Sovereign Dragon (Young, Spellcaster)

There were supposedly dragons of pure elemental earth, once. These were imperial dragons who, like their other elemental counterparts, came to the Universe, lived, and died, their bodies becoming part of the continent. As fire became lava, wood became forests, water the seas, lakes, and rivers, and metal the veins of precious minerals, so earth became the land, the stone, the mountains. By way of logic, if there exist such environments and entities today, then earth dragons must exist too. Or have existed, once upon a primeval time.

And yet among the imperial dragons today there are only sovereign dragons, who leave serpentine skeletons behind upon death in place of rock, stone, or land. The dragons' innate spellcasting, weakness to unheated iron, and other traits highly suggest that they're associated with elemental earth. The rest of their powers have little to no such association, instead centered on the mysteries of the metaphysical spirit and mind.

There's no clear explanation for why sovereign dragons are the way they are today. Some guess it might have been a deal to fulfill personal ambition, to go from those tasked with selecting rulers to becoming the rulers themselves. Others wonder if the lands of Tian Xia were corrupted in the past, and the earth dragons walked away from their elemental natures to save themselves. Perhaps they too became empyreal dragons, but then returned to the lands of mortals when no suitable ruler rose to the throne.