Malok the Destroyer
Malok the Destroyer is a huge red dragon that inhabits the Old World. It had been the mount of a dragon prince of the kingdom of Caledor during the War of the Beard, but when he died, Malok set out and created his lair on the Isla de Sangre, an island north of Estalia.[1]
Being a Dragon thousands of years old, Malok is colossal in size. It measured approximately sixty meters from the end of the snout to the pointed spike that topped its immense tail. Its limbs and flanks are covered with red scales that darken to a thick cuirass of black bony plates upon reaching the back, from which a row of sharp spikes rose. Each of the dragon's legs is a thick lump like a tree trunk, swollen with muscle and power under its scaly covering. Colossal wings spread from the shoulders, great leathery fabrics stretched over a structure of finger bone.[1]
Malok has a body full of scars, the result of his life of conflicts, although two of them stand out from the rest, painful memories of his participation in the war between the High Elves and the Dwarves, which serve to identify him more easily.[1]
History
When the Dragons began to fall into a deep sleep and fewer and fewer came to the call of war. Some members of the Caledor nobility suffered from the loss of power resulting from the long sleep of their draconian allies, and ordered the creation of a series of magical talismans, the Fell Fang, small musical instruments made from the fangs of these beasts. and that they allowed them to control the dragons according to their will, enslaving them and forcing them to wake up when their lords called them. But that was considered both a crime for the selfish use of magic as well as an act of treason against creatures that were friends and allies of the elves. For this reason, those nobles, known by the name of Grey Lords, were condemned to exile and were forbidden to return to Ulthuan.[1]
Furthermore, the Fell Fang were dangerous artifacts. It took enormous willpower to be able to fully control a Dragon, and at best the control is not very strong. It is easier and requires less effort when you have to force a dragon to do something that is in its nature, but it is much more difficult to control its impulses when forced to do something contrary to them. And what is worse, once lost control, the proud dragon used to unleash his wrath on whoever possessed the Fell Fang, in revenge for having been subdued in such a way, regardless of the death and destruction he might cause in the process.[1]
One of these nobles was a former dragon rider, who had settled in the territories now known as the Grey Mountains after their expulsion from the mainland island. At the outbreak of the Beard War, the exiled prince used the beast against the dwarves, making an entire page of the Book of Grudges in which his name appears. It was in that conflict that he was baptized with the name by which he is now known, since "Malok" means "malice" in ancient khazalid, displacing his Eltharin name that he ended up being forgotten.[1]
The large and most characteristic scar on his body was produced when he was struck by a runic spear during the Battle of Ilendril Hill. Such was the power of the runes that the dwarven smiths had engraved on the enormous spear, that even centuries later, the dragon still bears the scar. On his left shoulder and flank he had a large area of blackened flesh, another painful memory suffered during the siege of a dwarven stronghold called "Iron Peak", when he was struck by a zigzagging magic beam conjured against Malok by a Runesmith. The Dwarves remember that day well, swallowing one of the oldest and wisest runesmiths in the kingdom.[1]
Following the death of Caledor II on Tor Alessi and the rise of Caradryel to the throne of Ulthuan, the new Phoenix King decided to end the war with the Dwarves and ordered the Old World Elves to leave the colonies and return to Ulthuan. The elf prince who controlled Malok entrusted the monster with guarding his people during the march to the coast. But protection and preservation weren't easy for Malok to do; the dragon yearned to kill and destroy as he did when he fought the war against the dwarves, he began to resist and the prince was gradually losing control of the beast until he finally freed himself.[1]
In the fiery heart of a dragon resides tremendous pride, and Malok must have despised the stigma of being part of that retreat. Perhaps it was that wounded pride that finally allowed him to gain control of the Fell Fang. However it happened, Malok killed his master and then set about destroying all the elves he could find, showering fire on the refugees who were slowly advancing towards the sea.[1]
After satisfying his desire for revenge, Malok traveled to an arid piece of volcanic rock that loomed out of the sea some three hundred kilometers from the coast of present-day Estalia, devastating everything in it, and taking up residence within it.. The rock became known to humans as the Isla de Sangre, due to the red sand of the beach, being an avoided territory and from which thousands of stories and legends arose around its desolate landscape.[1]
For millennia, the dragon dozed inside the volcanic island, waking up from time to time throughout this time to feed and obtain treasures with which the dragons build their nests. And things would have continued like this if it weren't for the fact that a Bretonnian criminal named Gobineau seized Malok's Fell Fang, and unconsciously summoned the monster.[1]
The beast still remembered furiously how it was forced to obey the call, so it was sworn that it would kill the person who was in possession of the talisman. The dragon had completely obliterated the places where it had felt the call, wreaking great destruction across Bretonnia in its quest to find the artifact.[1]
Malok was stopped when an Elf sorceress named Ithilweil seized the Fell Fang. Employing the proper methods to make it work, the sorceress unleashed the Fang's full power, increasing the Dragon's desire to return home. That consumed the life of the Elf but managed to stop the scale of destruction that the beast was causing.[1]
Sources
- 1: Brunner the Bounty Hunter - Omnibus C. L. Werner (Novel)
