Reborn as a Useless Noble with my SSS-Class Innate Talent

The empire's capital had never seen such a hurried storm of activity.

The grand duchess's estate was alive with chaos. Footmen ran down the halls with armfuls of linens.

Carts full of rare flowers, bolts of silk, crates of spices, and ornaments rattled through the gates nonstop. Seamstresses shouted over each other, cooks bickered in the kitchen about menus, and the maids looked one gust of wind away from collapsing.

At the center of it all was the grand duchess, Amana, overseeing every detail with a strained calm. Her eyes scanned the reports and ledgers without rest, her lips pressed into a thin line as she signed off order after order.

Every direction was sharp, every decision immediate. Time, after all, was a luxury she no longer had.

Still, the pressure bore down hard on everyone. One afternoon, as the courtyard overflowed with imported flowers still needing arrangement, the head butler approached her in a rare moment of pause.

"Your Grace. I must beg your pardon, but I feel compelled to speak."

He began, bowing deeply.

Amana glanced up from her scrolls.

"Go on."

The butler hesitated, then said gently.

"You will only marry once in your life. Surely… even a duchess deserves the time to enjoy it. The servants are doing what they can, but nothing of true beauty is built in such a rush."

Her eyes softened, but her expression didn't waver.

"You think I don't want to wait?"

"I think you deserve more than this panic and exhaustion."

"I do. But it isn't about what I deserve. It's about what I need."

She whispered, then shook her head slowly.

She stood and moved to the window, watching the carts pass below.

"If I wait too long, Kyle may not return. Or worse, he may return changed… burdened. I need this now, while he's still himself. I need to know he'll be mine, even if only on paper, before the war takes him."

The butler bowed again, eyes downcast.

"Then we shall do everything in our power, Your Grace. It will not be perfect, but it will be yours."

"…Thank you."

Amana murmured, her voice heavy with emotion.

Meanwhile, at the Armstrong estate, things were not much calmer.

Kyle had barely stepped inside before he was ambushed by a flock of maids, tailors, and stewards, all eager to begin their part of the wedding preparations.

He didn't even have the chance to sit down before someone declared.

"To your room, my lord. We must start now!"

"Start… what?"

He asked.

"Preparations!"

Came the collective response.

What followed was a whirlwind Kyle would've normally resisted with every fiber of his being. Baths scented with crushed lavender, measurements for ceremonial attire, hair pulled and combed until it gleamed.

Every time he tried to rise or protest, someone gave him that look:

'You're doing this for the duchess.'

And, for the first time in his life, Kyle accepted it all.

He thought about the letter she'd sent him—short, hurried, filled with concern and vulnerability. And he thought about her sacrificing the dream wedding she had once spoken so fondly of.

A grand ceremony. Processions. Fireworks. Music. Politics and nobles. Gone—all of it.

He owed her, at the very least, his patience.

When the day's torture was done, and he was finally allowed to breathe during dinner, one of the maids leaned over and whispered.

"We'll be back tomorrow, Lord Armstrong. We're not done."

Kyle merely nodded and picked at his food, already resigned to the fate ahead.

As he sat in the quiet dining room, lit by warm candlelight and the faint scent of lilies, he thought about Amana again.

He didn't know what the war would bring, or whether he would return victorious—or return at all. But he understood why she was in such a rush.

This wedding, in its strange, rushed imperfection, was her way of anchoring him. Claiming him. Saying, "You are mine," before the world tried to take him away.

And Kyle, for all his usual stubbornness and pride, accepted that silently.

The morning sunlight filtered through the curtains, but Kyle had been awake long before dawn.

Sleep had eluded him. Not because he feared the war—he was long past fearing things like that—but because of the quiet ache in his chest.

A heaviness he couldn't shake. He wasn't sure if it was guilt, worry, or simply the weight of being loved more deeply than he'd ever intended to be.

Today, he was getting married. To a woman who had given up her dreams of grandeur just to make sure she didn't lose him.

Kyle sat by the window, watching the sky shift colors. His hands were still, but his thoughts were anything but.

He had fought monsters, gods, and fate itself—but nothing had left him more unsteady than the simple truth that someone like the Grand Duchess was willing to stake everything on him.

He hadn't even done anything to deserve it.

When the servants entered, bustling around him with combs, cloth, and instructions, he let them.

Normally, he would've resisted, but today he didn't complain. He allowed them to smooth his hair, fit him into ceremonial wear, polish his boots.

He bore it all quietly—not because he cared about appearances, but because this was the one thing he could give her.

The least he could do was look the part.

He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror once, surrounded by layers of royal fabric and silver-threaded embroidery. It felt foreign.

Like looking at a stranger. And yet, somewhere beneath all that—he was still Kyle. The man who didn't know how to love properly. The man who somehow ended up loved anyway.

As the servants left to prepare for the next round of adjustments, Kyle stood alone in his room again.

He placed a hand over his chest.

"I'll make it back."

He murmured.

It wasn't a promise. It wasn't a vow. It was a truth he would carve into the world, if he had to.

For her.

For the people following him into war.

And maybe… for himself, too.

Kyle wandered through the quiet paths of the Armstrong estate, letting the fading light fall over the stone walkways and old trees.

His mind was a blur, and walking helped, if only a little. He turned a corner—and paused.

There, standing alone near the garden archway, was Christan Armstrong.

His eldest brother.

Kyle hesitated. He hadn't spoken with Christan in days—not since the news of the rushed wedding broke. He wondered, almost bitterly, what his brother might say now. A warning? A judgment? A dismissal?

But Christan didn't even look at him.

Kyle began walking again, brushing past him in silence. And only then, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Christan slowly turn his head.

Their eyes met.

It wasn't anger or disappointment that Kyle saw—it was something far worse. A distant, haunted look, as if Christan had seen the future and already mourned it.

Kyle stopped for a moment, unsure whether to speak.

But Christan said nothing.

Just watched him… with sorrow carved deep into his face.

Then looked away…at first.

But Kyle knew that someone like Christan won't stay quite for too long. And he was proven right minutes later.