Bagginsbill Wrote:
"I don't know anything about real metals or real swords, but I found dozens of black blades in Google."

Those black blades do look cool, the finish is sometimes called "Manganese" or "BlackOxide", I was looking into it a few years ago because I wanted to know how to "black" some parts I was planning to cut with my CNC machine.

It's quite neat really, it can even be done at home, here's a guy who "Blacked" his own knife if anyone is curious: