User blog:DreamingOfDragons72x2/The Skullion's Helven Cousin

I just read How To Be A Pirate yesterday. At least two dragons were "introduced" in that, but the one that caught my attention the most was the Skullion. I just thought it was such a crazy idea that a dragon could have such a long list of weaknesses, and yet still be one of the more dangerous dragons. The idea was so crazy, I couldn't not do anything with it for the Helven Chronicles. I thought, "Okay, so the way I have the Helven dragons' strengths and weaknesses set up, none of the purebred dragons could have all of these weaknesses; how close can I get with a crossbreed?" So I thought about it, ran a couple mental simulations, and came up with a Helven dragon that is almost exactly like the Skullion.

The first thing I considered was, in order to study a dragon, first you have to find it. Weaknesses one and two (and an unnamed three, I think) of the Skullion: it cannot fly, cannot swim, and I seriously doubt it can tunnel (if it could, it could tunnel under the ocean and eventually get off its island). Easy enough: the Helven Skullion is a triple-crossbreed that has no capability to dig, swim, or fly. As a result, its four wings are fused to its four talons - the only Helven dragon that literally is a quadruped. An interesting side effect gives it a third named weakness of the Skullion (it can't hear), but also changes named-weakness number four: the Skullion can't see, but the Helven Skullion can't smell. Newtsbreath would be happier trying to raid treasure from this one's island; so would Gobber, although I think for him (and the rest of the Hooligans) there's a good-news-bad-news thing going here. The Helven Skullion also has trouble breathing, so if you can avoid getting captured for long enough it will eventually drop from exhaustion and stay down until it gets its breath back, giving you time to hide.

There are two named strengths of the Skullion: its incredible speed and its powerful sense of smell. The Helven Skullion has the speed, all right, but instead of a strong nose (since I mentioned in the weakness column up there that it can't smell), it instead has very powerful, always-open eyes, so big that they distort the shape of its entire head. It can see color, shape, movement, and it can see in two directions at once. Instead of incredible bathing, a treasure-hunting party MUST wear the exact same colors as the terrain of the island (almost an excuse to GET dirty once you arrive, to be sure you've got it) and carry ABSOLUTELY NO SHINY THINGS! This would mean for the Hooligans: either very dirty or rusty shovels or get your dragons to dig, cover your metal armor with fabric, and (since I doubt they would ever leave a blade dirty and unsharpened) NO BLADED WEAPONS. Hammers and bludgeons only, and only the ones with no metal studs. If you are unarmed and you think a Helven Skullion has spotted you, fall on your face and make yourself as one with the ground as possible, lie still, and pray that (1) you got enough dirt on your back to blend in properly, and (2) it doesn't step on you while it's looking for you, since at a little over three tons it would probably break something.

The exact weaponry of the Skullion is described as Venom 0, but long and sharp teeth and claws. That's doable for the Helven Skullion; make it a Spiny dragon. It would also be a Vulkan dragon, since it would want to live in a very hot place where a lot of water and dust in the air would actually improve its ability to breathe. Since it's at least moderately social, it would need to also be either a Hooded or Hackled dragon - if it were neither of those, it would have to be strictly solitary, since it could only communicate with its own kind by visual displays. Both of those would be the most social version of the Helven Skullion, but it would cease to have claws.

Oh, and color. The Skullion is described as black and purple; the Helven Skullion has black, all right, and a color that would either resemble purple or blood, but it also has white. No biggie - that would give it an excuse to have skull markings. This would also then be the second Helven creature I've come up with that has skull markings; the first was a Skullantula, a kind of spider that looks from a distance like a tiny skull walking around by crossbones. Maybe they share a habitat, or something...

This dragon is such a wacky idea that I might have it star, or at least cameo, somewhere in the Helven Chronicles. Because it's a hybrid dragon, it would have to never be seen again after it appears in one book; no sense in people thinking it's common. It's all the more dangerous because it's so rare that people don't know how to handle it.