There’s something strange about the village Ferraton, but you can't quite put your finger on it. Something is off, or missing rather. It all clicks together when you meet the drunken blacksmith in a barren workshop. 

The loosely hung doors. The city watch carrying crude clubs. The captain of the guard sporting an ancient bronze dagger. The hungry stares at your armor and weapons as you ask where the smith worked.

There isn't a scrap of iron in this entire town.

It’s those damn golems. Bulky clay men who overran the ore mine in the hills. They took to frisking travelers and knights for their weapons, their armor, their horses’ shoes. Then they came to Ferraton. Countless golem, stealing every barrel band, snatching every pan, prying every nail and hinge. Every scrap to the last buckle.

All of that would have been strange enough, almost a good story in a year or two. But then the herds started disappearing… And the shepherds after them. 

Where did these clay men come from? Where were they taking all of the iron? The smith sobers as he meets your eyes:

The dreaded… the growing… Castle Otranto.