Steel Glass

Neither steel nor glass, Steel Glass (also known as Space Glass) is a composite material first developed in the late First Age, during The Uprising. It is highly resistant by nature, capable of lasting through extreme temperatures (both high and low), corrosive elements, and both slashing and blunt-force damage, among other things. On top of all that, Steel Glass is also transparent, lending itself to use in windows and viewscreens.

Properties

Material Characteristics

Steel Glass strongly resembles glass, or transparent acrylic. It is a thick colorless material, typically produced in window-sized sheets. Once solidified, it becomes almost impossible to manipulate further, making it necessary to produce Steel Glass windows in their desired size, rather than as large sheets.
It is smooth to the touch, as well as hard and solid. Even while scratching over it with (blunt) nails, the material feels perfectly smooth, with no imperfections. Steel Glass takes on the same temperature as the environment, leaving it neither warm nor cold to the touch.

Physical & Chemical Properties

Steel Glass is highly resistant to many (environmental) dangers, including extreme temperatures (both high and low), corrosive elements, and damages.

History & Usage

History

First discovered during the late First Age, Steel Glass immediately showed promise as a material used in spaceships. However, it was extremely difficult to produce, with most attempts at replication the procedure failing. This lead to the suspicions that there was some unknown variable missing, which led to production sometimes succeeding, but often failing.
After the Second Age commenced, Steel Glass production soared. Though it was initially still expensive to produce, it became increasingly easy to replicate the procedure, and even newer, cheaper Steel Glass outperformed Steel Glass from the First Age. Its overall use, and rapidly-dropping price, made Steel Glass an increasingly accessible material, to be used for all sorts of windows in the place of actual glass. These days, it is often found even in regular buildings.

Everyday use

Most commonly used for the windows and viewscreens of spaceships and space-stations, Steel Glass is also commonly used in buildings, including in places where its resistant nature serves little use.

Type

Composite

Value

Low

Rarity

Very common

Odor

None; faintly like plastic when new

Taste

Plastic-y, with a strange tingling sensation that feels like it should taste like something

Color

Colorless

Common State

Solid

The Mystery of Steel Glass

While enough time has passed that the initial troubles with producing Steel Glass have mostly faded from knowledge, it was a big mystery during the early Second Age, especially with newer Steel Glass outperforming older material.
In the end, it came down, like many things, to Vita. During the production process, Vita naturally entered the material, further enhancing its natural properties. During the First Age, there was often little to no Vita during production, leading to failure or weaker Steel Glass. When it flowed back as the eras changed, production thus improved.