<div align="center"><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: andale mono;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 20pt;">Nomed</span></span></div><div class="floatright">(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v252/HlySd/cata_01.jpg)<br/><br/>(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v252/HlySd/av-62037-2.jpg)</div><strong>Species:</strong>Black Dragon<br/><strong>Gender:</strong>Male<br/><strong>Age:</strong>2,739<br/><strong>Abilities:</strong>The black dragon is renowned for striking fear into the bravest of warriors. Fear and assaults at night were his most effective strategies. By controlling fear, Nomed wiped out armies and sent them into disorder. Unable to gather their wits to follow the orders given by their leaders, the warring armies would perish by dawn.<br/><br/>The black dragon is equipped with a defensive gas that he releases from his mouth in the form of dark smog. The smoke is very thick, blocking out the light, and obscuring one's surroundings. If inhaled, the gas will afflict the enemy's mind with frightening hallucinations. This gas can also afflict a person while he or she sleeps and bring forth nightmares.<br/><strong>Sexual Orientation:</strong>Dominant Heterosexual<br/><strong>Flaw:</strong>Greed, gluttony, stubbornness and vanity – Nomed, unlike most dragons, is very fond of items that can live just as long as he. Therefore, he can’t resist valuable things—consider him almost a kleptomaniac. He is a pack rat and refuses to sell or get rid of anything he owns.<br/><br/>The black dragon isn’t a fan of sunlight. He prefers to do battle at night so that the harsh glare doesn’t get into his sensitive eyes. This can make him rather stubborn in combat situations or situations that require transport. If the day is too sunny, then he refuses to leave the shade.<br/><strong>Treasure:</strong>He has a cavern deep in the swamps full of gold, silver, gems, et al and weapons of his slayers. His lair is his library. Every item he remembers exactly where he acquired/stole it from. If there is one thing Nomed hates most, it is those who tamper with his treasure. His most prized item is a tiny silver necklace that he pilfered off a young girl when he was a hatchling. It was his first achievement.<br/><br/><strong>Weapon(s): </strong>His abilities as a dragon are his greatest weapons, but as a human because he has never been a human before, besides his raw strength, he is unskilled in the ways of self-defense (flaw).<br/><br/><strong>Description: </strong><br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Dragon</em></div><br/>As a black dragon, Nomed is the embodiment of terror. His size and his grotesque physical proportions make him something akin to Hell itself. As a natural defense mechanism, Nomed’s appearance aids in his ability to shroud his enemies in dread. When perched, he tends to hunch forward with his wings arching above his head like two, sharp towers. As a silhouette in the distance, he resembles a devil and was what allowed many warriors to recognize him.<br/><br/>Height: 60ft<br/>Length: 150ft<br/>Wingspan: 225ft<br/>Weight: 79.5 tons<br/><br/>The dragon’s body is thick with muscle layered in tough scales. Because of his weight, he isn’t the fastest runner nor is he a fast swimmer. He is built like a tank for durability and powerful strikes, and his preferred method of transportation is flight and climbing.<br/><br/>Nomed’s wings are large, wide, and built for flight as well as assisting him in scaling. There are three sharp claws at the second bend in his wings for snagging ledges, and sound holes in the tissue that when in flight produce haunting howls that frighten predators. Because of the size of his wings, Nomed is excellent at maneuverability and achieving great air.<br/><br/>The dragon’s head is littered with protruding spines and two, bull-like horns that curve outwards from his thick skull. His eyes are often empty like a skull, hollow and black except for when he uses his fear gas. When gassing his foes, they say his eyes appear like ghostly orbs, striking terror into those who look upon him. The dragon’s teeth are long like daggers and cannot be bound behind lips; therefore, they are always fixed in a disturbing grin. His tail is thick at the base and thin at the end and isn’t long like most dragons’.<br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Human</em></div><br/>In human flesh, Nomed is a six-foot-one, two-hundred and twenty-five pound male. His skin is a gentle tan with a hint of caramel and his hair is a black, two-inch mess if not taken care of. His irises are black, foreshadowing the creature he truly is. Old scars that no one would have seen on his dark hide as a dragon hatch his flesh. He is built solid, and like the spines on his head as a dragon, there is stubble about his jaw that if not groomed could become a beard. Who would have thought a handsome man would emerge from such an ugly creature? Although handsome, because of his defensive ability, he can be just as intimidating.<br/><br/><strong>Personality:</strong><br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Dragon</em></div><br/>In the past, Nomed was known to be a wicked dragon, perhaps the one dragon that made the stereotypes about his race true. He took pleasure in attacking the kingdoms with the most gold. The town, Gunnimead, was a frequent target for its precious mines bore him many splendors. He would dive into human wars that did not concern him, devouring both sides until his belly could hold no more. The dragon simply cares only about himself. He is hedonistic and a collector of treasure, desiring only to add new valuables to his cave.<br/><br/>The humans to him are but food, but he has no desire to destroy their race completely for they are capable of making precious objects that he can add to his lair. In summary, he hates them yet uses them to live.<br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Human</em></div><br/>As a human, Nomed is rather primitive. He never studied humans—not that he ever cared to—and so he is unfamiliar with their laws, customs, and social norms. If confronted, he isn’t afraid to literally rip another man’s throat out with his teeth. He also isn’t afraid to urinate wherever he so pleases. The dragon simply does not care.<br/><br/>Nomed does as Nomed pleases and delves in visions of self-grandeur:<em>there isn't anything he can't do, and there isn't anyone he can't beat</em>. Call him a sore loser, and one who refuses to admit wrong or defeat. He is a dominant male that if one is not careful can easily misinterpret the advancement of other males as a challenge.<br/><br/>He is very aggressive and can find difficulty getting along with others. Other dragons hadn’t liked him before, and so he is used to living in solitude.