Answer:
An inference
Step-by-step explanation:
Through inference, you reach to a conclusion or opinion after you had seen or perceived something such as a behavior, a text, an action, an event, etc. Therefore, by looking for all the words, sentences or ideas surrounding the term "malleable", such as "to serve as springs" and "others were too hard to bend", we can infer that "malleable" is an adjective that describes something that is flexible enough not to bend and not to break or crack.