[b]"Awake! Guardian of the Center, awake! The Land is threatened and only you remain to defend it!"[/b]

Kouryuu, the Yellow Dragon, opened his eyes to these words, the remnants of a spell cast long ago to detect magic. He stretched his body, it had been so long since he had last fought. Though magic was an inherent, underlying aspect of the universe, and a hidden trait within humans, humans who learned magic inevitably began to abuse it, and it came as a welcome reprieve when magic was suppressed and people shifted away from it towards science. Granted, science had its problems, but nowhere near the potential for harm that humans wielding magic had. Undoubtedly, the peoples' lives had now been thrown into turmoil, and with the strength of the peoples' prayers for salvation, Kouryuu would rise from the Earth to punish the evildoers.

From a wooded hill in the middle of a park in the middle of the city of Hanatani, Kouryuu emerged in his full majestic splendor and roared triumphantly, "Pah~!" Kouryuu blinked to himself a few times, noticing the small puff of air that had issued from his unusually round snout. He looked around in bewilderment at his own body before finding a nearby lake from which to view his reflection.

"Gnaah~!" Kouryuu let out a high-pitched squeal of frustration. "Why am I so small ~pah! What happened to me ~pah? Why do I say ~pah~ after every sentence ~pah?" Fortunately no one was around to see him in this state. He flew around and saw that the park was fairly small, that just outside the trees he saw shapes of houses he didn't recognize, he saw a civilization covered in aluminum and concrete. He went back into the ground and swam around around the town, silently observing the population. "No one believes in the ancient powers anymore ~pah. The suppression of magic was too great ~pah. I...I don't have the power of the peoples' prayers to aid me ~pah! What do I do ~pah? I need to find help ~pah!"

With that, Kouryuu swam back to the hill under which he had been resting in order to harness the leylines and seek aid.