The Fisherman & The Deep-Sea Dragon
There was once a man living in a fishing village by the sea. He was considered an odd one, always venturing further and trying to go deeper with his nets. He went where others dared not go, and so was often alone.
One spring there came a terrible typhoon which threatened to drown the entire village. When the storm finally cleared, the man was of course the first to head down to the beach to try to find his wrecked boat. But rather than finding his boat, he found a dragon.
The massive grey beast appeared to have been thrown onto the beach during the storm. The thought came that perhaps the creature had been the cause of the storm. He was certainly big enough. Taller than a house despite lying on his side, and long enough to stretch the entire length of the beach and more.
Most would have run but the man approached, and found that the creature was wounded, though from what he did not know. It’s blood was an odd colour, a bright blue like the sky. It made the air smell vaguely of copper.
As the man got closer, the sea-dragon awoke and swung it’s head around to see the source of the shuffling in the sand. The man froze in the face of this mighty entity that could so easily eat him in one bite. The man waited, expecting to be dead any second, but the dragon did not move. It stared at him with a gaze full of soul, that seemed to convey meaning. As if it were asking for help. The man decided he needed to help the dragon. But where to find a bandage large enough for a dragon? He had an idea.
Promising to return, he left and resumed his search for his boat. He found it by the rocks, smashed and partially sunk. He removed the cream-coloured sails with some effort, then gathered some moss and returned to the dragon.
Despite the immense size of the creature, the man approached with little fear. The dragon did not move, though it continually watched him with it’s unblinking amber eyes. The man used the sails from his destroyed boat to bandage the dragon’s wounds. Then he returned to the village to tell them of what he had found.
The villagers did not believe him at first, but eventually the younger ones decided to test his story and ran to the beach. They quickly returned and confirmed his story.
The villagers had heard many tales of the reclusive deep-sea dragons. Afraid of what would happen to them if they killed the dragon or let it die, the villagers unanimously decided to help it until it healed, and then send it on it’s way.
The man was the first to approach again, this time with the two healers of his village. They inspected the dragons wounds, determined they were non-fatal and should heal easily in time, and left the bandages as they were.
That done, the villagers had to figure out where they would rebuild their boats. The dragon took up much of the beach they had always used for sending off their boats each day. The man advocated for the dragon, saying that it would not hurt the people helping it. Insisting that dragons were too intelligent for that.
Though they disliked the close proximity they would have to have, the villagers eventually conceded to staying on the main beach and began work on repairing their boats. Additionally, while following their fathers to work, the children began calling the dragon Typhoon, naming it after the storm that had brought it onto their beach.
The man checked on the dragon’s progress each morning before going to continue repairing his boat, and then again before heading home in the evening. When asked about it he had claimed it was because he was concerned about getting his sails back in one piece. But later he admitted that he kept going to the dragon because he felt drawn to it. He was drawn to what he saw in those eyes. There was something uncannily familiar about it. The dragon seemed to recognize him, even when it couldn’t see him. It even seemed to relax some while he was around it. The man too, found that he felt more relaxed around this creature than he did his own neighbors.
After the first few weeks had passed, the villagers began to wonder whether the dragon would become hungry enough to attempt to eat them. Once again the man was the first to jump to the dragon’s defence. He argued that with the boats nearing completion, they could offer some of their catch to the dragon to help stay off any hunger he might have and reinforce that they were helping the dragon and thus not to be harmed.
The villagers agreed to this plan, and a few days later they finally took to the sea in search of fish enough for them and the dragon.
The dragon, which up until this point had barely moved, seemed to come to life at the sight of the fish arriving in the boats. The villagers began loading fish into a cart to give to the dragon. But a moment later the dragon was at their boats and eating the majority of their first catch of fish.
There were a few protests, but most of the villagers were too scared of the dragon to try to correct it. Instead they took what fish they had loaded into their cart and returned with it to the village.
This behaviour repeated itself a few days later, when the villagers returned with another large cache of fish. The villagers began to worry that they would starve before the dragon healed. Still they continued to try, rationing out what fish they were able to snatch out before the dragon began eating.
