Magical items weren't mere tools enhanced through the Qi. They weren't living beings, either, but existed in a middle ground that could lean toward each extreme.
As such, magical items had innate defenses, or rather, requirements. Just like it took physical strength to lift a heavy hammer, cultivators had to meet similar conditions.
Those requirements followed the cultivation stages' increasingly widening gap. There were also other factors to account for, like additional conditions or the items' very will.
Liam's opponent was not only of a superior rank. It had even rejected him outright, suggesting the presence of a will, or at least a personal preference, but that didn't make him powerless.
Alchemists could improve magical items through the Alchemical Refinement, which was nothing short of affecting those objects' fabric, altering it quite radically, too. In Liam's case, his knife had gained intense poisonous properties.
