The Nine Dragons of Vale

"Form fits function." The Nine Dragons of Vale are a group of nine powerful mafia bosses in the Kingdom of Vale. They are the keystone heads in the criminal network of The Zanipher Philosophy and were the primary antagonists of the now-discontinued Monster's Den.

Overview
The Nine Dragons of Vale oversee a large amount of the intricate organized crime system of Vale. They can be described as the keystone of the system: alone they are powerful, and together they are almost unstoppable. As a group, they seek alliances with potential rival groups in order to gain more power, and have thus built an extremely intricate base to prevent defeat. This, combined with the cloud of rumors and mystery surrounding their actual identities and skills, has made them major contenders for control of Vale's underground organized crime society.

The Nine Dragons often pursue their own interests, but have a general alliance that might be more accurately counted as a nonaggression pact. When necessary, they will support each other, and they will team up if required to deal with what they consider to be a significant threat. They do maintain constant communication with each other, but to date have not yet made any major plans with each other. Their individualistic areas of specialty have so far prevented any major conflicts between the members, although they sometimes have to negotiate over advances on similar projects.

Interestingly, the Nine Dragons act as sort of high level sellswords, providing their services to anyone who has enough money (an astronomical amount) to pay for such an advanced job. Some attribute the success of the Dragons to the government's inability to spread their Huntsmen and Huntresses accurately, and also to the oft-unseen darkness that still dwells throughout Remnant, without actually realizing that the darkness lies in the heart of every individual.

Captain Daniel Lowell
The most powerful of the Dragons, Daniel is an ex-soldier who held the rank of Captain.

Specialty: Pure Combat

Arkos Cannon
Second strongest of the Dragons, Arkos is the most generous and forgiving of the dragons, and is known to be quite compassionate to his followers. Hates any perceived challenge to his authority, and will react extremely badly to it.

Specialty: Smuggling

Tony Syson
Third strongest of the Dragons, Tony is by far the most charismatic of them, and perhaps the smartest. After being bullied as a child due to being far smarter than the other students, he used his talents to manipulate students and even teachers into doing what he wanted. His method of fighting is an underground form of boxing that makes use of several powerful illegal strikes, enhanced by his lightning dust gauntlets.

Specialty: Pulling Strings

Danilus "Dani" Morse
Fourth strongest of the Dragons, Dani is easily the most polite of them all. Dressing in fine suits, this walrus faunus takes care to mind his manners.

Specialty: Counter-intelligence

Gala
Fifth strongest of the Dragons, Gala is a seemingly carefree individual whose jovial attitude hides his twisted sense of entertainment, as his hobbies include forcing other beings to perform demeaning or even suicidal tasks for the pleasure of himself or his clients. He wears a wizard hat that he dubs his "Certified Mafia Boss Wizard Hat".

Specialty: Torture

"Daybreak" Zanipher
Sixth strongest of the Dragons, Zanipher is cold and an excellent liar, preferring to manipulate the emotions and perceptions of those around her while retaining a mask of nonchalance. She was raised in a high class family and trained for success. Is one of the greatest sword-wielders in the underworld, also the most unpredictable of the Dragons, which is how she likes it.

Specialty: Gathering Intelligence

James 'Hook' Everest
Seventh strongest of the Dragons, "Master" recently joined the Dragons by offering them his organization's impressive mercenary abilities. Interestingly he specializes in hunting criminals, but also works alongside some of the highest ranking ones in the criminal underworld. Some of his men even act as fixers for the other Dragons, using their skills to put the blame of their crimes on other criminal groups unassociated with the Dragons, making the police eliminate their competition.

Specialty: Assassinations, advanced tech supply

Aleco
Eighth strongest of the Dragons, Aleco is a man of balance. Running a sizeable contracting business, he organises various contracts for giving pain, whether it be for information or centered around his personal belief that those that give pain, should first receive it. These two forms of contracts are what he deals in, and he spends most of his time organising this business.

Specialty: Contracting

Others

 * The Stranger: A spymaster/information broker in the employment of the Nine Dragons.  His true identity is not known even to them, but he works for all of the Dragons.
 * Donovan Barnes: An ally from the distant region of Atlas, one of the Dragons' first in a goal to extend their network beyond Vale's boundaries.
 * Obsidios "Sid" Bowler: An oft-hired young spy.
 * FenHong Se Suzhen: A teenage heiress at Beacon whose parents have collaborated with the Dragons in the past in order to boost the profits from their entrepreneuring company. Once she takes over the family's company, it is expected that she will maintain the same relationship with the Dragon Heads along with her official duties.
 * Billy Taupe: A mysterious man working under Arkos Cannon as a mercenary, who uses an urban legend as a guise for his criminal activities.
 * Pallas and Altan: Nightshade mercenaries who are both members of the Onyx Trio.
 * Team RASB: a Beacon team which is swayed into occasional grudging assistance with the Dragons in exchange for massively improved resource availability.
 * Rosso Fiammata: the son of two wealthy lawyers who briefly worked as a low-level lackey for the Dragons before being violently killed in a gang battle.

Allied Factions

 * Nightshade: a private military corporation which caters to wealthy individuals like the Dragons, and excel at performing silent assassinations and infiltration.
 * Master's Realm: an underground vigilante organization which eliminates the "unorganized crime" which could threaten the peace in Remnant and provides technology to the Dragons.
 * Daybreak Syndicate: an extended triad family which operates as a legitimate corporation that specializes in information retrieval and high-level private investigations.

Other Relationships

 * Team DAMN: a team at Beacon which aims to disrupt the activities of the Dragons. Three of the members have had a prior antagonistic relationship to the Dragons before starting the current school year.
 * Black Order Battalion: a powerful military organization which the Dragons aim to monitor in case of situations of direct conflict in the future.

Role-Plays
Below lists roleplays which one or more of the Dragons or their associates have instigated but not necessarily participated directly in.
 * A Monster's Den
 * Observe and Collect
 * A God vs A Dragon
 * Interrupted Everyday Routine
 * Schemes in the Library
 * Directionless Undercurrents
 * For a Fallen Friend
 * A Certain Civil Interaction
 * Fun and Games

Trivia

 * Each of the Dragons were created by and based off of a longtime member of the RWBY Fanon Wiki. They're evil self-inserts >:D
 * "Dragon Head" is an actual name used to refer to the leaders of Chinese triads.
 * At this stage they're mostly just plot devices :/
 * Zeph had to do so much digging to get those RPs.
 * Hydra image source: https://grabcad.com/library/hydra-logo-1
 * If you would like your Antagonist or Faction to form an alliance with the Dragons, please leave a comment below with a link.

Associated Media

 * Monster's Den:The Manga
 * The Zanipher Philosophy