Words of the Elder Days

The Words of the Elder Days (or simply the Words) are considered to be the oldest archive and the oldest extant written words in the world, containing information about the history of the world in the Age of Titans prior to the Annihilation, and also reportedly much information about the Dreadlands. The Words do not consist of books, but rather words and images carved with Dragon claws into the walls of an extensive underground cave system lying underneath the Holy Mountain in Draconica, in Roulonne. The language is an exceedingly ancient form of the Draconic tongue which requires extensive study even for native speakers of modern Draconic to understand.

The writing of the Words of the Elder Days began in approximately 4000BC, as it is written within the Words that the archive began at the same time the Flame-Bearer lit the Eternal Flame in the temple atop the Holy Mountain.

The contents of the Words are a total mystery. Anyone who reads the Words is forbidden - under pain of an agonising, torturous death - from writing down what they had read or speaking with others about it. Several important figures throughout history have attempted to make the information public, and it is from them that we know scraps of knowledge about what is contained within and the practices of the Guardians. All these individuals were hunted and killed, and all the public figures who announced they planned to reveal the Words ended up dead or destitute. The Nesarian Empire is criticised both for letting such valuable information remain a secret and for allowing the vicious and utterly unrelenting Guardians go to extreme lengths to defend it, but no comment has been made.

The Words of the Elder Days are essentially the Draconic counterpart to the Red Library in Feronar, an island of Sevaliara, although both the Dragons and Elves say the Words are both more extensive and more fiercely guarded - although it is sometimes brought up that the Words of the Elder Days is more broadly historical in nature whereas the Red Library has a specific focus on magic and magical history, meaning its contents may be significantly more dangerous. This is, of course, assuming the Words do not also contain writings on magic.

## Guardians

The Guardians are those tasked with defending and preserivng the Words of the Elder Days. There is no information about when this institution was founded, but its formation is estimated to have taken place at the same time the writing of the Words began, or shortly after. Only Dragons can be Guardians. Their internal organisation is largely a mystery.

The Guardians are an entirely extra-governmental institution, possessing full authority to put any intruder to death, even a Goldscale or the Emperor himself. They also have the authority to train and indoctrinate their members however they choose, something that is necessary for them as many of their methods of indoctrination are illegal under Imperial law, as Guardian novices are severely stress-tested; not only do they have to undergo dangerous trials, but they also have to undergo physical and psychological torture to prove they will not give in to the most persistent and sadistic of intruders, and their sex organs are destroyed or otherwise rendered inactive - through castration for males and either surgical removal of the womb or taking drugs to make the sexual organs wither and die, often combined with female circumcision, for females. The Guardians also have some kind of operation performed on their eyes to make them better at seeing in the darkness of the tunnels that hold the Words, but this makes their eyes very sensitive to bright lights. This practice is the most fiercely-kept secret surrounding initiation into the Guardians, and the method of how it is achieved is totally unknown.

Besides those few Guardians who represent the institution to outside forces, Guardians are forbidden to speak to anyone who is not a Guardian.

There are rumours that the Guardians keep several sex slaves who produce new Guardians, and that these offspring guard the most sacred portions of the Words and undergo the hardest trials of all, many of them dying in the process, and those who survive never leave the tunnels that hold the Words, never seeing the sun. These are of course nothing more than rumours, impossible to either prove or disprove due to the intense secrecy of the organisation.