Lung

Player's Name: Kira
Contact info: discord: Narva#9949 ; plurk: narwa
DW: narva

Character: Lung (I'm using his original name because the English translation named him "Firedrake" which is just completely unfitting <.<)
Canon: Dragonrider
Canon Point: After defeating Nettlebrand, before the first dragon wakes
Age: Young (probably not older than a century) - physically he isn't fully grown yet, but he is regarded as old enough to speak in council.
Gender: Male


History:

[I'm sorry this got so long, but about every station seems to introduce another important character/concept...]

Lung grew up in the Highlands of Scotland among a clan of dragons that was in hiding from the humans. It wasn't luxurious but they had all that they needed, and for a good while they and their many allies (kobolds and rats, mostly) as well as other mythical beings that lived in their area and wanted the place safe too (like fairies) could protect the area by causing accidents and malfunctions every time that humans tried to build there. But then one day, one of the rats brought word that the humans were going to flood the area, and while all other dragons gave up, Lung volunteered to go and seek out a place so mythical that even the oldest dragon in the clan only remembered its name and a few hints: The Rim of Heaven, where the clan came from originally and where no human would ever find them.

Thus him and his kobold friend Sorrel embarked on a journey. First they went to a harbour city at the southern shore of the North Sea, where Gilbert, a cousin of one of the rats back home, sold them a very useful map and they found a new travel companion: Ben, a human boy that Lung quickly befriended. But Sorrel distrusting both Ben and the map led to them getting off course quickly when they continued, and they spent a day in a location that Gilbert had marked as dangerous. A terrible mistake, as it brought them to the attention of Nettlebrand. Nettlebrand was a homunculus, built along with other homunculi by an alchemist who worked on the creation of gold. For this, he needed dragon horns, so he built Nettlebrand the Golden: A malicious, aggressive, powerful, nearly indestructible monster whose only purpose was to hunt dragons. Just that he ran out of dragons eventually and devoured his maker, and most of the other Homunculi. Only one remained: A fairy-sized, man-shaped creature named Twigleg.

And now Nettlebrand got news of a new dragon being sighted, and that said dragon was looking for the ancient home of the dragons. So instead of going right over and killing Lung, he devised a plan to use Lung as a guide to that home instead. He put Twigleg on a raven and sent him after Lung, Sorrel and Ben, keeping the poor Stone Dwarf who had brought him the news as Twigleg's replacement as his hide polisher.

And then a storm brought both dragon and raven down in Egypt. While Twigleg and Sorrel were saved from imprisonment by Ben (humans thinking they were a robot and a monkey), Lung met Dr Barnabas Wiesengrund, a self proclaimed (and indeed quite knowledgeable) researcher of mythical beings. Wiesengrund gave them some tips on how to proceed, and with Twigleg in tow, whom Ben had kind of adopted just like Lung had adopted Ben, they proceeded to ask a Jinny for more information on the Rim of Heaven. They got the information and Twigleg... had begun to love Ben and didn't want him eaten by Nettlebrand. So he double-crossed Nettlebrand, relaying incorrect information to him and delaying him some.

Continuing on, over the Indian ocean they were surprised by a lunar eclipse and would have drowned, if a sea snake had not risen above the sea, curious what made her scales itch so - mythical beings are always noticeable to one another, but dragons are particularly "broadcasting" of their presence. In a village at the mouth of the Hindus river, they met Dr Zubeida Ghalib, a dragon researcher and friend of Wiesengrund, who told them stories about the dragonrider, whose reincarnation Ben might have been, and of the dragons who used to come to the village until Nettlebrand showed up, his ravens darkening the moon so the dragons couldn't fly away. But the sea snake that they had met together with her sister held Nettlebrand down so the dragons could escape. She also told them of a special kind of flowers: The dew which gathered on them, if drunk by a dragon, would enable the dragon to fly even when the moon wasn't visible. Here, Twigleg's secret was revealed.

Meanwhile, Wiesengrund got almost killed by Nettlebrand, learning that his friends were being pursued, and took off to the monastery that he knew Lung would eventually be headed to, taking his wife and child with him.

Continuing on up the river and into the Himalaya, after some trouble and encountering a cousin of Gilbert, they reached the monastery. The monks were excited to see a dragon again at long last, but confused that Sorrel had only two arms. It turned out that the local kobolds had four, and with one of them in tow, Burr-Burr-Chan, they fly to the Rim of Heaven.

Here, they meet Maya, the last dragon of those who had once come to Dr Ghalib's village who was still awake - all the others had grown too scared to go out to drink moonlight, fearing Nettlebrand, and instead eaten the lichens in the caves where they lived, and slowly turned lethargic and then to stone.

They devised a plan to take down Nettlebrand that worked out, and with Nettlebrand melted, the Stone Dwarf that had accompanied him revealed that he knew a way to wake up the sleeping dragons again.

Lung will be taken from the night after this, while the dwarf is working.


Personality:

Lung has never been alone and never faced hatred, bullying, and similar adversities. This informs a great deal of how he interacts with the world.

