"I was taking my walk around the palace premises when the courier reached me.
-"Lord! Lor--" The courier was out of breath, and he stopped to catch it.
-"Yes, yes, what is it?"
-"Lord, we recieved Count Vandrin's tribute."
The courier took out a small vial out of his pouch. The vile-looking liquid inside was bubbling noxiously. The courier also handed me a note that came with the vial.
-"That's great, but would you mind reading it to me?"
Even though I could sense general objects and movements, reading was far beyond me at this point.
-"Oh... yes, of course, my Lord. My deepest apologies, I seemed to have forgotten."
The courier read the note out loud. I sighed.
-"Vandrin, Vandrin, Vandrin... Who does he take me for? What am I supposed to do with a single vial that only has an 85% chance of working? What if this liquid happens to be regular coloured tap water? Of course, he could just blame the 15% of failure."
-"Could I possibly make a suggestion, my Lord?"
-"No. Now go take this vial to the chemists at Qim. Be careful not to trip on any of the rubble there - the factories aren't gone entirely yet."
I detected a bow from the courier, and he ran off to Qim. The disappearance of the factories was a heavy loss at first, but golem-building compensated tenfold for everything those factories provided. A silent, filthy industrial area before the disappearance, it is now full of pits where golems are made every day. There are alchemical centres scattered across the peninsula, which are mainly used to strengthen existing golems. I'm sure they can be used to analyse the contents of the vial, though.
Truly, at first, I was apalled by the idea of animating matter that has never been alive into a manageable creature. That is unholy, even by my standards.
Soon enough, though, I began to see the perks. Golems were completely obedient, but at the same time sentient, which relieved my mind of controlling twice as much as I had to normally. Stone golems and iron golems were particularly durable, while the magic-saturated atronachs made perfect heavy assault soldiers, replacing the mechanical scorpion machines. No sword or bow could cut or pierce solid rock.
Unfortunately, since golems came after the conquest of the continent, I've never field-tested them. Luckily, there was a particularly large wave of resistance in the never-surrendering Asgarnia. At the time, dispatching two atronachs and one stone juggernaut seemed like a rather good idea to me..."
--- --- ---
Asgarnia was hiding under a thick layer of clouds, as it has been ever after the Kandarinian invasion. The gloomy sky had some holes here and there, and the light shining through them cast an occasional ray of sunshine down onto the wrecked city. These fissures were quickly mended by the sky, but it was only a matter of time until new ones ripped. It was as if the clouds were trying to stay over Asgarnia...
Today, however, something seemed amiss. There was a large armed convoy approaching Asgarnia. Usually the convoys were small troop reinforcements, and occasionally supplies, when Asgarnia's resources were completely drawn out. The convoy today, however, was gargantuan in size compared to the previous ones. There were three enormous carriages, covered with thick black cloth. The carriages were pulled by six undead ogres on each car. Unless Kandarinians were planning to stay for a thousand years, supply carriages were never this big...
---
There was a large convoy around the carriages; Bert knew that for a succesful raid that should cripple the Kandarinian oppression, the attack had to be carried out in an ambush. The rebel forces were already planted at both sides of the normally small road, made wide by the supply cars going in and out of the city.
-"Alright, folks, you know the drill: take out the undead ogres first. They will crumble quickly under a well-placed shot of Kandigun, but they'll do a hell of a lot of damage if left untended." Bert clutched his own weapon. Kandiguns referred to the Kandarinian spearguns captured in battle and previous ambushes. "These carriages are too big to be food rations - they must be some sort of weapons. If we capture these, or even destroy them, it should give us an upper hand in battle."
The rebels silently nodded.
-"The convoy draws near. Everyone, to your positions. Hide!"
The ambushing party ducked into two ditches on the either side of the road, while others hid behind a few trees on the roadside. They sat tight, and waited.
---
The stopming of the undead ogres was shaking the earth beneath the ambushers. They were really close... Really, really close... but the party had to hold to let the ogres pass a bit in front. Then they could strike from behind, and use the moment to dispose of the ogres effectively, while they were just turning around to retaliate.
The ogres went into the trees... and slowly passed. This was the cue for the ambushers.
With wild screams, they exploded out of the ditches, and concentrated all fire on the 18 ogres. Quickly, the heads began to roll; carriages stopped one by one. The living Kandarinians were quick to react - they opened fire onto the attackers, with little to no effect. The Asgarnians were wearing protective armour designed specifically against spearguns. Most of the Kandies returned their weapons onto the sheathes on their backs, and drew their wristblades. Thus, the crimson blood began to flow through the mockingly white stone road...
Surprisingly, not all Kandarinians were fighting. Three of them crawled into the carriages, one in each, while their fellow fighters were defending the precious cargo inside - whatever it was - from the attackers. Some were slain, many were wounded. It was about time for a miracle to happen to shift the battle either way.
Suddenly, a blood-chilling roar came from the depths of the middle carriage, stopping both the ambushers and the defenders in their tracks. It was the attackers' guess that not even Kandies themselves knew what was the cargo they were defending with their lives.
The black fabric ripped open, and an enormous abomination crawled out of the carriage. It seemed to be made of chunks of marble, which were floating in mid-air - held together by nothing, it seemed, other than sparks of electricity zapping between the stones. The arrangement of the rocks on the head was made to eerily resemble a human face.
The golem let out another feral roar, and begun cutting through the mass of the attackers. Its weapon looked like it appeared out of nowhere - an axe, seemingly made of pure, blinding light blue shine - which was nevertheless more effective than any other weapons ever held by ordinary soldiers. The axe went right through armour, without even putting a scrape on it - but left a trail of necrotic flesh wherever it touched the body. Essentially, the weapon was pure death. It did not cut, it did not crush, it did not pierce. It simply killed.
With the Atronach's appearance, the Kandarinian fighters relaxed a little bit. Soon enough, the other two golems were charged enough to walk into battle. There was another golem looking a lot like the first one, and then there was the stone juggernaut - an awe-inspiring creation, seemingly shapeless due to its huge size. The juggernaut did not bother itself with weapons. All it had to do was step on a human, and the next second, all that was left of it was a perfectly flat bloodied pancake on the ground.
Needless to say, the attackers stood no chance. They were wiped out in a matter of minutes, and as soon as the resistance seized, the three golems turned to Asgarnia, and advanced towards the distant, half-ruined city...
//A quick note on these golems - they look pretty cheap, so I came up with this idea. They can only be active for, say, five posts until they fall apart in need of another recharge. In order for this to happen, a magically-inclined [sic] individual (which could be an NPC) needs to drain a good three quarters of his power, which has to take at least two posts (this being an exception, as it was meant mostly as an introduction). After that, the golems are bound to whoever charged them.\\
