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Looking at Corbeau, you wouldn't have a clue where he came from. The years spent with pavement as his bed, and familiarity with racing to get his cold, pre-eaten meals before the Trubbish could finish it off.
The only hint now is the permanent furrow in his brow, from having not owned the glasses he so desperately needed at a young age, and the amount of wrinkles spread across his face considering he is not all that old.
You may question the wrinkles - are they not from the bursts of his short temper? His face contorting in anger and determination?
No, they run too deep in his skin to have been just from his years working as the head of the Rust Syndicate.
There is a reason his eyes are so piercing, and his words so sharp.
They've been honed over years of having nothing to his name except himself. They were the only weapons in his arsenal, and he had to use them well, and often.
Being a short and scrawny kid in scrappy clothes, other kids in robes just as tattered saw Corbeau as an easy target. And he didn't blame them for taking from him, not even all those years ago. Everyone needs to eat, to sleep in the driest spot you can snag on a cold and rainy day.
But that doesn't mean he would hand it over easily.
No, he would fight, as well as his tiny body could.
This is where those wrinkles came from.
When his teeth had to be his blades,
when he had to climb the larger kids like thorny trees,
when his nails would enter eyes,
when he quickly twisted wrists,
when he hit old wounds ("always note everyone's weaknesses" was an important lesson for his survival),
anything and everything he could do to give himself the head start out of their grasp before he bolted away.
Corbeau was a cat - he warned trespassers with a hiss, he made his body as big and tense as he could, and gnarled and gnashed his teeth if they got any closer.
If it was their first time encountering him, they usually continued to advance. How much damage could such a small kid do?
...When all was said and done, Corbeau would be left with another kid's greasy hair between his fingers, and their blood dripping out his mouth.
Every time, it took a while for him to get out of that state - frenzied, alerted by every noise despite the loud drumming of his heart in his ears. But they usually wouldn't mess with him again after that.
You can read this all in fine print along the wrinkles of Corbeau's face, but most people are too far away to read it, and thus, they remain innocuous lines.