Valiant's Journal

[Hitman Hard]

*The writing is blindingly white and wrote careful, almost refined*

He's been backstabbed, avoided castration once, filled up with arrows and narrowely survived due to jumping aboard a passing caravan, tortured in the dark in a fashion similar to my own and bore the misphap like a bear.

But Lyons Torkel's worst enemy was himself and everybody knew it. Lyons never had a satisfied look to his features, never laughed unless the joke was laid out pointedly or if proved to be dirty or demeaning about women he'd walk away or lift the offender by his throat and send him sailing out a bar window. It was hard to not catch Lyons in a bar.
He really hated those type of jokes and I guess that was one of the main reasons I liked him. I once saw him in a delerious, drunk state shaking his girlfriend to and fro in that stuffy basement he called a house but he never struck her.
He gave a rustic sigh and restrained himself before I could turn that bottle against Lyons.

The hard truth was, the bottle was already bent towards Lyon's destruction. Lyons was as much a drinker as an avid pig of fine foods, he consumed gallons of various fish each week and deseprately fought against his ailing body with rigid exercises. Lyons was a man who wore sin on his sleeve with the resigned, accepting grace the best Ilmateri fails to show.

His steadfast loyalty to the Triad, and his fierce pride for Baldur's Gate, and his personal sense of tradition and glory was unmatched. I never knew a greater man, or developed such an unbreakable bond with any other being on this realm.

Lyons hangovers grew to an irksome, hellish height by 1339. I suppose the pressures stacked too high even for him, but I think ambition was too blame.

Lyons was widely regarded around the Gate as an obnoxious, Paladin wanna be jester, the eye of justice for those too poor to turn to the authorities, the terror of street gangs and cowardly exploiters, the "mind fried" vigilante who thanklessly saved a trio of children from a burning farmstead, his enemies were infinite, sadistic guards and false knights, pirates and peddlers of evil drugs, hardcore orc racists, but in the end cancer knocked on Lyons' door and there wasn't much we could do about it.

I only wish I could of listened to Lyons more in regards to orcs, I cannot take back the actions I committed against deprived orc kin or mend the scalding wounds and stigmas heralded by a centuries long plight of regressive intolerance carried out by the evil hands of man and elf and dwarf.

Lyons was granted the title amongst criminals and cutthroats as The Despiser, yet the truth rang clear to those few who gave him the chance. Lyons was a walking tragedy up untill the day he passed peacefully into the Seven Heavens.

[Hitman Hard]

Frustration! Have they not seen a man go down, before? What do I have to do to prove my repentance to the other knights and clerics? I have sacrificed! It seems the Radiant Heart doesn't want me in their world and see me as some monstrous thing savaging whatever gets in my way! It seems the only world I can walk round comfortably is the shadows.

[Hitman Hard]

Hells below, Heavens above, yet on this world I get to witness a little bit of both. Often times tragedies go by with no type of acknowledgment, poor men die huddled around their last bottle and comatose harlot with only Auril's cold breath for company. I see a quiet, desperate war raging on the streets and farmlands, people die every day in it and their names never make it to any official Roll of Deeds. . . no matter how many cold winters they endured while the Dukes sat in all their projected glory. Another Paladin once told me not to speak against the Dukes for it's a treason, but our duty is a radical one that does not submit to their black and grey ideals of defeatism.

My depressive thoughts take me to a certain day now, to a bar long boarded up. . . the year 1339. A morose year among many.

A barmaid with quick, paranoid eyes of deepest brown struggled to take in all the orders tossed at her. Some men with blasphemous tattoo art marring every pore of their bodies made raucous laughter as they realized her plight and moved in to exploit her vulnerability. She flinched reflexively and dropped a tray full of fish, the shortest and widest of the men who held enough cheek fuzz to be considered half-werewolf guffawed and studied every detail of fear on her freckled face.

"I'm making my rounds, honey. . ." Cheek fuzz's voice rose up and down between bravery and excitement, the alcohol spoke for him.

"J-just t-t-tell me what ya want?" Her breath coming fast, the voice could of belonged to the most fragile, innocent halfling in all of Gullykin.

She moved to pick up her tray and edged towards the bar counter, as if she had cast an invisible barrier between her and the drunken bullies.

I could hardly take any more of this as i sat in a back corner, gripping the table before me, grimacing and blinking a league a minute. A coward was one thing, but a man who drank a fifth of Moonlit Knight and considered himself a God was just plain contemptible. If I would of glanced away for just a second, it would of been left in the horror-filled back alleys of history the nobles refused to bring up in the most casual of conversations. But there it was, front and center.

