Galus walked back up the path, and met the group. They were looking at him shocked, they had apparently seen the altercation.

Nepheli spoke up. "He gave you what you wanted, why did you kill him?"

Galus looked at her. "Because Gideon would have made his death last, not to mention they would have turned on us given the chance, leg or no leg."

Edgar shook his head. "That might be true but you said you wouldn't kill him."

Galus raised an eyebrow. "I said no such thing, in fact I made it quite clear I was going to kill him."

Edgar looked confused then realization creeped across his face. "Shit you are scary."

Galus shrugged. "Just don't ask how I got the grafted sword back."

Edgar looked confused, but didn't ask.

Galus walked off and the others followed. "Let's go talk to Albus, he can hide Irina until the omen killer is dead."

Galus walked over to a large pot, and crouched down next to it, knocking on it's surface, the pot vanished in mist revealing an old albinaurics, needless to say he crawled backwards in a panic. "No! No secrets lie with me! Please just leave!"

Galus held up his hands to calm him, and it seemed to work, a little too quickly in Galus' opinion.

Albus looked at his hands. "You're an acolyte of Miquella?"

Galus realized he was seeing the tattoos on his palms and nodded. "Yes, he and Saint Trina, they sent me to help your village."

The albinauric from the well approached, crawling upon the ground. "It appears true Albus, he is here to repel the invaders..."

Albus looked at him. "Otin? I thought you dead."

Otin nodded. "I stayed near the well, but this man found me, and fought the fowl poisoner and made him reverse the process by which they poisoned our waters, we can flee now."

Albus looked at Galus. "Thank you, but I need to ask more of you I'm sorry, but can you please find Lattena. I fear what might have happened to her." He handed Galus the half of the Dectus medallion.

Galus nodded, taking it. "I'll find her, and I won't rest until justice is served to the man who did this to you."

Albus smiled, and Galus walked over to the bridge, Edgar and Nepheli following him.

They ran into some resistance by a couple of albinaurics but Galus promptly put them to sleep, though he started to feel a light throbbing behind his eyes from fp expenditure, he guessed that meant it was about half depleted.

When they got to the other side the smell of burning flesh hit like a truck Galus lost what little lunch he had today onto the ground. He spat a mix of bile He walked forward seeing the Omen killer looming over the flames. It must have heard him, because it turned toward the group and Nepheli took a step back, Galus sensed a great amount of hesitation but he didn't have time to give her a pep talk.

Galus rushed forward using his bloodhounds step to move at great speed swinging his bloodhound fang sword and he felt it collide with something hard. he slid to a stop about twenty feet away from the omen killer. He saw they blocked his strike, with their massive horned clubs. One of the omen horns had been sheered off and a deep smoking cut was left in the... Bone? Was that bone? He couldn't really tell what that material was for all he knew it would be an omen leg bone. The cut reminded him of when he would start fires with a couple of sticks, so the speed and friction created heat, he remembered seeing the bloodhound knights claws were glowing hot when it clawed to a stop, bloodhound step is a powerful ability, but it had it's weakness, for one he could not see what he was hitting, the speed was such that it was like fighting while on a damn roller coaster.

Galus rushed in but not dashing, using both of his hands wielding it almost like somekind of nodatchi, he wished the handle was a bit longer to balance out the long blade, though it was a lot lighter than the thick blade would have you believe, he wondered what the hell this brown metal was. It collided with the horned surface, they raised their other club to to strike him but it shifted instead to block Edgar's strike from his own large curved sword colliding with their other club leaving the leaving them open to Nepheli, but she was still standing there, but she wasn't alone, Gideon, FUCKING, Ofnir was standing their a bunch of glintblades hovering around her. He seemed more interested in our fight than helping. Galus cursed kicking the omen killer in the knee hoping to break there leg, but it didn't even budge. He cursed as they turned their head toward them and a glow came from the mouth of their mask. He dodged out of the way as a gout of flames blasted from their breath. He attempted to hound step behind them but they struck him, fuck they were faster than they looked. He was knocked backwards colliding with a tombstone, he luckily blocked it but it felt like he tried to block four wheeler being thrown at him, and his wrists and arms hurt like hell. He saw them turn their full attention on Edgar, they omen killer raised a club and smashed it into a burning corpse the horns impaling it, before raising it and flinging the flaming corpses the body at them, he cut the body out of the air but a good flaming chunk smacked into his face and patted it out, that was all the distraction they needed because they rushed forward and attacked, they attacked them.

