Bufkin

* Biography
* Threat Assessment
* Trivia and Notes
* Gallery

### Bufkin: Once Upon a Time...

In the land where demons, angels, faeries, and spirits thrive, Bufkin was born. He was spawned by magical particles fusing together in a fluke, creating a small boulder from which Bufkin would hatch. He was not unlike the youth of other races: small, chubby, child-like, and immature — except he did not grow older, nor did others like him, for they were what were known as the cherubim — angels of the lowest order in Heaven.

Not much is known of Bufkin from those days. Not even Bufkin can remember much of his time spent as an angel, but it seems certain that he sided with the sect known as the Morningstar Rebellion in the Silver City's Civil War. As a result of choosing the losing side, Bufkin joined his leader into exile into the infernal plains, which would soon be organized into the Kingdom of Hell. With infernal magic infecting the graces of the angels, the once supernal creature mutated and over time would become known as the devils. Bufkin, like other former cherubs, became known as imps and were quite quickly slotted into the lowest place on the totem pole of Hell's social structure.

But after thousands of years of perpetual neglect and abuse at the hands of demons and devils who considered themselves his betters, Bufkin became a leader to a small band of other imps who chose to against their Heavenly exile and leave the infernal plains to seek out a new place to call home. After many years of travel, Bufkin and his troop of imps found their way to a land which would later come to be known as Oz — but that would be many years later down the road.

The imps of Oz found a forest on the western side of the continent to settle. They made trade agreements with some tribesmen in the area. They became known as Mun Ki — meaning "flying child" in the tribesmen tongue. In order to put their new trade partners at ease, the gifted the tribesmen with a magical golden cap they all had sworn magical oaths on. The thought of was that the leader of the tribe could wear the cap to prevent the troop of Mun Ki from betraying the tribe. We will never know whether peace was assured through the cap's magic, or simply a product of mutual friendship between the troop and tribe. Yet, another thousand years or so, European settlers came to the continent and everything changed.

Due to the island empire of Albion having had a past history with Sheeda which had led to the collapse of Camelot, the Albish began rounding up the faerie creatures of their lands and exiling them to Oz. The abuse perpetuated on the elves, dwarves, gnomes, and other creatures sent to Oz would be recycled and dealt out to the native tribes of the continent. The Mun Ki were unaware that their trade partners had been massacred by a band of elven raiders until a hunting party ventured into their forest, with their sergeant wearing the golden cap.

The Mun Ki were enslaved by the elven populace of the western continent by the power of the golden cap. Bufkin and his fellows became scouts and messengers in service to the Western Warden — leader of the Winkie Nation — who made the golden cap their crown. Though the Winkies would become a more civilized people after their brutal beginnings, mostly due to their joining the alliance that would evolve into the Emerald Kingdom of Oz, the Winkie's Warden was still hesitant to give their prize "monkeys" (both a bastardization of Mun Ki and a reference to the imps' size and tails) any sort of independence. In fact, the true nature of the imps' servitude was a state secret not known to the general populace of Winkie Country. Should any imp reveal the truth, the Warden would know as soon as they put the cap back and would then swiftly order the execution of the tattletale.

When the Winkie court entertained a beautiful woman named Gothel who claimed she was a powerful sorceress, Gothel approached Bufkin with booze, getting him to spill the secret of the imps' servitude and for this, she promised the imp she would protect him with her magic if he instead swore a new oath to serve her. Bufkin did so, and Gothel held true to her promise, using her magic to seduce the Warden and then murder them in their bed. With the Warden dead, Gothel named herself the new Warden and gave the golden cap to Bufkin — but not before studying it and using magic learned from it to put the entirety of the Winkies' under spell. Bufkin did realize he had made a bad deal, but was powerless to do anything about it.

