I got the idea for this character last night while I was playing Okami. Not sure what compelled me to put a guardian sapling on top of a wolf, but this is the end result of that,

So this guy, he doesn't have a name, but he was once an envoy of the gods who traveled the forests of Nippon with a blooming beautiful guardian sapling upon his back (I will hopefully draw this version eventually). So when evil was released and the nature cursed by darkness, so to did he become cursed. As he is a being tied directly to the forests and trees.

Once nature is restored, so should he... in theroy.

Also he may also look this way if faith in the gods is extremely low, but that version there is less plant death where he goes because of the whole not being tied to evil thing,

Paper texture from cgtextures.com