Woods

LAND

The Woods is the green, gentle land where every world begins. It has grass, leafy trees and pines, rolling hills, deep lakes and winding rivers. It is the safest land to learn in, but its nights still bring hungry night things, and its lair holds Silvetus.

CONTENTS

Where it is
The land
Animals
Night things
Villages
What it gives
Dungeons
The lair: Silvetus
Creatures
What its traders sell

Where it is

The region at the middle of every world is always the Woods, and you always start in it (see Lands).
Further out, the Woods turns up again as some of the world's other regions.

The land

Ground: green grass, with paths of bare earth.
Height: gentle hills, rarely more than two levels high. Easy to cross.
Water: deep lakes you can swim and dive in, and long rivers. See Fishing.
Trees and plants: leafy trees and pines, berry bushes, flowers, mushrooms, and wild strawberries and pumpkins. Its sister tree is the Copper Beech, which gives Beechwood. A sapling planted in the Woods grows into one of the Woods' own trees. See Trees and Wild Plants.
Weather: every kind, shown as it is (see Weather).

Animals

Deer, foxes, rabbits, birds, ravens, hens, cows and a few sheep live here (Deer, Fox, Rabbit, Bird, Raven, Hen, Cow, Sheep). Grey wolves and brown bears roam the land and will fight you.

Night things

At night (Day and Night) these come out of the dark:

the common four: Gnawlings, Longlegs, Crawlers and Scuzz;
Kobolds, a band of three, and swarms of Flitterbats;
rarely, a Werewolf (only one about at a time) or a Gnawmother, the gnawlings' queen.

Villages

The Woods' villages are glades: a square with the houses scattered round it among the trees, each its own size, every door facing the square. Its folk have names like Pip, Fern, Hazel and Bramble, in villages with names like Thimblebrook or Hazeldell. See Villages, Village Quests and Traders.

What it gives

The Woods' trade is dairy and bone meal: Copper Ore, Beechwood, Milk and Egg are found here, and worked into Bone Meal. These go into bronze gear, milk dishes, and bone meal to feed your farm beds.

On a Spirit Wager, the Woods' water favours every element a little.

Dungeons

The Woods' dungeon mouths are a doorway in a grassy barrow mound, a stairwell cut down into the ground, or a little ruined court.
Inside they are barrow halls: round and cut-cornered rooms, winding passages, chambers held up by great roots, and now and then a grove open to a shaft of daylight.
Besides the common four, Mild and harder dungeons hold Kobolds, Flitterbats turn up, and Dire and Fatal ones may hold a Werewolf or a Gnawmother.

See Dungeons and Chests.

The lair: Silvetus

Each of the Woods' regions has one lair, with a great gate in a sheer outcrop near the region's middle. Its boss is Silvetus, a great beast of living oak and braided roots. Clearing your first Woods lair wins the Heart of the Old Oak, the Woods' Jewel.