I would like to write here about the drake, bird, and for that matter fish and dino which roamed what is now northwestern Galar in the early Triassic period, but as of now that is beyond the scope of this series. Instead, I must relate the sad tale of Dracozolt and its brethren, abominations of paleontology who ought never to have come into existence.
Their unfortunate resurrection, at least, has not been a total loss for science. Apart from the difference in coloration proving the prior skeletal reconstruction very wrong, Dracozolt's yellow upper body and red cheeks are an apparent synapomorphy with Pikachu and other electric rodents. The green lower half, with its red stripes and long tail, is more difficult to pin down, but a distant relation to Sceptile or Tyranitar is often suggested. Yet whatever could be learned by reviving the Dracozolt required only a single specimen; it is stubbornness and folly on the part of Galarian paleontology (international organizations having wisely rejected Dracozolt as a valid taxa), combined with the lobbying of some influential but irresponsible trainers, which allows new Dracozolt to be born.
Dracozolt's oversized lower body and tiny mouth makes it hard for it to maintain its own body weight, and trainers must be careful to offer it highly calorie-dense food, lest it expend more energy eating than it gains. Although powerful in battle, it struggles to recover from injuries; even the sandstorms in which it thrives as a competitor slowly wear down its health, both in battle and over the long term. At times, it cries in pain with no apparent cause; at others, it seems curiously unaware of otherwise crippling wounds. Thankfully, Dracozolt can not breed; someday, Cara Liss will lose her power, and Dracozolt, born of the Holocene, will mercifully go extinct.
