Understanding how and why dragons hoard treasure

To learn why dragons hoard treasure, you would first have to do some research. For your sake, however, I've done the research for you. All you have to do is read.

The first recorded instance of humans and dragons integrating with one another around 4000 B.C, give or take a few dozen or hundred years. The pages written about Dragons were sketchy at best. Dragons were first said to appear in Spain, Siberia, even England. They did not have any kind of dislike or distaste of humans, but rather the intrusion of humans. (We've seen that before, haven't we?)

Humans, more than likely, were that of nobility who were tasked by their King or ruler to seek out and kill a dragon because of a case of it terrorizing the county, or plaguing mankind. dragons might not have been inherently bad or good through their own nature, but humans are naturally scared of what they don't understand, and dragons weren't exempt from this list.

Be it spiders, horses even, ants, sea creatures, humans fear and defend against new things they discover, and either kill them regardless, or learn about and study them.

Generally, dragons would be encountered in old, abandoned castles. The walls are crumbling, the other knight's and soldiers sent to kill the dragon are nothing but burnt bones after they were destroyed but the breath of fire expelled by the great lizard-like beast.

Dragons were also reportedly found in caves, and this is where they would be found with the hoards and piles of treasures they were often described with. But where does this treasure and vast loot come from?

More than one place. whoever was foolish enough to visit the dragons lair. Be they soldiers sent to kill the dragon, envoys maybe sent to persuade the dragon to leave their farms and villages alone. Dragons had to eat to, and were well known to swoop down over farms and steal whole livestock such as bulls or cows.

Other places could have been castles where gold was stored, if the dragon somehow had knowledge of where this gold was being kept. Dragons were not known for being superior magic beings, aside from their ability to breath fire. They did not see through walls, couldn't turn invisible. Their size alone, however, was often enough to turn away one who though themselves brave or brawny enough to defeat the great beasts.

In terms of what dragons did with their rolling waves of gold in their lairs, they would sometimes use the hard gemstones to cover the vulnerable parts of their body, mainly the underbelly. If a dragon somehow made the mistake of letting a very strong sword get to their underside, it could be cut open. It would take a sword sharp enough to cut the air itself, but it could be done. Their have been papers published on the defeat of dragons, though they were mainly found in very old records from times long ago. The Middle Ages was a very poplar stretch of old history where dragons were boosted about.

So dragons hoarded treasure they stole or were brought, and could use the gemstones to help defend themselves even better than already. Dragon skin was probably harder than some metals, and could deflect the blow of a sword or a hammer with ease.

Dragons liked to hoard treasure because it would help them resonate their own energy, manifesting it almost. Dragons would set themselves into a narcotic-like state, almost drug induced if you really wanted to look into it. Dragons sleep quite a bit on their treasure piles, which would fill entire rooms or massive sections of caves. This narcotic like effect would undoubtedly help the dragon sleep better, but no less dissuade it from being alerted to the a threat. Not to say it isn't impossible to sneak past a sleeping dragon. You can certainly find an article, or a dozen, on the internet about a brave knight who snuck through the treasure room of a dragon to help accomplish some other task.

Now while dragons don't have any particular use for the vast amounts of treasure they possess, you could boil it down to the base sin of greed. Dragons, being far larger, stronger and smarter than the average human, would have no need for using gold. They need no clothing, need no human weapons. Dragons may simply sit atop their piles of gold for the sheer reason as to say,

"I have this, and you do not," but in a more dragon-like way.

Ah dragons. Long since the stuff of legends, lost to time in the old works of the old world. You'd surely be hard pressed to find a living dragon in a days in the currant era. Your best bet though would probably still be very north. In Scandinavia, or very remote pats of Europe even. Scientists and researchers have "put together" skeletons of dragons, though now we know them as just makeshift arrangements of large bird wings and long serpentine dragons. The traditional dragon, with four legs and wings on its back, would be even harder to recreate. The cousin to the dragon, called the wyvern, has wings where a dragon has its front legs. Wyvern's seem to have more natural resistances to attacks and assaults than dragons, despite the latter having two less legs for mobility.

A wyvern strength comes from its wings, with allows it to fly faster and further than a dragon, which is generally larger than its serpentine cousin. While dragons may have a thicker hide than wyvern's, neither winged species is more or less dangerous than the other.

Should you happen to go looking for a dragon at any point in life, perhaps you'll remember this notation in your standard copy of the Monster Hunter Field Guide, and it will prove useful. Additionally, six out of every ten monster slayers recommended not opening the field manual when actively trying to fight a dragon. The six recommendations come from those who did not open their field guide when fighting monsters.

I hope this additional information will help in the future. Until next time, Hunters.

-penned by the wizard Gimod the Grey, writer of Magical creatures of all shapes and sizes.