After a few weeks of this, the villagers grew concerned that they would starve not just that summer but in the following winter, since the dragon was eating not just their food but their livelihood. The man, who at this point had grown fond of the dragon, only barely managed to convince them to continue for just one more week.
As the seventh week dawned, the man approached the dragon and removed the makeshift bandaging for the last time. The dragon’s wounds were now fresh scars. It could leave.
The man tried to encourage the dragon to go into the water. It did not move. He tried coaxing it with fish. It blinked. At last, the man took his blue-stained sails and attached them to his restored boat. He pushed it out into the water, tossed a fish onto the sand and pointed out to sea, trying to convey to the creature that he was going out fishing and the dragon should join him.
He had no idea if the creature would understand, yet sailed out just past the protective barrier before looking back. To his astonishment, the dragon was following him. There was a brief flash of fear as the massive beast swam towards him, nothing but it’s back breaching the surface. It’s eyes seemed to glow beneath the water’s surface, still focused in on him. Then it curled around beneath him, as if waiting for him to move.
Adrenaline pumping, the man sailed to his usual fishing grounds. The dragon followed. He cast his nets and the dragon swam a little ways off. After a bit of waiting the nets began to tug. Unexpectedly they began to heave. His boat threatened to flip from the weight pulling down on it.
For a moment, as he was being tossed to and fro at the helm, the man thought the dragon was tugging on or had gotten caught in the nets. When he rushed to the edge to look, however, he found the dragon herding a large school of fish straight into the net.
The man heaved and pulled the open side of the net up to close it and prevent the caught fish from trying to escape, and to prevent more fish from trying to enter. He left it in the water since he could not pull such a massive weight up into his boat by himself. He began steering the boat towards land, dragging the captured fish behind him. He wondered whether the net would hold all the way to the shore. This became a greater fear as he neared the shallows.
The net hit sand. Suddenly the weight vanished and the dragon’s head appeared above the water, longer and wider than his boat. The net of fish hung from it’s mouth.
The dragon kept pace with him all the way to the shoreline, where the other fishermen were only just heading to their boats. The men’s jaws all dropped. The children who were there immediately ran to get their mothers and grandparents.
By the time the man dragged his boat the last few feet up onto the sand, the entire village had arrived. The dragon dropped the sack of fish onto the deck of the boat. The weight made the boat sink a few heads down.
Seeing the fish, the villagers cheered and gratefully began scooping fish into carts to bring back to the village. This time, the dragon ate only a single fish. The one that the man had previously tossed onto the sand.
The man stood proudly, happy to have pacified the villagers, and happy that the dragon had been willing to pay back the help he’d been given. The dragon did not exit the water, though he did rest his head on the warm sand. When the man went home that evening, he left believing the dragon would be gone by morning. He was wrong.
When he went to the beach the next morning, the dragon was waiting for him in the water. It stared at him expectantly, occasionally glancing over at his boat. Once he had recovered from his astonishment, the man, boarded his blue-sailed boat and once again headed out to sea with the dragon.
They repeated the catch of the day before, and returned well before the others even had a chance to get into their boats. Once again the villagers were astounded and overjoyed. They wouldn’t need to fish for a few weeks now. They had plenty to sell at market. They had more fish than they needed.
The next day, the dragon was waiting again. The man sailed with the dragon and caught another boat full of fish. The village could not store any more. The man wasn’t sure if he would be able to convey this fact to the dragon.
The next day the dragon was waiting again. Determined to not disappoint the dragon, but to also not bring back any fish this time, the man took his net and placed it onto the sand before getting into his boat.
If the dragon could have looked surprised, it would have. It was the second time the man noted a real reaction from the creature –the first being it’s reaction to being offered fish for the first time.
Still it followed him out beyond the safety of the cove and into the ocean. The man sailed over to a spot where the water was crystal clear and a brightly-coloured reef waivered beneath the water. He wasn’t sure what the dragon would do, but he believed such a creature would be able to appreciate the location.
The dragon entered the reef, swimming close to the surface, and the man took a breath and jumped into the warm water.
He swam down and down until he could hook his feet under a piece of coral and just stand there on the ocean floor. The dragon’s massive frame slowly weaved above him. It swam around and when it finally made it’s way back to the man, it’s head was level with his. The dragon’s claws scraped the tops of coral and rocks. The tiny fish scattered and dove into their hiding spots. The man looked at the dragon. The dragon looked at the man. And then it started humming. And the man heard a music that no human had ever heard before.