SMACK!

The jarring sound of a tray clattering, glasses breaking, and a ringing sang a sweet righteous rage into me as I bolted from my table.

Cheek Fuzz roared devilishly, his own actions clearly blurred and distorted under the false confidence and evil of Moonlit Knight as he continued to smack her round, the sound of flesh ripping sent many heads turning. I was going to walk up with a casual smile and stick him in the heart with a dagger The realm seemed to slow down as I advanced. Cheek Fuzz saw me coming and I guess I couldn't put on a false smile for they drew their weapons. It was over now, no need for restraint.

A shriek of steel as everyone declared war, most the faces from the booths were leering at me. For what reason, I did not know. I guess a wise man is an apathetic one to them. A vast black, I thought. Where there is only. . .

A figure in dark grey armor lashed through my opponents, sending most to the floor crumbled in agony. I only caught the silver streak of long hair and the orange, blazing eyes as he pommel-striked a stumbler and brained the other with a mace.

It was Lyons Torkel, the "mind fried" vigilante who got right in Cheek Fuzz's face, grinning ear to ear before he sent that pissant sailing through a red-painted bar window.

[Hitman Hard]

He observed the palace district, trying to find something sentimental or harmlessly humorous, like children running and laughing or three fat men piled on a tiny bench. But all he could view in the impenetrable darkness were the booming voices of nobles, clutching their over-priced lamp lights in their over-fed, crusty fingers as they rushed for locked doors.

An ache sprang up from his lungs as he wanted to see the beauty of the city but could only see a rotting. He knew screams of the downtrodden were blatantly ignored here and promptly kicked back to the sewers to boil over.

A boy wrapped in rustic brown leathers and pale eyes approached from out of a sewer grate that opened in a cat's screech, Valiant did not see him coming and abruptly slammed the boy up against a wall.
Regret carved it's way into his mind, he released the boy and uttered an awkward apology. The boy scampered away, passing a huge sundial before being swallowed whole by the dark.

Valiant cursed for being so needlessly vigilant with the poor boy, he cursed himself for being so hard. The knight plodded to the temple of Tyr, feeling very much chiseled on and bent by the emptiness of the malignant sword coast. But he hadn't broke. A few starving people passed by, their eyes more like windows pointing to far legends of strange lore. A chorus of haunted and half-dead voices followed him into the temple. Intent on their beg.

He held a soft featured gaze on a few peasants before looking away and bowing his head before the altar and the head priest. the knight prayed to the Even-Handed through the night and begged for Tyr to take away the pain of his fire damaged lungs. When he stood up in the morning, the knight knew it was a pain he would have to bear for the rest of his life. A reminder to never break again.

[Hitman Hard]

He had too many problems bubbling at once, and it was rather hard leaping on the latest lead when a new menace leered it's face from whatever hellish cult it vested loyalty to. Where did all the good men flee to, He mused.
Too many suspicious knots in the Emporium's business dealings, their rise to an economic powerhouse way too fast, someone dead and little room for him to prove it. The knight knew one thing, he wouldn't stay neutral for long. . .

Valiant slapped gold on the counter, leaving a full whiskey shot on the counter and several staring, filth-ridden people behind. He hit the side streets, sunk into a sewer grate, and disappeared into the darkness below the world.

Several minutes later, the knight emerged out of the grate, he had concealed his dark steel and now clothed in leathers from head to to. He speculated as he skulked.

It was time to use one of his more subtle skills, it was time to take advantage of the darkness and be vigilant and wise like the Even-Handed and Torm and the Great Guard.

Ilmater could whisper, but even He is a hard God who sees through the guises of tyranny and offers mercy only when it is not a detriment to those trying to salvage themselves in a dead, black-grey world.

He remembered what a peasant boy asked him years ago, when Valiant killed a man for necromancy and a throng roared it's hate and drove him out of the farmlands.

-----------

"Why didn't you explain yourself to them? Let them know it was for the best?" The boy had asked, staring at him with downtrodden, jade green eyes.

"Let them jump to whatever conclusion they find necessary." Valiant had said, those many years back, as a dawn grey light streamed over the pair.

"Why? You will be hated and called a hungry dog. A hard, violent thing."

"My life is forfeit, I am but a shadow following his duty."

"That sounds terrible." The boy remarked.

"Someone has to die."

"It is for the greater good?" The boy asked, Valiant determined the boy to be highly educated for his age.

