Aww... It’s a cute baby dragon. It enjoys swimming in a nearby pond.

And look! Its fins and tail have gotten bigger, and you’ve moved it to a larger body of water to swim in. It must be close to maturing.

Young dragons are relatively defenseless. They are born with relatively soft scales, which are shed and replaced with harder ones as the hatchling matures. Once a hatchling’s wings grow in, it typically marks the beginning of maturation. At this point they are often capable of hunting on their own and are usually left alone by their mother.

This slithery serpentine dragon finds much pleasure in slithering and slathering through the muck-infested waters by the cavern. His constant bathing in this filth has meant he is extremely poisonous, which protects him from many a hunter. It unfortunately has very strange effects on his fellow hatchlings that attempt to nibble him playfully. It warps minds, body, and soul, and so the hatchlings have learned to not try playing so roughly.