment years ago when Lucian had saved Alicia’s life.

Alicia herself hadn’t realized her rescuer’s identity until their reunion at the Awakening ceremony, and she’d since spoken of preparing a formal invitation, drawing him to House Winter’s own estate so she could properly thank him for it.

Claudia’s brow lifted, visibly caught off guard by yet another layer to this story unfolding in front of her.

"And what about you, Irvine? Have you found anything interesting about that seventh Sarnel child, something that would explain why your second daughter’s taken such an interest in him, beyond the simple fact that he’s apparently the first male white Awakening in recorded history?"

"Wait. So it’s actually true, Amelia? He really is a white Awakening?"

News of Lucian’s Awakening color hadn’t traveled nearly as fast or as far as the ugly rumors already clinging to his name.

Most of the empire remained entirely unaware of the truth, including the imperial family itself, and even House Sarnel’s own upper ranks, Cassius and the Elders among them.

It was as though someone, somewhere, had deliberately sat on that information right up until tonight’s engagement announcement could steal the spotlight instead.

Jeanne, coincidentally, had spent the entire evening consumed with tending to her mother, in no position to correct the record either.

Something sharpened behind Irvine’s eyes as he leaned forward again, his focus narrowing entirely onto Lucian’s distant figure. For a man of his caliber, that gaze went far deeper than appearance alone, reaching past the surface to read the shape of power itself.

A long moment passed in silence.

There was strength there, undeniably, something substantial radiating off the boy even from this distance.

And yet a thread of doubt kept tugging at Irvine’s certainty, because he couldn’t detect even a trace of the Element of Light clinging to him, the exact signature that should have marked a true white Awakening beyond question.

"Is this some kind of coincidence?" Irvine murmured, still studying the balcony rail beneath his fingers, eyes fixed downward.

Claudia, Amelia, even Cedric, who’d stayed quiet through most of the exchange, all turned toward him now, curiosity sharpening at the mention of a male white Awakening actually existing.

"I actually crossed paths with someone else once, silver cloak, silver hair, everything about her should have read as a genuine white Awakening at a glance. Turned out it wasn’t real at all, just the effect of a fractured yellow crystal relic she carried."

"So when I heard about a silver-cloaked figure at tonight’s event, I assumed it had to be her showing up again. Instead, I’ve stumbled onto something far more surprising, that a genuine male white Awakening actually exists after all."

Irvine’s tone had dropped into something more serious now, weighing every word.

"Honestly, I couldn’t sense a single trace of the Element of Light from that Sarnel boy myself. But since you’re the one confirming it, Amelia, I suppose it has to be true."

Amelia insisted she couldn’t possibly have mistaken what she’d seen. It wasn’t only the Obelisk’s telltale white glow she’d caught sight of, she’d seen the winged shape itself, a being wreathed in the Element of Light, manifesting directly from Lucian’s own body.

"Ah, you mean the Omen creature? If that sacred being actually appeared, then there’s no room left for doubt at all."

Irvine let out a short laugh, easing himself back down into his seat. "Now I’m almost curious how the imperial family’s going to react, once they realize what kind of gem they nearly threw away tonight."

Meanwhile, down on the floor, Lucian felt the weight of being watched settle over him, a prickling awareness crawling up the back of his neck. He turned toward the second-floor balcony on his right, searching for whoever’d been staring.

No one. The space stood empty as far as he could tell.

He faced forward again, and that was when he caught movement ahead, someone cutting through the crowd with purpose, heading straight toward Burrel and Galen, clearly intent on defusing whatever was still simmering between them.

"So the Prince decided to show up after all." The comment came from Cecilia, spoken with the easy familiarity of someone who already knew exactly who that figure was.