First of all, Lung is one side of a half. We don't know when they first met, but it is clear that him and Sorrel have spent most of their lives together, to the point where they have in a way fused personalities - Sorrel does all the distrust and snark and Lung does all the trust and gentleness. Separated, both of them run into serious trouble - in Lung's, the problem is that he can be overly naive and trusting.

He needs very clear signs of something being dangerous or hostile to not consider it trustworthy, will permit and try almost everything as long as there is no very clear threat in it, and encounter even yelling people with curiosity over caution. He knows that dangers exist - be it that creatures or humans are malicious, unthinking, function by dangerous rules or are simply predators. But until one a few weeks ago, they were always abstract to him. Yes, the dragons lived where they lived because that was the last place that they could escape to, but he'd never met one of the humans that caused this, only knew stories.

This approach applies to individuals, groups and even concepts. He will treat them with kindness, curiosity and trust, and always assume the best of someone else, even in cases where not only Sorrel but everyone else around advises caution.

A part of this is also nature; dragons in his world come from the Himalaya region and are much more like Chinese than Western dragons - they bring luck and are considered wise, benevolent creatures worthy of deep respect, and their departure was regarded with sadness. What sets Lung apart from most of the others of his species is that those traits are coupled with curiosity and youthful vigour and the will to fight - not fight something, but fight for something. And that he will believe in dreams and stories and work to achieve them; he is change where other dragons are static.

Lung is courageous, but it is never coupled with aggression. His species is one of healing and peace - their fire heals, their presence lets people prosper peacefully - and the only time we see him attack something with the intent to "kill" (or, return it to its natural state which will erase all personality and sentience, as the creature of departure was not sentient) it is a thoroughly evil, murderous being whose survival would mean the end of all dragons. But he will confront a being that could and will try to have him for an afternoon snack if said being is about to kill his friend, or fly into the great, hostile unknown to find a safe space for his family. If running is an option, he will always choose it over fighting.

He will do almost everything to see his friends and family safe and happy, but he's just not used to that thought meaning others being harmed, and will do his best to find a different way if he can.

Lastly, Lung is kind and physically affectionate. He is used to sharing physical proximity with those he cares about and sees no reason to hesitate in touching others for encouragement, gestures of affection or in teasing. There seems to be no pattern to whom he befriends, but he will treat everyone with friendliness and if a closer bond develops take that seriously.


Fears:

Harm coming to his friends, be it in the form of injury, some kind of imprisonment/enslavement, or something else that causes them great hurt (death, not so much, though he would grieve for it happening to those that he doesn't consider mythical beings).
The moon being gone when he needs it - an example would be a lunar eclipse while he's out over the ocean.
This is something that he doesn't fear because it doesn't even occur to him, but it would scare him a lot: Losing the healing properties of his fire/his fire turning into actually harmful fire.


Weaknesses:

Most of all his naivete. He's just way too trusting for his own good.
His reluctance to physically fight something - he's never really had to do that. Also his lack of fighting skills/weaponry.
Unless he drank the dew gathered from a specific flower, he is unable to fly while the moon isn't overhead - trees or clouds won't be a problem, but a lunar eclipse or a mountain will be, so I assume he'll be flightless without the elixir inside a house as well.
Sadness makes his fire die. He will have to consciously breathe it again to rekindle it, and it'll be ...lesser.


Mundane Strengths/Abilities:

He can swim.


Sensitivity/Magical Ability:

- can fly (but needs the moon or dew that gathers on plants that live of moonlight for that)
- can breathe blue fire, which is warm and can make stone pleasantly warm for a while, but has no destructive qualities - it is said to tickle pleasantly when aimed at a human
- his fire heals (diseases as well as injuries)
- his fire returns everything that was changed by magic to its natural state/breaks curses/etc (obviously this can also be lethal if f.ex. you have a magical substitute heart etc)
- like all mythical creatures in his world, he can die but will find his way back from the Otherland (where people go after they die). Thus, unlike humans and regular animals, he isn't forced to stay dead but can return if he wishes to (humans and regular animals lose their way in the Otherland or forget who they are). He can also enter the Otherland willingly - it basically just is another plane of existence to him.
- his speech is universally understandable, and he understands most languages just as well (he however doesn't understand concepts that he doesn't know - aka if someone tells him about an animal that he doesn't know, he won't magically know that. Note: This ability also includes intelligent animals, like his world's rats).
- he is more resilient towards magic than all other living beings in his world, though he can still be hit with magic - it just takes more.
- other mythical creatures make his scales itch when they come close - though he's so used to that because his biffle is a mythical creature, too, that he doesn't notice it any more. He would likely start to notice it again if he was ever removed from other mythical creatures.
- doesn't need to eat - dragons live off moonlight. In turn that means that he will have to eat/would starve if there is no moonlight
- this is a legend, but the people in the Himalaya region believe that his kind brings luck (signified by rain and health), and canon suggests that this isn't entirely untrue (though it isn't clear what the conditions are) [My proposal on how to handle this in game would be that characters in his proximity would get lowered difficulty on their die rolls, or something similar :|9]


Supply List:

1. A backpack that contains:
- some seeds
- some vials with a clear blue liquid in them
- a map
- mushrooms and human food
- a teenager's sweater

2. Leather contraptions to tie riders to his back


Sample RP post: