Mana and Miasma

As Freya's mana began to take control of the dangerous miasma through Art's help, the sword pumped even more of the harmful energy into Freya's hands. The purple veins exploded upwards from her hands up to her forearms. Her color turned even paler as the pain increased tremendously.

Art immediately increased the output of mana even more, as a moment later the energy was pushed back just as quickly as it had spread. The energy returned to the arms where Art continued to surgically weaken its influence but not outright weed it out.

Freya's pain also lessened as the toxic energy became more and more tame. The sword began continued to excrete the purple energy in droves, but the small gemstone could only hold so much energy.

'Sleepy' Freya heard a childish voice in her head before the soul gem lost its luster and the sword calmed down. The voice, that Freya concluded probably belonged to the demonic sword, was strangely angelic.

Yet while the sword was not pumping any more energy, it didn't mean it had completely disappeared. The demonic energy continued to wreak havoc inside Freya's mana channels, but Art was also working overtime as his extremely precise scalpel continued trimming down the violent energy.

With Art's effort, the miasma was soon confined to the edge of Freya's skin, where it materialized as a light purple arc on the back of her right hand. The light purple arc pulsed for a moment before it calmed down, and the energy went dormant.

As the pain finally vanished from her hands, Freya took a sigh of relief. Yet, when she took a look at the sword in her hands, it had lost a lot of its luster. With a quick evaluation, she found that the sword had not lost any of its durability, then why did its demonic presence disappeared.

'The soul gem has exhausted it energy reserves.' Art answered her unasked question, 'It means you can no longer use the magic skill attached to the sword or more likely miasma skill, should I say. Until then, this sword is no better than a normal sword.'

Miasma, the word, was new to Freya. Although she was not exactly ignorant in the ways of magic, she had never heard of any energy that clashed so violently with mana. 'What kind of energy is miasma?' she asked, hoping Art would explain this mysterious energy.

'Miasma is the antithesis of Mana.' Art explained, 'The complete opposite yet extremely similar. It more commonly known as demonic mana or demonic energy. It is extremely dangerous for humans, as they are beings born into a world of mana. Furthermore, it is even more dangerous to mages that hold vast amount of mana in their bodies.'

Art continued to heal the damage done to her body and her mana channels by the toxic miasma. 'While it is possible for metals to retain miasma, it would inevitably lose their energy when exposed to the mana rich atmosphere of this world.'

Art closely examined the two runes on the blade through Freya's eyes. 'It's truly a masterpiece of a weapon. The Runesmith has somehow managed to not only retain miasma in this atmosphere, but also give this sword the ability to regenerate this energy. Truly fascinating, the materials only limited his talent, if he had better materials, he could probably have forged this into a Master rank weapon.'

Freya understood the weight of those words. A weapon a rank or more above the currently Epic ranked sword. She continued to stare at the beautiful sword in her hand. Although its luster was gone, it still held a certain dignity. Its terrifying gray color and its razor sharp edges looked just as menacing as ever.

She shook her head out of the trance and asked another questioned popped into her mind. 'If Miasma is really that dangerous to humans, how was Edward and his family able to use it? Also, how did you manage to isolate it inside my body with MANA, if they are so dangerous to each other.'

She gazed at the light purple arc that had appeared on the back of her right hand.

Art gave her a psychic smile and answered, 'At least you are intelligent enough to ask the right questions, even if you are too sentimental. For your first question, it was the sword the channeled miasma and not its wielder, like Edward. The sword only injected miasma into you because it hadn't accepted you as its master yet. An Aura Knight with such a sword is a nightmare for mages.'

'To answer your second question, just as Miasma is destructive to Mana, Mana is also destructive to Miasma. As such, a Mage, with extremely refined control of Mana, could in theory use it to systematically weaken as isolate Miasma.'

'Unlike the limited reserves of the soul gem, your mana reserves are far larger. I was able to use your mana to isolate this dangerous energy to the outskirts of your skin, where it could safely leave your body, but contrary to my expectation something entirely different happened.'

After hearing his word's Freya focused on the system messages that had appeared during the fiasco but she had ignored due to the immense pain.

[Warning! Dangerous Levels of Miasma detected!]

[Eject the dangerous Miasma immediately!]

[Miasma has been successfully isolated.]

[A new quest has been issued.]

[Quest: Demonic Energy (Miasma)

Difficulty: Epic

Description: Although the dangerous Miasma has been isolated inside your body, it is still not completely gone. If you are able to absorb even more of this energy and able to gain the recognition of 'Demonic Severance', a profound ability will bloom for you.

Objective:

i) Absorb even more Miasma. (20/100)

ii) Gain recognition of Demonic Severance.

Reward:

i) Skill/Trait Evolution Card.]

It was officially her third quest, after the Goblin hunting quest and the Orc Extermination quest she got a few days ago. Yet this simple quest had a level of difficulty a level higher than both of them. Not only did she had to continued and absorb the dangerous Miasma into her body, she also had to gain the recognition of that damn sword.

'I will help you with the first objective. Looks like at this rate it would take five days, as a single session is worth a fifth of the task.' Art concluded, 'but the second objective is completely up to you.'

'What is an Evolution card that is mentioned as a reward?' The female mage asked.

'I don't have the foggiest clue.' The Great mage answered.

'What do you mean you don't know?' Freya asked in confusion. 'Aren't you the one that created this system?'

'I created a copy of another system that even I don't understand completely.' Art answered with a mental eye roll. 'It is given that even I won't be able to completely explain it.'

'I guess you aren't so great after all.' Freya commented with a grin. She then got into position and began to practice her swordsmanship with the demonic sword. Although it didn't have its magic skill, it was still better than her other steel sword. It was better for her to get used to it.

Although she still had no way to gain the sword's recognition, there was still a lot of time. For now, she continued to train.