Humans lived their lives under the shadow of the dragon. These are just a couple of stories of such lives.

  Bo the Birdcatcher was exactly what his title implied he was, he was a birdcatcher.

  What was a birdcatcher? Someone who caught birds, of course. Bo was the best at it, in fact, he had been training since he was very young, ever since his father had decided he was ready, when he could first start holding up a bow, he was training to follow his father's lead as a hunter.

  But hunting most things was boring. Most things wouldn't be able to run. The only things that could survive a shot from his bow were large, sturdy, durable and strong enough that they were well beyond what he could actually handle, usually a matter for those trained in military matters or the Dragonguard itself to handle.

  That left the most challenging kind of prey to hunt for him to be the monstrous birds that sought to usurp the skies that the Silver Dragon lay claim to.

  And in Argentum, usurping anything that belonged to the Silver Dragon was enough reason to be judged and sentenced to death. Transgressing the Rules of Nature was a sin, and as far as anyone was concerned, sinning was wrong.

  But lately, the birds were getting bigger, stronger and flew higher, being faster and more able to take damage from his bow. Bo had been upgrading his bow, bigger and heavier in turn, to keep up, but he was starting to run into a problem.

  "So I made this bow," Bo said. "It's made out of a Dragonwood branch," he said, running his hand along its length, the almost mirror-sheen of the silver wood on the surface of the bow letting him see his own face on it, "it took me three months of straight work to shape it. The bowstring is made of braided wormthread," he added, "and it's attached with nails donated by the Dragon Priestess."

  Thus, he presented his creation, a bow so heavy no human could ever draw it, to the Water Dragon Clan's Chief Huntress, a woman that dwarfed him in height, with biceps larger than his head, tits even larger than that, long dark red hair and a cool green cloak that billowed in the thin and gentle breeze.

  She took it in one hand, he had to use two just to lift it.

  "I give this to you - and with it, I ask for your hand in marriage! I want to make bows only for you," he said. "Will you become my partner for-"

  "We're already married you doofus!" she responded, smacking him upside the head.

  Right, Bo the Birdcatcher, premier Hunter of Birds in Argentum, was already married to that woman. "The day I married you was the happiest day of my life, so I want to relive it over and over again," he said, confidently.

  "You- you utter fool!" she said. "Just for that, you're getting so many cuddles tonight, you'll melt!"

  "Oh no, whatever shall I dooo?"

  "They're so lovey dovey it could make me vomit," another member of the Water Dragon Clan, getting dressed and ready for the next hunt, pointed out. "Oi! Chief! If you want to stay back feel free to, we'll just go out hunting and take your share for our own!"

  The muscular women murmured words of agreement.

  "I'll see you when I return, prepare yourself," she said, poking her husband in the chest, "and you lot, don't think I don't see you cutting corners, tighten up those packs properly!! I don't want any of you to lose any of your tools, especially the Dragoncraft!"

  They all continued preparing, Bo even helped, since he had also brought a nice heap of arrows for his wife.

  Elsewhere...

  The Dragon's Blessings could be heavy sometimes. The Scribe was one of those who was blessed with a name and a purpose by the Dragon, and though she did not bear the transformed body of his direct servants, the Kobolds or the Dragon Priestess, she was the First Scribe, the leader of the Order and carried perched upon her nose the Crystalline Wisdom that had been granted upon her.

  Of course, her role was simply impossible to perform purely on her own. So she had been granted authority to create the Order of the Glasses. It had actually started when she had met the foreigner who had expanded her knowledge of math, and with whom she had gone down the path of engineering.

  Nar Abert had become a really critical part of her life. It really was a shame he wasn't interested in her, she could've used his partnership for the longer term, and though her aging was slowed by the healing performed upon her on a regular basis by the Dragon Priestess, she wasn't getting any younger.

  Alas, Nar Abert had found love elsewhere, and was now expecting a child from his wife, while the Scribe was yet to find someone who could be her equal or at least as close to one as he had been. His genius for engineering had expanded her own understanding significantly.

  Her order had grown, a lot in fact. The scribes wore long and thick blue robes and kept them immaculate. The Dragon had given them big pointy hats with floppy tips and wide brims as part of their official ceremonial attire, and had set them on the task of turning wood pulp into paper, binding it in leather covers, and storing their knowledge and wisdom not in scrolls or tablets, but instead, in books.

  Not for the first time, The Scribe was in awe of the Dragon's almost unworldly wisdom and knowledge, the creation of Paper had been revolutionary. While it was incredibly difficult to make at first, thanks to their advances in engineering and the vague instructions from Magna Argentum, they had managed to get it down to a science, and they were even improving, creating whiter, sturdier and thinner paper than when they started.

  She entered the chamber where her underlings were either writing down information contained in scrolls or tablets into the books that could be more easily, and safely, stored, or preparing session plans and lesson aids for the many educational spaces dispersed through Argentum.

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  That one had been her own initiative, and she had gained approval from the Priestess and the Dragon himself, Magna Argentum had even given her another idea that would help, notebooks and clue cards with brief snippets of information that could serve as a reminder so that people weren't carrying around the entire book all the time, and only brought out the valuable item when it was necessary.

  She walked all the way to the table where the rules for the scholastic games competition that would be held.

  Magna Argentum was clear, open and honest about how children were to be treated. Already, the playgrounds were starting to be filled with boys and girls of all ages who had not yet undergone their coming of age, and more were being built.

  It wasn't very difficult to tell that it would only take a mere ten seasons for the impact to start to be felt, already it was obvious that the growing and future villagers that were visiting the playgrounds regularly were developing greater cooperation skills and stronger physical forms than those that found themselves stuck in situations where they couldn't.

  In fact, the scholastic games were a byproduct of that. Promoting cooperation was an asset for the future. Teaching kids to belong was very important.

