Tingis, the weapon maker, called me over immediately as he saw me enter the barracks. He seemed excited... even more so than when he burned his beard off last spring in the kiln, so I knew this was going to be good. After he blurted out a few unintelligible sentences, he finally calmed down enough to show me a dark colored rock. In this rock was a shiny material that I had never seen before. He then broke a piece off and heated it in the fire. The substance didn't burn, but instead it began to glow as if it were magical. He then pulled it from the fire and hit it hard several times with a rock. Right there in front of my eyes, it changed its shape, and as it cooled down the glow disappeared and the material remained transformed.
After many years of trying to make our arrow heads sharper by banging rocks into each other, it was obvious to me now why the weapon maker was so excited. Although he was still trying to determine the best way to work the shiny, magical material, he was confident that new weapons could be made that were sharper and sturdier than any others we currently use. I will have to check back with him to see how his experiments are going. In the meantime, I need to gather some hardy men so that we can construct a settlement near the source. I think we shall name the camp, "Tingis", in honor of our ingenious weapons maker.
