Disclaimer: I don't own stuff.
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Once Eragon returned to the treehouse Levos spoke with him and Eragon soon explained why the elves had seemed so gobsmacked by Levos's display of power. As it turns out lightning contains quite a lot of energy and as such, the ability to generate continuous bolts of it demonstrated considerable magical skill, especially without speaking. As such it was likely that the elves were simply amazed by his apparently large reservoir of magic and that was the reason why they stared at him.
Levos soon felt rather relieved once he understood the elves behaviour, he didn't like not understanding things. Considering that he had little left to do that evening Levos decided to retire for the evening.
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The next morning Eragon had already left by the time that Levos awoke. Not knowing what to do with himself Levos descended the living staircase before beginning to wander Ellesmera. He spent around an hour and a half sightseeing before he heard more rhythmic clanging of metal on metal. At first, he was rather confused, as he was on the other side of the city in comparison to where he was yesterday and it was unlikely that one city had two training fields, so what was that noise. After a few more moments of listening he had, it figured out. No matter where or on what world you were only one action created a repeated rhythmic dull ringing of metal, forging.
Rather than rush towards the sound, he meandered, taking the long route. He enjoyed seeing the beauty of the forest as he did. Although he eventually did reach a small clearing where he could see a forge built into the side of a simple home.
The elven woman, one of the first that Levos had seen who actually looked old, Didn't seem to notice him as he approached as she was too intent upon the beginnings of a chainmail cuirass that she was forging. Levos was suddenly reminded of another elderly blacksmith, although this woman's forge didn't have a giant eagle statue attached.
Levos watched as the woman dextrously and efficiently plucked a red hot ring from the forge, threaded it into the armour then welded it shut. He stood back and observed for around an hour before the woman laid down her tools and stretched, finally noticing him. Levos approached her when she looked over at him, she began to speak, although she quickly recognized his look of confusion at her language, switching languages began asking why he was there, as she didn't recognize him.
"Apologies, I heard the sounds of the forge and followed them, I used to work the forge myself and was rather nostalgic at seeing a master at work. I am Levos, you are" Levos said, extending a hand in greeting.
"Rhunon," the woman said introducing herself. "I don't suppose you're with that Eragon boy are you?" she asked rather brusquely.
"I am, why do you ask?"
"Ah, he's the only other one who doesn't speak the ancient language." She responded before bending to insert new metal into the flame, apparently now comfortable with his presence.
"Yes, I do apologise for that." He said, continuing "you've already met Eragon then?"
"That I have, he came here asking me to make him a blade, I said I'd try to if he managed to bring me bright steel." She responded, now shouting to be heard over the noise of her forge welding a new ring.
"What is bright steel?" Levos replied, similarily shouting "I have never heard of metal by that name."
"It's the metal that I forged all the riders swords from, I got it from a fallen star. But as far as I can tell I've found all the fallen stars and harvested all their metal," she responded now laying down her hammer for a moment to let the curtains cool before continuing to work. "It's the toughest material I've seen in my life, and a long life it has been. It started a dark black colour, you couldn't hammer it cold. It would develop tiny cracks, eventually shattering a piece. But when you hammered it hot, you could forge it into any shape. But when you place certain enchantments upon it it was nearly indestructible. But it did have an odd tendency to change colour to a dragons scale colour when they were nearby through the forging. The dragon always reported feeling tired afterwards too. I wish I could have studied it more while making them, but I only had so many blades to make, and forging is rather the distracting process after all." Rhunon said now fully engrossed in her description, Levos could tell that she held a true love for her craft. Although once she finished she noticed that Levos had taken to rummaging around in his bags. "What are you looking for," she asked rather confused by his behaviour.
"Give me a few seconds, ah, here it is" Levos exclaimed while standing up, before presenting Rhunon with a dark black ingot and asking "Is this bright steel?"
Rhunon almost snatched the ingot from his hand before beginning to examine it with a look of wonder, "Yes, yes it is, where did you get this?" she asked seemingly giddy with excitement.
