Forged Destiny [Book 9: Ch. 3]

"He wants me to find out if Ironwood will sustain without him, doesn't he?"

"Yes. And to see if you can create it."

"Me!?" I leaned back. "What? How would I make it-?"

"It is metal, is it not? Maybe you could forge something akin to it. These… pores you speak of. If you could make it the same shape and size with the same pores, would it not be Ironwood?"

"M-Maybe."

It wouldn't; I was sure. There was something about it, something more than simple metal. In a very real way, it felt alive. It… It felt like it had thought. I hadn't dared delve as deeply into that as I did the first time – my reaction in front of Winter was startling enough – but I could still feel a hum of energy when I laid a finger on the piece within Penny.

If it relied on Magic, then how did it still pulse now? Was Penny supplying it? Why had it felt so… eager to meet with me? Was eager even the right word? Did it have personality? Could you call a plant `eager` for growing toward the sun? it was just something it did. Something it needed in order to survive. Could you call a tree intelligent for planting its roots down and turning its leaves up toward the sun?

That was what this felt like. The Ironwood was leaning into me.

[...]

"It's confusing. It's alive, but not. Like a plant. I can't tell if it's intelligent or just doing what a plant normally does, but it doesn't grow on its own as far as I can tell."

"It doesn't," Penny confirmed. "The Ironwood Forest that father first constructed has not grown since its summoning twenty years ago. There were those who feared it might grow and swallow a nearby village, so it was measured each year. It has not grown a single inch."

"It doesn't make sense," I said. "I can't understand it."

"What's to understand? It's magic." Yang threw the comment out.

"Well…" I tried to think of the best way to explain. "Ironwood is metal, right? So is this." I hefted a chunk of ore out a crate. "It's the exact same mineral composition when you get down to it, and this is created in the wilderness just like trees. But it's not alive. It's rock with metal in it. What makes Ironwood living metal but leaves this lifeless?"

"Magic," Yang repeated.

"But it persists even without Ironwood's magic. And it's still just metal. People have melted it down into slag. I could make it into a knife. Would it still be alive? Would it die? How does metal die? It has no brain, no living material or any kind of nutrients."

—Forged Destiny [Book 9: Ch. 3]