Yallam

Yallam, located near the northeast coast of East Osenia, is best reached by sailing up the river passing close to it.

Yallam (ヤラム村 Yallam Village) is a technically optional settlement featured in Golden Sun: The Lost Age. Located near the northeast coast of the southeastern continent of Osenia, it can only be reached once the Lemurian Ship is acquired and the Eastern Sea can be explored. There are no plot-relevant cutscenes that take place in Yallam, and an optional song-and-dance number the local children can perform for the party is only meant to hint to the player that the Sea of Time in the center of the Eastern Sea can be crossed into by navigating the currents in the proper manner.

From a gameplay perspective, Yallam is easily one of the most beneficial settlements in The Lost Age to make repeat trips to because it houses the game's resident blacksmith. He can randomly convert your forgeable items and rusty items into expensive but powerful and diverse equipment artifacts that cannot be acquired in other ways.

In Golden Sun: The Lost Age

For all NPC gossip, see Side Scripts.

Yallam becomes accessible in East Osenia as soon as the party begins sailing the Eastern Sea. Though it is a short ways south of the continent's northeastern beach, the rocks surrounding the beach force the player to instead reach the village by sailing north through the river that begins between the pair of twin beaches at the southeast corner of East Osenia. The boat can be disembarked from at the bridge immediately south of the village's overworld icon.

Yallam, despite having little plot relevance, is deceptively useful for supplying your party with exotic artifacts.

Out of the four "developed" settlements that become accessible across the Eastern Sea at the same time, Yallam is the only one that is not mandatory to visit. Its main contribution to the player's ability to orient themselves through the non-linear Eastern Sea arc is an optional cutscene-like sequence that takes place in the screen east of the main village screen, existing to hint to the player how the Sea of Time in the heart of the Eastern Sea can be passed through. By asking a child in the "playground" to perform a song written by the deceased local sailor Yepp, Felix will automatically follow the marching children around the rocks and stumps strewn across the area.

The lyrics to Yepp's song, in conjunction with the directions and roundabouts the children lead Felix through, are disguised instructions on how to navigate the rushing currents and whirlpools of the Sea of Time when it is entered through its south end. The player is capable of making this voyage into the Sea of Time without even needing to engage this song sequence, and the volcanoes can be sailed around in either direction to get them to temporarily "turn off" obstructive currents. The only reason the party cannot make it past the watery maze and into Lemuria at first is that the boss at the end cannot be damaged until the complete Trident of Ankohl has been reforged following the completion of every mandatory dungeon in the Eastern Sea.

Yallam features weapon, armor, and item vendors just like the other three mainline settlements that can be accessed as soon as the player first becomes capable of sailing throughout the Eastern Sea: Champa at the south coast of the northern continent of Angara; Izumo on the island northeast of the Sea of Time; and Apojii Islands at the east edge of the world. The weapon vendor at Yallam has the exact same generic inventory as Kibombo, the village visited previously. While the Jerkin, Heavy Armlet, and Mail Cap are exclusively sold at Yallam in The Lost Age, they mostly start off outclassed in some way or another; the stronger Silver Vest is sold at Izumo and the Festival Coat artifact can easily be found there, and Champa sells the stronger Silver Armlet. There could be some value in replacing the Nurse's Cap on one of your two "caster-style" Adepts with a Mail Cap, but your "warrior-style" Adepts are better served by the Silver Helm also sold at Champa, as well as the superior Viking Helm artifact that can be found there right away.

The party can randomly convert its accumulated forgeable items into paid-for weapons and armor at the smithy. The chest off to the left, containing the Masamune, requires the first game's Force Psynergy to reach.

The non-mandatory Taopo Swamp, located southwest of Yallam over the mountains, can only be reached by heading out of Yallam's north exit and winding counter-clockwise through East Osenia. This dungeon allows you to find two Tear Stones and a Venus Djinni, and if you have the Tremor Psynergy, you can also obtain the only Star Dust that will be available up until you gain entry into Lemuria. As forgeable materials, they are ideal fodder for the blacksmith service that is Yallam's claim to fame.