"Well, while rare its not particularly uncommon back where I hail from. It was actually your description of the forging process that clued me into it. While it is possible to forge it as is, back home we use some very hard to get ingredients to forge what is called daedric weaponry, you take the ebony and shape it into a vessel for the Daedra, it twists and warps it in the process but creates some of the best quality weapons there are. It sounds like you might be doing something similar by siphoning off a bit of the dovah sil to improve the weapon n the process. Although since the dragon is willing in the process it does not change the blade overly much." Levos said, delighted to already be leaning and theorizing about new ways to create weapons and armour with another master smith.
"Well, should Eragon return with bright steel, I would like you to oversee the forging process. we may discover new crafting methods if these two methods are as similar as you propose." Rhunon said, feeling more joy than she had in the last century at the prospect of exploring new methods and techniques using methods that she had no knowledge of.
They continued to speak, their conversation turned to more mundane methods of smithing although they weren't able to speak for long as quite soon the forest itself seemed to cry out, as they heard the roar of a dragon, followed by the panicking of many animals. Levos shot up at immediately, as he noticed the movements of the animals and the feel of the forest changing before sprinting off.
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As he ran he began to think about what he'd seen, small animals panicking as large ones rushed in one direction and nature itself seeming to grow angry. The usual signs that precipitated a spriggan attack. He was following the sound of the roar, worried that either Saphira or more likely, Eragon was being attacked. As he ran he began to tap into his unnatural strength to increase his own speed, he could feel his features shift and his teeth elongate as he did so. He began to put on Nahkriin as he ran, suspecting that he may require its power before this was over, praying all the while to whatever deities were listening that he wouldn't fall on an unseen root. It took him longer than he would have liked to arrive at the site of the roar, although he stopped in his tracks as he did. he could see others gathering around the clearing as Eragon hefted a large chunk of stone, although judging by its glimmering patches I was more likely ore. He looked around the field as Eragon strode forward in his direction. Both Eragon and Saphira were covered in small cuts and many bruises, as the trunk of the Menoa tree was charred on one side and the field looked like it was ploughed by a madman. There were roots everywhere, slowly returning to their original underground tunnels.
Levos could only stare as Eragon walked by him carrying his load, quickly followed by Saphira. He could not think of any explanation for what had happened here, did spriggans attack, was Eragon practising magic and found the ore but not its precise location was Saphira intoxicated (as he had heard rumours of her fondness for ale and mead) and had torn up the ground. He elected, in light of this confusion, to simply remove his mask and follow Eragon, hopefully, an answer would reveal itself.
Levos quickly recognized the path they were taking as the one he had recently finished running. Quickly connecting the dots he determined that the ore Eragon was carrying must be the bright steel that Rhunon had mentioned sending him for. Although that still didn't answer what had happened in that clearing.
It didn't take long or them to arrive back at Rhunons' home, as it turned out it was indeed bright steel ore, quite a few blades worth as well. Then Rhunon explained the only issue remaining. She had sworn an oath, a rather magically binding one at that, to never again craft weapons.
Though a solution was finally found, she would control Eragon's Body to create a weapon thereby she wasn't crafting it, rather Eragon was crafting it with Rhunons' expertise. They had suggested using Levos' body, but when he explained how the dragon souls within him tend to react to others entering his mind they quickly discarded the idea.
Levos took up a position where he could see the entirety of the process. He did find it rather amusing as he watched Eragon smack his own finger with a hammer as Rhunon tried to get used to using his body. Levos did find it supremely interesting watching the process though. Most of it was a standard process for smithing ebony, although Rhunon appeared to have a much fancier method of folding steel and integrating carbon. Levos was astounded tough when the enchanting started. He could feel the weaving of dragon magic into the blade. He could see the very structure of the blade crystalize and sharpen itself to a near infinitesimally small edge, before the magic reinforced the structure of the blade, although it moved oddly, the magic seemed to burn as it drew a small amount of magic from Eragon. He continued to be amazed as he saw magics he didn't recognize some of the enchantments as flame-like magic seemed to fill the blade and the sapphire in the base of the pommel. He continued to watch as a truly powerful blade was shaped from the metal and imbued with magic as the night dragged on into the dawn.