Knight Berunek (Belunek)

Mid-arc, while Berunek polished his Gold-rank ascent, the family freed him from war-council duty. Earlier he had been poisoned in Bey by the Doombasen apothecary clan — Lorist tracked the poison and got him out alive.

A principled, stubborn veteran from Maple Forest (Maplewood). When Steward Hansek tried to lure him into civil service, Berunek flatly refused — he held that a knight's place is on the battlefield, and stayed firm even under Lorist's coaxing.

One of House Norton's first Gold Knights, distinguished from the early campaigns. As a Silver Knight he was pushed toward the Gold breakthrough under the family's care, freed for a time from staff duty. Earlier, in Bey, he was poisoned by a local noble apothecary — Lorist tracked the poison and pulled him through alive.

He appears from the early arcs (ch 89-95) as a rising Norton knight. During the winter beast tide (ch 176) it was Berunek who brought Lorist's order to the Third Sector to douse the walls and raise an ice-fortress, objecting with Bodfinger to Fatty Shi's suicidal stand.

By the later arcs (ch 492) Berunek is grey-haired, one of the family's first Gold Knights, commanding the Rock Legion. When Steward Hansek hoped to draw him into civil service, Berunek, loyal to his Maplewood roots, heard him out but stayed unmoved — and went on serving as a field commander (ch 515).