Atlas: The Desert God

This picture is so much tinier than usual, ahahaha!
But I am so proud of this design. It came out so Final Fantasy-esque in the end, which was very much unintentional until I had the lineart done.

_{Atlas is a gigantic dragon, belonging to a species native to vast deserts. These dragons are relatively intelligent, Atlas specifically used to being revered by desert natives as a god. The natives have a shaky contract with Atlas in which they pacify him with live human sacrifices to prevent him from causing a massive drought and simply eating his fill from their populace. They believed that he literally drank the rain from the sky to cause such droughts, and rightfully feared him for his ferocity and cruel nature.
His species itself is composed of few individuals because the world can't support so many of them at once. New dragons are created when tail segments from two creatures merge into a growing wyrmling. These dragons feast on minerals dug up from mountain sides to grow their thick armor scales.
Highly territorial, rocky desert regions are their most favorable habitat. Territorial disputes consist of a display of their large claws and bright gold colors, and often end in fights where each locks claws with the other and battle out their aggression with tooth and horn until surrender or death. Particularly threatening opponents are flashed with the near-psychedelic inner flesh and tongue of this creature's mouth, which shimmers in ways akin to the shimmer of light on an oily surface. Their tongues are actually ridiculously long, and are used mainly to lick up prey like an over-sized anteater.}

My cousin insists a battle with Atlas would be like an optional boss in Final Fantasy. He compared this fellow to Ruby Weapon most often.

Atlas (c) me and my cousin. I have the original GIMP files, so I can easily prove it's my creation. e_e