My name is "Ager-Pishko-Kois-Halekia-Lyubrai-Azel-Azel-Seknat-Kois-Ager."
Dragons these days consider such names incredibly tacky and antiquated. That is only natural, as it was hardly a common naming convention even when I was born.
My parents' names followed the exact same format, and they did not hesitate to give me a similar one. They seemed to view names as grand ornaments—the longer they were, the better they displayed our uniqueness.
Yes, exactly. My parents believed that they—and I—were special dragons with noble blood. While the Dragon Race is already infamous for its towering ego in such matters, my parents were exceptional. They went a step further than merely boasting that dragons were a superior species. They genuinely believed without a shadow of a doubt that even other dragons were inferior to the three of us. We were simply different from the rest of the Dragon Race.
It was the sort of talk that would infuriate any other dragon, but they were entirely serious. I remember the speech they gave me time and time again.
"Never forget. We are special dragons. You must never mix your blood with those low-class, mongrel dragons. You must maintain this noble blood. It is our duty to preserve our pure bloodline."
Regrettably, I couldn't honor their wishes.
The times had already changed drastically by the time they had me. Members of the Dragon Race no longer cared about things like scale color; they simply fell in love and had children. They even transcended physical appearances and biological classifications. Winged dragons mated with earth-burrowing dragons, and sea-swimming dragons mated with fire-breathing dragons. Watching this, my parents would click their tongues and call it "vulgar, disgusting behavior no different from beasts," but it was an unstoppable tide.
Furthermore, there was a bigger problem. We could no longer find any more special dragons like us.
"Just because their scales are gold doesn't mean they are the same kind of dragon as us. Look closely. Can't you feel it? There's something different about them."
My father was actually right. I could tell just by looking at similar dragons classified as Gold Dragons within the Fire Dragon class. They were different from us.
In the end, I never found a mate before both of my parents passed away.
*
I couldn't believe it when I heard the news that both of my parents had died in battle on the same front.
This war was never supposed to drag on for so long in the first place. Moreover, it shouldn't have been a war where two dragons belonging to the oldest cohort in the dimensional system lost their lives.
Because those braggarts called the Ancient Race were unmistakably an inferior species. There was no need to judge them by the standards of a special dragon like me. It was true even by the standards of an ordinary dragon.
I remember that moment clearly. When they reappeared after having vanished for ages, claiming that "this was originally our land" and demanding we hand over sovereignty, every dragon just laughed.
The evidence they presented to assert their historical rights sounded closer to legends, superstitions, and folktales to us. It was only natural; until the Ancient Race actually returned, they were treated much like the Dragon Eater Tribe from children's stories.
To use an analogy for their attitude, it was like someone claiming they were granted a plot of land in a creation myth, and despite having never actually occupied it or being able to pay a fair price for it, they were stubbornly demanding that sovereignty be handed over anyway.
That was how it sounded to our ears. Pure nonsense.
Furthermore, they weren't anywhere near as powerful as the legends described. Or perhaps the dragons had simply grown too strong in the meantime.
The first war ended in an overwhelming victory for the Dragon Race.
But after vanishing once more following their defeat, they suddenly returned wielding absurd weaponry and overwhelming technological prowess. Shattering everyone's expectations, the Dragon Race was pushed back on every front. The Territory they demanded returned—the place now known as the Dimensional Center—was on the verge of falling. That was the era when my parents passed away.
Enraged by the news, I volunteered for the front lines. Up until then, I had been fighting in the rear at my parents' insistence, but there was no longer any reason to stay there. My kin naturally welcomed me. They must have thought it a waste to leave a powerful dragon like me to rot in the back.
However, the tide of the war had already shifted drastically against us.
*
"This is no time to worry about methods!"
After much agonizing, the dragons swallowed their pride and even drew their own blood to use as weapons. It became glaringly obvious during the war that the majority of species, especially Kavites and other members of the Ancient Race, exhibited severe adverse reactions to dragon blood. So we fashioned weapons from our blood.
I remember a Kavite great general who showed symptoms of severe poisoning, screaming as he went half-mad.
