Drachenburg’s origins are carved as deeply into myth as into stone. Long before it became a city-state, it may have been a refuge—a fortress carved into the cliffs by desperate hands fleeing collapse, famine, or some other threat. The mountains offered no mercy, but they offered protection. What began as a last bastion became a cradle of endurance, where survival bred a culture of stoic pride and fierce independence.
Though the city now speaks the Common tongue, its dialect carries the cadence of old Hesan. Linguistic residue lingers in the clipped cadence of Drachenburg speech: final consonants are hardened, vowels narrowed, and compound words favored over borrowed terms. A Drachenburg mason might say steinbind instead of “mortar,” or felszorn for “rockslide”—terms that evoke both precision and poetic severity. Scholars place the city's foundation somewhere around 500 to 800 years ago, but debate whether Drachenburg was once a pre-imperial culturally Hesan kingdom or simply a haven for those displaced by natural and political events. Either way, the city’s identity is resolutely its own: austere, self-governed, and unyielding.
Craftsmanship is revered, not just as art but as proof of the city project. Stonework, metallurgy, and civic architecture are expressions of civic virtue. The masons of Drachenburg build for permanence. Their neutrality is not passive but principled, forged in the belief that endurance outlasts conquest. This ethos permeates every borough, from the high halls of Mediborough to the wind-scoured terraces of Northborough.