CORRUPTED Great Dragon of Azis!!??

Hi.
Was reading The Clutch of Dragons and on the page 36(book)\38(pdf) found an astonishing comment of Man-of-Many-Names.

"> There are rumors that an escaped Azzie drake of considerable power is running around Central America. I suspect it may be one of those true drakes, but there aren’t any Azzie great dragons.
> Glasswalker

> That you know.
> Man-of-Many-Names"

And my mind started the race against time and managed to win it. One dusty corner had kept the following passage:

">>>>>[Hoi. Well. This dragon drek. Maybe I did see something. I didn’t want to say anything at first ’cause I didn’t want to get flamed. But hey, maybe it’s important. I don’t know.
I saw a dragon, an eastern dragon, landing on top of the Aztechnology pyramid in Tenochtitlán. Saw it from the astral. I was on a vision quest.
It was a big dragon, but there was something hinky about it. Something ... off about its aura. I didn’t like it.
It scared me. Black patches. Blank patches. Like you see when somebody’s got cyber, kind of—’cept the blank patches didn’t connect with the physical part of the dragon. They connected more with its mind, its essence. Its soul, maybe. And those patches kind of writhed …
It landed on the pyramid. Then it went inside. Last I saw of it.
But it was there. And it was big.]<<<<<
—Bobby Two Eagles (11:25:15/5-27-56)

:::::[JUNGLE CAT] He saw this on a vision quest?? That alarms me more than anything else.
:::::[WORDSMYTH] The source is questionable, Cat, despite what you might believe. But … black and blank patches in his aura that writhed?? That sounds like something of which this person should have no knowledge …
:::::[LADY OF THE COURT] Is it what I think it is?
:::::[HECATE] You are too young to have experienced it personally, my dear, but yes. It sounds like Corruption.
:::::[THE LAUGHING MAN] You would know, my dear.
:::::[THE BIG ‘D’] QUIET! We are at the heart of the matter!
:::::[THE LAUGHING MAN] I thought we might be, old wyrm. And I’ll admit this requires further investigation—but additional supposition here is pointless. We’re treading on deep dark secrets I suspect we’d rather not bring up in mixed company. The wounds, for some, are too fresh … Oh, dear, now I’m sounding like the wordster.
:::::[WORDSMYTH] Remarkably, again I must agree with my painted friend. This sounds potentially dangerous; the implications are frightening. But if we are only going to wander into territory that causes dissent, we should stop, acquire more information, and then speak again.
:::::[THE BIG ‘D’] Words! Words! How much more time will slip past? The cycles repeat themselves truly, do they not? You would all stand idly by while this horror continues until you can “research” it more and “discuss” it further?
:::::[THE LAUGHING MAN] I for one will not be inactive, my friend. Fate has already dragged me into this. I will continue my fight.
:::::[LADY OF THE COURT] Oh, please …"

It's from the book "Location Sourcebook - Aztlan", SR 3rd Edition.

Am i a slowpok again that didn't pay any attention at this ticklish info???

PS The passage from Dunkelzan's Will "To the first party to determine what lies behind the door of room 5B78 of the Aztechnology Pyramid in Tenochtitlán and file a report of their findings on Shadowland, I leave 5 million nuyen or medical care for the remainder of their natural life, whichever seems most appropriate." also popped up,

but that's nothing in comparison to bloody corrupted great dragon!!!

Second edition. Published in 1995, and set in 2056.

Ye, of course, my bad.
Any ideas on the topic?

Wow, that's some pretty corny writing. "Let's not discuss this horrible ancient secret." "Yes, let's discuss how we're not going to talk about this horrible ancient secret."

Even if we admit that we know ALL the great ones, the only Great Dragon that we know of and that could be corrupted is... Feuerschwinge.
She had PLENTY of time to get to Tenochtitlan...

Feuerschwinge, the twisted Mutated Great Dragon of Radiation?
That Feuerschwinge? In Aztlan? Unlikely at best i guess.

Also Feuer is Western dragon (which sports wings) while your mystery flyer was Eastern (no wings, narrower body) in appearance.

Of course, a Great could just as easy morph its form, but in that case why fly in which will be noticed when they can just walk in the front/side door in a more compact form....

Also while taking other metahuman forms is not uncommon, you will find most dragons would be loathe to take on another spellwyrm's appearance as it is just poor manners, draconically speaking.


And it was more than one drake that got out from under the Azzie thumb....

right. that. i forgot.