<br/><br/>His eyes are still sensitive to the sunlight, and so his stubbornness will remain; and also, if not kept under supervision one will find him to be quite the troublemaker.<br/><br/><strong>History:</strong><em>They have always called me a monster—a demon sent from Hell as consequence of their sins. I find the stories they write about me amusing. Because I take what I please, I am considered evil; but don’t they do the same? They sacrifice their own children under a king just to take another human’s territory. There are those that sit fat and rich upon vaults of gold that they swindle from others—hypocrites. That’s all humans are. Weak and fussy hypocrites!</em>- Nomed<br/><br/>The black dragon is known best by the people of Gunnimead and Illiria, who even after his disappearance tell of his evil deeds through bedtime stories. If there was one thing Nomed left behind (besides his lair of treasure), it was a lesson about greed:<em>Do not delve in greed or the black dragon will take from you everything you hold dear.</em><br/><br/>Imprisonment hasn’t made him learn his lesson for he feels that there is no lesson to be learned. He is simply being punished for being what he is.<br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Hatchling</em></div><br/>Centuries ago, when Nomed was but an egg, kings sent their knights into the swamps to rid them of dragon eggs—specifically, black dragon eggs. The kings exposed their men to parasites and diseases, the very natural defenses black dragons chose to nest in, knowing it would keep their young safe. Through the king’s persistence, many eggs were harvested and wheeled into the town of Gunnimead to be crushed with mallets by children during festivals.<br/><br/>One night, the town’s fate was sealed when one of the eggs on the hay-strewn wagon began to crack. A passing child with a mallet had noticed, and instead of alert the knights, she gathered the egg into her skirts, fled home, and into her room. Her name was Claira and she raised the dragon in secret, learning that it enjoyed grubs, worms, toads, and insects, and then soon larger things: chickens, pigs, and fawns. The more he ate, the bigger he became until he was the size of a Great Dane, and was slinking about the house, filling his lair that was Claira’s bedroom with stolen jewelry, gold, and silver from the mines.<br/><br/>As the town grew suspicious of their missing livestock and precious metals, Claira became fearful. One night, she had opened her closet to find a mound of gold pieces spill to the floor at her feet. Her drawers, beneath her pillow, her mattress, and even her shoes were full of stolen trinkets. When the dragon returned with a silver goblet in his clutches, Claira had caught him and demanded that he return everything he stole. But the black dragon was greedy, and in retaliation, snatched the silver necklace from her throat, which unintentionally left deep cuts upon her chest. The child was startled and scared of him. She screamed to alert her parents, who immediately chased him from the house. The black dragon soon found himself fleeing for his life as the knights were summoned and the Baron of Gunnimead was set on keeping the news a secret. If the king found out that the town had sheltered a dragon, then he would be executed.<br/><br/>The black dragon was pursued without rest, and no longer being Claira’s pet, he had learned several handicaps. He wasn’t a fast runner, a good swimmer, and he hadn’t learned to fly. He kept his wings spread just in case he might do so, but they ruined his balance and made him stumble on numerous occasions. The knights were close, and the squirrels took pity on him. They told the dragon to climb! And he did, discovering that he did it quite well. He hid in the trees until archers noticed him hunched upon the boughs like a gargoyle. They had called him a demon!<br/><br/>Fly! The birds cried as the canopy was filled with arrows. The dragon watched the birds scatter and copied their movements, managing to flutter from one branch to another until finally he could stagger into the sky. The black dragon was free and he escaped Gunnimead with Claira’s necklace.<br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Captured</em></div><br/>The life of a black dragon was the most difficult to live. He continued to satisfy his hunger whenever he could, raiding pastures and fleeing from his pursuers. When he became a juvenile, he fell in love with a brown dragon, unaware that she was already mated. Her mate dropped upon him violently, and in a short bout, Nomed had lost his first battle of dominancy. The dragon had been humiliated, and out of revenge, he had consumed all the eggs in her nest. It had been his first act of cannibalism, but not his final act of evil.<br/><br/>The black dragon stole treasure from the caves of other dragons and devoured their eggs whenever certain pastures were too risky to raid. Eventually, the dragons became fed up, and in one incident, Nomed was sought after and attacked. He was wounded badly and could no longer fly. He was soon at the mercy of the knights and they took him to Illiria. The king at the time was a cruel monarch and chose not to kill the dragon but use him. Nomed was imprisoned in the bowels of the city, where he would learn to dine on human flesh. The king fed him criminals, traitors, heathens, and even innocents. Having not seen the outside from months to years, the black dragon became desensitized. He ate what was thrown into his pit, and the more he ate, the larger he became until he had to be moved, but no knight would risk it.<br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Hate</em></div><br/>Nomed was never moved and his prison had become so stifling that he had gone mad. Desensitized and confined for several years in his tiny prison, the black dragon shook the city with his fits of rage. Soon reports of devils and ghosts being spotted filled the city as a strange black fog began to occasionally seep from the sewers. The king continued to keep the black dragon a secret and tried to once again send knights to move the infernal beast, but they would return screaming, shouting about monsters being in the sewers.<br/><br/>It was when Nomed’s restraints had grown rusty that in a furious frenzy the black dragon broke free from the belly of the city to turn the continent black with his wraith.<br/><br/><div align="center"><em>Black dragon fly high regain your past<br/>Lost in the fire, the fire of hate<br/>Black dragon fly high spit your red flame<br/>They’re lost in the fire of damned<br/>The fire of hate – “<strong>Black Dragon</strong>” Luca Turilli</em></div><br/><div align="center"><em>Sleep</em></div><br/>Imprisoned once again, the black dragon sleeps to restore his sanity by resting his mind. Perhaps he was the only one most deserving of such a punishment, but he could say the same for the humans.