Phoney Bone

"God, I pity me."

- Phoney Bone "From here on out, it's nothing but smooth sailing!"

- Said moments before their cart crashed against some boulders.

Phoncible P. "Phoney" Bone (フォニー骨 Fonī Hone) is the selfish and greedy cousin of Fone and Smiley Bone, as well as the reason he and his cousins got run out of Boneville. His is known for his get-rich-quick schemes, to which the denizens of both Boneville and the Valley have fallen victim on more than one occasion. He is an RP character used by Gallibon the Destroyer.

Personality
Phoney is extremely greedy, arrogant, lazy, patronizing, selfish, cowardly, bad-tempered, clever, somewhat idiotic, and devious. He will let no one get in the way of his schemes, even his own cousins. However, he still cares deeply about them. Phoney was not used to life outside his affluent lifestyle and had much trouble adjusting to the customs of the Valley.

Phoney will stop at nothing to get rich, and his excessive arrogance always makes his plans go wrong. Phoney will often do things without consideration for others or thinking about what could happen if he fails. He refuses to accept that he made a mistake and will use others as a scapegoat. Phoney is unable to understand when he is in real danger until it is almost too late, and he never looks at how his plans could go wrong.

Backstory
Phoney, like his other two cousins, is an orphan. The oldest of the three, Phoney took care of them and focused on protecting his cousins. Eventually, he became a wealthy businessman, but was incredibly cheap and deceitful, even building an orphanage on a hazardous waste landfill. Phoney eventually decided to run for mayor, which Fone Bone believes was only so he could run more shady business deals. Phoney planned a picnic in a park and invited everyone in town. He promised free food (later revealed to be Prune Tarts) to anyone who showed up. Phoney wanted to make an announcement for his running for office in front of the statue of Boneville's founder, "Big" Johnson Bone. He tied a 50 ft balloon of himself to the statue, due to the fact he is Johnson's descendant. However, the balloon broke loose soon after his announcement and chased Fone Bone's first grade teacher, Mrs. Crab-Bone, into the river before Fone Bone and Smiley could let the air out of it. Then the bad prunes kicked in and gave the whole town "the Fast-Track Sallies". Phoney got into serious trouble and his already unstable reputation was shattered, with the current mayor even giving young Bones a holiday off school just to throw rocks at him. Not for the first time, Phoney was run out of Boneville soon after, his cousins helped him get away.

The first book begins two weeks after the cousins left the city. After much bickering, the cousins are separated by a swarm of locusts. It is unknown exactly what happened to Phoney, but he made it into the Valley by spring.

He is guided by a confused Ted to Fone Bone, but runs into Gran'ma Ben. Soon after meeting Gran'ma Ben, he is chased by her on a cow, and stays with her at the house. However, unable to adjust to the simple hardworking lifestyle, continuous arguing with Fone Bone, and almost instantly causing problems, he runs off to the village to gamble on the upcoming Cow Race. He is seen again at the Barrelhaven, where he meets Smiley, and they share a toast. However, he is forced to work for the irritated owner, Lucius, because he is unable to cover his debts with his currency.

Phoney begins working as the chef of the tavern, and begins his plans to manipulate the Great Cow Race, foreshadowing the second book. At the end, he is confronted by The Hooded One, who is searching for him. He is warned that the Hooded One will return for him, and she disappears. At the end, Phoney is reunited with Fone Bone, who comically begins to strangle him.

Up to his tricks, Phoney uses Smiley to make people bet on "The Mystery Cow" for the Great Cow Race, an annual event held at the Spring Fair involving racing cows. However, the Mystery Cow is simply Smiley in a cow suit, and Phoney is trying to get out of his debt and "get rich" from a multitude of animals and eggs. Lucius, however, catches on that the villagers might be getting scammed and tells the villagers that they need to see the Mystery Cow before the race. Once again, Phoney is ahead of them. Hiding Smiley in an old shed, Phoney is able to create a racket large enough to fool the villagers that his cow is genuine. However, Phoney's greed is his unraveling. Right before the race, Lucius bets his entire bar on Gran'ma Ben to win, knowing very well that even with his profits, Phoney would be unable to pay off the enormous debt.

