Chapter 77

Mana is never a static substance.

Some say that mana is a tool that embodies ideals.

Others say it is like a wheel carving out fate.

But the way I define mana is a bit different.

It might be more bleak and plain than their expressions, but I want to call mana a thread of probabilities.

Another term for probabilities is possibilities.

We pull a thread from that yarn to determine the future.

For example, when clouds gather, it may rain, snow, or lightning might strike.

A farmer whose crops are on the verge of wilting will want a suitable shower.

To draw out these possibilities, we learn mathematics, observe natural phenomena, and weave the fabric of the future with the thread of mana and the loom of magical circles.

However, mana is a thread that moves on its own.

Just as it is harder to fix a living person’s heart than to repair the engine of a stopped car, mana is the same.

In the past, my master taught me a metaphor related to this called “the bead on the bed,” and I greatly resonated with it.

The bead sitting on the bed does not move without external force, but the moment we sit on it, it creates a slope around its center, causing the bead to roll over and come closer.

We can know that the bead is rolling because there is a slope, but the bead itself cannot understand why it has started to move.

Although mana is not a sentient being, it moves irregularly and ceaselessly, like a tadpole in a chaotic world.

Because of this fact, it has been tricky for us to inject an appropriate amount of mana into the magic circle.

—

“Wow, this time I did pretty well.”

“Honestly, I don’t even know why it came out so high. It’s so hard…”

After several injections, Yuna, exhausted, thudded her head onto the desk.

She tried injecting mana overall and then just in the center.

Listening to my advice, the more she increased the intensity, the overall efficiency of the magic circle went up, but occasionally it resulted in numbers like 2 or 3, indicating that it wasn’t the case every time.

“Hey, Nameya, can’t you try?”

Yuna handed me the model magic circle.

“How much efficiency should we aim for?”

“Can that be adjusted?”

“Yep.”

“I see…”

Yuna’s complexion darkened as she exerted herself to try to boost the numbers.

I felt uneasy, as if I were trampling on a child’s dreams.

Her lips were protruding, making it obvious to everyone that Seoyuna was sulking.

Sigh, as the adult, I should comfort her.

“Yuna, listen to me. It’s not that I’m better than you at magic; right now, it just looks that way because I know more about it than you do.”

“What’s the difference?”

“There is a difference. You’ve only been learning magic for a year, right? I’ve been at it for much longer.”

“For how long?”

“About 20 years?”

“Don’t lie…!”

“Okay, I’ve done it for about 5 years. So if you study hard and learn everything I know, you’ll definitely become a superior magician.”

It’s natural for reincarnators to seem like geniuses when they’re young.

But that doesn’t guarantee that they’ll remain geniuses when they grow up.

Just like how I could overwhelm Prince Hiasen or Hero Klaus with my swordsmanship when they were still young, but later, they eventually caught up to me in skills.

Yuna’s magical aptitude was at a level where she wouldn’t lose to any friends her age, and I wanted to instill confidence in her.

“So let me roughly explain this magic. Look.”

The number of circles doesn’t necessarily indicate the power of the magic.

However, the higher the circle, the easier it is to cast high-output magic. This is because as the mana circuit becomes longer and more complex, the decline in efficiency gets offset.

Magic can actually be named however one likes, but in this case, I will call it “Heat Transfer – Coil” magic.

The heat transfer magic I heated Yuna’s head with earlier could have been cast using one of the three methods: conduction, convection, or radiation.

However, this 2nd circle magic is a rather unique form that transmits heat using electromagnets and coils.

If I were to explain in detail, I’d have to cover “Ohm’s Law,” “Resistance Loss,” “Skin Effect,” and “Eddy Currents,” but I kept quiet as I didn’t want to make Yuna cry by overwhelming her with complicated terms.

Basically, since it is heat magic, and not vector magic, the stronger the output, the more mana you inject.

Due to the scale effect, the more powerful the magic, the lower the relative inefficiency typically becomes, which meant the detection values tended to be higher.

However, the reason the efficiency differed depending on where the magic was injected was that the resistance values were set differently within the magic circle itself.

So, while looking from the forward direction, injecting 150kE from the north might be optimal, injecting 200kE from the south could be the best route.

