Worldbuilding Wednesday - The Dragon City of the South

Or, Some Ramblings on a City with Dragons

Called Diuzisborg by its inhabitants and Dragonburg by most, the southern port city of the Dragon Guardians are one of the most important in Reiaghy. Two roads lead to the city – the Northern Road and the Water Road; from the east. Along this road many goods are transported to and from the main land. Because of the swampy ground between this and the other port cities further east, many goods are also transported by sea. Trade between the New Isles, the Western Isles and the Southern Lands are also done mostly by sea in order to cut out the laborious land travel and the stark desert of the Death Plain.

Another reason for ships to stop at Diuzisborg is to enlist the help of Dragon Guardians and Dragons on their way northwest to the New and the Western Isles. After the Sundering, Sea Dragons were awakened from the deeps of the ocean and hunt the ocean between the Southern Coast of the Continent and the Sundered Lands. To be able to make a voyage in the Southern Ocean, therefore, ships and their crew needed protection from these Sea Monsters. At this time, ships were still too flimsy to withstand an attack, and the weapons not sophisticated enough for proper defence. Captains therefore enlisted the help of a dragon and its Guardian – two if the dragon’s Guardian was female – to accompany it to the isles and back and fend off any monsters.

Although the dragons were usually enough to frighten off the monsters, some still attacked vessels and even sunk some ships. The dragon would then call to its brethren (if still close enough to the land) to help it save as many of the people as possible – first by slaying the sea dragon and then taking the men to safety. Because of the extra cost of procuring a dragon and its Guardian – as well as the extra space taken up by a Guardian, some owners were loath to pay the extra cost – or even stop at the port to call. Many of these unaccompanied ships were lost – some without any survivors, seeming just to vanish into the vastness of the ocean. Others decided to make their boats and ships seem as dragon-like as possible in hopes to scare off any Sea Dragons. This method was especially employed after the dragons and their Guardians left the city and the Dragon Cliffs to seek a more peaceful isle further west.

Dragons were also sometimes used in transporting goods over the Dragon Cliffs and Dhôr Mountains to the dry lands, which got most of their wealth from the salt mines (some of the best salt purporting to have healing qualities, but even the lowest grade mined still better than most other types in the Western, Southern and Middle Lands).

However, dragons would not be used as constant beasts of burden – and their Guardians would also not use them so. The work the dragons did do; was seen as a way of helping their Guardians and other people of the Continent after the Sundering. For they knew that, if the Guardians should not exist, that they, too, would perish or lose the talent of language bestowed on them. 

Image from: http://graphicsfairy.blogspot.com/