Just west of the blacksmith's building to the northwest, past a cracked wooden post, is a depressed area of ground containing a treasure chest and cave entrance that will be conspicuously visible whenever you visit the blacksmith. This can only be reached late in the game, after the Reunion has resulted in the party's roster doubling in size – and the game file must also have been enhanced with password data from a Clear Data Save File in the first Golden Sun in which Isaac's party found the Orb of Force in Fuchin Temple. Only with the Orb of Force in the party's inventory can you cast the Force Psynergy on the wooden post to allow you to hop west onto the ledge with a lot of weeds that can be cleared away with Cyclone. The weeds hide a ladder hole connecting to the cave entrance and letting you reach the chest, which contains the Masamune, one of the most powerful weapons in the game to Unleash with.

Blacksmith service

After giving a workable item to Sunshine on the bed, leave and reenter Yallam to be able to buy the randomly picked outcome from his wife at the bottom.

By far the most mechanically significant feature of Yallam is the blacksmith, Sunshine, who offers his service in the relatively large stone building at the northwest corner of the village. If you have any item in your party members' inventories that he can work on to make you "something special," you can pick any forgeable material like a Tear Stone (listed as "Processed") or a rusty weapon (listed as "Rusted") to have him take it off your hands temporarily. Then, you must either spend the night at the inn, exit and then reenter Yallam, or – most conveniently – enter and exit the sanctum so that he will be lying back on his bed the next time you enter his smithy. When you talk to his wife to acquire the newly crafted item, presuming you have enough coins to afford it, you will spend the unreported purchase price for the item to acquire it and be able to craft your next item with him.

This service single-handedly turns Yallam into the party's most consistent source of strong artifacts throughout the entirety of the game, and it is also where most of the party's coins will be spent at. There are many types of forgeable materials that can be found throughout the game, with monsters in endgame areas potentially dropping unlimited amounts of each type, and each type is randomly reforged into one out of between four and six unique items with set probabilities. Furthermore, there are a handful of rusty weapons found in either dungeons or specific shallow spots in both seas that can be reforged into comparable weapon artifacts.

Because the party can continue to find forgeable materials and rusty weapons throughout their time in both the Eastern Sea and the later Western Sea, there will be many occasions where you would want to return to Yallam to convert them into weapons and armor. However, for most of the game, you would have to make a laborious voyage across the entire world to get back to Yallam. The game's sole equivalent to a "fast travel" system, the Teleport Psynergy, is found only in the final storyline dungeon of the game, Mars Lighthouse, so reengaging the blacksmith for his service is only convenient during the endgame.

Vendors

The village's inn, located just left of its north exit out into the overworld, charges 16 coins per party party member, making it cost up to 64 coins for most of the game and up to 128 coins after the party's roster doubles in size late in the game.

Weapon Shop
Name	Class	Cost	Effect
Battle Mace	Mace	2600	Attack +56
Battle Rapier	Light Blade	2900	Attack +58
Broad Axe	Axe	1400	Attack +50
Claymore	Long Sword	4000	Attack +70

Armor Shop
Name	Class	Cost	Effect
Heavy Armlet	Bracelet	2000	Defense +25
Jerkin	Robe	2400	Defense +26
Mail Cap	Hat	2000	Defense +23

Item Shop
Name	Class	Cost	Effect
Antidote	Consumable Item	20	Cures Poison and Venom from one Adept
Elixir	Consumable Item	30	Cures Delusion, Stun, and Sleep from one Adept in battle
Herb	Consumable Item	10	Restores 50 HP to one Adept
Nut	Consumable Item	200	Restores 200 HP to one Adept
Sacred Feather	Consumable Item	70	Reduces rate of monster encounters based on level.

Collectibles

• Antidote: Uncovered by casting Cyclone on the pair of weeds atop the central hill, just right of the wooden bridge that connects to the smithy.
• Elixir: Found in the inn, in the wooden boxes stacked atop each other at the upper-left corner of the interior.
• Nut: Uncovered by using Cyclone on the weeds at the southeast corner of the main village area, just right of the south exit into the overworld.
• Oil Drop: Found in the smithy, inside the wooden barrel at the east end of the interior.
• 16 coins: Found in the empty jar just outside the inn, left of its entrance.

