Maegwyn
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The Dragons that Bloom in the Spring
By Rimblade
Throughout all of history, mankind has lived in uncertainty, faced with several very difficult questions.* Who are we? Where are we going? Where are we going to get our next meal? These questions are acknowledged, and many people have dedicated their lives to solving them.** Beyond that, however there is yet one more question, the most important of all: What's going to eat me?
It could be argued that this last question is the source of many of the most fearsome monsters of myth and legend. The subconscious, racial memory of humanity tells us that, despite the apparent lack of horrific monsters waiting to devour us, they must exist. Children imagine horrific creatures waiting in the darkness, though they laugh at such sentiment when they mature.*** Still further, men seek to find such creatures, seeing in them either that magic which the world has sadly denied them, or a being of abject evil on which they can orient - something easily definable as 'evil,' much preferable to the complexity of reality. It is from these wellsprings that the compelling image of the dragon emerges.
JUST KIDDING
Seriously though, if you were taken in by that obvious fabulation, you should be ashamed of yourself. Everyone knows that dragons exist; indeed, most adventurers reading this will have fought several do.. hu... thousand. I myself, though I would never label myself a great dragon-slayer, have committed repeated acts of genocide against this strange race. Luckily, that doesn't appear to matter - there are always more. More. MORE. MORE.****
I shall return to this point presently. First, I would like to present a number of interesting questions to consider when one looks at the draconic race:
1. Dragons are everywhere. It would be incorrect to say that they exist on all worlds, but any planar travelers will note that there sure are a lot of places they call home.
2. Dragons tend to maintain a static population. Note, I'm not talking about historical events which might have devastated the draconic population. History doesn't count.
3. Dragons tend to share several charactaristics across realms. I.E. they are extremely large and eat too much.*****
4. Dragons are immune to virtually all name-brand repellants. Dragon-off, Fire-away, and even Wyrm-B-Gone: these are little more than scams.
When first I compiled this list, several things confused me. How ARE dragons so common, multiversally speaking? Despite being clearly the top of the food chain on virtually any world they inhabit, the sheer size and metabolism of such creatures means that they are not, from an evolutionary standpoint, astoundingly viable. Clearly I was missing something.
My first theory was that perhaps Dragons reproduce in the fashion of mushrooms, or plants. Imagine this scene: two little bluebirds, glowing with the health and light of springtime, invigorated by the deft touch of the breeze, flutter about, hearts as gay and happy as any creature might ever hope to be. Below the play of the birds, a huge flower opens slowly, solemnly, each petal shimmering with the glory of the morning's dew. Slowly, with majesty fit to shame a king, the flower opens to the sun, revealing the new-born drake, which glitters like some precious jewel under the glory of the sun. The jubilant little birds greet it with their delightful song of love, and it replies by eating them both, then testing out its fire by turning the woodland glade into an inferno.******
It doesn't quite seem right.
Of course, considering my genius*******, my second guess proved undoubtedly correct. Upon careful consideration of the number of dragons across the multiverse, I have determined that Dragons are, in point of fact, alien to all planes. Indeed, the fact is that dragons integrate themselves into those planes which prove to have favorable environments AFTER the creation of those planes. At first, the idea seemed absurd, even to me*****************, but it turns out that there is a great deal of support for this theory. The Void Dragons, for instance, show how dragons might adapt to strange environments without too much difficulty. Other realms show similiar support for the adaptive powers of dragons, and even shed light on how they arrived on those individual worlds, though we won't get into specifics as to just which realms those are, because I fear them deeply.********
Of course, this leaves open the obvious question: Where are they all COMING from? It is impossible to know, for even the dragons themselves seem to lack that knowledge. My personal suspicion, however, is that there exists, somewhere in the swirling nothingness between worlds, a vast draconic empire, ruled by a single omnipotent dragon-emperor-king-god-czar-thing (For the purposes of this document, we shall call him Draggums). I speculate that Draggums rules an infinite empire of dragons which span the void, which will mean one thing to any quick-thinking person: population issues. Draggums has to administrate this huge empire for all of eternity, and due to the relative nature of time, his ministers and advisors can spend forever on a thirty-minute lunch break. To that end, he has been trying to deport his citizens into worlds, to alleviate the stress.
While any reasonable person will realize at once that no matter how many he gets rid of, an infinite number of citizens will not actually diminish, so actual progress is irrelevant. So long as Draggums appears to be DOING something, he can continue to get re-elected to his post (I can't be sure that God-emperor-czar is an elected position, but I see no reason for it not to be). Of course, the problem is that each world can only support a certain number of extraplanar entities (due to a complex process of entropy, enthalpy, and epidermis). This means that whenever a dragon on one of these worlds dies, Draggums shoves another through (not personally. He's probably got people to do that for him). Note that dragons BORN on a plane do not count as 'extraplanar.'
There you have it: the origin, nature, and explication of dragonkind. In conclusion, I would simply like to assure all readers who may have become worried by the idea that an infinite number of huge, hungry beasts are waiting outside the thin film which protects this tiny world from total destruction that this is no cause for alarm. After all, the probability that you'll be eaten by a dragon is only one in three, and there's nothing at all you can do about it if it occurs. Nothing at all. Nothing.
For any dragons offended by this article: Please remember that my umbrella, hat, and raincoat are completely fire-proof. Thank you!
(This message brought to you by Those People Who Keep Bringing You Things. Seriously, guys, why are you doing this?)
~~~
*This is an exceptionally creative way to start off an article, I'm sure you'll agree. Nobody has ever tried this approach to an opener!
**You'll note that very little heavy lifting is involved in the contemplation of the deeper mysteries of the universe. If you find it otherwise, you're doing it wrong.
***Once they grow older still, they realize that their mistake was actually in assuming that the monsters in the darkness were so very tame.
****Not technically true - in reality, they seem to have a very consistent population level, e.g., there are always too many of the darned things. Seriously.
*****Furthermore, they are extremely impolite guests, and will eat their way through your larder in moments, which is why it is always best to ensure that your upcoming dinner date with a dragon takes place at a friend's house.
******Incidentally killing Smokey the Bear, who was occupied nearby, telling a group of cub scouts to take care with their campfire. No cub scouts were harmed.
*******Actually, I don't have anything further to say here. I just want to see how many asterisks I can put in a line. Seven so far!
*****************Wait a second, I don't HAVE to use a normal progression! I can just add ten asterisks in!
********AHAHAHA, I don't have to list them in order either! I've gone MAD with the power! THE POWER!***x10^9
***x10^9 Just how many people have ever had to use scientific notation to express how many asterisks they're using? I'm an innovator, and no doubt about it!*(i)
*(i)An IMAGINARY asterisk! Do you see an asterisk there? Well there isn't one! It's imaginary!-*
-*.kniht I ,sdrawkcab epyt ot evah I sneam ksiretsa evitagen A*/0
*/0...oh no. What have I do-
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