It was in a cave deep in the mountains, where no men dared to traverse, that Kleet stood. All around him sat bones of all kinds. Troll bones, orc bones, bones of man and of elves of every kind. There were so many that they hid the marks of claws once sharpened and the marks of fire once breathed. They made the lair unrecognizable.

If the lair was Kleet's he may have tried to make it look somewhat presentable. Decent enough for another dragon to visit without gaining a boost to their ego. As it was not his lair though, he simply stared. A reminiscent look in his eye as he surveyed what was once the lair he had been born in.

It belonged to his mother back then. Back before he had been sent away to become a true dragon on his own. He could still remember those days, when he had siblings and they would play. Their little games often compared to domesticated cats if they were much larger. The memories were potent in their affect, bringing a rare tear to the dragon's eye.

The lair was no longer any of that.

It had been taken by a brute not long ago. Some dragon who had forced his mother to flee, only for himself to die not too long after. Three ballista bolts to the head was all it took. His mother had already found a new place to lair by then, and saw no reason to return to this place. None of Kleet's kin did.

None save for him. His reasons for doing so completely singular. And it was not to gleefully think back on times so old. No, he had come in search of an item that was once among his mother's collection. Said item was a book of seemingly insignificant worth. A simple tome that could be bought in any human city. One the elves would surely mock from their high towers.

And with it, Kleet could potentially be the first dragon in this age to learn magic. Most of his kind would mock such a thing, they would look down on the mere idea. To them magic was weakness. It was just another weak tool of the mortals in an attempt to emulate them, Dragons the peak of life. But Kleet knew better.

He had seen and heard of too many dragons falling victim to the magic of mortals. Of entire kingdoms getting destroyed by its power. Magic was indeed a tool, but it had so much more value than any his kind gave it credit for. And like almost every dragon under the sun, Kleet liked things of great value.

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So he did his best to find the book. He trampled over bones and searched in every little hole. Every rock was overturned and every intact bag gone through. He searched as thoroughly as any dragon could ever chance to search, and found nothing. Until he happened across the bones of a single elf.

The skeleton of the elf was unusual. Unusual in its singleness. There were no other elf skeletons in the defunct lair. A few dead dwarves, yes, but only one elf. And the dead elf held, clutched tight to its chest, the book.

Kleet smiled the most draconic smile he could smile and took His book. Then he left the cave for good, prize in hand as he flew to his own lair. It too was a cave, a better hidden and defended one. Unlike the cave that once belonged to his mother he had minions, a whole tribe of goblins that had sworn loyalty to him. A loyalty that he did not have to force, he just happened to rescue them from certain doom and now they willingly served him.

Then there were the traps. Each and every one of them had been set up by the goblins under his direction. They weren't the most brilliant of foils, but they were numerous enough that any land bound creature would no doubt be impeded by them. It was just as he liked it. A slow advancement while under constant assault from a seemingly never-ending force of goblins.

Even if any intruder did make it past, they would be too tired to fight him with the best of their ability. An effect not only ensured by all his defences, but by the size of his lair as well. The grand cave that he called his own was so large that it would take anything less than a dragon a while day to get from end to another. Adding to that, was that it was maze like. There were over two hundred paths for a group of would be dragon slayers to lose themselves on.

And at its heart Kleet did rest. He lay in a circle, tail upon himself as he read through the pages of the old grimoire. It was far more... Advanced than the book he remembered being in his mother's collection. There were complex formula and theories and explaining of subjects. It was far too complex to be a book meant for a novice.

But Kleet considered himself up for the test. He poured hours upon hours into reading the book and searching it for clues. Any scrap of information that he could understand and put to use to further his new study into the arcane. Eventually, he found that scrap. A single passage that attempted to explain what magic was at its core.

He barely understood any of what is was saying. But, from he gleamed, he was able to begin the formation of a picture. It was a simple picture, like one drawn by a child, and it would be the spark that would take him to new heights. As soon as he managed to decipher what it was.

Magic, after all, was for mere mortals and like them it was far more complicated than it looked.