The following item can only be reached late in the game under special circumstances that can be permanently missed:

• Masamune: Contained in the treasure chest that can be seen off to the lower left of the smithy for much of the game. Reaching it requires striking the cracked wooden post overlooking the chest with the Force Psynergy; the Orb of Force utility Psynergy item that bestows it is only acquired after the party's roster expands at Contigo following the completion of Jupiter Lighthouse. This can only happen if any level of password was previously applied and data was transferred from the first Golden Sun, specifically from a Clear Data save file in which the Orb of Force was found by Isaac's party in Fuchin Falls Cave. After striking the tree so that its top part falls, hop left to the mass of weeds, clear them away with Cyclone, and climb into the exposed ladder hole and follow the path out of the cave entrance next to the chest.

History

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Yallam started out as a small settlement. Among its residents was the master boatsman Yepp, and he was able to sail through the Sea of Time with utter ease. He found a huge bed of pearls on one of his expeditions in the Sea of Time area, and after showing them to Yallam's townsfolk, he sold them in another town and bought all kinds of things Yallam needed. Yallam then turned pearl diving into a business, with many of the townsfolk becoming pearl divers, and that is what caused Yallam to become a thriving community, with Yepp constantly bringing in work and news of the outside world.

Yepp in addition was a songwriter, and he created a sort of song and dance ritual accompanied by a specific layout of stones and tree stumps in the field just east of town. This was a cryptic way of recording the sequence of sailing maneuvers that could be used to sail through the Sea of Time to reach Lemuria itself. Yepp wanted the children of Yallam to learn this ritual in hopes that somebody someday may use these instructions to find the lost land for themselves.

Yepp died later on, and Yallam was devastated in all respects, morally and economically. There were now no boatsmen to find pearls or work and the pearl diving business disappeared as the populace became depressed. Yallam would now become merely a low-key settlement that would get by strictly on fishing for Yallam mountain fish at the nearby Taopo Swamp.

In the current day and age, Yallam is a highly downbeat town laden with abject poverty and despair. Its only remaining relative claim to fame is the town's resident blacksmith, Sunshine, whose wife describes as handling the best forge in all of Weyard. He is extremely talented in taking raw materials and crafting weapons and armor from them. However, he is slightly eccentric, working only when he feels like it (and he proclaims that's only when it's raining) and disappearing at Taopo Swamp for days at a time to find such materials.

With the eruption of Mt.Aleph, the lighting of the Mercury and Venus Lighthouses, and the return of Poseidon and the consequent warming of the oceans, much of Weyard's climate is out of balance. For Yallam, a lengthy drought ensues which dries up Taopo Swamp halfway, and Yallam mountain fish are now unavailable, so it enters its toughest time ever. Felix's party, the ones who pretty much caused all of the above by raiding Mt.Aleph and activating the Lighthouses, enters the town and encounters Sunshine. If Felix has either a piece of forgeable material or a rusty item, Sunshine suddenly gets his spirit back and gets to work on reforging the item, and Felix comes back later to claim the new item with due payment. Felix can also partake in Yepp's song and dance ritual with the children, and he gains a general understanding of how he can navigate the Sea of Time and make it through to Lemuria on the other side.

Trivia

• The name "Yallam" sounds similar to "Malay" when spoken backwards and is likely a reference to the ethnic group endemic to the real-world Malay Peninsula, despite little apparent resemblance to Malaysian architecture or culture in Yallam itself. Yallam's presence on the northeast end of Osenia, the in-game representation of real-world Australia, can be seen to align with real-world Oceania in broad strokes because of the Malay Peninsula's relative proximity to Australia, despite that being located a fair distance northwest from the continent.
• Yepp's song features the same tune as "Kagome-Kagome", a Japanese nursery rhyme. The hidden music player in the Battle Mode lobby in The Lost Age features two versions of the song; track 20 is what plays during the song and dance sequence at the east screen of the village, whereas track 21, which does not feature percussions, does not appear to play in-game at any point. The Nintendo Music app only features the first version in its track list for The Lost Age, making it more likely that the second version is dummied content.