Embodiment

After Sir Edwin Harlowe published his Principia Arcana in 1687, research into the natural laws governing Magic accelerated dramatically. No longer were thaumaturges forced to spend most of their careers reinventing the principles of Magic and deriving their own idiosyncratic systems. The universal framework outlined in the Principia allowed scholars to collaborate effectively, and this led to remarkable advances in understanding the fundamental nature of the universe. One of the principles established in these early years was Embodiment, the idea that all animate beings are composed of a physical and a spiritual body joined as one. Although this belief was long held, it was James Brooke who proved it definitively in the early eighteenth century, and his work, along with that of his contemporaries, reshaped the world in the century that followed.

Brooke, an associate professor at the University of Carbury, identified the universal spells required to bind a spirit to a physical form. The act itself was not unprecedented; individual mages throughout history had created similar animated constructs. Such feats were rare, however, because only a few practitioners possessed the skill to devise their own versions of this Magic. Brooke's work, by contrast, was universal and could be used by anyone trained in basic Magic or by anyone able to follow his instructions with precision, even without a full grasp of the underlying theory. The clarity of his thaumaturgical formulation also dispelled any remaining belief that an animate body could exist without an animating spirit. In doing so, it confirmed the law of Embodiment and pushed competing theories aside.

The Manipulation of the Spirit

Nature is full of bodiless spirits. They inhabit every kind of phenomenon, from the elemental forces of wind and fire to particular places, and some even arise from abstract ideas such as good or evil. Most of these spirits are essentially mindless. They possess no sense of self or identity, no will, and no agency. They exist only as spiritual echoes of the phenomena to which they are attuned.

Working with such spirits was a central part of Brooke's proof of Embodiment. Drawing on accounts from eastern Elbid, he set out to create the first construct produced under his formulation of the law: a clay body invested with a simple gnome, or earth spirit. After several attempts he succeeded, and the body animated, though it was capable of very little. It had no understanding of movement and no conception of self, and only through magical prompting could its animation be demonstrated at all. It lay upon his workbench, animate yet motionless, and Brooke presented it to his colleagues as practical confirmation that his formulation held true.

Constructing the Future

While Brooke's homunculus, as the small clay construct came to be known, generated excitement among thaumaturgical theorists, further advances were needed before the field would affect the wider world. These came as Brooke and the scholars who followed him expanded the theory and investigated what other spirits could be bound into physical form. Some, such as those of wind and fire, proved challenging. They tended to escape or destroy the vessels that housed them, which required additional enchantments to be layered into the construct to contain and restrain them.

In 1737, Brooke unveiled a small bronze bull animated with a spirit of fire, a far more impressive creation than the original clay figure. To confine the nature of fire within the constructed body, Brooke and his assistants introduced spells of comprehension and compulsion: the first allowed the mindless spirit to understand instructions, and the second ensured that it obeyed them. The bronze bull would walk across Brooke's workbench at the command of anyone carrying the control talisman, its hooves leaving scorched marks across the wood. It could also breathe a cone of fire on command, and it was this final capability that caught the attention of The Army of Albion.

The Taloi, and More

The Army provided Brooke with the funding he needed to expand his laboratory and move beyond small constructs that were little more than curiosities. With new resources, he began creating constructs the size of human beings or larger. Over the next several years, Brooke developed the Taloi, a bronze soldier invested with a fire elemental that soon became a mainstay of the Army.

The Taloi were only one part of the work produced by Brooke and his colleagues. Construct Horses, built with wood and leather bodies and animated by a wind spirit, were introduced in 1743. They have since replaced flesh and blood horses in nearly every field. A wide range of industrial constructs followed, each built for superhuman strength and endurance. They lack cleverness, but they need no sleep or food, will follow simple instructions, and can be taught repetitive tasks.

During the Dragon Wars, constructs became common in the factories and fields of Albion, taking on the basic labor that had once been done by those sent to fight the Cult of the Leviathan. Their abilities were expanded far beyond the early models, and constructs can now be used in almost every setting where manual labor was once required.