Primesteel

Primesteel is a pure-white metal that shines under even the scantest light, found in small nuggets that are very heavy and radiate with a comfortable warmth. Looking at a piece of primesteel inspires an intangible sense of deep unease, not unlike the feeling of creeping danger that comes from being stalked by something. Some have described it as a feeling of being primal, of being unchained, or of having an inherent wilderness.   Primesteel has many unusual properties aside from its weird aura, such as its ability to repel aeriou. A nugget measuring one inch by one inch will create a space devoid of aeriou that is ten feet in radius. When placed next to sterea or mana, the primesteel will convert the solid and liquid into aeriou and repel it. When placed near a mage, the mana in their bodies will be converted back into synai and expelled through the skin in a painful, but not damaging, process.   This makes it the ideal material to incapacitate mages, making them unable to use their synai until the primesteel is removed from them. Iron manacles with nuggets of primesteel measuring half an inch embedded within are the primary way of containing mages.   Small amounts of primesteel are found throughout Elgis, scattered seemingly at random, though there is a much higher concentration of the metal in the mud of the oases near Pokugara . It is in such high demand that primesteel is the primary export of the desert town, though the nature of the primesteel makes defending large shipments of the metal very difficult without the use of mages.