Leshy

The Leshy (Russian: леший, meaning "[he] of the woods") is a side-protagonist appearing in Shadows of Darkness. He looks like a elder man made entirely out of wood, has moss for hair and a bird nesting in his forehead.

The Leshy is scarcely referenced by the other characters before the hero actually meets him, at which point he starts various games for the hero to embark into. The games are actually simple and require the hero to either guess within each one of the six bushes the Leshy is hiding (this can be done by clicking one by one on the bush that moves), or to simply chase the moving bush around the screen for some time. Once the game is over the Leshy will appear to the hero and ask him a rhyming riddle. The riddles consist of three question-responses, the first of which indicates a certain in-game character, the second - an in-game object related to that character, and the third - the action to undertake for both. The player has to use the mouth-icon on the hero, not the Leshy, to make guesses (because using it on the Leshy will prompt a regular conversation question, to which the Leshy never replies). Although the Leshy only asks one question at a time and disappears thereafter, it is possible to leave the screen and quickly come back in order to continue the guesses.

For example, at some point, the Leshy will ask a riddle related to the Rusalka, and, if properly guessed, he will tell the hero, in rhyme, to give her flowers. Other riddles include the Chernovy, Nikolai and Anna, the burgomeister, the Stoviches, the gypsies, the Domovoi and, eventuallly, Baba Yaga. After all of them have been guessed, the Leshy will still play games with the hero, but as soon as prompted for riddles, will tell the hero to leave him alone.

In Slavic mythology, a "leshiy" is a druidic spirit which protects the forest. It has an appearance similar to that in-game, but usually plays with the people from afar. It can lead the lost people out of the forest, if they're kind to him, and lead unkind people further to their doom. Compare to the Domovoi, which is the same kind of spirit, but "of the house".

Behind the scenes

He can be found by travelling one screen south and one east from the Cemetery, appears only during the day (and only if the hero isn't being chased by a monster), and also has his own in-game musical theme.