Galus got up, and conjured a discus of light to strike them in the back. It got through their defenses and it cut through their arm, and Galus walked forward popping his back and rubbing his wrists, he'd stabbed his sword into the ground, nothing save for his seals in his name. He conjured two more discs and sent them flying at them, the first reversed toward Galus the three discs circling around him the omen killer turned, it didn't show fear which Galus found strange. He sent the three discs zipping toward them, it attempted to block them but it cut through the club In half and cut them across the side, the other two aimed toward their head and it dodged but they dodged them, though it did sheer through their corroded bronze mask the metal clanging to the ground and revealed a woman with blonde hair with heavy scarring. She started forward tossing the useless handle to the side, and grabbed a vial, and drinking the contents and breathing out a scorching cone of fire. He danced backwards and recalled the discs the discs started coming back toward the omen. They cut through the woman's legs, dismissed one, but grabbed the other two, and used the discs to cut their head off.

He turned toward Gideon, he was still there. "Gideon!" He yelled, marching forward.

Gideon brought the glowing swords closer to Nepheli. "I always knew this one was too soft, my accursed oath to my friend is the only reason I adopted her."

Galus stopped seeing the obvious threat. "I know what you want, but you will not be getting the Dectus medallion, frankly I thought you'd send Ensha to fight in your place like the coward you are."

Galus looked over his shoulder seeing the ass in the skeletal armor. He saw him holding the arm bones beneath Edgar's chin from behind them.

He looked back at Gideon. "You want to know what happened to Miquella no?"

Gideon held his staff like a cane. "What would you know?"

Galus took a step forward, and the glintblades moved closer to Nepheli. "Not another step, I'll kill her, and your friend."

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Galus inwardly smirked, he saw something move from behind Gideon, I'd need to keep his attention on me. "Gideon Ofnir, 'the all knowing' I have a question." He waited and Gideon nodded for him to continue, Galus smiled. "How do you get so limber that you can bring your head between your legs enough to kiss your own ass so fucking efficiently?"

Gideon stayed silent.

Galus shook his head. "Seriously you really believe your own hype that fucking much? A true sage knows, that there's an infinite amount of things to know, and a very finite amount of time to learn it."

Gideon tapped his large golden cane on the ground and he felt a burning on his chest. "I've had enough of your incessant babbling."

Galus smirked, and released his grip on the rings of light. They hovered there and he aimed a hand at Ensha, the man lowered his hands and looked at Gideon before rushing at him, Gideon was taken aback by the betrayal.

Edgar looked confused but went forward to attack with the man who just had a bone to his throat. The three closed in on Gideon, who apparently realized his folly and turned to run but albinaurics blocked his way, Irina in front of them, she smacked him with the stick, he stumbled back at the surprisingly strong blow by a blind woman no less. Galus turned to Ensha and sent a disc through his neck, there was no telling how long that effect would last.

He turned back to Gideon who was getting attacked by the albinaurics with their hooked ivory sickles. It was oddly satisfying to see him getting dragged to his knees by those he stepped up on to try and reach greater heights. He decided to let them have at it, though that seemed to be his first mistake, he raised his staff and a barrage of Glintstone bullets impacted some of the albinaurics he managed to to get to his feet, and start stumbling away, Galus crouched down holding his hands out to a couple albinaurics who gave him the ivory sickles, he got up, and started toward Gideon. They stumbled over the bridge, they turned blasting a Glintstone blade toward Galus, it missed, and Galus continued walking and got to the edge of the bridge, he sheered the ropes and the bridge jostled sending Gideon careening to one side and the bridge went lopsided and Gideon fell off and some of the rope had apparently wrapped around their ankle and when they fell it wrapped around their ankle, and when the rope went taught and Galus heard a scream from below, he he saw Gideon hanging by a leg, which must have been snapped out of it's socket, he didn't have his dumb staff anymore so his magic was a non factor now. He raised a hand conjuring a discus of light, he'd seen enough movies that if he didn't see the villain die, then there was a chance they'd come back to bite him in the balls later. A hand grabbed his arm, and he looked over his shoulder seeing Nepheli.

She looked at him. "That's my foster father, and he's unarmed."

Galus closed his eyes. "Even if he was four way amputee I'd still think he's to dangerous to live."

Her grip tightened. "He's unarmed."

