Webnovel Author: Evil_Dao - Novel Collection

You make a fair point, but I was mainly referring to the Western Dragons (who originally could be killed by mortal knights). The Eastern Dragons were always mighty, but even then, things changed a lot. Originally they were more like symbols of power rather than the dreadful entities they became afterwards. Mounts or subordinates to more powerful gods. Three good examples are the Dragon King, the Azure Dragon, and the Yellow Dragon. The first got punked by a kid on flaming wheels, the second is a symbol, and the third is either the incarnation or mount of the Yellow Emperor. The nagarajas come to mind (especially Vasuki and Ananta), but they're more Serpent Gods than Dragon Gods. You're right though, there are way better examples. Loved the exchange, and hope you enjoy the story!

Btw, it's me on an alt

I thought long and hard about your points, and while I understand where you're coming from (I have a similar problem with demons), I feel like this is just a by-product of what I call "the Curse of Poularity." When a work of art and literature gets too popular, it often prompts imitations, transformations, or outright deviations in the people and fans it has seduced. And there's no way around it cause there'll always be that dude who thinks they can make that popular theme better. Add a twist, change or whatnot to make the theme more in line with their wants. And among those guys, some will be really talented. So their vision spreads and alters the mainstream view. A good example is fanfictions. You also have dragons, who originally were nowhere near as powerful or terrifying as they're portrayed now. But since humans always had a fascination with monstrous reptiles, they added traits of mythical reptilian monsters to dragons (like Typhon of greek mythology, Jormungandr of the Norse, and many others), leading to what we have today. I don't think it's inherently a bad thing, but I can understand the dislike.