He didn’t know how long he stayed down there. He never seemed to run out of air despite usually only being able to dive for five minutes at a time. He had only come up for air a handful of times before the sun began to sink on the horizon. It indicated that each time he had been under the water, it had been for nearly three times the length he could usually stay. The dragon had surfaced for air only once.
The villagers were confused when he returned, wondering what he had been doing all day, but also silently grateful to not have had to waste any fish from an unnecessary catch.
With how much fish could be caught in one go with the dragon, the villagers only needed to go fishing twice per week. The dragon appeared to eat his fill during the hunt rather than after, which explained why he did not need any of the fish he helped bring back. In-between that, the man spent his time with the dragon. He repaired damage to his nets on the beach next to the dragon rather than by the fire of his own home. He went sailing with the dragon and ended up discovering a large collection of pearl-laden clams and mollusks. The village was overjoyed at the income such a find brought to them. The man sailed further and further out, he dove deeper and deeper. He became a recluse. But one which the village was immensely grateful for.
One day the man returned to the village, stammering and looking rather wild. Ranting about something. Speaking a language no one had ever heard before. The villagers who considered him a friend tried to calm him with an alcoholic drink. After over an hour the man was able to speak coherently again, but what he said only confused the villagers even more.
“He spoke to me. He spoke. He told me his name. I told him mine. He has been calling me Water-Walker after my boat, like how we have been calling him Typhoon after the storm that brought him.”
The villagers naturally assumed he was loosing him mind, and insisted he take a few days of bed-rest to process everything. The man responded by telling them he needed to tell someone named Khuio, first.
One of the men followed him, and sure enough the man went straight to the dragon. It seemed to have been expecting him, sitting on the sand in a manner resembling a lounging cat. The scars on it's body were just that, scars. The dragon was completely healed. Why did it not leave?
The man reluctantly accepted three days of bed-rest. Everyone was convinced it would fix whatever was wrong. But the moment those days elapsed he returned to the immense grey dragon. The creature itself had not moved from it’s spot in the sand during those three days. It hadn’t entered the water, nor eaten any fish offered to it. It had just lain in the sand and waited, facing the direction of the man’s house. The behaviour was disturbing to all the villagers.
The next morning as the fishermen were preparing to head out to sea, the man came down the beach looking ready to join them. But to everyone’s shock, he did not climb into his boat. Instead he climbed onto the back of the dragon.
Once the man was seated comfortably just behind it’s horns, the dragon calmly turned and waded out into the water. Everyone on the beach watched with open mouths as the pair swam to the edge of the cove.
The man called back to the others, encouraging them to follow. They did, and watched with wary anticipation to see just what would happen next.
The man and the dragon led the other fishermen to a spot they had never fished before. The black water was considered suspicious and potentially dangerous. The man called for them to lower their nets. They did. Then the dragon and the man vanished beneath the black waters.
After a few minutes, weight began crashing into their nets. When they could not hold any more, they pulled up the nets and saw fish twice as large as the ones they normally caught. They hauled each catch into their boats and the wood groaned from the weight. With three boats now full of fish, they had twice the amount of any catch the village had ever achieved.
At last the dragon and the man broke the surface of the water. Black water streamed down from their forms, but neither looked winded from their adventure. The man grinned to his fellows and waved encouragement as he and the dragon passed by, heading back towards the beach.
While the remaining villagers were undoubtedly taken aback by the record-breaking cache of fish being hauled in, most of the after-shock described was likely due to seeing a human riding atop the massive grey deep-sea dragon. It was a thing completely unheard of. Yet the man looked like he had been doing it his whole life, and the dragon seemed to be enjoying itself. When it reached land it lowered it’s head, and the man slid down onto the sand.
Before the man went to help the others unload, he put a hand on the side of the dragon’s head and spoke to it in the strange guttural language he had used during what the villagers had thought was a manic episode brought on by ocean madness. The dragon hummed a response, the first sound the villagers had ever heard from it. And then the man was at the fishing boats helping unload the fish like nothing had happened.
