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Once you have looked into the eyes of an Exterminator, it is impossible to forget them. The look in an Exterminator's eyes, of pure, concentrated, white hot FURY, The irises vibrating with pinpoint anger, is a look that haunts a person through their waking hours and in their nightmares forever after.
  How to Twist a Dragon's Tale  

Exterminators are a very dangerous species of dragon featured in How to Twist a Dragon's Tale.

Physical Appearance[]

Exterminators are known for their semi-transparent, but black skin, through which can be seen two hearts. Throughout Book 5, they are variously compared to large wild cats: "sinister leopard-like shapes", "large black winged panthers", or "three times as big as a lion", showing just how sinewy, strong, and predatory they are.

HtTaDT-ExterminatorClaws

Another key feature Exterminators have are their extremely long, extremely sharp retractable talons, as big as swords. Evidently they can have these claws out individually or all at once. Exterminators have either five or six digits on each paw: "Six talons came shooting out of the ends of its stubby reptilian fingers," and "ten sword-claws leaped from the ends of their fingers like switchblades" (five to a paw).

There is some contention as to how many limbs Exterminators have - two or four (not including wings). Alvin's Exterminator is described:

Its tail and its horns appeared to be on fire. It reared up on its hind legs, slicing through the air with its ten terrible sword claws.
  How to Twist a Dragon's Tale  


And a few paragraphs later:

With the other arm he lashed at the Exterminator's sides with a great black whip until the dragon brought down its great front legs, and bowed down in snarling, pacing, barely controlled submission.
  How to Twist a Dragon's Tale  


Clearly the large Exterminator that Alvin rode had both front and rear legs. However, a little later in the book, when thousands of Exterminator babies were hatching from their shells, the author provides a picture that clearly shows only two legs.

Exterminator3

This may simply be author error. Or perhaps, young Exterminators only have two visible legs, while larger, adult exterminators have four. Also of note is that Alvin's exterminator is described as having horns, whereas no drawing of exterminator shows horns.

Exterminator eggs are also translucent, and become more transparent the closer they are to hatching. The hatchlings inside can survive for hundreds of years before they hatch, fully aware of the environment outside and cramped in the shell. The eggs can only hatch with contact from fresh lava from an active volcano.

Weaknesses[]

Exterminator dragons have one predator, the Fire Dragon, whose diet is exterminator dragons and lives in the very lava that hatches them.

Behavior[]

Perhaps due to the length of time spent squashed in their shells fully aware, Exterminators are rather malevolent and aggressive. A group of Exterminators can decimate a landscape with fire alone, and enjoy doing so.

Training[]

Despite their viciousness, Alvin the Treacherous was able to tame an Exterminator for a Riding dragon. He accomplished this by erecting statues of himself all around Lava-Lout Island, so that the dragonets could see him before they hatched and look to him as a leader. A juvenile or adult Exterminator is probably not very easily trained, if at all.

Exterminators sided with the dragons in the Dragon Rebellion, assuming any were left after the ending of How to Twist a Dragon's Tale.

Appearances[]

How to Twist a Dragon's Tale[]

For centuries, the eggs of the Exterminator dragons lay around Lava-Lout Island. As the volcano became active and spewed forth lava, the Exterminator eggs hatched and the juveniles wreaked havoc on the nearly islands. Through the course of the Book, Hiccup attempted to get the stone used in the "Thing" meetings to the volcano to stop it from erupting. Ultimately, the stone turned out to be an egg of a Fire Dragon that stopped the volcanic eruption and feasted on all the Exterminators.

The Incomplete Book of Dragons[]

The Exterminator appears in this reference book as well as the Dragon Key at the back of the book.

Gallery[]

References[]

  • Icon-WebsiteDragonGuide
     The Exterminator in the Hero's Guide to Deadly Dragons on the Official How to Train Your Dragon Books Website. NB:   http://www.hiccuptheviking.com   is no longer available.


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