Galus sighed, he could tell she'd kill him if he directed his discus of light to cut his head off or any other part of him, maybe even cutting the rope would cause them to snap at me, so he disabled the discus, his head was killing him anyways, he walked over to the house, speaking over his shoulder. "He's your responsibility, Edgar, Gideon's a slippery eel, don't let him try and worm his way out of here, I'm gonna take a nap."

Edgar nodded, walking over next to a nice tree he crossed his arms for warmth and closed his throbbing eyes.

-------------

Galus opened his eyes, and Miquella was sitting next to saint Trina. "You've made it to the the albinauric village." Miquella said, Trina speaking after her other half. "And have liberated it at that."

Galus looked at them with a smile. "Did you two rehearse that?"

The looked at him, an unamused look on their faces.

Galus sighed. "Right, you're two halves of the same person."

Miquella looked at him. "So, why are you here?"

Galus sighed. "I wanted to sleep off my migraine."

Trina nodded. "You over did it didn't you."

Galus nodded. "Well, I needed to get rid of on one but three powerful enemies, I didn't have a choice."

She chuckled. "Yeah, that makes sense, don't push yourself too hard, it'll make you feel like... As you say, hell frozen over."

Galus sighed. "So, I've been meaning to ask, what's with the flower."

They looked to eachother. "It's a symbol of rank and marks you as one of ours, if you have it on you and show it to albinauric riders or the knight of the Haligtree they'll know you're not an enemy and might even escort you. Remember, you're our shield, our enforcer, you command the soldiers at our ramparts, you martial our albinauric huntresses, you make sure that nobody come to harm us."

Trina walked over to him. "I've been devising a way to undo what's been happening to our body, the purifying tear stone, unfortunately, somebody killed my disciple who had it, and the person who has it is very dangerous, violet bloody finger Eleanora, the good news, she's been sent to kill you and she doesn't go anywhere without the gemstone, it's a necklace she wears."

Galus nodded with a sigh. "I'm sorry, I'm just a magnet when it comes to enemies."

Miquella stood up, "I think you do deserve a reward, so when you awaken, do look within yourself."

Galus nodded, getting his meaning, he is basically saying that he is giving Galus a new spell or two, but he had one last question. "Your sister, how do you expect me to help her, I remember that scarlet rot causes heightened aggression in their afflicted."

Miquella nodded. "It does, but she's shown an ability to resist the aggression effects."

Galus nodded, he supposed it made some sense. "Alright, well, I guess I'll see if I can't wake up." He said, Galus disappeared in a puff of golden sparkles.

Trina looked at Miquella. "I don't know, I didn't think he'd be up to snuff, but he's shown to be kind to the weak, resourceful when faced with overwhelming odds."

Miquella spoke. "And he can be brutal to anyone who'd dare cross him." The serene way he smiled didn't match the words he spoke. Miquella remembered when he watched through his eye when they offered the noble on a silver platter to the misbegotten after brutally beating him half to death. He was indeed dangerous when he was calm, and evil incarnate when he was angered.

----------

Galus opened his eye, it was still awkward not having two of those, he sat up seeing Nepheli rebuilding the bridge, Edgar on the other side. He got up brushing the dirt off his pant legs and butt, he popped his back, he was getting used to sleeping in armor, though he was still looking forward to getting an upgrade on his armor, he closed his eyes, and he smiled at the revelation.

He summoned a glowing golden sword, then dismissed it and summoned to a dagger, then switched it to a spear. All three were weapons he's wielded before. his old bastard sword, his back knife, and the spear he'd used in castle Morne, this, was gonna be useful, not having to lug around an entire armory was nice, it reminded him of Morgott's ability to summon weapons.

He tried summoning the hound fang sword, to his surprise it worked, he tried to bloodhound step, again surprised it worked, he summoned the crossbow shooting before summoning the spear and rushing forward and slashing, then started swinging around the spear like a bo staff, he stopped when he saw people were watching his mock battle.

He unsummoned the spear and walked over to Albus, sitting down next to him. "I see the villagers are recovering. They certainly gave Giddy over there a beat down."

Albus nodded. "Yes, we've been getting better, though I fear for the life of our Lattena, she's been missing for some time now, can you get her? She's yet to finish her pilgrimage."

Galus nodded. "It's on the way, so I don't see why not." Galus said, though that was his plan the entire time, no woman left behind and all.