"I curse you, you monsters with venom in your veins! We were only trying to take back what was originally ours. Just look at what you've done to this world while we were gone! You dragons are polluting the other species with your poison. Dragons were never creatures meant to live like this in the first place. For you filthy beasts, there is a better way of life. And that is..."
The great general couldn't finish his sentence. The moment the word "beasts" was mentioned, an enraged Ancient Dragon of the Fire Dragon class unleashed a breath attack it had been gathering until its chest was ready to burst. The Kavite was obliterated without leaving even a speck of ash behind.
However, it became an exchange where we lost countless Ancient Dragons for every great general the Ancient Race lost. The problem grew increasingly severe. Even the species the dragons had previously ruled over betrayed us and sided with the Ancient Race.
The way the Dragon Race treated other species across the various dimensions was described with words like "abuse," "exploitation," and "wringing them dry." It seemed we had thoroughly earned their resentment. It was only natural.
In the end, the war ended in victory for the Ancient Race.
After going through a humiliating settlement—a ceasefire in name only that was essentially a declaration of surrender—we were forced to live within the framework they designed.
*
After the war ended, I fell into deep contemplation.
The period of agony and wandering wasn't long. I am a dragon who dislikes wasting time, after all.
The question that dominated my mind was this:
Why did we lose?
So I analyzed the reasons for our defeat. The Ancient Race returning with astonishing technology was the primary reason, of course. But the fact that we collapsed without even having the chance to mount a proper counterattack was largely due to internal subversion within each dimension and the activities of spies.
In short, if the species we ruled over had sided with the dragons, we wouldn't have lost so easily.
However, most dragons considered caring for and empathizing with their subjects to be as difficult as plucking stars from the sky. Meaning, they viewed it as something so difficult that it might barely be achieved if they spent their entire lives on it, but ultimately something they didn't need to waste their time on.
They were entirely different from the Ancient Race, who were experts at pretending to care for their subjects outwardly, or exploiting them in such a way that the exploited never even realized what was happening.
But I had known for a long time. I knew that I was different from other dragons.
I wasn't talking about the teachings my parents had repeated until my scales fell off.
I was capable of empathy.
For species other than dragons.
*
I believed this was a crucial element that would dictate the future of the Dragon Race. I also noted that my late parents possessed a similar disposition, and speculated that this was perhaps an innate trait. It felt fundamentally different from something that could simply be the result of upbringing.
So I began researching my own blood. Since this broke the taboos of dragon society, I conducted it in secret. My goal was strictly to uncover the reason why I was different from everyone else.
But during my research, I stumbled upon a realization from a completely unexpected direction.
'Dragon blood... is strange.'
I was probably the very first dragon to study dragon blood so seriously.
Dragons are renowned for their mighty bodies and immense vitality. To some, it's an infamy. A seething, overflowing vitality. That is the defining trait of a dragon.
Seething and overflowing.
Yes, overflowing.
'The vitality a single dragon exudes over a lifetime is abundant enough that they wouldn't run out even if they used it until they died of old age.'
In truth, dragons do live for a long time.
But are they immortal beings?
No, absolutely not.
'With this much, even my tenth-generation ancestor, an Ancient Dragon, should still be alive today. But no dragon lives that long.'
It was strange.
Truly, incredibly strange.
This surplus vitality seemed to reject being absorbed into its host. It simply lingered in the blood, fading away only when the dragon died.
A Dragon Heart, which could extend the lifespans of other dragons if consumed, couldn't endlessly extend the lifespan of its actual owner. It was a complete paradox.
'What reason could there possibly be to evolve like this?'
I couldn't comprehend it. The sole purpose of this overflowing vitality seemed to be simply existing in the blood.
But as I continued my research, I could no longer focus on that.
Because I discovered something far more shocking.
'What in the world is this?!'
It aligned with the original objective I had when starting this research. It was a discovery that proved I was indeed special.
However, it revealed itself in a form subtly different from my expectations.
'This isn't a natural pattern. Someone... implanted this with intent.'