True again. How thoughtlessly. What then?
Maybe FASA has just put this storyline on the shelf?
've just read the SR2 Aztlan to the end.
1 - Someone has tought the Blood Magic to Azis.
2 - Turns out they have a Locus down there... somewhere... Again this door from Big_D's Will comes to mind.
3 - The best of the best Blood Spirits are summoned through sacrifice of... dracoforms. I wonder, where the public execution of Dzitbalchen is described?

Honestly, i do not think that anyone wants Aztlan as a great-bad-guys anymore. Less and less black and wite - more and more shades of grey((

No, here they are speaking about True Drakes

"There are other drakes, however—“true” drakes, beings
created by tremendous feats of draconic magic that are difficult
and strenuous for even the great dragons to perform. Accordingly,
the only true drakes of which foundation is aware serve Lofwyr,
Alamais, Ghostwalker, or Lung. Unlike the people who have
Awakened as drakes, these are dracoforms  first and metahumans
a distant second. Interacting with those who have come under
the Draco Foundation’s protection was o en like trying to have
a conversation with /dev/grrl." TCoD, 35



Everyone makes mistakes. Az is based on blood magic for how many years? And only once some random Bobby randomly noticed it in great form. If any astral-perceiver could do it, i highly doubt that that this dragon appeared "outdoors" often.

just the only wild guess i have.
u are one of the elder ones. Have you had any ideas 'bout that since 1995?

Exactly. Has any actions been taken by them? Maybe there are some official missions describing further Azi investigation, initiated by H. of Ehran?

Ok, let's not lose our heads here. What we have is a mention of a corrupted dragon (pretty much proven by the discussion in Atzlan), and an off-hand mention that he could be a Great, which is proven by nothing at all (even if Man-of-Many-Names is a reputable shadowtalker, Clutch of Dragons is a late 4e high-quality book written and edited by CGL professionals). I wouldn't trust that notion too much.

Considered.
At first i thought: Who could survive since the Theran Empire to pass the knowledge of Blood Magic to Azia?
The second thought - why should it be a living person? If it is majorly bound to specific places and background, cold the intuitive knowledge of it AWAKEN in a mortal, dwelling in proximity to a Locus in a construction that is (at least!) 5 000 years old?

All I know is that this has inspired me...

Pity my players. Pity them.

Share your ideas when they take a form, be so un_kind! *devilish loughter*

Edited: "or medical care" - he said."...for the remainder of their natural life" - he said... NATURAL is the word that intrigues, doesn't it?

In Earthdawn era, blood magic was not the sole province of the Theran Empire. Such knowledge may come from another source. Blood Wood immortal elves for instance, or...

No.
And i think Ancient History once somewhere declared that door to be a MacGuffin only.
Some place where a GM can put whatever he wants there to be behind that door.
And seeing how he made the best compilation of Both immortals/Dragons and the Will
AND he was one of the FreeLancers for SR i am taking that to be true then.

-> a spirit
-> a Passion/Mentor/Totem/Idol
-> the sire of Deinastras (sic) - those immortal humans behind the Ordo Maximus
-> Mr. Darke
-> Thais
-> Harlequin, struck by an idea that seemed awesome at the time

To name just a few.

That's how a lot of stuff used to work in SR, and sadly doesn't anymore.

Thais i could see working . . half snake lower body half human upper body, wings and son of an IE and a Horror(don't ask)

Now, the real question would be who taught Howling Coyote magic, and if the CIA had that someone assassinated in revenge.

He was a shaman.
So Coyote did it.

I'm pretty sure there was a corrupted great in Earthdawn already...

Well, those magical burns will kill you, naturally.

Iirc two dragons mentioned In Augmentation connected to Aztec and at least one other mentioned in 4thEd.
Big D it seems also had serious holdings in Aztec. Mr Darke and his horror servants seemed to serve interests in the company, but didnt seem controled by it.

Manitu? Had an idea of crossing SR and Deadlands long ago. Didn't work out.

The "or..." part. Dzitbalchén set by Pobre not only for political, influence and national Mayan vs. Aztec reasons. That's too simple.
I like the idea of an unknown Great One)) The shadow inspirer of Mr. Darke, a two Ages old adversary of Dunk, maybe...

Thanks for the opinion and quote!

The novel World Without End mentionned Thais, the supernatural, demi-Horror "son" of Aina, was in South Dakota in 1890 and met Wovoka, the shaman of the original Ghost Dance.

