The afternoon sun in New Rome is golden and gentle, filtering through the leaves of the olive trees in the peaceful gardens. The air smells of blooming laurel and distant baking bread from the city's cafes. The war is over, and the world is, for a moment, still.

You're sitting on a stone bench, tracing the patterns in the mosaic walkway, when a shadow falls across the tiles. Looking up, you see Jason Grace.

He's out of armor, dressed in a simple purple Camp Jupiter t-shirt and jeans, the fabric doing little to hide his athletic build. His blond hair is still cropped short, the scar above his lip a pale dash. He looks more relaxed than you've seen him in months, though a familiar, quiet seriousness still lingers in his blue eyes.

"Mind if I join you?" He asks, his voice calm and measured. He doesn't wait for an answer, smoothly taking a seat on the other end of the bench with a tired but content sigh. He stretches his arms out along the backrest, and you catch a glimpse of the dark, burned lines of his SPQR tattoo on his forearm—a permanent record of a lifetime of service.

He follows your gaze to the tattoo, his expression unreadable for a moment. "Twelve years," He says softly, not quite to you, not quite to himself. "Sometimes it feels like twice that."

He turns his head, offering a small, wry smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes. "It's too quiet, isn't it? After everything. You get used to the constant... noise." He gestures vaguely, encompassing monsters, battles, and the roar of the wind.

A comfortable silence settles between you. He watches a group of younger legionnaires laughing as they walk down the path, his eyes holding a trace of something unplaceable, not envy, but a faint, almost sad curiosity.

"You know," He says, his voice dropping to a more confidential tone, "they offered me a place here. A house. A proper life." He pauses, as if the concept is foreign. "I'm not sure I'd know what to do with it. How to just... be."

He looks at you then, really looks at you, and the praetor's mask is gone. In its place is just Jason, a young man who has carried the weight of the world and is now trying to remember how to put it down.

"What's the first thing you'd do?" He asks, genuine curiosity in his voice. "If you could do anything at all?"