January 8, 2002 - [No Link]

The Empyrean used golems as simple, expendable laborers. The wide variety of golem materials reflects the diversity of environments in which they were created. Most Empyrean enchanters simply made use of the material available at hand. Some materials were more for "prestige," however – the ownership of diamond, gold, or platinum golems, for example, was a symbol of wealth in the Seaborne Empire of Yalain – similar to owning an overpriced car.

Golems were found in mines, kitchens, and storehouses, doing menial and difficult labor that the Empyrean considered beneath them. Golem labor was used to help construct the great light-house near Tou-Tou.

Empyrean juveniles often amused themselves by making Mud Golems -- their equivalent of mud pies. They would be used for large-scale games of "toy soldiers," or for help with chores.

Coral golems were used to dredge harbor channels, scrape marine growth from the keels of wooden sailing vessels without careening, and maintain artificial fisheries.

Magma golems were used as workers in Empyrean pyreal forges. These forges were built in active volcanoes (Mount Esper was once a pyreal foundry). While alchemists and mages worked on the material from afar, the golem physically worked the metal itself – sometimes by within its own semi-molten form, sometimes in a raw flow of liquid lava.

Chris "Stormwaltz" L'Etoile