Galus walked over to his sword, grabbing it and resheathing the blade. He might be able to duel wield the swords, given their remarkably light weight.

He turned and walked over to the others. "We can probably leave but this place is in shambles, even now there lies dead unburied, that's not even mentioning the buildings, it'd likely be better if we relocated them to somewhere in the lakes, this place is all but unrebuildable. There's also the fact that we are on a time crunch"

Irina looked toward Galus. "Galus, are you alright? You've been asleep for hours."

Galus realized it was night time for the first time. Crap how did that slip his mind. "Crap, maybe we should stay here for tonight."

She nodded. "We need to rest for a bit, maybe a day or so." Galus realized just how tired she looked.

Galus nodded, putting a hand on her shoulder. "I said this once and I'll say it again, while I live nothing will happen to you, if you want we can stay here tomorrow and rest. Me, Edgar and Nepheli can help rebuild. We can't just leave this place like this, I'm not the kind of person to save a kingdom from a mad king and leave without making sure the kingdoms ducks are in a row."

Galus walked over to Gideon seeing his armor was off, and he saw him, his long grey hair, and wrinkled face, and the light brown eyes that looked at him looked deceivingly warm, he looked like he could teach kids at Hogwarts, if he hadn't seen the armor piled up next to him, Galus crouched next to it, he picked up the chest plate, it had a really weird texture, like somekind of mix between metal and stone. Well, his prayer for better armor was answered, though the eyes and ears were a dumb touch. "Hey, Giddy, what's with the ears? Don't you think the all hearing, all seeing, theme is a bit on the nose?"

Gideon grunted, Galus noticed they had a gag in their mouth, he was going to give whoever did that a high five, he dropped the chest plate with a thud and sat down across from them. "So, Giddy, buddy ol' pal ol' Chum, ol' fellow" he said the last two words with a cold that Ranni would envy. "I'm going to make you a deal, one time only limited time offer, for these five minutes only you can get the answers you're looking for about Miquella the unalloyed if you repay the unalloyed order with your assets, you are a powerful man, but you're also a very knowledgeable man, I know you're a monster, a creature who would say and do anything you could to get your hands on this knowledge, and then promptly try and have us killed in our sleep."

.

Gideon grunted. Galus patted him on the shoulder. "That'a boy." He grabbed the back of Gideon's head and untied the gag.

Gideon looked at him. "Who are you?"

Galus smiled. "I'm Galus, the unalloyed hound, shield of Miquella. It's my job to make sure homicidal maniacs like you don't kill my lords people. Admittedly I came late."

Gideon closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening them again and speaking. "Galus, you realize Miquella can bewitch the minds of men and women alike right?"

Galus clapped sarcastically. "Bravo, bravo, if I didn't know that, then how do you think I turned your ally Ensha into a puppet."

Gideon blinked. "Why would he have given you such an ability?"

Galus tilted his head. "Because I prefer not to kill if there's a chance the person isn't evil, the only reason you're not dead is because your foster daughter begged me not to. Next time you tell her she's useless and soft, just remember that she's the reason you're alive." Galus summoned his golden knife and giving it a twirl a trail of golden light following it's blade.

Gideon looked at the buck knife, and Galus looked it over closely. The blades glow reflecting in his lone blue eye. "What do you believe in Gideon?"

Gideon looked at him. "Power."

Galus nodded. "Knowledge is power, that is still really on the nose."

Gideon actually gave a chuckle. "Well, it started as a hobby you know, I was a boy who asked alot of questions, what is the erd tree, why do we worship Marika, eventually I found a body on the road, I managed to find the person who did it, but I was so jubilant that I knew something nobody else did, that I didn't tell anyone I'd told myself that I wouldn't unless they asked. Unfortunately, nobody takes you seriously as a child, nobody asks your opinion on anything, so they didn't ask me about who killed the man, there were several more murders that occurred throughout Leyndell, and I was the only one who knew who the killer was, so yes, I had the knowledge of who the killer was, and as such, the power to stop them any time I wanted. In a way, I was the same as the murderer, we both craved power and control over others. Eventually I revealed the killers identity after their thirty fifth victim, and was celebrated as a hero. And so my hunt for knowledge began after that."

Galus gawked when he finished, say what you will but Gideon was a good story teller, he could empathize, he'd felt very helpless as a child. But that didn't justify 'genocide'! Galus got up, and regagged Gideon, he walked off, he needed some damn breakfast.