taxonomites | [location: Taxon Forest, mainly, but even the Woodsman goes into town for acquiring Stuff]

Once upon a time, there was a man, who was so pained by grief that one day he simply stopped feeling. Not the pain of his own, not that of others; there was nothing that could move him to the point of pangs or aches of any kind. What had once been the most expressive face and bright blue eyes, was no more. Lack luster orbs and too little skin stretched too tight over bone had taken their place.

Some said he was blessed for no matter what hurt or wound might befall him, he couldn't feel a thing. Others said the opposite: that he was cursed never to feel even a knife stabbed into his back. Some said he had once loved so deeply that his heart shattered. Unable to repair it, he could never love again.

For as long as he could remember, he had been a guardian of the woods, the Woodsman, and what ever name he once had, no one could remember. The loss of his name, like so many other things of his past, didn't pain him. It was just a name, after all, and he'd found himself neither lacking nor wanting. 'Woodsman' would do, for that was his nature. The forest was his dwelling and his workplace, and protecting it was his life. Though he had broken too many bones within its borders than he could recall, and though it had paid him in countless scars, all was well. He was alive to tend the woods.

((ooc: No hat for Cain! Rumplestiltsglitch stole it as per the backstory posted in

hamsterball. No one glitched knows that the hat belonged to Cain in real life, but if your character isn't glitched, well... Ask him about it, and you might just get an affirmative. Or not. <3))

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"Only if you know your place, young Michael," he said firmly. "Beware the pixies, and toadstools, and old oak trees."

He stepped closer, squinting in the waning light. "It will be dark soon, and worse things yet make a playground of the night."

Michael's eyes widened at the man's words. "Pixies? They exist?" he asked, a trace of excitement in his voice.

The Woodsman inclined his head in the shadow of a bow. "Of course. Magic too, young man. Magic and ill will and spite. Pixies and fae and far worse yet. Wolves, and dragons, beasts who were once men."

It was the closest thing to mirth he had felt in an age. "Have your parents taught you nothing of the woods?"

"I don't have parents," Michael said, with a slight shrug. He'd grown up with his older brother, who'd told him many stories, but Michael had never been sure if he should believe them.

"Can you tell me about the forest?" he asked the Woodsman, eyes widening.

"My apologies," said the Woodsman, and that was as far as his empathy reached. He could ask forgiveness of an ill timed assumption and mean it.

"She is older than time itself," he told the young man. "Full of magic and creatures in possession thereof. Some even claim there are lions here. Lions and tigers and bears."

"Really?" Michael asked, hungry for all the stories about the forest the Woodsmen obviously knew.

"Have you ever seen a lion, sir?"

[location: Taxon Forest, mainly, but even the Woodsman goes into town for acquiring Stuff]

[Location] Taxon Forest

[Location] Taxon Forest

[Location] Taxon Forest

[Location] Taxon Forest

[Location] Taxon Forest

[Location] Taxon Forest