"Do you know what's in there?" asked Querion, the elven craftsman, as he returned the 'Iron Bride' to Barrett and pointed to the wooden box in front of him.

Why do you want me to guess this?" Barrett looked down at the box under the elf's finger. With the cold light cast by the diamond-shaped crystal in mid-air, he noticed that the surface of the brown square wooden box was carved with a circle of thorn-shaped relief patterns. These patterns are so real that if you touch them, you will be stabbed by them and make yourself bloody.

"Danger" is the first impression that those patterns give Barritt. Does this mean that the box contains something dangerous?

What could it be? a severed head of Medusa, a mushroom that emits poisonous spores, or a statue of an orc without clothes?

The barbarian thought for a moment and gave the answer in his heart, "Mithril?" Although Mithril is not dangerous, combined with the elven forging process that Barrett has learned, this is all he can think of in his mind now.

"Can't be mistaken, but it's not entirely true either. Querion pushed the box toward the center of the platform, allowing the moonlight gathered by the levitating crystals to shine on its surface, "This is what you'll need to repair your weapon...... One. Of course, the main part. He pressed his palm against the thorn pattern and spat out an elven phrase of unknown meaning, followed by a faint flash of light from the surface of the box.

The elf glanced up at the two of them, and slowly opened the box, which was a strange mass of bright silver that flowed slowly like a liquid.

When the metal is illuminated by the moonlight, its own flow begins to increase. Like a living creature, it slowly climbed up to the outer edge of the box, as if trying to run out of it.

At this moment, the elven craftsman Querion spat out a few more elven words, and the crystal that gathered the moonlight in mid-air suddenly dimmed. The bright silver metal lost most of its vitality, became a little lazy, and gradually retracted back into the center of the box.

"In ancient times, elves, like other races, also forged weapons from fire. "Our forging is even better than that of the dwarves, and every suit of armor from the hands of elven craftsmen is light and strong, and every weapon is deadly and elegant. These outstanding crafts have accompanied the gradual prosperity of our civilization and allowed us to defeat one powerful enemy after another. But at the height of the glory of the great Elven Empire, we have mercilessly abandoned this craft. ”

"Why abandon it?" asked the little mage, puzzled.

The elven craftsman looked down at the metal in the box, "Because of the pride of standing at the apex of all races, we can't tolerate the constant noise, the scorching heat in the forge, and the constant ash rising from the chimney. So, we started looking for new ways to forge. ”

Barrett knew that the mages had also tried to find new methods of forging, but not in the main material world, but in the negative energy plane, and more importantly, the most fundamental purpose of the two was completely different.

"And then you created it?" the little mage looked down at the strange metal.

"Create, no, no, no!" the elven craftsman repeated three times, each time heavier and heavier, "this thing is not from the elves. We just discovered it and brought it back from some unknown plane. Over the years, we have only learned how to control and use it. ”

"It's not something in our world?" Barrett was surprised.

"No, I don't know where it came from. The elf shook his head, "When a civilization reaches its peak, it will try to explore other planes beyond the main material world. The planes I am talking about do not refer to the elemental and quasi-elemental planes, nor to the Machine Realm and the Garden of Joseph, nor to the Nine Hells of Bato and the Endless Abyss, but to more distant worlds. You should have an idea about it. He looked at the little mage, Krees.

"It's not too much, just a little bit of it. The little mage looked at Barrett, "The multiverse is extremely vast, and the planes we are familiar with are actually all around the main material world, but the distance is different. In other words, you can think of our main physical world, and of these chaotic and bizarre planes, as an interdependent 'whole'. Crane drew a big circle with his hands.

"And through the void, which is countless times deeper than the Dark Realm, there may be more such 'wholes'. In fact, many things in our world are brought back by plane travelers from some unknown and distant 'whole'. I've heard that there are still former goblin Travelers in the plane, but they don't return to our world. ”

"Is this possible?" If it's true, did those plane travelers survive for hundreds of thousands of years, if not more?

"It's not impossible. The little mage replied, "For many races, like goblins, belong to immortality." And the word 'eternal life' can also be obtained through a variety of ways. For example, elemental avatars, transforming lichs, vampires first embrace, etc. ”

"And this thing in front of you was also brought back from other planes that were extremely far away from a certain plane traveler of the Elven Empire. Quillion concluded.

Barrett was confused, I just wanted to fix the sword, and I didn't want to know anything about these mysteries, "Is there any danger about it?"

"The plane traveler who originally brought it back found it to be very similar to Mithril in many ways, so they called it 'Activated Mithril,' a name that is still used today. "And its most striking property is 'devouring.'" It devours other metals and converts them into parts of its body, with a small amount of that metal itself. ”

"If it were a normal process, we would let it swallow some ore, then increase its activity through moonlight, then infuse it into a pre-prepared mold, and finally use the spells and inscriptions researched during the Elven Empire to kill most of its activity, so that it can no longer devour metal and change form. The result is a complete piece of equipment that slowly repairs itself. ”

After listening to this, Barrett suddenly thought of the flesh puppet 'Meat Ball' in his mind, and he thought that the appearance of activating Mithril to eat should be similar to that guy, "This doesn't sound too dangerous." ”

"This thing wasn't as docile as it was in front of it at the beginning, and it caused a lot of disaster to the Elven Empire, but these have been solved. More importantly, your situation is not part of the normal process. "Activating Mithril may obediently repair the weapon in your hand, cling to it, slowly restoring it to its original form, or it may melt it into your body like swallowing ore." If it's the latter, your weapon will cease to exist. Of course, you can also use the engulfed activated Mithril to craft a brand new weapon, but I don't think that's what you'd like to see. ”

"If you don't want to take the risk, I can give you an elven sword I made as a gift, and I hope it will be your new companion to accompany you on your journey. ”

Barrett looked at the 'Iron Bride' in her hand and hesitated. This sword is not an ordinary weapon for him, but also some kind of indescribable snuggling and sustenance

Tell me, good girl, are you going to take the risk? Maybe you'd rather rest in the Spatial Ring, after all these years of trauma, you're probably tired. The brute closed his eyes and pressed the hilt of his sword to his forehead.

After a long time, our barbarian adventurer slowly opened his eyes and looked at the elven craftsman on the other side of the round platform, "She told me that she wanted revenge. ”

......