Introduction.
This is the story of how things can get worse than before, even when you live with a Rabbit. This story might not even have a happy ending, but it is an important story to tell to understand the balance between all the decisions you can make between good and evil.
The Elves do not know this story; somehow, the Humans try to avoid Elven's interest in their failures.
How Peter The Rabbit turned dark.
Littleberg is the poor Human village at the southeast end of the island, and it is said to be the village where no other people want to live. It is where the less fortunate and miserable try to make a living but mostly just have given up. The Elves never come here, and the Foxes are only represented by the local Human nutcase "Crazy 'Ol Vulpus" who roams around the village believing he's a Fox. The Goblins do come by and found it too depressing to come up with any fun to make.
In the village, there was a Rabbit named Peter. He came to them out of love and cared for the two boys living alone with their angry father. It was a special day and opportunity for all of them because living with a Rabbit is very special. Rabbits are never forced to work and are free to live wherever they feel safest. They carry no economy and may ask any Human for any supplies they need. Such is the law of The White King.
The good nature of the Rabbits takes no advantage of anything; they will never ask for anything they don't need and will never ask for something others would need more than them. In return, the Humans are blessed by their presence, and good things always happen when having Rabbits near.
Rabbits usually make their homes by digging up a small hill, and Peter started to dig up his house next to the angry father's house. The two boys were thrilled and even helped him with some broken planks to make him a door and a little table. Peter was grateful for the gifts, but their father got furious. He had other plans for that spot on his land. Plans that he hadn't thought about yet, but surely no plans of digging up the good soil to make a rabbit home.
The days went by, and even though people started to get hope for their lives by having Peter around, Peter's presence got more and more under the angry father's nerves. The people in the village started to mingle among themselves, they lightened up, and alcohol was no longer their only comfort in life. The sheer joy from Peter gave them the will of life, even though the village stayed poor.
Even at night, there was a beacon of hope, and Peter used his magic to light up his tiny home, making them smile and think of him. The village had never been notable in any production, and only the angry father came to King City to pay tax and trade on behalf of the village. Every time he returned, he felt left behind by the better craftsmen and farmers at the market. The other villagers cared less about trying to make a fortune, especially now. Why should they seek fortune when happiness is achieved with Peter around?
The angry father was not happy. He was the only one trying to make things work around the place. He was working his ass off to get some income and to get the village known by potential buyers and traders. He was the only one to even care for the village to grow out of its misery. He could not see what good any laziness could bring, and he found his village even lazier now than before. The angry father started to breathe hate over his sons. They were the laziest by spending all their time playing with Peter instead of working.
According to the angry father, Peter was living in the village for free, and happiness won't give you food on the table or spare parts to fix the broken leg on the table.
NOT EVEN ONCE HAD PETER USED ANY OF HIS WHITE RABBIT MAGIC ON ANYTHING. Other than lighting up his stupid tiny home.
One day the angry father had enough of it. He took his best crops of whatever he had and the deed of his farm to King City. He would change his life and bet it all on one horse.
He was gone by days, living in the Foxes tavern, drinking and mingling with all kinds of people, and used all his savings to live a rich life behind the walls of King City, just for once. Sadly, every time he brought up the subject "Littleberg," all his new friends turned on him, laughing, and wouldn't trade. He even started advertising the village's happy Rabbit, but with no luck. Everyone turned on him, even the random Goblins, but they don't understand anything of making serious trading anyway. They just goof around and do stupid things. Everyone turned on him except for one odd-looking lady in the corner of the tavern. She had an idea, a secret way of making gold. The odd lady claimed to be in direct contact with someone who was in direct contact with one of the Goblin Shamans. The Shamans are the leader of the Goblins, the clever ones, and the only one of them to use magic, Dark Magic.
The Goblins have their goldmine; this goldmine is the largest in the entire world, and the regular Goblins have no idea of the value of gold. From time to time, the Goblins come to trade with Humans just because they find it funny to do unless you can provide a Rabbit that has turned Dark. This trafficking is the most unheard, illegal, and unforgiving business you can be involved in. Rabbit trafficking was the cause of the Goblin war 15 years ago and banned any Goblin Shamans from King City.
