This contest will last until Friday, July 18th. Entries sent in after turnover on the aforementioned date will not be accepted.
The winner of this contest will win a 250,000t prize. One runner up will receive a 25,000t prize.
1) I reserve the right not to choose
any of the submitted lores.
However, there
will be a winner selected regardless of whether or not the winning lore is actually used.
2) Entering costs 500t per entry.
3) You may enter as many times as you want.
4) One entry is equal to one story.
5) Entries must be at least 500 words long.
6) Entries may be as long as you like.
7) Keep your entries appropriate.
8) Please nothing silly. Humor is welcome, but nothing ridiculous please.
9) Do not criticize other users' submissions. This includes the entries for naming portion of this contest.
10) No fanfiction or fandom related stories.
11) Do
not write me into the story,
please. I find it very weird and it makes me very uncomfortable.
12) Breaking the thread and contest rules will result in disqualification and no refunds will be issued upon disqualification.
13) PM your entries as well as entry fees to me with the subject of Lore My Gen1!
1) @
Faylon
The young Fae male flicked up his ears as he hatched out from his egg. A different one form from the others that he had seen beside him. But he wasn't yet the age to question why this was the case. The others remained asleep within their shells, and Dragonhome was having a rare downpour of rain. It pattered away above the newborn and his adoptive future clutchmates, and he looked but there was no one around. The barren surroundings made him consider. And he spotted the hoard guarded by a rather carelessly asleep clanmate. It might not be something that is ever outgrown, the tendency to approach bright, shiny objects. But it wasn't just curiosity, the Fae's mind was at a whirl how to generate warmth. Taking hold of baubles and some tools, he flicked at it with his tail and maintained it in a makeshift container: a broken lamp. Dragons really hoarded the strangest things sometimes, but they could turn out to be useful. Soon enough the Fae's resourcefulness led to a small array of circuitry and baubles. The adults who returned were confused initially, but upon finding the comfort in the technology accepted it with ease. When the clutch eventually hatches, the Fae would be their big brother. A big brother tinier than most of them, to be sure. But his mind was always sharp, and for that no one ever underestimated this Fae for his size.
Growing up, he had taken to his Lightning clan blood immediately, and continually tinkered with the hoard under some degree of supervision. It was the first time that the clan had another elemental egg born to them, and the certainty of how to raise him wasn't around. But he was very secure about himself, confident if a little quiet. He associated with others on occasion, but for the most part was content left to his own literal devices. But it wasn't that he was selfish, in fact, he seemed to seek the enrichment of his clan's comforts. His innovation would focus on being simple, but efficient. And as he got older, he yearned to know more. He had never sat still long enough for the native Earth dragons to tell him their stories, but with the new curiosity he nodded and learned much. The influence he had gotten from them was that while he was keen on introducing the new, he never forgot what history meant. How one had to carefully treasure these to teach, and to be able to move ahead.
Flying to the base of what remained of the Pillar of the World, the Fae stared wordlessly. And it was for the first time of his life he wasn't sure what to do. The Earthshaker could use each and every one of his followers' talents--what more meaningful venture was there that he could devote his life to? He returned to the cave contemplating, making plans that would be dismissed for superior ones, or discarded altogether for impracticality. Was a restoration of the Pillar--without the assistance of the other deities--impossible? Maybe. But there had to be more than the continued grief over what had been lost to the Earthshaker.
2) @
Schiannath
One afternoon as he was searching for interesting gems and trinkets in the Greatwyrm's Breach, Itami happened across an abandoned lightning egg. It was still quickened, kept sunwarmed and safe by the heat of the day and the warmth of the rocks it rested upon. All the same, it would not long survive exposure to the chill of the night; Itami felt his breast swell with protective pity.
He took the egg back to his lair and secreted it away with one of his clan's clutches. Soon enough, a diminutive Fae was hatched.
The young male did not seem much scarred by his solitary and unfortunate start in life, nor by being displaced from his native domain. He was curious and clever, interested in all aspects of the clan's daily life and the workings of his home. Indeed, he was unusually gregarious for a Fae, though his clanmates did find his monotonous speech off-putting at first. They soon learned to navigate the quirks and flares of his fans though, and to follow his mercurial moods and goodnatured games.
He soon found a place among his adopted clan, running wild with his age-mates and roaming far and wide across Dragonhome. The clan found his cheerful, irrepressible nature refreshing; a necessary breath of fresh air against the overwhelming miasma of grief that had permeated the land since the Earthshaker awakened at the end of the Third Age. He was protective of his adoptive brothers and sisters, leading them in games and tricks that startled and delighted his clan. At times, however, he could take the trickery too far.
On these occasions, the great gray fans on either side of his head would droop pitifully and his lambent blue eyes would dim as he made his slow apologies. Even the hardest of hearts would clench in pity and forgiveness at with a pathetic sight before them. Whether he knew this or not was a matter of opinion.
He was endlessly curious about the world around him, asking endless questions about the great works of art that decorated the caves and lairs of the Greatwyrm's Breach and the long and storied history they detailed. He learned quickly - and could soon retell the stories of the earlier ages with a skill and dexterity that have made him one of the clan's favoured storytellers, despite the rather mechanical aspect of his delivery. His stories were also free of the inherited sorrow that plagued so many of the dragons native to Dragonhome.
