Galus somehow managed to drag that shitty fucking sword up three flights of stairs, and up into the castle itself, he walked through a hallway, and looked into a few rooms, one of which he noticed a portrait, one of a man wielding the grafted blade to fight against Godfrey. he remembered something about that, apparently Godfrey killed a clan of swordsmen and some absolute mad lad thought he'd wield a sword made of all of his clans swords welded together, that guy apparently got their ass kicked and died, and Godfrey kept the sword here on honor of their bravery. Galus had to admit, even with it's unwieldiness seriously no wonder he died, it had a lot more interesting lore surrounding it than a lot of other, rolled his shoulders popping them into place and started dragging the sword again, checking the rooms, after about five times of seeing rooms that looked like cougars had pillow fights in there. Pillows and blankets ripped apart and claw marks in the walls and wood bedframes.

Eventually he came to a room that wasn't torn asunder, it was alot more feminine and he assumed it was Irina's, he sighed, walking over to her dresser, maybe he could get her some new clothes from here. He turned a nice white dress under his arm and saw a painting on the wall of Edgar say holding a much younger Irina on his knee, the large sword leaning on the wall behind him. He sighed, he 'might' refrain from round house kicking him into the challenger deep when this was over. He draped the dress over his shoulder and grabbed the painting, he had a lord commander to meet.

Galus kicked down the door, and walked out onto the ramparts. He dragged the big ass sword onto the rampart, the soldiers who were fighting earlier were dead. The misbegotten who had killed them were eating them they looked up at him and Galus must have been emanating an aura of death and anger or maybe it was instinct but either way they backed right off.

He dragged it up another fucking flight of stairs and found Edgar sitting right where he always was in the gate, sopping wet from the rain, he dropped the sword in front of him, then put the painting right next to it. Galus spoke in his no nonsense tone "Choose."

Edgar looked up at the man who was standing there. "Excuse me?"

Galus strode forward grabbed him by the chest plate and threw him onto the ground. "Choose! You were happy with her, you had something truly special, and you left her alone waiting, and blind on a bench in the shit end of nowhere! Now choose, will you be a father, or will you take your precious sword."

Edgar looked at him with fury. "That is this castles treasure, it is my duty to-" he was cut off by Galus' boot crashing into the side of his head.

"Your duty is to your family! Your soldiers, are dead! Your castle is overrun, your daughter is alive, and you are here, sitting in the fucking rain and wanting your sword, here it is, but I swear to fucking Christ that I will throw you into the ocean if you dare so much as touch it." Galus screamed at him.

"Swear to who?" The man asked,

Galus blinked. "Not important, what is important is that you're still here! Your daughter is safe, not sitting alone in the fucking woods! So choose, your daughter or your duty." Galus grabbed the painting, showing the picture to him. "What the fuck happened to you man?! You used to have your priorities straight, but now... Now you're just fucking broken."

Edgar started crying, this fucking knight was crying. Galus sat down next to him, and patted him on the back. "Fear not, you have a second chance, I made sure of that, now go, I'll even escort you personally. The choice is yours, an empty duty or a daughter who is full of life and love."

Edgar nodded, he reached forward his fingers curled in hesitation, before grabbing the sword, he got up and dragged it to the edge, before raising it over his head and throwing it into the ocean.

Galus looked up, cursing the rain clouds, that would have been a great time to start drawing that down.

Galus got up, and walked over to Edgar. He put hand on his shoulder, and then punched him in the chest, it didn't do jack shit with the chest plate there. "That was fucking beautiful, but I carried that thing up four flights of stairs to get that up here!" He sighed. "Good job. Now carry this dress please, your Irina's been wearing the same dress for the last..." He tilted his head, counting his fingers. "Eightish days."

Edgar sighed. "So, where's my daughter."

Galus hesitated, yeah your daughter? I left her with a witch who loves breaking all da rules and regularly turns students of the academy of raya lucaria into abominations in the eyes of the omnisaya, I'm sure that'll go over great. "She's at the waypoint ruins, she's with a friend of mine."

