#it's miserable start to finish for them and the only finish is death

[valeriefauxnom]

The Dangers of Dragon Pacts

So, in a recent post, I commented in the tags that pretty much every functional aspect of dragonblood and what the royal family does with it is risky/bad for their health, so consider this an elaboration on that rant!

Since I've addressed how dragonblood itself is a bit riskier (and only likely going to get riskier as generations advance), I'll focus on what they do with this dragonblood: pacting.

As always, very long post ahead!

Pacting, to start off, is not an easy process. The first hurdle a prospective heir to the throne must pass is the Dragon Choosing, which is not described in specifics, seems to require 'physical and mental' strength. Try to force an ability to shapeshift if you fail would turn you into a warped creature, and I doubt it would be any good for your sanity, either.

Euden comments to Sophie in her story that "he could have died at any time (when making his pact)" as well, which seems to back up Valyx's and Chelle's words here. The process is inherently dangerous, if it posed such risk to Euden when the dragon he was attempting to pact with wasn't hostile or otherwise trying to make things harder. Kinda speaks to how desperate Aurelius was when sending off his much-beloved son to try to pact with a powerful dragon, huh?

So! This prospective heir to the throne survives the Dragon Choosing, and is able to form a pact. Smooth sailing now, right? Nope! The pact itself is continuous burden, too.

And again, while it isn't exactly described what said burden entails, it's enough of a detriment/pain/displeasure that there was royalty in the past that has developed magic only to try to make it easier to bear it and continue the façade they are capable, strong rulers able to maintain a pact. This likely seems to be the undercurrent mystery behind why everyone is surprised that Euden can hold multiple pacts, because pretty much everyone else would likely not have a good time at all trying to maintain that.

Overall, the concept seems to generally hint to that there are 'limits' to the amount of dragon power one can handle or if they can handle it at all. So even if you're capable of surviving the Choosing, and have enough of whatever ability to hold a pact, you still need to be careful that you pick a dragon that's within your power levels. This is where Nedrick, Zethia, Euden, even potentially Ilia (as Elysium explicitly waited for her to be able to withstand a pact), struggle.

Nedrick and Zethia both pact with Bahamut, who is of such power they both struggle to bear it even with the halfsies of Bahamut they end up with. Granted, this is complicated further by their tumultuous relationship with the dragon in question, which could also be considered another weight to counterbalance.

The pact is not just an intangible thing, but a very real binding thread that both sides can use to try and 'tug' at eachother to use the other like a puppet. Bahamut uses this to 'tug' at Nedrick and Zethia to do what he wants to, and Elysium intends his pact to be a contant 'tug' over Ilia and all humanity, but we can see this going the other way, too. King Aurelius-possessed-by-Morsayati 'tugs' Zodiark, as well as Morsayati-possessed-Euden 'tugs' all his dragons.

Even if most dragons don't fear turning into a puppet by a puny human, I'm sure that's a reason why some might shy away from a pact. It's a state of potential vulnerability on both sides, and the best and easiest way is to make it a relationship of equals and trust than to try to force the other side to obey. That doesn't mean the other side can't try, though, and the recipient on the other end is at a major disadvantage: contract law.

Jokes aside, it's explicitly stated in Chapter 2 by Mercury that breaking a pact if it was forged in true motives (ie, not a false premise the other side had no intent on living up to) would kill a dragon. Even when she did have a valid reason, it still seemed to hurt greatly per her lines as an adventurer.

In other words, it's similar to a magically-enforced contract law with bigger stakes: you break it without a 'legal reason', you die. At least, for a dragon. I'm guessing it might not be good for a human either, but we don't really see that scenario. It's still a thing to be concerned about: if the other party is still fulfilling their word, but starts trying to 'tug' on the line, you probably won't be able to break it without dying because they're still holding up their end of the bargain. Ouch.

But I digress. Even Euden has a limit for dragon pacts and power, as evidenced by the time he takes the powers of the Primordial versions of the Greatwyrms into himself and was not having a Fun Time, to put it mildly.

He thought he could handle it, because, well, he's already handling them and more dragons, but no. "[The powers are] tearing [him] apart" is how he describes it upon Nedrick passing the ball to him. Euden only is able to still manage that in any form is through the proxy filter of the Greatwyrms after he divides it up again.

It's even maintained in events, that pacts are no small matter. In general, pacting seems to bequeath onto humans the dragon's power, 'splitting the difference' so that it can potentially reduce burden on the dragon, too, if they possess power they can't handle alone.

(also can we remark here on the fact that Leviathan is trying to ward Euden against making a pact because, essentially, 'it'd make you depressed?' I'm not sure if taking that literally is better or worse, but it's kinda funny to imagine. You never know, maybe pacting also spreads moods along the thread as well!)

I digress again. Ahem. Anyways, pacting is not easy, nor is maintaining it or breaking it. But you can transform into a dragon now, isn't that cool?! Surely that's worth all the struggle? I know I would love to transform into a dragon.

Maybe not. For shapeshifting is also not fun.

Pictured: Euden not having a good time shapeshifting, chapter 1.

So shapeshifting can open wounds, for starters. That could be dangerous, and I almost fear for the visuals if it's because the human form warping to a much bigger dragon has a transitory stage where the human body is expanding and forcing wounds open before the dragon form kicks in. Double ouch. Euden's not alone in the danger, however, as even Leo nearly gets killed by it.

Shapeshifting in Leo's state at the end of chapter 12/start of 13 immediately forces Euden and co into desperate action trying to save his life.

This is where I'd like to half-joke that that's why we hardly see anyone else besides Euden shapeshift using his pacts since Mids gave him the ability to share it, even though they technically can.

Because, well, Cleo and Elisanne and Ranzal saw that, went 'nope', and that attitude kinda spread to the rest of the Halidom! Emile does use Euden's pacts to shapeshift once in his story, funnily enough! But just imagine Euden trying to hold shapeshifting practice in the courtyard or something and everybody just nopes out of there after hearing what it does and what it's like.

Anyways, this is getting way way too long, so I'll cut it off there. Long story short: everything that dragonblood is and lets you do is not a fun experience even if you jump over the 5000+ hurdles to be able to use it in the first place!