All Piercing Spear

The All Piercing Spear is a legendary spear that could pierce through any material in existence. The original has been lost to the ages, but many replicas have been made. Some such spears attempt to break through the materials, while others just phase through them, the latter usually being more successful though less destructive. 
== History ==
There were once two ancient kingdoms in the east, one of gold and the other silver. It is said that the gods favored the one of gold and one day the king was visited by a mysterious merchant clad in gray robes. He came with but two items, a spear and a shield, both for sale for only a single piece of copper each. When the king asked him how good the spear was, he said, "It is so sharp that it can pierce through anything." When the king asked him how good the shield was, he said, "It is so strong that nothing can penetrate it." At first the king laughed and asked if he was serious. The merchant affirmed that he was at which point the king grew angry. He shouted, "Impossible! The Spear cannot be All Piercing if the Shield is Impenetrable and vice versa. You are either a liar or a fool, begone with you!" He drove the merchant out of his palace, but first he decided to take the spear for himself as he thought at the very least it would make a nice decoration. Even though he believed the salesman was a sham, he tested the spear anyway at the request of one of his advisers. To the court's surprise, the salesmans words were true. It mattered not what they put before it, wood, stone, or steel, the spear passed through them as if they were water. The king sent his soldiers looking for the merchant to apologize and give him his copper piece, but he was nowhere to be found.
The next day, the merchant visited the queen of the silver and offered her the shield for one copper piece. She accepted the offer and merchant departed. Upon testing she found that nothing could so much as scratch the shield.
The king of gold was confident with his new weapon and waged a war of conquest against his rival. The queen of silver was confident with her new shield and met him in combat with no fear. Unfortunately, precise knowledge of how the battle went has been lost to history. Accounts of how their legendary clash concluded vary by source, and all that is known is that by the end of their war, both kingdoms crumbled. It is said that when the king of gold died, the merchant appeared one final time to take a copper button off of the king's shirt before disappearing in a puff of smoke.