This could be a shipwreck on the shore

[returnsmagic]

WHO: Aurican and Crucible
WHERE: Some douchebag cafe in the City
WHEN: Sunday afternoon
WARNINGS: this possibly the most Y-TV rated log ever
SUMMARY: two dragons chat and catch up on what's been happening a couple of millennia
FORMAT: uh, quick log i guess?

[ Another being from Krynn. At least this man is perhaps more agreeable than Khisanth. Aurican hopes so, his head hurts at the thought of sharing even a continent with a chromatic dragon.

However, he can't have his guard down. It is likely this is a blue dragon in disguise, or another of the Dark Queen's pet monstrosities. But if it is one of Reorx's creations or Paladine's followers or even future children, then there is little to worry about.

But he cannot stop but admit that he is a little nervous about this meeting, purely on the grounds on what has happened to the future. He has no way of obtaining it from Khisanth, obviously, unless she is feeling capricious and cruel, which he has no patience for.

So he sits down with one of the tables right outside of the cafe, obtaining a seat for himself. ]

Comments

[returnsmagic]

[ Dragons cannot weep. For the longest time, even for dragons, Aurican assumed it is because dragons cannot grieve, cannot feel the sorrow that lesser beings have. He started to have doubts when Patersmith passed on, but as the centuries went by, so did those doubts.

But when the elves were attacked, it felt as though he was torn in two. His most precious treasure, ripped and burned and smashed to pieces, all the beautiful culture and lives simply destroyed, obliterated even. It was an agony that soon became a blessing, for it had numbed him when Burll flew into hellfire; when Blayze was ambushed; when Smelt was knocked out of the sky by lightning bolts. And oh, he missed them, he wished Burll was here beside him to see his future descendant before him. Good, steady Burll, gentle Burll, the bedrock of the metallic patriarchs.

What does this make Aurican?

The balladeer, of course.

He will write his brothers history in tears now, but in triumph. Even now, he can barely see the small flame through the sheen of his tears. He rubs his old hand against his eyes, wiping them away. ]

Not in vain, then.

What happened after the war?

[dragonlordbight]

[ Bight let the small flame flicker in his hands before finally snuffing it out. He kept a respectful silence for that moment as Aurican wept, he knew well that even dragons were not immune to sorrow or grieving for the lost and Aurican had lost many in his time..and would lose more before the end. ]

Far from it.

Through your work and that of the three brother-mages would lead to the defeat of Crematia and sealing of all other chromatics within the dragon stones.

A time of peace was bought by your efforts, lasting many centuries.

[ One that had not come without cost he knew and one that would not last. ]

Crematia however survived, and with her children arose once more to unseal the dragon stones and release the chromatics once more to bring about the second dragon war.

[returnsmagic]

[ Crematia. The red dragon. His heart hardens at hearing her name as his tears finally start to dry. So Aurican's suspicions were true: there was another war. ]

Have Paladine's forces won that war as well?

[dragonlordbight]

[ A second war of many to follow. He did not wish to be the bearer of bad news nevertheless he recounted what he knew nonetheless. His expression somber as he continued. ]

Crematia did not survive her second encounter. Her son, however took command of the chromatics to lead them against the metallics, your intervention gave them the chance to survive and scatter. He ignored them and set his attentions on the Elves.

[ He gave brief pause at that point before going on. ]

The three brother-mages were their undoing, unleashing a storm of magic on the Deathfyre's hoard unlike anything the world had ever seen or has seen since.

Deathfyre himself escaped and went into hiding, those of our kind who had survived the war gathered their strength and forged new alliances with the mortal races of the time.

[returnsmagic]

I see. I wonder which war Khisanth was involved in before coming here. [ But it matters not. ] Did Deathfyre followed his mother's footsteps as well and attempted another war?

[ Hearing Aurican's involvement with the second war gives Aurican his suspicion that that is when he finally died, but he notes there is no mention of Darlantan or the females. And there is a cold idea that Aurican's death won't be enough for the chromatics to ignore the metallics, if they all hatched from their eggs. No, it won't be enough, unless Darlantan and the females died along with him in battle, and the wyrmlings were much too young to be any threat immediately during the war.

But that's for another time, Aurican can't be bothered to derail the conversation. ]

You said you went through two cataclysms. What do you mean by that?

