Everything was okay at the start, and life was nice. The start was quite rough, not having any relatives to be helped by and being thrown onto the streets at such a young age. But as fate wanted, help eventually came in the form of a nobleman, who offered not only a place to stay at, but also a whole new life. Wanting to do nothing with his past, the young man decided to take up the new father's name, feeling like he finally had a place in life.

The Ezra family was a blessing he had always wanted, an actual place where people cared about him and made sure he was happy. He had a home, a job, friends; what else could he ask for ? He finally had what he always wished for. And even though there were some bumps in the way, he managed to live with them.

But once his father had passed, life became absolute hell. His new lord was the brother of the previous one, and one that hated all the servants living there. First their pay was cut along with part of their home, then after that their lands were taken as well. Cody made sure to not let the new leader know about the forest, which was his, as it was given to him by his father, telling him to never tell anyone about owning it.

After a few months everything turned to the worst. The peasants were kicked out, their payment and lands taken, and they were put to the streets with no help. But Cody was prepared; he had saved away the riches of the other workers at his place, and when the catastrophe came, he distributed it all between them. They were all beyond thankful, offering their services to him with anything, but he instead gave them jobs in the city. He himself stayed outside in his forest, where he built a small cabin to live in.

For years he had lived alone with his snake, working nonstop and making a small farm in order to feed himself and survive the winters. They had ups and downs, but eventually they settled down completely. Once the new landlord tried to get hold of his area, but as he had shown the judge the papers of his territory, he won the case, and even got a few more parts of land as compensation, but he gave those to people who needed it more.

After a while, Cody decided to take part in his first festival, alone now. He always went with his adoptive father, so he was considered a regular at the place. The merchants were surprised to see him in such a good state after everything that happened, and he quickly filled them in on what happened to him and the others at their old home. A nobleman had overheard the conversation, and approached the young man with a fantastic offer. They told him he was an enemy of the current lord, and would testify against him in court if he was given the opportunity. Cody immediately took the offer, and started planning with the other party over the months.

He started gathering documents and everything that he could use as evidence. He would sneak out at night to spy on them, and after getting the information, he would deliver it to his partner by horse that same evening or day. He made sure he wouldn't be followed nor spied on, hid every evidence he got, and kept the meetings and information sharing short and brief. By the end of five months, they had enough documents to make the court claim. And that's what they did.

On the day of the court summon, Cody could see the overconfident smirk on his former Master's face, which he knew would disappear when the trial would start. And he was right.

The moment the evidence was presented to the jury and the judge, the defendant's face fell into horror and shock. In the end his sister had to spoke, who tried to defend him with everything she could, but even with that, they lost by a mile, and could do nothing as the peasants in the room cheered and congratulated the heroes who served justice.

The lands were given back one by one, along with all the stolen money and heritage the workers were promised by their now passed away lord.

Cody stayed in his forest, and remained friends with the person who helped him with it all. He was told to call if he got himself in any trouble, and the young landlord kept that information in his head, stored away for when he would need to use it.

Once back home, he went back to his life and continued to live on his own, with the companionship of his snake, who had turned a bit friendlier after the achievement they accomplished together.

Sadly, a few years later, he heard about the death of his friend, which was a staged murder by a rouge Talon, who was said to be living in the nearby forests. That meant that every tree around the city was destroyed in the search of the suspect, including the ones on his land. Due to that, he had to try and find another method to live, as now the animals he hunted and plants he needed were all gone.

In the end he decided to sell some of his lands and hired a few peasants to work for him, which turned out to be a disaster, and he had to fire them within two weeks. That left him with more problems than he had started with. His snake had gone back to hating him most of the time, which made things harder as well.

After months, not being able to pay his taxes and everything, he lost it all. He lost his house, his stuff, his land. He had nowhere else to go, and nobody could help him. He was all alone now, with no help. And that meant that he now lived on the street. The worst place to be at at night.

He wasn't ready to make a new life yet.