But something had happened. And it made the villagers wary.
They had a few more fishing trips, each ended in wonderful catches of various fishes and other sealife that would fetch great value at market. But each time such a catch came in, the village grew more wary of the man and his dragon.
At last the villagers got together in secret to decide what to do.
“It’s unnatural!” one of the elders said.
“It should be impossible!” one of the fishermen ranted.
“Is it going to happen to us, too?” one of the younger women worried.
“The dragon has been good to us. But I don’t want to know the price of it. It needs to leave.” one of the elders sighed.
“But what of the man? He is one of us, albeit a bit strange. Do we send him away too?” one of the friends of the man asked.
“Yes. But not banishment. We will send him to one of the cities for healing. Surely they will have someone there who will know how to get that dragon out of his head.” the elder set his mug down on the table.
There were murmurs of agreement from the gathered crowd. It was decided.
No one knew that the man had been listening from the windowsill, having just come by to pick up a late-night jug of mead.
Only one person was awake to see him leave that night. One of the younger children who had always found the odd man more amusing than strange. The child had also been fascinated by the dragon, though too nervous to approach on his own.
The child followed him from the village meetinghouse to the man’s home further up the hill. He watched the man begin packing a waterproof satchel.
“You’re not leaving, are you?”
The man jumped at having been caught, then sighed.
“Yes. I must leave now. I do not want him to see the worst of my people. He has offered to show me more of his ocean world and the ways of his people. I will accept his offer and we will go.”
The child protested but a stern look silenced him.
“They would be sending me away otherwise. Only it would not be to nearly as nice a place as the ocean. I will leave. Everyone has what they need to not just survive the winter, but to thrive in it. You will be fine. And so will I. Goodbye little one. Perhaps one day I will return for a visit.”
The child followed him back out, but stopped at the edge of the beach, watching from a distance as the man approached the sleeping dragon and woke him gently.
He said something the child could not hear, and the dragon stood. The man patted his boat in fondness, and then climbed into his usual spot on the dragon.
The massive creature entered the water, the man sitting stoically behind the horns, and slowly they swam out to sea. The dragon’s shining form soon vanishing into the dark waters stretching off into the distance.
And so they were gone long before the villagers awoke the next morning. The empty house and the blue sails of the man’s boat were the only remaining indication that either had ever really existed. Well, that and the full bellies and increased wealth of the villagers.
The man and the dragon did not return, though rumours began to spread of sailors seeing a man on a massive sea dragon far out at sea. Usually he was said to be helping people survive the treacherous ocean surface. Sometimes he was swimming with a crashing pod of deep-sea dragons. Each time it was spoken of how he afterwards vanished beneath the water, heading back down into the deep on his grey dragon.
But those rumours soon faded into a whisper. And that whisper into a legend. No one knows the end of it. Whether he eventually drowned in the sea, or if he somehow lived on, perhaps finding an island to call home, or else by some magic going down to live permanently beneath the waves.
It is up to the reader to decide.
--Atelier
Historical Basis
This legend is believed to be a dramatised version of a historical event. However, proof of the myth is debatable as it relies heavily on second-hand eye-witness accounts from the inhabitants who once lived on islands along the coast of Scymour.
Additionally, it is unknown whether the dragon in the legend really was a deep-sea dragon or just an oddly-coloured oceanic dragon, which lived in large numbers further down the coast.
Spread
This legend is believed to have originated on a small fishing island off the coast of Scymour. Locals of the area firmly believe this legend to be fact.
This legend has been spread up and down the coast of Scymour and _________, and throughout the ocean trade-routes between Uria and Ethera.
Variations & Mutation
Legend Variations:
- The man began by saving the dragon from a dangerous sea monster
- The dragon was an infant when he found it on the beach, and it lived with the villagers until it reached adulthood
- The man was barely twenty
- The man was over forty
- The man learned a magic that allowed himself to live underwater indefinitely
- The man eventually retired and lived the remainder of his days on an island
- The man was eaten by the dragon
Few have seen a deep-sea dragon. Fewer still have interacted with one. And in the whole of Urian history, only one person has ever been rumoured to have ridden one.
This is the tale, be it truth or fantasy.
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