The Golden Toad of Embala

Long ago, in the 4th Age of Skaadom, the great country of Baenlore was just beginning to carve out it's national identity: the dracian melting pot, the most culturally diverse country in the dragon world. And Baenlore's capital city Embala was at the peak of this budding reputation. Because of its position sharing borders with the port countries of Keltus and Kornnaq, human beings, as they had begun appearing, could sail their ships across the watery divide and settle upon one of the largest territories in Skaadom. It is said that bands of pirates formed alliances with rogue sea dragons who helped smuggle hoards of treasures from the tiny islands of Pelonūex and Crynoble.

Upon arrival at a harbor in Baenlore, a man named Beron Cervantes and his motley crew of sea felons loaded their cargo into travelling wagons where they observed that one of their crates was unusually heavy. Beron, believing it was perhaps some sand that, upon excavation, had nestled into one of the golden vessels, called for his men to unhatch the crate. After they did, Beron became impatient, as they had been staring at the contents inside for nearly three minutes. In a temperamental huff, he stormed over to the crate and thrust its lid ajar. Inside he found the heads of the two men who had peered inside, and a little brown toad hopping around amongst them.

Beron fearfully reeled back at the sight, staggering to the ground. He assumed that this creature, whom he could not identify, had singlehandedly dispatched his men and must immediately be detained. Beron shouted for his men to return back to the ship for an emergency meeting; the crew did as tasked with no question, for Beron was a formidable captain. Quickly he snatched up the tarp that had kept the crate covered and bound the bodies of the two crewmates inside. Then he dragged the tarp to the far edge of the dock and let it sink to nihility. Beron pausedーit was of his conscience to let the deadly toad disappear into the watery abyss as well, but wealth and weaponous opportunity barred his judgement; he thought only of the toad's destination, and the lie he would tell to his crew to ensure their cooperation.

With the toad concealed in a solid gold box, one that Beron had previously used for his lucky poker chips, he held it up to his crew and proclaimed that he had sent their two absent shipmates off ahead (obtusely worded) to Embala. There they would inform Beron's item broker about the tremendously rare sapphire that rested inside. The crew cheered and Beron lead the horse-drawn carts onward to Embala; the gold box clutched tightly in his sweating hands.

The roaring city of Embala awaited the pirates and their glittering, blood-stained plunder; they were far from the only miscreants afoot. Beron greeted his item broker, an Eastern Oriental who went by the name Mongolfang. In private he explained the circumstance of the beast in the box. But Mongolfang scoffed at the tale after he too peered inside and found that his own head was intact. Assuring Beron something else must have been the cause of the deaths, he emptied the toad into a sturdy glass enclosure and tossed him a sack of 79 dharaks as payment. Deadly or not, it was still a rare, undocumented creature, and dracians young and old paid good money to see things they never knew existed.

About three weeks later Mongolfang too felt his conscience rattled as bizarre and unsettling things began happening to certain people who came to observe the toad. One old man began to speak an unknown language that was not Dracian nor Zellic, another man stopped seeing in color; a young woman had her teeth fall out, and finally, a dragon died from forgetting how to breathe. In terror and desperation one night Mongolfang took an ancient sword from his exhibit and attempted to kill the treacherous toad. Yet it sensed its demise, and sprang from the enclosure the second the lid was cracked. Mongolfang chased it down the moonlit street and into the Embalian Currency Reserve, a place where dracians store small, fixed amounts of coined money. The toad squeezed into the empty building and crawled it's way into vault number 3398 where it sat there staring at the gold contentedly.

In the morning, a crowd had gathered as a special op team for lethal animal containment was summoned to enter the building. So as not to risk the toad escaping again, a Whitefire dragon (powerful dragons employed by the government) blasted vault 3398 and liquefied all the contents inside. The melted coins slowly poured away, and to everyone's horror, there the toad sat, perfectly intact and encased in solid gold. The death of the two pirates and the dragon have never been historically confirmed, but those whose ancestors claimed to be witnesses to the event swear that it happened. To this day the Golden Toad of Embala sits in a glass display in the Edenport Museum of Cursed Objects where travelers can observe it safely and read about its bizarre story.