[dragonlordbight]

The Draconian war, otherwise known as the War of the Lance to mortals. [ He replies simply, he would go into greater detail when the time came ]

It would be a thousand years before he would do so, but yes. However the world had changed and for the first time dragons fought with mortal companions upon their back as riders. A war fought as much by mortals as it was by dragons.

Through the rise of Huma and the Silver dragon Heart, Takhisis herself was wounded in the final battles and forced from the world, for a time. Chromatics were forced to withdraw from the world or forced to slumber while we metallics retained the balance in lawful exile to the Dragon Isles.

[ He knows well that Aurican could well figure that there was more to what he had said, however he would only expand on such if asked by the gold.

At the Gold's question he dipped his head. ]

Indeed, two events which drastically changed the surface and peoples of Ansalon and Krynn.

The first cataclysm occurred during our time on the dragon isles, while many of us still slept. We felt little of its effects. In the time during our absence from the world a new empire arose by the name of Istar, an empire whose slow corruption of ideals thought themselves to be the true good of the world, to the point that the Kingpriest, the leader of their nation attempted to replace the gods themselves with himself. Warnings were sent and ignored by the people of Istar, and thus the gods set a firey mountain down upon Istar. Sinking it beneath the waves, and altering the face of Ansalon. In the aftermath, the gods withdrew from the world.

The second Cataclysm took place three hundred and three years after the first, many years after the Draconian war had concluded, both Chromatic and Metallic dragons were back in the world. Chaos himself was unleashed upon the world, his minions terrorizing much of the Ansalon and leaving devastation in his wake. Chaos was defeated and in the wake of his defeat, Takhisis worked her plans once more and stole the world away, cutting it off from the gods for a period of near fourty years until the war of Souls.

[returnsmagic]

[ Well. Dragons taking riders? He done it himself, of course, but he never thought that it will be possible for all metallic dragons to be ridden upon. Aurican wonders if the coppers were especially stubborn about this particular issue. ]

Praises sent to Huma and Darlantan's descendant, then.

[ He gives a rather heavy frown at the mention of Chaos. It sounded much like a god. ]

Is Chaos a god? An outsider perhaps, powerful enough to challenge the gods?

[dragonlordbight]

[ Bight dips his head somberly at Aurican's praises of Huma and Heart, both had given themselves to achieve what they had. Indeed he still remembered well those final days of the war so long ago. He himself had taken a rider in the time.

He nods once more in confirmation to Aurican's question ]

Indeed, the very embodiment of chaos itself. It took the work of gods, mortals and dragons to defeat him and force him from the world. Both Metallics and Chromatics fought and died side by side in the final battle.

[ A battle he himself would likely have been consumed in had he not been severely injured prior to the final confrontation. ]

[returnsmagic]

[ Aurican cannot even comprehend the mental image of chromatics and metallics working together, fighting a common foe. He tries to imagine his golden descendants flying alongside Crematia's grandchildren, dragon fire not aimed at each other but at a deadly foe of the void itself. ]

That is difficult to imagine, but I believe you.

So Takhisis is working her plots again. Had she been defeated this time?

[ It seems like an bad joke now, the way she keeps insisting on obtaining something that will never be hers. ]

[dragonlordbight]

When the world itself it at risk of destruction, even the most unlikely of alliances are possible.

I do not believe Takhisis was responsible for the chaos war, however she took ample advantage in the aftermath. She stole away Krynn itself and hid it from the gods for near fourty years.

She was however defeated, once and for all.

[There's a sense of finality in his statement.]

oh god so sorry for the slow

[returnsmagic]

[ Aurican frowns. He believes in Crucible, but he can't image it to be possible. ]

How?

Not to worry!

[dragonlordbight]

[His expression goes particularly somber at that point]

She was made mortal and slain as any other mortal can be. Paladine himself sacrificed his godhood to ensure the balance.

[returnsmagic]

Death is too good for her.

[ Aurican is shocked at this. In fact, he just barely gotten over the fact that he has succeeded. And while he knows it is selfish, but he can't help but feel vindictive on the preservation of balance, to take away Aurican's father like this.

She's a selfish god created so many wars. And for what? For her to die a miserly, mortal death. It would have been appropriate for her to die that way, except Paladine must pay the price. His actual father whom he has never met and never will unless in death. ]

[dragonlordbight]

Indeed, however it is the only way to be sure that she will never harm the world again.

[Crucible too wasn't quite pleased with the situation, it was a high cost to rid the world of such evil. It was not he to judge the choice of the god that had watched over them for so many years.]