I was in the middle of an experiment where I stimulated my own dragon blood with mana waves. Fully utilizing all six of my brains, I generated nearly infinite combinations of patterns and fired them.
During the process, the dragon blood reacted to a pattern I created purely by chance. It was a reaction teeming with artificial traces.
'Let's dig deeper into this.'
After that, I generated a multitude of different mana patterns. How long did it take? It's hard to even fathom now. Through such arduous effort, I discovered far more patterns that the blood reacted to. The very first one I had found was just the simplest of them all. They grew increasingly complex.
The tedious experiments dragged on. The work felt akin to compiling a dictionary for a language I didn't know in the slightest. It wouldn't be far off to call it an experiment in organic-chemical paleography. As the mana waves grew more complex, not only text but also visual projections popped out, which proved helpful to the research.
And so, having acquired a certain grasp of an unknown language entirely unheard of anywhere in the dimensional system, I was left utterly horrified.
The simplest string of text I had initially discovered.
It carried the following meaning:
-Livestock Product Traceability System Information Access
*
Because I am a dragon, I naturally do not believe in gods.
Therefore, I didn't believe that the thing I found in my blood was the work of a deity.
That only made it all the more terrifying. Reeling from the shock, I refused food and drink and agonized over it. The ones who had left this in my blood... in the DNA of dragons, were not gods, yet they wielded god-like technology.
And they treated dragons as "livestock."
Fighting the urge to stop thinking altogether, I pieced together the two newly uncovered facts.
'One. A dragon is born with a vitality so abundant they couldn't possibly use it all before they die.'
And.
'Two. There is an ancient existence that raised dragons, treating them as livestock.'
The deductive conclusion was simple.
'We were originally beasts raised as livestock. Those unknown beings... they fed on us.'
The surplus vitality in our blood was never meant for us.
It was clearly an arrangement prepared for someone else to drink.
Just as the Ancient Race wasn't a myth, the Dragon Eater Tribe wasn't a fictional entity either.
However, the ones who consumed dragons for food had currently vanished. I couldn't believe they had perished and gone extinct. A significant portion of the information within our genes implied as much. It seemed they had disappeared by their own choice. Simply leaving us... the dragons, neglected.
But would they never return?
Or would they?
I couldn't be certain.
But, what if they did return?
I thought about the very first thing dragons do when waking up from hibernation. Energy is consumed even if one does nothing but sleep without eating. It's only natural. Therefore, the very first thing the Dragon Race does after opening their eyes is fill their bellies.
They fill them up completely.
I could find no reason to guarantee that something similar wouldn't happen to us.
*
I probably can't leave all of this behind in a letter. I am currently hesitating.
The message I wish to write is simple. It is a declaration, a plea, and a request.
We are not beasts.
I don't know how it was back then, but we are now sapient beings capable of thought and emotion.
Nevertheless, I am terrified when I imagine how you will treat our species upon your return.
Modern society has reached a certain consensus on the grounds for recognizing a species as something not to be eaten, and the standards for granting them dignity. Yet, I fear that you will not agree with it.
We think. We possess the will to freely reason and make our own choices. We feel joy and sorrow. Moreover, we have always evolved, and will continue to evolve. We deserve to be respected simply for existing.
You must not eat us.
The more I study the traces left in our blood, the more I realize it. You possessed a civilization far more advanced than anything the Ancient Race could ever compare to. You are beings who lack nothing to be worshipped as "gods."
I cannot know whether you will return in the near future or in the distant, unimaginable future.
If we are still around by then, you will be able to see the civilization the dragons have built with your own eyes.
If so, will you judge us to be sapient beings and spare us from consumption?
Or will it be no different from the gaze of orcs looking down at an anthill?
I do not know.
I have decided not to share this truth with my kin. It's because I cannot bear the repercussions and chaos it would provoke.
I sincerely hope you will read this and change your minds. I hope you will confront the emotions pressed into this letter, written in your own language. I hope you, who are comparable to "gods," will understand us. I hope you will empathize with me.
You must not eat us.
I am also genuinely curious. So I wish to begin my letter with a question.
Just who in the world are you?
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