The Last Great Dragon

In the middle ages, earth was riddled with dragons. They had huge scales with emerald hues, wings the size of a human and eyes the colour of the gold they so loved and adored. Dragons dwelled in caves, isolated from society. The people of the middle ages were terrified of them, and rightfully so, dragons came in the night, destroyed villages in one fiery breath, ate their livestock, and pillaged their gold. It was not necessarily their fault, dragons were greedy in nature, and if they saw gold laying there for the taking, who were they to decline such a tempting offer?

The problem was, as their gold stockpiles grew, human greed grew as well, and soon knights from each corner of the globe came searching for the dragon’s hoards. They came with spears as pointed and sharp as the dragon’s teeth with armour forged in the same fire that destroyed villages and unbridled rage and fury.

The small dragons were the first to be killed, little dragons with hordes of golden cups and jewellery, too small to defend themselves against the barrages of the knights, they were slaughtered, and their gold taken. As the knights revelled in their success, their infamy grew, and more humans joined, desperate for gold and status, and thus the great dragon slaying of the 14th century began.

One by one the dragons fell. They fought hard and valiantly but were overwhelmed by the sheer multitudes of the knights. Their heads were severed from their bodies, hung up as decorations in the nearest villages’ tavern, their impenetrable scales moulded into armour for the bravest soldier, and fangs converted into sharp swords and spears. Gold was given to everyone who fought, and soldiers returned to their wives with more treasure than they had ever seen before. As their bounty grew, the dragon population dwindled until only the great dragons remained, hiding in their caves, protecting their gold.

One day the greatest dragon of all, Satoshi Nakamoto, called a meeting of all the remaining dragons, they met in a large cavern, with them all brining their prized treasure. To survive, Satoshi explained, Dragons must learn to adapt and outwit the humans. Satoshi realised that the humans were after their treasure and gold, and not dragon kind, and so he suggested they change their methods of hoarding. It was in that cave that bitcoin was created.

Bitcoin was devised to make sure the ancient dragons could hoard their wealth, but under disguise, the humans would not be able to find their new gold and thus dragon kind would remain safe and protected. When the knights came to slaughter the great dragons, they arrived at an empty cave, with no dragons or gold except for one small coin in the cavern with an engraved letter B on its surface.

With their treasure now safely protected, dragons began to evolve and adapt. Their wings slowly shrunk as they did not have to constantly flee from would be attackers. They eventually lost their tails, as they were not using it as a weapon, similarly their claws and fangs had become duller, and scales became flatter to give the illusion of skin and hair. Not all traits were lost however, their amber eyes remained as well as their fiery breath. The surviving dragons were now disguised as humans and they flourished, wealth in bitcoins and safe from humans, as the stories of the dragons became myth and legend.

As the humans progressed, dragons progressed with them, ever present in history, still possessing their extra ordinate wealth. Many of the wealthiest figures in history were secret dragons, they infiltrated monarchies and dynasties, and as the world became industrial, they became businessmen, wealth stored in their own form of currency.

On his deathbed, in 2008, one of the last great dragons, Satoshi Nakamoto, exposed bitcoin to the world. Humans embraced this ‘new currency’ unaware of the dragon’s involvement in its creation, and so dragons once again prospered without human knowledge, hidden and safe, an amber gleam in their eyes whenever someone mentions bitcoin.