  So that was why when she saw the idea of dividing the kids into teams based on their place of birth, the Scribe immediately stepped into the discussion, startling the four members of the order that were planning the event.

  "Absolutely not!" she immediately snapped, stepping in, "you will not segregate the teams like that, we will perform a drawing with lots instead," she explained, "the children must see ALL of Argentum as their fellow team, they should not develop rivalries based on geographical location," she said.

  "But wouldn't it be easier if the teams were formed out of people who already knew each other? Teamwork would be much easier to handle that way," opined one of the scribes.

  "That is not incorrect, but we sacrifice certain aspects to focus on others, we cannot have everything go our way, but we are all equal in the eyes of the Dragon, Magna Argentum does not appreciate artificially engineered discord between his own people."

  Someone was about to speak.

  "Must I remind you of what happened to those who sought to ignore the Dragon's commands and attempted to establish themselves as a ruling class?"

  They all flinched.

  "Yeah. So go back to the drawing board, we'll have individual and team competitions but not like this."

  It would take quite a bit of time before they were ready to start...

  But that was hardly the only tale to be told.

  The Dragonguard sometimes felt a little underappreciated.

  They did a lot of work, serving as the element that delivered the Dragon's Will to the common man, either by directly following his orders, acting in his name, or by following the orders of the Dragon Priestess. Their code of conduct was strict, and their vows were many. They were to maintain each of those vows, at all times.

  But, as Ornlu, Ariel and Castile led a group of Dragonguard out for a combat exercise, the precious few who had earned the privilege had to admit, the perks of the job definitely outweighed the burdens it brought.

  The mercurial whims of Magna Argentum made it so that their equipment, both in terms of armor and weaponry, was everchanging, as his thoughts and opinions changed sometimes for seemingly no reason, but luckily, he almost always allowed the Dragonguard to customize their loadout depending on what they preferred.

  The most recent standard loadout had reduced the size of the scale armor they were wearing, focusing on mobility, and the Dragon had come up with a new concept for a weapon, the favorite of the Dragonguard so far, long polearms with bladed tips, the head of an axe on one side, a pick on the other, and reinforced hafts.

  It could thrust like a spear, smash like an axe or hammer, cut like a sword and hook around shields and barriers like a pick, it was a multipurpose polearm that could defend and attack at the same time.

  Most of the Dragonguard was split between the large Two Handed Swords and the Halberd, either for reasons of style or preference, but for the most part, it was becoming a trend that most of the Dragonguard preferred large weapons.

  The nature of their work meant that they were often fighting very large enemies, so it just made sense to use large weapons, shorter swords and axes simply didn'd deal enough damage, spears were the most common weapon until the Dragon had come up with these new ones.

  The Kobolds led the way, deep, deep beyond the edge of the forest, far past the shrine of the Dragon, where the light grew dimmer, the monsters grew stronger, and the edges of the Dragon's influence could be felt.

  Big, strong, powerful and mighty, the monsters were nothing to scoff at. Lesser dragons would be felled by the two story tall Grand Gorilla, the Corrosion Serpent could melt the bones of its victims with only a drop of its potent venom and blended into the forest with its brown and green coat, and the Razor Raptors were landbound avians with claws as long as swords, beaks that could go through stone and really bad attitudes.

  Led by the Kobolds who dangled the promise of a possible promotion to their number, the Dragonguard was carving a bloody path through the forest, killing everything they came across with supreme efficiency and absolutely no mercy.

  Their combat abilities were improving by leaps and bounds under the real combat, most of what they fought was each other or human beings, which tended to not present much of a threat. After all, their silver capes basically rendered them impervious to all projectiles, the padding of their armor rendered most impact meaningless, and their clothes couldn't be cut by the bronze swords most humans wielded.

  You would've thought that their large weapons would be unwieldy in the environment of a thick forest, but the fact that they felled the trees with the same ease as they cleaved flesh and crushed through bone made them very easy to wield.

  For those newer in the Dragonguard, it was their first exposure to Dragoncraft equipment.

  Some of them were looking at their weapons in awe, and starting to understand.

  "Always keep distance and awareness of each other! The Priestess can put your limbs back together, but if you die, there's no coming back from that!" warned Ornlu the Wolf.

  "Be ready, Ariel will sing, and that will attract the monsters," the lizard-like Castile warned, "this is how we hunt, these ambushes are safe and simple to set up."

  Ariel the Mermaid cleared her throat as she moved to the center of the small clearing that had been carved into the forest. "I will be defenseless as I sing, so remember your training. Swordswomen, prepare for defense, your task is area denial, axewomen, you will be the hammer that smashes the enemies while the swordswomen play the anvil."

  One of the Dragonguard raised her hand.

  "What will the Lady Ornlu and the Lady Castile be doing while we do that?" she asked.

  "Nothing," Castile replied, her reptilian features twisting into a nasty smirk.

  Ornlu did much the same. "We will step in if you would die otherwise, but that doesn't mean we won't allow you to be hurt," she said. "This is what the training's all about, enjoy yourselves!"

  They would. They would enjoy themselves a lot.

  The Dragonguard spent much of their time working just to earn the privilege to directly attend to their Draconic Master, and while the new recruits that were being trained by his agents were still far from the day they could scrub the holy one's scales, as they began to de-stress by clearing up the hordes of monsters of the forest, they definitely could feel the perks of the job.

  It was a rare occasion when the Dragon was gone, after all, and they had nothing else to do but enjoy themselves, as per his own rules and commands!

  And as for that dragon... Well... He was flying across the sky, a ways away from Argentum, heading towards the meeting place where he would get together with the Lady Aqua.

  "Uhh, which way is south again?"

  That... might take a while.