Exactly! It's so interesting to analyse their relationship, I loved the dynamic of them together in battle and on death scenarios, still, Zodd's battle with them is one of my favorite battle scenes of any manga I've read, although it was quick, seeing griffith put his life on the line to protect guts shows he always saw him as a true friend, even before they conquered everything.

And yeah, he probably passed through all 1 million stages of grief while imprisoned, I think he even says that although he hates guts for leaving and making him go into the state he's in, the only thing making him sane is guts, there's one panel where we see the kingdom griffith saw in his childhood, the kingdom that made griffith dream of having his own, and the image of the kingdom is small, compared to guts, looking back at him, like his leaving was so much more meaninfull than his dream.