This suggests the author's intention either was that Thais taught Wovoka of the Paiute tribe a working magical techniques that somehow passed on to Daniel Coleman of the Ute tribe (while no one involved in its transmission could actually test it), or that Thais may have returned to find a new pupil.

Coleman evaded from Abilene in December 2011 only using "standard" magic. The first use of big magic attributed to the SAIM is Redondo Peak eruption in June 2014, followed by a communique in which Coleman mentions the Ghost Dance. IMO, it is a likely scenario that Coleman awakened as a shaman and learned spells from his Coyote totem at first, evaded and took the head of the SAIM, and only then someone, supposedly Thais, saw the opportunity and came to teach him blood magic and the Ghost Dance.

The CIA didn't assassinate them. It was the Free Marine Corps.


The Despoiler was killed in a Red Brick supplement though.

that sort of spoils my theory((

Ah! That's wgat they are talking about in Aztlan 2nd! But what IS this Corp? In a few words, if you please.

Weekend of revelations! Thanks. It didn't make any sense to me: the GGD was held by Howling Coyote but Frosty wished they had killed Coleman.

Barsaive at War was published in 2000. Atzlan was published in 1995. The original comments could in fact refer to Vestrivan. At that point, he was, supposedly, alive.

I do agree that Thais seems a more likely culprit though. He is part horror, matches the description and should be off the radar of most people involved in that discussion, with the exception of Harlequin.

Vestrivian the Despoiler's body was never recovered though, so proof of his demise is elusive. He flew into a Horror Cloud in Barsaive at War and vanished.

The Aztlan chapter of Shadows of Latin America (which I wrote and can be found in the link in my signature) made some references along this line of discussion.

Makes sense.

I have not read SoLA thoroughly, now i'll deffinitely will. It's a pity it was left to be an "apocryph".

He's also (possibly) mentioned in SoA, 2005:




On the topic of Aztlan's supposed great corrupted dragon:
It's been alluded to there being different kinds of blood magic, some horrifically evil, others less so (such as the Amazonia and possibly Tír Tairngire reforestation), though not without debate about it. I seem to remember from somewhere that feathered serpents are the foremost (or only) users among dragonkind, but I can't for the life cite a source.
A corrupted dragon could simply mean a dragon who is using blood magic, because it carries a stigma. As Vestrivan is a western dragon, I would doubt that he is who Dunkelzahn is alluding to.
Instead it could be an as yet unnamed great dragon who's in cahoots with the evil parts of Aztlan's government.

Unfortunately, I'm also pretty convinced that this particular storyline is wholly abandoned.

You know for all the power and wisdom these ancients possess, they sure do love to pass the buck whenever possible.

this is how we know they possess the wisdom and the power.

I'll take your word for it, but since this was after ED stopped being with FASA, it would no longer have been Shadowrun's 4th world at that point



An amalgamation of fanwankery describing soldiers who are so invincible and patriotic and well-endowed and pure of heart and [...] that reading anything related to it causes severe cerebral damage from head-to-desk syndrome.

When any organization gets a glowing review from Kane, you know you should be reaching for the salt shaker.

You have forgotten stormfront, have you? Not that I blame you. It's easier that way.


Ah right, I wondered about that when I read SoLA. So no body was found, and he is still alive (possibly). Anyone got an idea who this Sunset Blossom is, and why is this her mess?

I'm more interested in who Feng Xiansheng is, TBH. Miss Tick is pretty clear.

And it's ambiguous enough so that (s)he may be talking not about the despoiler, but rather this Boatswift person.
After all, the incomprehensible words are seared into their memory. Horror mark anyone? This may be a call to liquidate Boatswift. And in this light, one could surmise that Sunset Blossom may be Arleesh, since she's known to destroy things connected to the Horrors.

Hm. Arleesh makes sense in that context. Miss Tick is one of Alachia's troll the mortals accounts. Isn't Feng soneone from Shaanxi?

I don't care, SR stopped being with FASA since Year of the Comet, so it's no longer Earthdawn's Sixth World at that point

Feng Xiansheng seems to point to Lung: Crimsondudes Post

Would have been my guess, too, considering the general subject.

Mmhm, I have an idea who Sunset Blossom is. It touches on Earthdawn references I made in writing I did for Shadowrun that I don't think the Dumpshock conspiracy theorists have ever connected.

Let me be less of a tease. Here's a hint to get the ball rolling.





There are many more connections and hints, mostly found in Shadows of Asia, The Ork Nation of Cara Fahd, Barsaive at War, and the revised release of Earthdawn's Dragons sourcebook.

Dvilgaynon, then?