In such low-level magic, 150 or 200 would end up being similar, and one could ignore the efficiency and just use it, but it should be noted that once it reaches hundreds of thousands or millions, the injection stage must be considered carefully.

I simply poured about 170kE of mana into the center of the magic circle.

Beep—

The analysis indicated that the magic was cast close to the theoretical maximum efficiency threshold.

It seemed that it rounded up to the first decimal place to arrive at that result.

If calculated properly, it would have yielded an efficiency around 99.17%.

“How… how did you do it in one go…?”

Yuna said in astonishment.

“Now you can do it too. Want to try injecting 171.4kE?”

“I can’t be that precise.”

“I’ll help you, so just give it a go.”

Just like in the bathroom before, I overlapped my palm with Yuna’s hand.

Human skin contains various sensory receptors, with Merkel cells for touch and Meissner’s corpuscles for vibration particularly concentrated in the palms.

With this clasp, every time Yuna pulled out the thread of mana, the tremors in her hand or the tingling sensation allowed me to easily gauge how much mana she could inject.

Human hands are sensitively developed enough to directly influence spells being cast by others.

“Your hands are really soft. Like a baby’s skin.”

“That’s not something you should be saying, Nameya.”

“We don’t have much time left. Let’s hurry up.”

“If I faint, it’s on you.”

Yuna squeezed out her last remaining mana with all her might.

The mana she had unconsciously stained a deep red slowly flowed from her hand.

“It’s over 150 now.”

“Just a little more…?”

“It can’t overflow, so take it slow now.”

I could feel the blood flowing through her capillaries and her pulse.

Since injecting mana is an irreversible process, once injected, it cannot be contained again.

While it’s generally good to fill it generously, here we’re only considering efficiency, so I asked her to maintain careful control.

“It’s exactly 170 now. Just think of it as letting one drop out.”

“One drop? How? I don’t know how to do that!”

“You can do it. Just trust your instincts.”

“I really don’t know…!”

In the end, Yuna tightly shut her eyes and folded all four of her fingers.

She creatively attempted to touch the magic circle with her last pinky finger.

She instinctively realized that reducing the surface contact area would also decrease the amount injected.

“That’s perfect!”

Beep—

“I can’t look at the result! You have to tell me!”

“Are you seriously not going to look? If you don’t hurry, I’ll reset it!”

I pushed the box so that Yuna could see it well.

Surely, the result would be satisfactory for her.

—

* * *

Jacqueline Carroll watched the children passionately engage in the practical assessment with a satisfied smile.

It seemed that her aim to familiarize the kids with the ‘injection’ phase through a model identical to the magic circle had been early achieved.

Though it was a simple assessment where they just needed to record their processes of injecting mana into the magic circle in various ways, the existence of a quantitative scale from 0 to 10 fueled the students’ competitive spirit.

Who would record the highest number?

In the 2nd Grade A Class of Seviron Academy, a quiet competition was underway under the tacit agreement that the child who cast the magic circle with the highest efficiency would be regarded as the best during this time.

It all started with Han Gyeol Kim’s shout.

“Look! I’ve got a higher number than the teacher! It’s 8.7, 8.7!”

He shrugged his shoulders, basking in the envious gazes of the other kids.

Random numbers come out when you inject mana recklessly.

But if a high number comes up by chance, it could instantly grab the attention of the whole class.

To second graders, that in itself was such a sweet fruit.

“I went over 9!”

Iharu stuck his tongue out while showing off his box.

By then, everyone seemed to have forgotten that this was a practical assessment.

Five minutes left.

The record that seemed impossible to break was once again surpassed by Shin Si Hoo.

“Hey, everyone, look! Shin Si Hoo got 9.4!”

Si Hoo himself seemed relatively indifferent to this competition, but the commotion in the class escalated as many kids jumped up from their seats to check.

Some had already given up on the competition, while a few still held on to some hope, hoping for a tiny miracle within the remaining time.

Just before the bell signaling recess rang, Seoyuna kicked her chair back and stood up, raising her box high into the air.

“10.”

She shouted out the number with great emphasis. Yet this moment was far from an ordinary number.

“I won.”

Seoyuna directed a faint smile towards Si Hoo, a condescending grin of a clear victor.