He collected trinkets avidly -- building huge hoards of copper wire, nuts and bolts, tools and gear that dwarfed his diminutive frame. His clanmates expected that he would grow to be an engineer, like so many of the lightning dragons of his native realm.
Instead, much to their surprise and delight, he expressed a desire to be a sculptor. Though the process was somewhat haphazard at first, he was dextrous and dedicated and soon learned to sculpt works of great beauty. He creates great statues of scrap metal and wire that are both functional and filled with unexpected pathos - many of them based around the lore and the folktales he so loves - which take pride of place in many of the clan's lairs.
3) @
Faylon
The Fae’s origin was unknown, but the hatchling, grey and seemingly insignificant in this vast expanse twitched and searched. And soon he would come upon a clan of different flights and features. He first approaches his home as an absentminded intruder—or so one might think. An adult dragon of the clan had apparently known of the egg’s presence and was the one to bring him there when he saw he had no parents, and after the hatching bemused the Fae’s brief investigation of the rocky land around him. Being a newborn, it didn’t take him long to get tired and rest in place by the cave, and approaching him, the older dragon gave a thoughtful nod, and a small smile obscured by the overhead shadow of the cave they were in.
His settling in was not as smoothly as might have been ideal, some would say. Despite his silence, he was not the most patient of dragons growing up, and seemed to have his mind tick away while he could only twitch one of his frills in silence. He cared for the one who looked after him in his own way, he was polite enough about the claws that fed him. But he was easily bored, and yet not an outgoing hatchling. So he was quietly playful, and the communication barrier not only by silence but also by species—did not help him much. Keeping to his own business, his gray features and small frame made it easy for him to wander about, for the most part, unnoticed.
If there was anything that might be considered a bad trait about him was that his curiosity knew no boundaries. There were things such as battle tactics and creature information, and the olden history that the Earth dragons treasured so much. But more than that, what interested the Fae were his clanmates—in an objective point of view. He put their personalities into points in his mind: strengths, weaknesses, and potential… And though he had problems communicating his own thoughts, he heard the whispers around the cave and knew many things. To each clanmate he would give a brief statement of advice, that they could take and ponder on. He was consistently cool, no matter how emotional the other dragon was. This was the closest most dragons could get to talking to him. Rather than making more of his own individual known, he seemed to brush up how everyone else functioned and fixed them up, like applying oil to rusted gears and not searching for thanks. His counsel was also deeply trusted, and he would eventually come to be known as a keeper of secrets.
Eventually a young hatchling blinks, and asks another member of the clan about what the Fae liked to do, because he never shared much about himself. To this, the older dragon—the one who had taken care of him a short distance away in his younger days—mused.
"That dragon… is one that likes to 'fix' other dragons.
4) @
Harukai
Rumor has it that when the Stormcaller first created the Lightning dragon, a part of the deity's soul imparted itself into that ancestral egg. When each egg tosses and turns, it momentarily exposes the god's soul in a blinding flash. And so it goes that any Lightning Egg that crackles with great intensity must surely be as touched by and be as close to the deity as a dragon could be. Or so it goes.
But some eggs never crackle.
They never thought it would hatch, that egg curled up in its nest. As much as its wired nest fizzled, the egg itself showed no sparks of life until its cracking caught every nearby dragon unawares. But not all rumors ground themselves in truth. When the little Fae hatched, its eyes burnt with a ferocity that rivaled that of the deity's. A mortally indescribable glare.
Perhaps that was why no one dared to stare back.
No one dared to meet the little Fae's gaze. Any passersby felt their skin crawl and the air spark fervently -- and those who chanced returning the hatchling’s stare fell stunned by a static bolt. Did they know, the parents of this little dragon, what they had laid to rest? Had they known, and abandoned it to its fate?
Rumor has it that the Stormcaller itself left the egg. Or so it goes.
Throwing on a cowl did nothing to help the little Fae. Hide the eyes it might, but any who caught a glimpse of them or met the little dragon's gaze became held, enraptured, by a charged attraction not entirely of their own doing. Opposites attract, and the Fae had no comparable equal.
But every charge has its opposite. Where could the little Fae find its other? Not here, among the dragons who tried to disclaim its very existence on a daily basis. Where could it look? Where could it seek? Where could its other be found?
Rumor has it that Faes only speak with other Faes. But even they have their outcasts. Our little Fae never learned otherwise. Ostracized from the others for its dull, drab coat. Cold-shouldered in the hopes that it would leave before it could stir up the air once again. Perhaps that was why it threw on that satchel and headed out, away from the other Faes with whom it barely spoke. Better to become a castaway than to be cast away. Or so it goes.
But a Fae living away from Faes leads a hard life, indeed.
Rumor has it that Lightning Eggs siphon off excess energy in a process called “grounding.” Excess energy might harm the developing dragon within, tearing it apart, for no mortal vessel can hold a deity’s soul without suffering some sort of harm. At worst, an egg that never grounds may possibly trip and break. Or so it goes.
No one knows what it means to trip and break.
Has the little Fae found the answer through no fault of its own?
Has it no equal?
But no time now to dwell on the matter. Not even for a little Fae.
The Stormcaller calls us all back to work.
Rumor has it.
