Byakou

The Byakou is the Gunmen that Thymilph keeps for his own use, held in the hangar bays of the Dai-Gunzan and brought out as his backup means of combat should the flagship be unable to fight. Its frame suggests a white skull with a jutting chin and a second, smaller face set into the forehead. Spearhead forms cap its shoulders and thighs, and matching points extend from its arms. The name looks back to Byakko, the western White Tiger counted among the Four Symbols, the guardian constellations of Chinese tradition as they pass into Japan.

Its principal armament, the Alkaid Glaive, is a polearm whose tip can pour out energy to sharpen its strikes or unleash a fierce beam known as Condemn Blaze. Unlike the personal machines belonging to the other Generals, the Byakou is never shown shifting into an alternate mode, though it is assumed to hold one in reserve.

Thymilph pilots the Byakou during Team Dai-Gurren's second strike on the Dai-Gunzan. With his flagship stalled as Lagann seizes control of it, he ambushes Kamina's Gurren by firing Condemn Blaze up through the deck, and with Enkidu backing him he drives the spear clean through Gurren's cockpit and its pilot. Once Simon steadies himself and Lagann finishes claiming the great Dai-Gun, Kamina is revealed to be alive, the two form Gurren Lagann, and the combined machine bats away Condemn Blaze before ending the Byakou with the very first Giga Drill Break. It is the last foe Kamina defeats before his wounds finally take him.