## Threat Assessment

### Resources

* **Devil Physiology:** Bufkin was born an angel of the order of cherubim, but has mutated into a devil of the imp persuasion. Though originally born of supernal essence, he is now a creature of infernal essence.
	+ ***Enhanced Physicality:*** Though weaker than most creatures from the Void, imps have more strength, resilience, agility, durability, and coordination than they might seem — especially when they find themselves in danger.
	+ ***Immortality:*** As a creature from the Void, Bufkin does not age. In fact, like most imps, he seems to have retained the maturity of a child for thousands of years.
	+ ***Limited Cosmic Awareness:*** Bufkin is aware of significant events happening on his plane of existence or in the locale he claims as home (should he be away). Further, he is attuned to the psychic frequency which devils use to communicate with one another across reality and its subsidiaries. Bufkin can sense whenever someone speaks his name with the intent to call him to their location.
	+ ***Nigh-Invulnerability:*** Bufkin cannot be killed by most violent means.
	+ Supernatural Senses: Bufkin can perceive things across different dimensional frequencies, allowing him to see or hear things that exist on a different plane or concealed, such as ghosts or non-manifested angels/demons on a material plane.
	+ ***Tail:*** Bufkin can use his tail to pick up and manipulate objects. The strength is enough to share a smaller humanoid creature (such as a woman or child) and carry them away mid-flight.
	+ ***Telepathy:*** Bufkin can read surface thoughts with some effort.
	+ ***Teleportation:*** Bufkin can relocate himself and others to locations he is familiar with. This includes travel or other dimensions. Though, this sort of travel can exhaust his resources, particularly when moving from an incorporeal plane to a material reality.
	+ ***Winged Flight:*** Bufkin uses his wings to fly faster than he can travel on foot.
* **Golden Cap:** Bufkin's golden cap (also known as the Crown of the Winkies) can be used to control the minds of the Mun Ki troops of imps. Unable to destroy it, Bufkin has apparently hidden the cap after the fall of Gothel. Still, at the last one to wear it, the remaining Mun Ki tend to have some residual impulse to follow Bufkin's command.

### Weaknesses

* **Sloth:** Bufkin is a lazy creature by nature. Though he can be compelled to work, he will always prefer to spend his time drinking, napping, and playing games.

### Analytics

* **Physicality:** 3 — Trained / Exceptional
* **Occult:** 3 — Trained / Exceptional
* **Weaponry:** 3 — Trained / Exceptional
* **Expertise:** 3 — Trained / Exceptional
* **Range:** 4 — Expert / Enhanced
* **Strategy:** 2 — Basic / Typical
	+ **TOTAL:** 32
	+ **RANKING:** Low Threat

## Trivia and Notes

### Trivia

#### Additional Information

* Under Gothel's reign, Bufkin served as her reluctant lackey. Though Gothel had given him the golden cap, his pledge to Gothel meant that the Mun Ki were still slaves to Gothel, only with Bufkin serving as her proxy.
* Bufkin became Gothel's right-hand, as she directed Bufkin to utilize the Mun Ki as her secret police. Eager to take out frustration on the Winkies for their centuries of enslavement, the Mun Ki generally gleefully carried out the orders that Bufkin was reluctant to give — rounding up Winkies who were too willful to fall under Gothel's spell or others that defied the witch's rule.
* Bufkin was the one to inform Gothel that the witch Goody Rigby, who had seized the eastern Munchkin Country similar to how Gothel had taken the west, had gone to Americana to kidnap a girl with distant connections to the Gillikin throne — likely in a bid to use the girl with distant connections to the Gillikin Country from its witch overlord. Under Gothel's orders, Bufkin was standing by to intercept Rigby upon her return to Oz, but he was startled to find the girl from Kansas having slain Rigby. Panicking, he fled to inform Gothel what he had witnessed — but then was chastised by Gothel for not killing the girl right then and bringing Rigby's relics to Gothel. However, before he was captured and brought to her so that Gothel could use Dorothy to take over both Gillikin and Munchkin Countries (and hopefully all of Oz).

### Notes

* Bufkin is a character from *Fables* who originated from *The Wonderful Wizard of Oz* stories by L. Frank Baum.

## Links and References

* Appearances of Bufkin

1. ↑ Network Files: Bufkin