>>5297721You are caught off-guard by the booming voice which assails you from above. You look up the face it, adjusting your stance to balance yourself, lest the quaking tremors of its speech blast you off the top of the tower of stone with you stand atop. What you see there is… Divine.
Wreathed in a golden halo is a massive, unfurling serpent-shape, crested by many great wings. Its scales give way to feathers at point, and as the massive airborne serpent lowers towards you, its halo becomes a wreathe—a mane—of such feather-scales, golden and glorious. The panoply of plant-life beneath you bows from the great wind of its coming, and at places seems to wither or burn from its magnificent—from He who is called Serpent Ascendant. You shield your eyes from him, lest the same fate befall you as those trees.
>YOU REJECTED THE OFFER OF THE TEMPLE-PROSTUTE PRINCESS OF THE BROOD-MOTHER“You… Mean Glowie?” you ask. “And you refer to the Mother of Dragons, oh lord?”
>MOTHER OF DRAGONS? PERHAPS… ONCE, IN ANCIENT DAYS. SHE HAS CARRIED MANY NAMES, BUT HER INTEREST IN DRAGONS IS LIMITED. NOT SO YOUR OWN.You dare to peer upwards at the towering shape, and find the entire tower is encircled in monumental coils, coils without end, the tail of your Dark God trailing through the plants now. The light which once blinded in now blotted out; the plants die, or are changed, where the tail of the Serpent Ascendant touches them, or even his shadow falls upon them.
>SHE PROTECTS AND CHERISHES HER CHILDREN… BUT SHE DOES NOT ALLOW THEM TO GROW STRONG. SHE IS MOTHER OF GECKOS, AND TOADS, AND NOW WORMS, AND PERHAPS YET SPIDERS.You bow your head in respect, now sure how to reply—if a reply is even expected of you.
>BUT YOU, YOU ASPIRE. YOU WERE NOT SATISFIED TO PROTECT YOUR BROOD, TO SIT ON YORU AURELS AND SIRE SUCH SUPPLICANTS. YOU HUNTED A MONSTER TO THE DEEP PLACES, SLEW IT, AND TOOK ITS POWER FOR YOUR OWN.You dare to look up. Is this Dark God… praising you? Your eyes widen and your heart seizes, to find a single great eye focused upon you, easily large enough to dwarf you dozens of times over.
>IN YOU, I SEE A DRAGON… IN WAITING, IN CONCEPT, HALF-FORMED.What do you do?
>Prostrate yourself, and ask how you may be of service—even your pride is humbled before such a great and terrible being>Demand power—you believe have proven yourself worthy, and think that the Serpent Ascendant May be a worthy patron>Ask of the apparent disagreement between Dark Gods, and what originated it>Thanks the Serpent Ascendant, but ask why he has not better helped your floundering race>Write-in 