The Mechanical Dragon

~The Legend of the Mechanical Dragon~


Long ago there was a village that was experiencing a severe drought.
The old man of the village told of a legend of the tree of life atop one of two cliff spires.
The tree of life produced a fruit, one of which could feed a whole village for a year.
He also warned that of all the men who had attempted to retrieve fruit from the tree, non have returned.
He told of a great dragon placed there by the ancients which guards the tree.
The villagers roared and declared that the first person to return with fruit from the tree would be their king.
Many where to afraid to offer their assistance, but the bravest of the village stood up and declared that the dragon was no match for them.
A young boy stepped forward and offered his assistance, but the villagers laughed at him, and said he can after the new king as returned with the fruit, and the dragon is nothing more then a pile of rubble.
Three of the bravest men prepared for the journey to the canyon the old man spoke of..
Each man would go in turns; the weakest of the three would go first, and so on to the strongest.
The first man left the village.
Several days went by and he did not return.
The second man left, with more armor then the first.
Several days went by, but the villagers heard nothing.
The final man of the three, the strongest of the village, took all the armor he could find, and all the weapons he could carry.
Several days went bye, soon the villagers began to fear the drought would clam them all.
A day later a severely wounded man found his way back into the village.
The villagers rushed to his side to see if he had acquired the fruit from the tree of life.
He showed them he did not, and told what had happened to him and the men before.
The beast was so fierce it didn’t even need to see them, it knew where they where.
Their weapons shattered upon contact with its skin.
It toyed with them, and attacked when they screamed for their lives.
He had escaped only because the creature had tripped while it was chasing him, for it was blind.
The villagers gasped at this, the beast which had defended the tree of life for centuries was blind.
Fear set in as they realized nothing they could do could save the village.
The drought and the dragon had won.
While the villagers contemplated their fate, the young boy who had stood up before had slipped away, he wanted to see this great dragon.
After a day of travel he arrived at the canyon.
Upon one of two spires on the cliff face, he saw the tree of life.
As he walked towards the path up the canyon to the tree the ground began to shake.
He froze as a huge creature lumbered slowly over the canyon floor.
The dragon walked slowly, every foot step shaking the ground and loosening gravel from the canyon walls.
The boy stood still, remaining motionless knowing the dragon was relying on its hearing to see.
The dragon slowly stepped closer and closer, its huge head swaying back and forth, as it if it was searching.
It stepped closer and closer until its head was only a few yards from the boy.
It took a deep breath “I can smell you, and hear your heartbeat, why are you not running away” it asked the boy.
“I am not afraid” he responded.
The dragon slowly moved its head forward until the boy could feel its hot breath.
“How about now” the dragon asked.
“No” he stood his ground.
“If you scream I will crush you, as I did the others” the dragon rumbled.
“Then I will not scream” said the boy.
“hmm, why are you not afraid of me, most are”
“why should I be afraid of a blind dragon”
The dragon took a deep breath and let out a roar of laughter, which shook the ground beneath their feet.
“Warriors from all over the world come to take fruit from the tree, every time they see me they scream, it hurts my ears so much I have to stop them, and unfortunately in the process I usually smite them.” said the dragon. “Im sorry about your friends, but their scream was too much for me, especially the last one, like the whale of a child.”
The boy laughed, but not to loudly.
The dragon stood up on hits legs, its head no level with the tree at the top of the canyon.
It hooked a fruit on one of its teeth and lowered it down to the boy.
“Here, take this. Tell others they can come and visit me if they wish, but do not scream, and make sure they wash, I can smell as good as I can hear.”
The boy took the fruit and left the dragon in the canyon.
He journeyed back to the village where the villagers met him with great surprise and made him king as they had said.
The fruit saved the village and helped them prepare for droughts of the future.
The boy was now king, and he remained king for many years until his children where old enough to become rulers.
The boy also visited the dragon every so often until he was to old to walk the distance.
The dragon continued to guard the tree of life for centuries, no one visited him, and he never gave out any more of the trees fruit.
One day the pollution in the air caused the tree to wilt, and his spell was broken.
He crumbled apart, his shell and mechanical parts collapsing to the ground.

Some now say he lives on, in the canyon in the sky.



You can hear him jumping from cloud to cloud now, during thunderstorms.

(c) CMG