Cave Dragons

LAND: primarily Dreka, but all areas of Fyra Oyer

Cave Dragons are creatures that, despite their name, aren’t truly dragons at all. Paler in color and slightly smaller in stature, they reside in the various caverns collected beneath the lands of Fyra Oyer. At night they hang from the tops of their cave homes to sleep, and during the day and early evenings, they peddle their wares to passersby. Selling tools, weapons, gems, and more, they otherwise prefer keeping to themselves and their ever-increasing hordes of money. Never the adventuring types, they are more apt to send others to do their dirty work for them, whether by assigning quests, passing rumors and news of interest, or letting their desires be known for items outside of their realms to be brought back to them.

While having a penchant for collecting large sums of wealth, cave dragons do so with an actual purpose. They’ve always been merchants, collecting items from the darkened caverns below to peddle and trade for things out of their reach, but their lives used to be dramatically different. Their statures were taller, more slender, and with very long whiskers, looking very little like dragons at all, and theirs is an unwanted evolution endured over many Yar. Back when Vattenland was still an actual island, legend has it that King Drakon and several of his minions were tricked into flying deep into one of the caves that connected it to Drekaland. The entrance was sealed before they could escape, and they were trapped for so long that their existence had been perceived as nothing more than a fairy tale.

Cave dragons knew different, as their bodies began to take on very peculiar changes as the Yars passed. Underneath that island dwelled a beast with a treacherous curse, eternally looking for a way to escape and slowly turning everything else around him into a form of the toxic creature he had become. Drakon had been infected with the Gloom, an affliction few know the true impact of. When he’d been sealed in those cold, dark caverns, it wasn’t only he and his minions but also a large population of cave dragons. Over time, the Gloom spread to them, changing both their shapes and mindset, coming to resemble Drakon himself. When cave dragons experience sudden shifts in their physical abilities or appearance (whether through evolution or otherwise), it affects the entire species. Despite there being no openings in the caverns linking their prison to the outside world, the changes affected even the cave dragons above ground.

As of this writing, it’s unknown what the race of the Cave Dragons was called before the encapsulation of Drakon brought about their strange evolution. When Drakon finally escaped (sinking Vattenland in the process), he took with him an army of what have been termed Dark Cave Dragons, relatives of those same subtle merchants that roam the caves of Fyra Oyer now. The Cave Dragon shop-dwellers now horde their riches protectively, hoping that someday they will prosper enough to hire or make enough connections with brave adventurers to take down Drakon and avenge their afflicted brethren.