Dragons as you know them are merely diluted shells of what these noble beasts once were. When the people of Dragon City tamed them, they morphed and twisted them into engines of racing prowess. However some of them avoided the City long enough to live on...and await the day they would return to Dragon City, as demons of wing and flame. The blood and bone of Dragon City's Ancestry

Chapter One

Artha and Beau were blazing past the competition. They were currently engaged in one of Dragon City's most prestigious races. The Ancient Race. This race was based off of the first ever Dragon Race of ancient times and was perilous to the extreme. Very few were selected to compete and only the best were deemed worthy. Artha and his dragon Beau were one of those few. Obstacles and dangers awaited them but they had no idea of the true danger lying in wait, preparing to make his return and show Dragon City what it had thought it had locked away.

"C'mon boy! Go! Go! Go!" Artha urged his dragon onward as they sped forward on the curving stone-carved track. This area of the City was deep in the Wastelands and the track had lain dormant for years until Race Marshal Budge had decided to finance a repair expedition. Now the course was gleaming and proud, a testament of the strength of Dragon City's people not to mention the noble dragons who had helped make it!

As they pulled forward, two other racers caught up to them. One was riding a purple quadruped dragon. His white hair fluttered in the slipstream of his racing dragon and his evil sneer did not go unnoticed by Artha. It was Moordryd Paynn.

"Hey Stable Brat! I can't believe you actually made it to the front of the pack!" He laughed menacingly and Artha glared icily back at him, his dark eyes narrowing.

"Same to you Moordryd! I thought you still were in training! I guess daddy took the training gear off huh?" Artha laughed back and Moordryd nearly fell off his dragon in rage. He growled and cracked his magwhip in the Penn boy's direction. Artha dodged the whip and drew his own magstaff, swinging it at Moordryd as hard as he could. The sound of staff hitting helmet could be heard along the track and Moordryd groaned with pain and swooned sharply as his head pounded ceaselessly. He would have a massive headache come morning.

The pair kept on fighting right to the finish line. They hardly noticed as a large shadow passed them by, A large quadruped shadow sans rider and gear. Their dragons on the other hand did. They both skidded to a stop, roaring and snarling in alarm. Their riders went flying and landed on the ground in a heap, grimacing as the other competitors sped by them to cross the finish line.

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"What in the name of Magna Draconis is wrong with you!? Decepshun?" Moodryd screeched as he led his dragon back to the Dragon Eye holding area. Artha was having similar thoughts as he led Beau back to Parmon and Kitt with a sour look on his face.

"What happened out there?" Parmon asked in a concerned tone.

"That's what I'd like to know! Beau just stopped for no reason! It's like he saw a ghost or something! Decepshun stopped too! I don't know what they saw but if it was just a yellow-bellied newt I'm going to eat my own magstaff!" Artha grumbled.

"That wouldn't taste very good!" Lance Penn chuckled. His dragon Fracshun chortled along with him.

"Oh go stuff your head in a Draconium vat!" Artha snapped back. Lance made a "Hmph!" sound and stomped off to play a vid-game. Kitt chastised Artha gently for berating his brother while Parmon worked on maintaining Beau's gear. As he checked over the gear he watched a replay of the race including the part where Beau and Decepshun stopped. He gasped as he spotted what the two racers had not.

"Artha! Look at this!" he beckoned his friend over and they both stared at the frozen frame. Parmon had a look of surprise whereas Artha was confused.

"I don't see anything" he remarked.

"Look at the shadow there!" Parmon pointed to a spot just to the left of Beau and Decepshun. It was huge and dark. It looked like a dragon but it was not like any dragon they had ever seen. It had the build of a quadruped dragon only many times larger. There were two leathery protrusions on its shoulders and what appeared to be sharp horns on its head. Similar spikes studded its neck and went all the way to the tip of the tail where a large triangular spike jutted outward.

"What is that thing?" Artha saw it more clearly and was rather frightened.

"I don't know...but I think we better pay a visit to Mortis!" Parmon replied.

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"This is very disturbing" Mortis told the group with a grim look on his face. "Creatures like these haven't been seen in over three thousand years. What you described to me can only be an Ancestor...one of the wild dragons that was used to create the racing dragons you know today. Ancestors were extremely powerful in their time and it was because of their foul tempers, extreme power, and god-like strength that the Dragon-Human war began. The Ancestor Dragons had wings similar to the ones Beau can generate that allowed them to fly"

"Fly!?" Parmon gasped nervously.

"Yes" Mortis continued his explanation. "And when they got big enough, they could even breath fire. Think Thruster Gear only ten thousand times hotter"

"Breath fire!?" This time Parmon nearly fainted on the spot. Everyone was now extremely scared and nervous. Artha was the only one who showed some sign of confidence.

"So these "Ancestors" could fly, breath fire, and were powerful...how is that different from the racing dragons?" he asked curiously.

"They are extremely different Artha!" Mortis snapped back. "The Ancestors were capable of many things. Fire-breathing is the predecessor of the mag-blast! And flight was their way of racing except through the skies rather than on the ground. Also Ancestors could even do magic"

"Magic?" Kitt spoke up. "What do you mean? Like the stuff street magicians do? Or how Rivett turned himself invisible?"

"Something like that only much stronger" Mortis replied. "Most Ancestors had invisibility that let them hide from humans. Some could project illusions to confuse man. The most powerful could create natural disasters with a single stomp of one paw. Remember the Great Quake?"

"Yeah!" Lance exclaimed. "We learned about it in school!"

"That Quake was caused by a very angry Ancestor. One stomp crumbled almost half of Dragon City...or what you know today as Old City" Mortis said. "There are...or were, many types of Ancestors. The one you claimed to see was probably a Fire Ancestor"

"What does that mean?" Lance asked.

"It means that the particular Ancestor you saw has its roots in the element of Fire. The predecessor of the Red Draconium dragons. There were also Water, Air, and Earth Ancestors as well. Rumor has it there were also a Darkness and Light Ancestor" Mortis explained calmly. "Now then, we must investigate this further. If there really is an Ancestor on the loose, it must be found and stopped at all costs. Otherwise another War could begin and that is the last thing we want"