Zuhellion

Summary

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"Zuhellion can be considered a blessing or a curse, depending on what it is being used for"

— Fredrik Smithwonder, Royal blacksmith for the Royal Seal of Dralia

A rare ever-burning metal which seems to be stronger than steel and iron when manifested into a weapon. When Zuhellion is forged under extreme heats, dangerous to even the most fire-resistant blacksmiths, the metal can be formed and altered into fine weapons, armour, and trinkets. Even after an extensive cooling process, the heat is still retained within the metal, causing it to scorch any wood, cloth, or skin it comes into contact with.

The application

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In order to take full benefit of the rare an arduous process needs to be undertaken, which can only be done by the most skilled blacksmiths in order to avoid workplace accidents and imperfections in the final product. This process deviates somewhat depending on the product being made, but starts the same way;
1. The storing of the material
Once the Zuhellion as been collected from the site it has been found, it is transported in special carriages towards its first destination, the blacksmith. Once it arrives, the blacksmith will help move the raw chunks of Zuhellion from the carriage to a storage container, this is not done with bare hands, however, as that would simply scorch the skin resulting in horrible blisters and 3rd-degree burn marks.
Instead, the blacksmith will use a set of insulated leather smithing gloves in order to pick up a raw chunk and deposit it in the large bronze or steel cast storage containers that are located at the blacksmiths property. They use Bronze or Steel containers due to the low thermal conductivity of the 2 metals.
One container can hold up to 500kg of raw Zuhellion before reaching its safe limits, and as most experienced blacksmiths know, you do not want to go over the safe limit when dealing with a metal as unstable as Zuhellion.
2. Purifying the metal
As soon as all of the raw Zuhellion has been stored safely, a long and arduous process begins of purifying the metal, as in its current raw form, the actual metal chunks are surrounded all sorts of rock and stone, making it unsuitable for smithing in its current form.
To expose the metal and make it suitable for processing, a blacksmith will take a chunk of Zuhellion, weighing anywhere between 10kg - 50kg, and put it on a special cleaning table. This table is not a flat slab of wood or metal, instead it consists of 4 large, bowling ball sized, rough stone spheres in a diamond shaped holster. The chunk of Zuhellion is then placed directly in the middle of the 4 spheres, meaning that if someone where to push the chunk, it would automatically roll and turn around against the 4 spheres of the table.
Due to the rough texture of the spheres, the chunk of Zuhellion will already lose the most brittle pieces of stone and dirt that are covering the metal, when it is being rolled around. However, to get all of the excess material off, the blacksmith will grab a large steel brush and rigorously remove all of the excess material. This process takes around 1 - 2 hours per chunk, revealing a jagged piece of silver metal at the end, with bright orange lines running through at, as if the planet of Zuhal itself is infused in the metal. This pure chunk of Zuhellion is placed in a separate, smaller, storage container.
3. Processing the metal
At this point, the blacksmith will have to ask the buyer, whether it be a far travelling merchant or an army general, what they are looking to use the metal for. There are 3 main options;

A weapon

A set of armour

A piece of jewellery

In rare occasions, people will order a special flask made out of Zuhellion, which would mean that the liquid inside would always be at around 100 degrees Celcius.
If someone were to order a set of Zuhellion armour, the blacksmith would have to double-check whether or not the future owner of the armour set is resistant to extreme heat. This question must be asked due to Zuhellion being incredibly hot, even when processed properly, retaining a heat of 100 degrees Celcius at minimum. Someone that is not resistant to extreme heats would simply melt inside the armour, experiencing excruciating pain as the armour sears the skin.
When an option has been selected, the blacksmith will get to work over an extra hot forge for 8 hours at a time to try and heat up the Zuhellion enough to make it bend into the shape the final product needs to have. Depending on the size and specifics of the product it can take between 12 and 60 days to process enough Zuhellion in order to finish the final product. On top of that, due to the experience required for safe processing, it is not cheap to buy an item made out of Zuhellion, with most items running from 1500 gold pieces up to 150 000 gold pieces, depending on the specifics of the item requested.
For this price though, the end result is always immaculate and exactly as what has been asked for. Certain items made out of Zuhellion have made it into the general folklore after they were used to achieve rather significant feats. For example;

The Holy Cross of Dralia

The Searing Blade

The Infused armour of Baltazar

Due to these legendary items having existed and being part of many myths and legends, the price of items made out of Zuhellion has significantly increased over the centuries. On top of that, if a legendary item were to be recovered it could be sold for a very hefty price on the open market, perhaps for even higher prices on the illegal markets.
4. Delivering the item
When the product is finished it will have to be delivered to its new owner. Most of the time, the new owner is too careful to let it be shipped, and so they will stay in the town where the blacksmith is located to make sure they can simply pick their new purchase up from the blacksmith.
However, in the case that the new owner is not close by, the item will need to be shipped out. This happens by wrapping the item in thick leather sheets that are kept half a centimetre off the product by several small bars of steel. This is done to make sure the leather does not get burned by the Zuhellion, creating an awful smell and possible damage to the product.
After wrapping the item, it is placed in an extra secure carriage which is driven to the destination surrounded by 3 more carriages filled with guards and hired mercenaries. The extreme security measures tend to scare off most crooks and thieves, however, some bandits have still made attempts in the past to rob a carriage or a blacksmith in order to obtain an item made out of Zuhellion, as can be read in the documents below;

The midnight heist on Cloverbrook Avenue

The robbery on the high toll road

In cases of successful delivery, however, the blacksmith is paid and the cycle will repeat itself creating a rather lucrative high-end income stream for only the most skilled blacksmiths.