The two left the castle and Started on the road. The rain had let up and Galus spotted something of a rainbow, that was nice. He looked back to the road ahead.

Edgar looked at Galus, then back to the road. "While you and Irina were on the road, did you run into any trouble?"

Galus nodded. "Tons, first it was misbegotten, then cultists of the frenzied flame, your men fought them off but... I fear they had been corrupted in the process."

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Edgar growled. "Captain Davis was right then, they needed to be dealt with, but I told my men to focus on fortifying the castle, what's one more tarnishes on my record."

Galus nodded. "Was he the one in charge of the bridge blockade?"

Edgar nodded. "Good man, steady, able to adapt to bad situations."

Galus nodded. "Sounds like you respected them."

Edgar laughed. "Respect yes, but we butted heads like bulls."

They continued until they found themselves at Korne's camp, though it seemed he had moved on, he did find a note left for him, saying they had left to go up near waypoint ruins, right where they were going, though he didn't know how he knew they were going there.

They moved on and got to the bridge, and much to Galus' terror, the guards were there, and their eyes were as yellow as sulfur. He unsheathed his sword, Edgar looked at him in confusion. "You're sure they're corrupted?"

Galus motioned toward them with his sword. "Look at their eyes. Did your mens eyes burn yellow when they were under your command?"

Edgar shook his head.

Galus motioned. "Then why did you ask." Galus walked forward, seeing one of the figures over there was the charred corpse he saw when he crossed With Blaidd earlier.. he closed his eyes, and sighed. "Looks like Shabriri wants to talk in person."

Edgar looked confused. "You mean Shabriri, from the story of a man who was killed for heresy?"

Galus nodded. "The very same, he seems to be just a tad miffed that I didn't let your daughter die. He probably isn't keen on me saving another one."

Edgar looked at him like he just slapped him. "Wha-"

Galus slapped him on the back. "I'll explain later, but I'm going to go talk to an outer god, wish me luck. And kindly stay right about here, I'll see if I can't exchange witty banter and then do what needs to be donem" He says, walking off toward the bridge.

He met the grizzly scene of the corpse with a stoic face.

It made a wheezing sound and shook, probably a laugh of somekind before speaking in the worst smokers voice he'd ever heard. "So, you're here, I expected you to run in the other direction, and they call me crazy." It said, and further wheeze laughing they became more like coughing before a burned up piece of lung got propelled onto the ground. "Well that is just embarrassing."

Galus drew a blank, did this outer god just make a dragon ball abridged reference? "Is there an inn between here and the fucking point, what do you want."

Shabriri looked at him shocked. "I thought you wanted some witty banter, fine, bring me my maiden, or you will wish you were never born."

Galus nodded, pretending to look thoughtful, then brought his sword through it's head. "No."

The soldiers didn't take kindly to that. They employed the same tactics as they did when dealing with the cultists, only now it was just one man attacking them. He dodged a pair of bolts and with a blur he was behind the shield wall, and with a spin a pair of heads toppled to the ground. He was lucky it was only the two greatshielders, it would have been hell of they had a full phalanx. Great sword wielder was next and he side stepped another bolt and then dodged a sweep of their greatsword, he stabbed his sword through it's stomach before he tore it to the side, and in a blur he was was to the side of the balista platform and his crossbow was in his off hand, he shot it and it hit the man in the helmet, the bolt shattered and then hopped up one platform and to the next one, he slashed the man, and then kicked him off. He leapt off stabbing a wielder of a shield and sword through the shoulder and into it's heart. Tore the sword out kicking the body off as well.

