GUARDIAN OF THE END

After not receiving any response from his patron, Jason decided to leave the topic for later on.

"Now that I know what you need help with, its going to be much easier. First show me what are the things that you can do." Hestia said curiously.

"I kinda already showed you what I can do though." Jason replied while pointing at his healed arm.

"So that means you haven't tested the limits of what the light element can heal huh." Hestia muttered. "Let's try inflicting a wound that will cut deep into your arm."

Jason was about to protest when he remembered that he hadn't felt any pain earlier. This made it easier for him to experiment with his skill without being afraid of receiving huge pain.

'I do need to practice this in real life as well or my pain tolerance will hit bottom level…' Jason sighed mentally.

Since the ability didn't reduce the amount of pain Jason felt, he would've to build up his pain tolerance. Otherwise, there was a good chance that he might end up gasping for air in the middle of a battle due to extreme pain while his ability fixed his body.

"Well, here goes whatever that goes." Jason muttered and plunged the dagger into his arm with full force.

The sharp part of the knife smoothly cut through his arm and the tip soon passed from the other side. Jason let it stay there for a few minutes while black blood dripped from the wound.

Only after an entire minute did he take the dagger out of his arm. It was glistening with his blood yet Jason was much more interested in the wound on his arm.

'System, give me a detailed report of everything that is happening.' Jason ordered.

[ The light and dark mana running through your body is roaming around the wound without doing anything. It seems like something is preventing them from moving forward. ] The system reported.

Jason looked at this in fascination before raising his head to meet Hestia's eyes.

"Can you tell me why my arm is not healing automatically?" Jason asked.

"I will explain that if you can answer a question that I ask. You agree?" Hestia asked back as Jason nodded in reply. "Then tell me, if mana is always running around our body or it is present in our mana cores at all times, why doesn't a body get destroyed from it?"

"It's because… because…" Jason tried answering yet he was stumped.

Mana, both normal and elemental, ran through a person's body at all times. Or sometimes, the elemental mana simply stayed in the person's mana core/cores unless it was called upon by the person.

Jason's dark mana was an example of the former while his thunder mana was an example of the latter.

He had been using magic for quite some time yet he had no idea why his body didn't corrode from the inside despite the dark mana present inside him.

Furthermore, using lightning or thunder magic should have left his body completely electrocuted.

"I don't know." Jason declared at last.

"The answer is quite simple. The only reason our body doesn't explode is because of the thing known as affinities. Affinities actually refer to the amount of mana a person can contain or use without their body feeling any side effects." Hestia explained.

"But if that's the case, why does a mage's body get hurt when he or she tries to learn magic and fails while attempting it?" Jason asked in confusion.

"Let me show it to you instead of telling you." Hestia smiled and raised her right hand.

Suddenly, a sphere of light appeared in her hand. The sphere of light bounced up and down in her hand before it suddenly expanded and blinded Jason.

Once his vision recovered, Hestia had cut a long diagonal slash on her hand.

"In the first case, I summoned the mana and willed it to do what I want. Currently, I'm not using the mana so the wound is still present in my hand," Hestia explained.

The wound on her hand dripped a drop of golden blood, better known as Ichor, to prove her point.

"Even I, one of the nine strongest guardians and an ex-goddess, can't heal myself completely passively." Hestia explained before her wound instantly closed.

"Though I healed it passively, my body was aware of the wound." Hestia continued on. "You on the other hand can heal it passively even if your body doesn't register the pain or infliction of a wound."

"I am confused…" Jason admitted.

"Come back to the real world." Hestia smiled as though she had expected this.

Both of them exited Jason's dream world and woke up back on Duphia.

Hestia appeared in front of Jason's in her wolf form.

[ I am going to inflict a wound on your body but you are not going to feel any pain from it. ] Hestia explained.

'And how you are going to do that?'

[ By disabling your nerves and making that area numb of course. ]

'Ayo.'

Seeing his expression, Hestia couldn't help but chuckle. The guardian then followed her words and disabled every single nerve passing through Jason's arm.

< Warning! Your right arm can no longer be responsive to anything. You can still use magic but if you go overboard, no limiters will be present there. >

Seeing the system window, Jason waited for the wound to be inflicted. He didn't look at his arm though and waited for five minutes.

[ Jason, open your eyes. ] Hestia's voice suddenly entered his ears.

Jason opened his eyes and looked at his arm. He suddenly jumped three feet in the air when he saaw that Hestia had almost cut half his arm off.

"HOLY ASDFGH!" Jason forgot to speak when he saw his arm barely being connected together.

However, right in front of his eyes, he noticed that the skin was slowly closing together.

[ The internal part of your arm hasn't started to heal though. Its just the skin and the cells a few centimeters below it that have been healed. ] The system informed him.

Once his skin had completely closed, Hestia focused on his arm. Jason was soon told that his entire arm had been healed by Hestia.

'I thought I was going to lose a limb today.' Jason sighed in relief.

[ Come back to the dream world. I will explain what I just did. ] Hestia said in a reassuring voice.

Jason stared at her for a few minutes before lying on the bed. He calmed his body down and on will, entered his dream world again.