Monday, March 27, 2023

Page 3263

"Do you know Lozaro's current whereabouts?" said Hector.

'Yes,' said Grigozo. 'Or at least, I know where he is most likely to be found. If you are to seek him out, however, then I would advise you to be exceptionally cautious in your approach. He is a man that has been on the run for many years from not only the Vanguard but also the Mad Demon himself. Lozaro is a man paranoid beyond measure. Any sign that something is amiss, and he will flee--and be quite difficult to pursue, I suspect.'

"So?" said Roman. "Where is this guy, then?"

'If you accept my surrender, and give me your word that you will not kill me, then I will happily tell you.'

"Uh-huh..." Roman gave Hector another look. He seemed like he had plenty of questions for Hector, too, but now obviously wasn't the time for them.

Hector still wanted to wait for Garovel's input before formally accepting, but... he was already feeling quite certain that he wasn't going to kill a defenseless, surrendering reaper. That just seemed flatly too cruel.

He decided to ask one more thing first, though.

"If I were to ransom you to someone, would you rather they were with the Vanguard or Abolish?"

At that, Grigozo seemed to finally struggle with finding his words.

Hector just waited, though.

'That... seems a loaded question to me.'

"Why?"

'You ask me to choose between certain death and a life of torment.'

"You really think the Vanguard would kill you when you have so much valuable information you could share with them?"

'Yes. If I were lucky, they would milk me for all I was worth and then put me to the sword. If I were unlucky, then I would be given over to one of the many malevolent idiots that infest their ranks, and they would simply skip to the end. Either way, it is not something I would choose.'

'Hector,' arrived Garovel's private voice.

Ah. Hector searched for the reaper's presence and found it, though it was still fairly far away. 'Garovel, I think I'm just going to accept his surrender.'

There came a pause. No doubt, Garovel was not pleased with being left out of the fight again and wanted to give him a piece of his mind, but the reaper stayed on topic. 'You sure about that?'

'Yeah. We can keep him prisoner, can't we?'

'We can. What's his name, though?'

'Grigozo.'

'...Alright, that's fine for now.'

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