The boy had been observing a farmstead adjacent to the tree next to him for most the conversation and when he turned around the man was gone.

[Hitman Hard]

No pain only a hard dark. . . Valiant thought.

Valiant gave a mighty swing, thinking: Die Asmodeus cultist, die!
Stray blood droplets spilled onto the beheaded dwarf merchant's body. The knight sighed, the damn, little stout man almost made it to the Sharp Teeth. He'd chased him through the back of the Friendly Arm inn as the merchant refused to cooperate and caught him effortlessly thanks to the magic of his boots. After he buried the body which produced more or less a large, oblong patch of freshly disturbed dirt. . . Ameris and Hoihe chided him and lectured on what justice meant.

He looked at them slowly in disbelief then walked away with a groan.

[Hitman Hard]

The aches in his lungs were joined by the aches in his head now, patrons eyed Valiant with open contempt, he even swore he heard a patron in a high backed chair mumble the words "false Paladin," under his sour breath. Then again, hallucinations were a thing the knight wasn't unaccustomed to.

A very dim and smoke-filled night in Bentley's Bar, a few patrons who came in regularly enough in light armor and lighter capes, watched the moustached man accept an ale from the scrawny, gnome bartender. Valiant noticed a few surprised looks, when he didn't set the ale down to stare at but took a long draw of the peasant-swill.

He nodded to Bentley and took a booth seat in a back corner. Someone had wretched pretty badly under the table and his boot was sunk deep in the peasant-swill vomit. Valiant grimaced, like he always did when he got angry and took another pull. His mind whizzing away. . .

2 Days Ago

A cold wind set through the ominous twist of trees. Valiant's gaze slowly trailed up his father's frail, lifeless body. The knight wished he could of been more pleasant to this person who had caused him so much loss. He was relieved to see no aggravations marring the flesh and it appeared as if Saul had fell asleep and never woke.

He wept for an uncertain time and as he carried Saul away, through the clearing, the wind howling a dark song, a note dropped from Saul's blood-red cape and into the branches and tall grass.

Valiant picked the note up and started out of the woods once more, refusing to read it till Saul was rightly buried. He had already tried ressurection scrolls, which threw a remorseless, false hope at him, the magic had sizzled to a glow upon the scroll but the light died shortly after Valiant uttered the third word of power.

Digging holes was always grim business but strangely enough, he found himself going through the motions of this ritual dreadfully often. He recalled the dwarf-cultist and the many others before him. . .

"Beshaba's bad breath." Valiant said morosely as he concluded burial and opened the note, a palpable unease rooted in him but he held the paper decisively firm as he read.

Dear Paladin The Brave, Honourable opposer of torture,

Just a little present from me to you. I hope it reminds thee the values of vengeance, and those whom cross The Doombringer's fold are never truly free.

Warmest regards,
Jeshaba

------

Valiant's face was held in a numb gaze at the dark steel boot sunk in peasant-swill vomit, he slowly slid his boot out of it. A few more patrons walked in, they reeked of swamp water and wood-smoke. He downed the ale, then a Moonlit Knight, then another.

The darkness leaked in from a window behind his booth and deepened considerably.

He could sit here and get drunk, forsaking the sacred paladin code and risk losing all of his graciously given powers or he could do something. Maybe someone needed saving. Maybe someone needed killing.

[Hitman Hard]

Valiant watched the change come through, apathetically. He knew now was the time to gut this man in homespun cloth edging onto the brink of monster. Yet he remained sitting on a bench housed within a hedgerow. A windmill spun round and round.
The eye darting, mouth twitching, wiry man showed all the signs of disease; his height unimpressive, yet the hunger in his eyes made up for what he lacked.

The wiry commoner tore apart his homespun, taking the imposing form of a dire rat of massive size.

Valiant stared at the wererat numbly as it rushed forward. His great-sword leaning over his lap, the fiery point seething into the hard soil. All he could hear and see was the leering faces, the stares of contempt, the words of damnation. . .

He's Bhaal's hand, the cultist thanked him for all the blood he shed on these lands.

It's his fault things are so bad at the Friendly Arm Inn.

Fake Paladin! Murderer!

The wererat tore through the daylight, Valiant hadn't seen a rat so big before, he wondered if dying to a rat was justice. But then he remembered he didn't care. Black fangs swallowed his vision, he felt the sickly warmth of the rat suffocating his nostrils.

The twang of a crossbow set the knight standing, flaming steel in hand.