A Rabbit that has turned dark would lose all hope of living. It will turn its pure white magic into destructive dark soul-eating magic, and that's what the Goblin Shamans hunger for; they can and will extract the Dark Magic and use it for destruction.
To turn a Rabbit dark is hard, but Humans have their ways. The kind nature of the Rabbits will never make them use the Dark Magic. They will turn to solitude and die alone by their heartbroken sorrow by letting the darkness consume them.
After consulting with the mysterious, odd lady, the angry father was in a conflicting mind. He was not at the point where his only option was turning to that level of crime to earn gold and decided to travel back home, hoping for a better solution.
The angry father was on his way home to Littleberg, hoping that everything would have turned for the better. He dreamed that the village was booming and everyone was working hard. He dreamed of Peter showing his true magic and that Littleberg would be the noblest place on Yellowrod. He even prayed to The Moon Dragon, the goddess of balance, that there would be a balance in his life. He had never prayed to any god in his life before.
As he arrived, his dream was more broken than when he left. Nothing, absolutely nothing had happened. Nothing was repaired, nothing was crafted, and no one was in the field to take care of the next harvest. All he met was them running to him, asking for profit from King City.
That day the angry father started to drink his sorrow away. All he did that day was yell at his sons. He forbade them to ever speak to Peter again. At night he went out of his house, yelling, cursing, and blaming everyone for all the mistakes he could come up with and turned it all against Peter.
His sons tried to talk to him, but he struck them for it, hard. He had never laid his hands on them before. He stroked them as he screamed toward Peter. "This is your doing; this is your fault; you are the one hurting them, not me!"
His sons were in shock, hurt, and crying. No one dared to do anything. Then the sons turned on Peter as well.
"Where is your magic, Peter? Why can't you fix our dad?" they cried.
At that moment, the village witnessed magic. Peter got heartbroken. All he ever wanted was to see people's smiles, all his time where he could see how everyone around him was getting better and happier, and he thought he was loved and doing a good rabbit job. But now, he realized he had failed. He turned dark.
A dark aurora started to shine around Peter as his entire body shook, and his hands were on literal fire. Everyone backed in shock as Peter scanned around him with hot glowing red eyes. He looked for an aim to his anger, despair, and the destructive Dark Magic growing inside him. He looked at the angry father and wished he could overwhelm him with visions of fear and death, but he cared too much for him. Peter looked to the night sky, reached his hands for it, and felt the urge to blast a cone of fire up in the sky to let the anger rage out and create a magical firestorm, but he didn't. He was too pure to display such anger and use the Dark Magic. The fire on his hands went off, and Peter entered the deep depression of a Dark Rabbit.
Everything was quiet afterward. Peter was no longer angry or no longer a threat to anyone; he had turned it all inward. He became a soulless shell of the happy Peter that was. The people in the village were looking up at the night sky, and they realized it was the first night of the full moon, the hunting night for the mighty wolves.
Peter started to walk alone in the forest; no one cared about him anymore, and everyone feared their own lives. They all ran to their houses, locked and sealed everything. The giant wolves take whatever they feel like taking on the first night of the full moon. They claim it to be a part of their will to keep the balance for The Moon Dragon.
The two sons tried to drag their angry father inside their house, but he suddenly understood that Peter was worth a lot of gold. He had to retrieve him; out of all this misery, he could sell a Dark Rabbit and change his life for good.
The sons fell crying as they saw their father for the last time in their lives, as he ran out on the giant wolves hunting night, never to be seen again.
The following day, the sons went inside Peter's little house and found out that he had done some magic. The soil he had built his home of was the perfect conditions for growing Moonshade Mushrooms, the most valuable ingredients for any Elven alchemist to possess. The rare mushrooms can only grow under very strict conditions and in the light from White Magic. The village was rich, but only until they ran out of mushrooms.
And Peter? Some say he ended up at Helga's Inn at the border of the Goblin Wasteland. Hopefully, as the Rabbit's last hope, she could take good care of him.
Bonus:
I once challenged Nathan to create a random character for fun, and he made Crazy 'Ol Vulpus. He never made it into the final main story, but he is in the Rabbit Forest, believing he is a Fox.