Phoney informs Smiley that he has to win the race due to the bet and gets into Smiley's costume with him. Unfortunately, Phoney causes Smiley to fall into a ditch filled with Rat Creatures, ultimately causing them to collide with the race. Gran'ma pulls ahead to win the race, and an angry mob mauls Phoney with eggs in response to being cheated out of their savings. Lucius informs Phoney and Smiley that in order to work off their debts, they will work for him and Gran'ma Ben until the summer's end. Phoney is later forced to do chores at Gran'ma's farm, and makes fun of Fone Bone's pathetic attempts at love poems. When he goes off with Lucius and Smiley to Barrelhaven, the group is ambushed. After a long chase, they get to the Barrelhaven. Soon Phoney Bone claims that dragons are the ones to blame and claims himsefl to be a dragonslayer for hire, tricking the villagers into worshipping him. Later on though, it is revealed that he lied about this once they came upon tracking down the Great Red Dragon, butt before the villages could do anything about it, the Rat Creatures appeared and brunt down the village. Phoeny Bone was later injured and taken into a camp to heal.

In Ghost Circles, Phoney argues with Fone Bone over who's fault it is for not wanting to go home. While the cousins, Gran'ma Ben and Thorn walk across a bridge, Phoney yells when Fone Bone slips off and is relieved when Thorn grabs Fone Bone's arm. Phoney Bone hears that Atheia is rich in gold. Him and Fone Bone get a job chasing giant bees out of the market. Later, he attends a meeting with Gran'ma Ben and Thorn, and is arrested the next morning alongside Smiley by numerous Vedu soldiers.

At one point he tries to get the treasure in the well in Atheia while Smiley fetches Bartleby. When Bartleby is found out he holds a ladder for Bartleby to run up, and then he tries to get Fone Bone to leave with him, but is rejected. Later, Gran'ma Ben forces him to go with her to try and stop Briar, but when they get to the end of the tunnel, they are captured immediately. Since Briar's focus is on Gran'ma Ben, Phoney manages to slip away unnoticed. Later, he returns with reinforcements, only to find out that he "missed the war" and is disappointed, although he still thinks he's "a hero". Just before he goes to Barrelhaven, he gets "his" haycart back and finds the treasure still hidden inside the hay.

However, he pesters Fone Bone to make his decision on whether to stay or go, and is anxious when he keeps seeing snowfakes. He attends Lucius's burial and stays in Barrelhaven all winter due to the snowfall. In the spring, when they cross the raging river, he warns Smiley not to let the "supplies" fall out of the haycart. When they are on the edge of the desert and about to leave, he finds out all the treasure has been emptied out and replaced by "those hard, stuffed bread thingies" and is visibly upset. Gran'ma Ben gives him the coins with his face stamped on them saying "nobody around here wants 'em anyway." He's still upset because he had an "empire to rebuild" and it's only a few coins.

He finally reveals that he doesn't like hard, stale bread thingies but they are the only food in the desert. He asks Smiley to hand him one and Smiley request a gold coin in payment, and Fone Bone tells Phoney to give him one, saying "We're out in the middle of th' desert" in reference to Out from Boneville.

Debut: A New Untamed World
Phoney Bone later ended up in Montana along with Fone Bone, Smiley Bone and Bartleby. There, they drove their cart around the plains before it then crashed and burned, much to Phoney's displeasure. Fone Bone then explored the area, checking the new place they were in. Phoney looked around as well, to find some Narutons roaming around. When he and Fone got into an argument, the two stupid Rat Creatures Stinky and Smelly then appeared and attacked Smiley and Bartleby. Fone Bone then fought off Stinky and Smelly with his spear, chasing them off. The Bone Cousins and Bartleby then took off for elsewhere, as they needed to get a move on to their travel.

Abilities

 * Knife: Phoney Bone is equipped with a knife that he can use for close combat.

Trivia

 * It is 90% impossible to reason him out of one of his schemes.