The wererat screeched it's claws against the bench's edge, gurgling for a prolonged moment before it collapsed with it's maw of black fangs wide open.

A hook-nosed farmer stared at him, crossbow in hand. "The hell's wrong with ya boy? Are you lost?"

Before he could answer, the farmer rushed off to tend his field, scowling.

Valiant went back to his thousand league stare of the windmill, dead wererat at his feet.

The sun bled vitriol. . . he felt his fingers tighten on the pommel of his great-sword.

[Hitman Hard]

The light reflected threefold in his well-cleaned mirror, a pale battle-wrecked face slowly healing from the latest justice-prowl. The light was a mock in itself for it illuminated the severe injury resting on his forehead. Talon-marks left by wyverns. . . The knight tried to plow the thoughts from his mind but they came. Faith held his resolve, yet a vague cloud of confusion clubbed into him. Doubt. He took feather quill in hand, writing intensely.

Reveal the truth, Tyr orders. Yet I secret myself in the shadows to gain the truth. . . Not entirely a misdeed but a subtle trickery? I cringe at the rationale of that but I also cringe when the criminal finds ill-gotten edges or sanctuary through vile, shadowy machinations. Hoihe claims shadows are not all bad and maybe he's right. I shall further explore the issue when i'm not feeling so eccentric.

Punish the guilty, Tyr orders. Gladly and without second guessing!

Right the wrong, Tyr orders. This is the hardest part of the duty, for you must be true and just in your actions even when your enemies eat you up like acid, even when they beg for you to deal a savage vengeance. However, Tyr's goal isn't to be overly merciful or fair to what most societies expect, but the learning of truth and the punishment of the guilty.

It's crucial to conduct a deep search of the soul, no matter your piousness or status or decorated accomplishments . For it's a means to grow and endure. A zealot's duty is fraught with tribulation and darkness and that's what makes it all the more true and pure.

[Hitman Hard]

The knight had overheard in the bar from lathanderites about drow poking their heads out on the surface, south of Candlekeep in pairs; and immediately begun prowling the shadows for the rest of the day for Eldarian was caught up in the midst of maintaining politicial face and oathed to speak more of this later.

So Valiant skulked about the field outside the Inn in his dark brigandine armour which led to an unfortunate violent accident perpetrated by the magic-user Sani. Luckily, the knight Elril rushed to his defense but it was to no avail. She evaded justice and teleported before Valiant was restored back to life and several knights clad in their grey and silvery armour inquired what had caused the incident but of course Valiant recalled nothing.

The man with scars lacing his face, forearms, and neck went right back to skulking, this time the lions way- hell-bent on discovering if these drow were after him. But in the back of his mind he already knew they were. Mean streets had given him the instincts to sense it and he couldn't really think of anyone else personally who had so enraged the wretched elves of the darkness below the world. He passed a few people who didn't notice him though one suspected they heard something. Darkness fell and by the time he got to Beregost he purchased a horse that took him to Nashkel.

He quietly slid his visor half-open to vomit across a snowy road, feeling as if his lungs were frostbitten and his stomach filled with seething, animated swords. He saw adventurers of a sort, females, lingering beside the first bridge into Nashkel so he hid behind shadows and snow-covered rocks and like a strange divine miracle his memory was restored thanks to their careless blurting about rumours concerning a bald man being struck down by magics by a lady named Sani and that she was in the Inn in Nashkel right now! However, the knight could hardly give two-dungs about the petty squabble he was forced into and was about to reveal his position when he heard she was involved with criminals. So he proceeded to engage the ladies in elven whispering, trying his hardest to mask his accent and walking that fine line between subterfuge and strategy. It wasn't a lie to secret your intention or identity, after all. He failed to find anything else informative or useful from them and they grew hostile in their motions as he refused to reveal himself, one named Cheya unsheathed a mighty axe and the knight skulked away hastily.

He oathed to resume his skulk tommorow till real information was found so he walked into the Temple of Helm, removed his brigandine armour and replaced it with dark steel before heading back into the snow-white world of Nashkel and this time engaging them in a conversation befitting of a Paladin.

He thought privately to himself. Is duty supposed to be this dark and were there any old allies left who could be of use. . .?

He faked a smile at the women and pretended everything was alright, the triad would not let him be afraid.

[Hitman Hard]

*the writing is roughly scrawled*

I know more.

[Hitman Hard]

I don't know why I looked but I did. . . like the time dirty zhents forced me to watch their depraved torture session of orc children. Almost as if an external force pushed me forward.

