The heavy leather bellows groaned under the strain.
Balthazar threw his massive weight against the wooden handles and forced another surge of oxygen into the blast furnace. The coals shifted from bright orange to a blinding white. The heat in the workshop was suffocating. The air tasted of ash and copper. The master blacksmith wiped a mixture of sweat and soot from his eyes and grabbed his long iron tongs to check the crucible.
The raw ore extracted from the northern ridge was not normal iron. The metal had absorbed centuries of ambient magic while buried deep within the earth. It resisted the melting process with stubborn resilience. Balthazar needed to reach an unprecedented temperature to liquify the magic infused ore and burn away the final impurities.
He pumped the bellows again. T
