Chapter 1: The Street Urchin and the Illegal Golem
Day 1
Chest Island’s Street Urchin, Clifford Evans
Chest Island
ISLANDS of the Golem Tamers—that’s what people called the glimmering pair of islands surrounded by the deep blue sea.
Only one true power—the Torah Church—reigned on St. Rollins Archipelago, but the islands prospered through its primary industry revolving around the production and manufacturing of Golems. Each island, with an outer circumference of over twenty kilometers, was equipped with everything needed for Golem production: mines where the required materials for Golems were excavated, Golem Workshops where those raw resources were smelted and refined into Golems, specialty shops for Golems, and even a port designated specifically for Golem trade.
Chest Island, the bigger of the two islands, had a poor and deprived region known as Shoulder Coast. With an unemployment rate of over fifty percent, people all over the island referred to this poverty-stricken district as the island’s garbage dump.
Hovels stood wall-to-wall, supporting each other from falling over in the sea breeze’s fury. Vagabonds stared with lifeless eyes at empty space. Smells of emergency rations filled the stale air, accompanied by raucous noises and angry shouts as people brushed shoulders on their solitary trips, their heads down, backs hunched.
For all of them knew of a single truth. The residents of this district were cursed, for they could neither create nor use Golems—they were the outcasts, the dregs of society with no hope for a better tomorrow.
Outdated horse-drawn carriages served as the primary means of transportation. They had a functioning subway not too long ago, but it was recently abandoned for a steam train that passed by their station without stopping. The decision to forgo the subway had further crushed any trace of hope for improvement in the lives of Chest Island’s residents.
Nevertheless, there were people who had put that neglected underground station to good use. One such boy’s voice could be heard from inside the now largely abandoned subway that ran along the coastline.
“Listen up, guys! I’ve finally finished my Golem!”
Inside the gloomy underground station was a blond street urchin wearing a soot-stained hoodie and cargo pants. He was quite baby-faced even for a thirteen-year-old.
The station had become a hideout for children without parents like him. Other street urchins flocked to the boy from their respective corners of the station, curious about what he had in store for them today.
Facing the growing crowd, he continued his announcement as if he were a professor before his class, “Okay, everybody listening? You can create a Golem by imitating God through molding an inanimate object into a human shape, engraving an incantation by which it’ll operate, and then naming it to bring it to life.”
A gigantic statue slept behind the boy whose eyes sparkled brightly as he spoke. The human-shaped giant stood over two meters tall and was crafted from joined metal fragments. It gleamed dully under the yellow lamplight with the unrefined yet impressive presence of a suit of armor belonging to a knight from the Middle Ages.
Incantations the boy had meticulously engraved into its metal covered it from head to toe. But without a name, it had yet to move.
Noting its inactivity, one of the other street children asked the blond boy, “So, Cliff, how’re ya gonna give that statue life?”
“Good question. For that, you need to use this power here.” Cliff smiled and held up his right index finger suffused with a faint light.
Direct Engrave Incantation was a mysterious art used when the Golem Artificer magically inscribed the Golem’s operating principles right into its body to grant the Golem life. Cliff acquired the technique after years of brutal practice and training. He stroked the Golem’s chest with his glowing finger, and black incantation letters engraved the metal beneath his touch.
“…Aside from inscribing the Engrave Incantation throughout its frame, you need a Restrictor to move a Golem as well. You can grant an inanimate object life only by engraving an absolute rule that restricts the Golem’s actions,” Cliff clarified as he finished marking a Restrictor on its chest. He touched the head next. “Lastly, you need to inscribe the most important of all Engrave Incantations. You have to engrave the forehead with the letters spelling emeth.”
Emeth meant truth in the ancient language. Cliff proceeded to engrave the five letters onto the giant’s forehead that granted a Golem life.
“And once you finish inscribing all the Engrave Incantations and give it a name…the inanimate object will gain life and move!”
The street children swallowed hard as they watched him.
Cliff locked his eyes upon the giant, solemnly raised his voice, and began to chant the naming invocation, “…My name is Clifford Evans. With truth as my witness, I give thee the name Gandolf!” His words, instilled with a deliberate steadiness, echoed throughout the somber station. “Live as one with me and return to dust with me. I order thee to…” His eyes flew wide open, and he shouted his first command, “Stand, Gandolf!”