A mage offering services of teleport brought me to Triel the other night. I tipped him a bit extra so he could offer the same service later. What I sighted belongs in horrid books of madness- better left unopened. A landscape of shriveled vegetables, burnt out fields and a dark, empty sky mirroring the carnage of a ravaged, green rot once dignified as an idyllic farming community of Chauntea worshipers. A once hard, enduring town neighboring the likes of maligned orcs and apparently snake-maggots.

Vile darkness filled areas once serving as bastions of light and hope. I chuckled morose because I couldn't help them, because I cared.

And now I hear a town to the far north was razed because of the band I once aligned with and the actions we perpetrated against the soul-sucking , Loth-bent drow. But what can you do besides throwing on your boots and cloak, record the crimes you've witnessed or heard about it, just to be a copper short and a day late?

The last few days of activity haven't struck me as duty. More of survival. I grow weary progressively as my contact fails to contact me further.I know little of him besides the nagging impulse i'm dealing with a Harper Agent. I certainly hope so.

The tension between former friends has grown palpable and I said some things I honestly don't regret it. It's not H's choice or right to hold onto the dark stone eating away at his mind and subsequently putting all of us in more danger. Something should be done about it and I doubt i'd lose my god's favour striking a grotesque being I no longer know nor want to know.

In fact, I hold the same contempt for H as I do the rest of the drow assassins. I try to leave as little information as possible in my journal for I don't think I have many days left. The druids and rangers move to stalk the drow and learn of their plans, all the while offering me no reports on progress or developments. Hardly surprised.

The knight set down his pen, taking his holy symbol in hand and praying lightly as he speculated in the mansions of strategy and "life" within a throbbing skull.

He'd slept little with all the stress and his face pale as milk. He'd been pushing himself too hard and he peered into the sparkling mirror before him in his cozy, Silver Rose room which proved much more expansive and warm then his former. He splashed water on his face and it sent shivers spiraling up his spine.

[Hitman Hard]

The Assassins are supposedly gone,their obvious desires compensated by Za'than and his "network." I faked my happiness and relief at the news, embellishing it further by bear-hugging Za'than and kissing him on the masked cheek; sending Valkrun and his brother surprised and brow raising. I chuckled within my mind, humans can be so tightly wound unlike elves then again an elf had cast a spell on my free pie today. Only ignorant people uphold ideals of contempt based on someone's race. I gauged Za'than's expression as surprised and he took some steps back. (Za'than wears a mask, oops, wrote this when i was tired, forgive me)

-------

I get the sense I don't trust many; where I once saw good in all I spot coldness lurking under everyone's skin. It's ugly and empty.

I am tired of half-measures, excuses to uphold honour when I want to deal a crippling, pragmatic blow.

I stare at the grey sky and pray to a God who hasn't cast me out, who doesn't compromise and is the most pure and good. Tyr has taken my Paladin Powers but not all of them. The darkness had always wriggled under my skin- coiling itself around my vision. It solidifies slowly and I let it happen.

Valiant only smiled, realizing for the first time he was only half a righteous man. His pen thumped to the floor. Valiant faced the mirror directly and spoke.

"After all, what can you do when your on a pecking order? Good deeds are terribly offensive." He drank from a bottle of whiskey of unknown sort and stuffed it away hurriedly, feeling traitorous. He grinned at his reflection in the mirror, a darkness entering his voice, "Folks walk on edge around you, scrunch up their faces in fear, doesn't it get irksome?"

Mirror Valiant shrugged back and suppressed an expletive- a morose rage burned in his eyes. Valiant cleared his throat and burst into a half-speech in response.

"The Dukes hoard their jewels and steal the poor man's woman and crops. Yet you allegiance to them, weather their storms and carnages and tentacled horrors and the countless war-bands of undead and maligned orc and what do they have to show for it besides shoving you out the Grand Duchal the second you complete a job. it was a serious job."

He swiped sweat off his booze-inflamed eyes, his breath coming hard with his head bent downwards. The drunken Knight faced the mirror slowly, "What's it say about the rulers whom allow lands to break, become violent, jagged edges for foul mercenaries to haunt and sully the reputation of proper law enforcement all around. Punching faces is the most effective interrogation procedure I know."

