Beyond(?) the Western Forests

This post is dedicated to the lovely Loch. The Forest of Worms is popularly held to be depthless, and exploration from the ground has certainly born this out. Whence then, comes the so-called 'Iron Panoply', which was retrieved about 150 years ago from the swollen stomach of an enormous worm creature during one of their attacks on the fortified border, and which is now kept displayed in the permanent collection of the Scholomance inside a vitrine of glass.The 'panoply' is actually a single piece of what was presumably once a larger set - a breastplate (and a piece of gorget, fastened with a strange irregular clasp in the shape of a bladed star, now rusted together such that its mechanism is no longer discernable) of curious design, apparently human, but very large, and extremely heavy. The material is also strange, iron certainly, but alloyed with substances unknown to the chemists of the capital. The metal has formed (or grown?) crystalline ridges and striations, which sometimes form…