He looked around, seeing one of them rushing Edgar, and saw a pair of fuckers in yellow robes rushing him in a literal frenzy. He crouched down and rushed over with his bloodhounds step, it got him there quickly and Galus wasn't able to see Edgar bring his halberd down on one of the cloaked figures heads, and stabbed the second with the spear end. Leaving the soldier, which Galus managed to cut in half half in his rush. It was amazing the kind of shit a blade coming at someone nearly the speed of a bullet could do to the human body. he stopped in front of Edgar seeing the two cultists already dead and gone. Galus nodded in respect. Edgar nodded in return. And then the somehow still alive torso started spewing flames from it's eyes. Galus just barely reacted, grabbing Edgar by his collar and threw him backwards, and felt a blast of flame hit him square in the face. it was hellish, once again it felt like his mind was on fire and he wasn't sure if the screams were his or the cacophony in his head. Eventually he managed to power through it, he looked and saw Edgar breathing heavily, his halberd broken holding the broken end like a war axe. Clearly Galus had done a number on him but atleast he was alive and not turned into a raging madman.

He stabbed his weapon into the ground. "Are you okay?" Galus asked, wincing at the sound of his own voice, fuck his head hurt.

Edgar huffed. "I... Should be... Asking you that..."

Galus looked down seeing he had quite a few wounds on him. He reached to his belt grabbing his flask and taking a drink, the familiar numbing sensation coming over himself. He sighed seeing the wounds closing.

He grunted looking at Galus. "Think I can get a bit of that?"

Galus passed the potion, and the commander drank some of it it. "Thanks" Edgar said.

Galus looked at Edgar. "So, once you and Irina reunite where will you be going?"

Edgar shrugged. "Was thinking stormveil castl-"

"No!" Galus shouted in a panic.

Edgar looked at him raising an eyebrow. "Why not?"

Galus groaned. "Where do I start... Godrick would probably cut you both to pieces and graft you into a his body, if you're lucky. Listen, I know a place, and I think you can take on a demi human or forty. I was going to make this place my own little house. But off the coast of limgrave there's a small island only accessable by a cave with many demi humans in it, there's an old dragon communion church there that's long since fallen into ruin, the most hostile thing on that island is a very angry goat. I'm not interested in whatever crazy shit the tarnished are getting up to, I just want to live my life in peace."

Edgar looks at him. "Really, you don't want to be a lord? You might be skilled enough to get to the throne."

Galus sighed, shaking his head. "I'm a heretic in the eyes of whatever remains of the golden order, they respect strength but despise equality. As they've demonstrated time after time, I'm strong, but I'm nowhere near equal, I'm just wanting to live in peace, is that such a horrible crime?"

Edgar looked thoughtful, Galus got up. "We should get going. It'll be a long walk."

-----------

Irina sat in the room with the pumpkin head, Selen made her sit out there because her overall depression was distracting her.

She looked up, hearing the sound of chainmail, she looked up excited. "Dad? Galus is that you?"

A voice that was rather raspy spoke. "No, I'm not your father, but I am looking for you." She heard the pumpkin head get up, and the smack of it's club smacking into it's open hand.

The voice tittered. "So you really want to get in my way? I finally have an opportunity to end my suffering. I'm not about to let a brute like you get in my way!"

Irina heard the iron door open and heard Selen's voice. "Irina, get in here, and lock the door."

She got up and started running but someone caught her by the collar of her dress. But a large force hit the person off of her. She ran along the wall a hand brushing the wall and the other in front of her, she felt someone else grab her and put her into the room.

Before the room locked up and she heard something happen, she brushed her hand on the door noticing a smooth glassy texture where the doors ornate carvings once were. She backed up as the sounds of roars screams and blasts of glintstone sorceries came from the door. Until silence.

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Galus and Edgar got to the waypoint ruins, he ran into Korne on the way there, he'd found nothing worth buying or selling there, so he left. Galus shrugged, waving to him and the mule he was riding on.

When Galus got to the ruins he knew something was wrong when he saw the Miranda flowers dead. He rushed over to the entrance, Edgar close behind, he stumbled at the sight that met him inside, seeing Selen sitting against the wall, gasping for breath. The pumpkin head was dead eerily familiar burn marks on it's body.

Selen glared at him, and pointed. "you have explaining to do."