[Hitman Hard]

On Vigilance

Your an a**hole if you consider vigilance healthy for the soul. It can be a blurring, dizzying, double-edged sword;like a sea of acid blackening the heart into something alien. Reel your fishing rod a bit further into the sea and you forget the miles you've already swam, compassion for the innocent replaced by an absence of feeling; an intense suspicion most would call outright paranoia. You look back and wonder about the times your justice proved hollow, you regret the times you slammed the door of redemption, it hurts so deep you can hardly breathe; you wonder if your making the world a better place to survive for other embittered survivors. Do all necromancers deserve death?

Probably not, I can think of children who've experimented with the magic out of naivety and lack of knowledge. When I can, mercy is offered but I cannot shake the nagging feeling every time mercy is rewarded, a battle is lost, a principle left in the dust, a grey-black world falling further away from ideals of law and good and hope. In direct defiance of my Lord's duty.

I won't abide their heathen, death magic and I certainly won't allow them to corrupt the masses, guilt is a cancerous trap and masquerades as mercy. The necromonger within the gibberling cave should of been dealt with, I should of struck him lifeless immediately, instead I barked that he should leave. It's guilty until proven harmless, not the other way around.

Then I look at someone like Lady Cecilia or Lady Elvina and I see a bastion of compassion and peace, a light in the decay of the realm; the way a righteous person should really live.

Old habits creep back tenfold, it's a vicious cycle of gloom and loss as I compromise to the drink and fall prey to being the worst sort of hypocrite. The self-loathing is palpable, it stalks around with me and never shuts up.

I blacked out some nights past and don't recall much besides stabbing my fists into a dwarf's face, pounding it into the road till I could hardly recognize who I brawled. His beard drowned in blood and ripped along the sides chaotically from all the punching and kicking. He had been drunk and out-of-order such as myself, but It was my duty to be the stronger one, the stiff-necked, unwavering knight. . .

Instead I acted like a common man, someone lost to the grey of the world.

The only thing seeming to alleviate my internal wallow and the simmering cauldron within my lungs is the drink. I can shun it but for how long?

I still hear my God's voice in my head, but it arrives less frequently, and I know why. Tyr was angry about my failures, angry about my concept of duty, angry at me for relying on my pragmatic, worldly stratagems at the blackest of hours.

I am disgusted at myself for allowing guilt and shame to weigh me down.

000] --------

He rose from his bow before the altar of Tyr, slinging his bag of holding over his caped shoulder and scurried off into nighttime streets to lose himself in a thick shadow and change into leathers and stalk the tunnels that were devoid of starlight and hope. There was a hard, righteous glimmer in his eyes as he said, "A knight in shadow, but not broke."

The black knight would serve as judge, jury, and executioner in the darkness the world had left behind to defilers and opportunistic sadists and the impoverished survivors who simply wished to fetch a row-boat "home".

Others were born to redeem the world, bandage the wounds of unspeakable sins and give birth to new prospects of hope, but some are born zealots and their duty only goes as far as protecting and enforcing. It's the least a vigilante can do.

[Hitman Hard]

it had started with a simple question.

"Is that the design of Bane on your cape?"

Valiant grabbed the dirty banite by the scruff of the neck and dragged him down the wyvern canyon, punching him hard enough to draw blood. He'd seen the lie in his face-the nervous sweat, the evasion in his eyes. Voices of protest sounded off all around-an orc begged for mercy, even Koryeneer seemed to wish it. But the knight proved hard-headed and set the banite against a rotted tree.
"What is your guild up to?"
Silence reigned from the banite. Valiant had to give credit, this one was toughened from life on mean streets.
Valiant punched him in the face;still seeing reluctance.
Reveal the truth, he oathed.
The orc who saw the knight thoroughly best the banite above the canyon-lunged at Valiant desperately but he was no match for the rage-filled man. The orc found himself sprawled out on the desert ground a mere minute later.Valiant repeated a few more of the same questions which the banite stubbornly refused to answer. Valiant gritted his teeth, he'd seen enough, and begun tying a noose which he looped around the banite's head.Valiant let the rope fall and watched the banite dangle on the rope till the last vetige of life escaped him. Valiant grinned a little. Koryeneer breathed through his teeth. Afterwards, Valiant honoured his god's commandments by burying the beaten body. Valiant placed a hand on Koryeneer's shoulder and told him, "The world is a safer place now."

"I certainly hope so Valiant,for your sake"
Valiant was about to retort Koryeneer was as guilty as he for standing witness to it all, but then he simply shrugged his shoulders. Koryeneer had little choice in the matter.

Valiant waded back up the canyon to see the orc hiding and stared holes into him, "You come back for the body and I'll kill you."