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~~((Thanksgiving Special - page 22 of 30))~~
'You did well, Hector,' said Garovel. 'Perhaps a little TOO well, in fact.'

"...What do you mean?"

'You slew the Man of Crows.'

Ah...

He remembered now.

The reaper. He'd killed the reaper.

His eyes eased shut, and he lay back down again with his forearm pressed against his forehead.

And he sighed.

He'd been in so many fights now. So many life and death situations. It felt a little strange to think about it, but... he still wasn't really used to killing. Especially people. Reapers.

In fact, that might've been the first reaper he'd ever killed. It was a bit hard to be certain, thinking back on some of the more chaotic fights he'd been involved in, such as the one at Dunehall where there'd been tons of invisible enemies around.

If nothing else, that was the first reaper he had knowingly killed.

Yes. The first.

He didn't much like that word. First. It implied there might be many more to come.

Egh.

While he didn't exactly feel bad about it, he didn't feel great, either. Hell, he hadn't even known the reaper's name. Or the crow guy's for that matter. When it came down to it, he'd barely known anything about them. Beyond the fact that they were the "enemy" and that they were infamous, they'd been mysteries to him.

It made him question things.

Could he have taken the reaper captive, instead?

Hmm.

Not likely. The way those crows had been gunning for him, they would've killed him and freed the reaper immediately thereafter. And the Man of Crows would have escaped. And Garovel might've been dead now, too.

Or maybe not. Maybe he was lacking imagination in some way.

Ugh.

He didn't like how... unbothered he was, right now. He felt the weight of his actions, the importance of them, but he didn't feel guilt. Like, at all, really.

That was a good thing, he supposed. And not wrong, perhaps. But it was still... concerning, in its own way.