[The quiet contentment Yuan is broadcasting makes Kratos glance over with a smile while Colette and Lloyd are debating which Iselian dogs stand a better chance of catching a quick fox. When is the last time he's seen Yuan like this? Not for thousands of years. Not since before everything went wrong, but after they had figured out how to navigate their individual differences. A moment later, Raine's question catches Kratos's attention.]

I -- yes, of course. If you don't feel it's too much of a disruption.

[He can't remember the last time someone felt the need to point out that he's done this before. He'd been a knight; of course he'd also been a teacher. Kratos hesitates, glancing sidelong at Yuan. He isn't entirely sure how much Yuan has told them about their ancient history, and the era from which they'd both come.]

I have done this before. When I was a youth, I tutored my half-siblings. And when I became a knight, I taught knights-in-training, and my own apprentices.

[Apprentices. Plural. The plural feels like a punch in the gut, but after the fact; a blow he doesn't see coming, because it slips off his tongue before he thinks to stop it. The distant rumble of the worlds clashing, for a moment, seems very close; and overlaid on Mithos's laughter. Kratos doesn't realise it, but his face tightens.]