Frostbound

The weeks leading up to the start of Winter were full of activity. With Stone readily available being bought and quarried, the Outer wall was finished up rather quickly, only waiting for Gabriel and I to engrave it.

While we did that, work began on the Inner Wall.

The roundabout way we constructed the city was rather odd, but it would soon be finished. The Keep was first for defense reasons. We used it as fortifications against the Waves and in case we were attacked.

The Outer Wall was next. It took the longest amount of time and the most Stone to construct, while also being the part that drained most of our stores of precious metals.

For the Wards we designed to work, the inlaid metal needed to be able to handle the mana forced through it. Which ruled out most of what we had available to us and the only usable material was what we brought with us.

If I hadn't bought so much from the tutorial store, we would've had to settle for a lesser version of the enchantment.

That being said, the Frosted Silver we had a stock of was now completely gone.

Silver was one of the best Metals to use for enchanting for its Mana conductivity alone. It wasn't the strongest, so inlaying a sword with the stuff was a terrible idea, but a Ward hidden under inches of Stone would be fine.

Additionally, the type of Ward and the effect being powered by Ice Mana made the cold-aligned Frosted Silver the best choice. Using [Mana Infusion] for months on end only made it better.

It took a lot of trial and error to figure out which metal was best.

Gold worked, and so did extremely pure versions of Copper and Aluminum, but they usually burnt out at a much lower threshold. Stronger metals that were harder didn't have the conductivity needed. Steels, Irons, and their various alloys didn't have the property we needed. We didn't have the time to test why which metals worked and didn't, but that was on my long list of things to do once things settled down.

A list that was getting continually longer.