Zeldryn remained seated in his chair.
His eyes were still open.
His gaze was fixed on the empty space in front of him, but his mind wasn't paying any attention to the room.
Only one thing kept circling through his thoughts.
Mana.
How was he supposed to absorb it?
And once it had been absorbed, how was he supposed to make that mana move toward his Mana Hole?
Zeldryn tried digging through his memories of the novel Life Really Is Happy, Right?
More than five thousand chapters.
He had read countless battles, training sessions, increases in power, and abilities that used mana.
There had to be something he could use.
Even a tiny piece of information.
A single explanation.
Or even just one sentence.
Zeldryn leaned back slightly in his chair.
His eyes moved toward the ceiling as he continued trying to remember.
How did the protagonist absorb mana for the first time?
He remembered a few parts.
The protagonist sat down.
Sensed mana.
Absorbed it.
Then...
Zeldryn frowned.
That was it.
The novel apparently never explained the process in detail.
At least, there was no detailed explanation that Zeldryn could still remember.
In the novel, everything had seemed simple.
The protagonist absorbed mana from his surroundings.
Once the mana entered his body, he let it move toward his Mana Hole.
Then the process was complete.
Zeldryn slowly tapped his finger against the table.
Tap.
Tap.
Tap.
“Absorb the mana... then let it move toward the Mana Hole,” Zeldryn muttered to himself.
He repeated the sentence in his mind.
Absorb it.
Let it move.
Toward the Mana Hole.
Zeldryn stopped tapping his finger.
His eyebrows lifted slightly.
“Wait,” Zeldryn said quietly.
There was one part that suddenly felt important.
Let it move.
Not move it himself.
Not force it.
Let it.
Zeldryn immediately sat up straight.
His mind returned to the experiment he had done that afternoon.
When he first managed to focus his mind on mana, a single tiny golden-yellow particle had appeared within the darkness of his mind.
Afterward, when he opened his eyes, he had been able to see the mana particles filling the air around him.
Until now, Zeldryn had assumed that he needed to find some way to control them.
Pull them.
Move them.
Force them inside.
But what if his assumption had been wrong from the very beginning?
What if the moment a mana particle appeared inside his mind was already the beginning of the absorption process?
Zeldryn touched his chin.
“If that's the case...”
Zeldryn muttered as he continued thinking.
“Maybe I don't need to force it to move.”
He remembered the sentence from the novel again.
Let it move toward the Mana Hole.
“So I just need to let it?”
Zeldryn asked himself.
Of course, he had no idea whether the theory was actually correct.
He didn't even understand what had truly happened when that single mana particle appeared inside his mind earlier that afternoon.
But compared to every other possibility he had right now, at least this theory was based on something he had actually read.
The next problem was even more annoying.
The Mana Hole.
Zeldryn fell silent.
He knew the term.
He also knew that a Manholer possessed a Mana Hole and that absorbed mana would eventually move there.
But...
“What exactly is a Mana Hole?” Zeldryn quietly asked himself.
He understood its general function.
But what did it look like?
How was someone supposed to sense it?
How did someone know when mana had reached it?
Zeldryn had absolutely no idea.
The novel he had read had treated things like that as if they were basic knowledge that everyone in the world already understood.
The problem was that Reka wasn't from this world.
Stolen novel; please report.
He had only been a reader.
And now he had to understand something he had never even bothered thinking about while reading.
Zeldryn slowly rubbed his face.
If only this body didn't belong to some isolated bastard...
Zeldryn complained silently in his mind.
If his circumstances were different, he could probably just ask someone.
Zorin Giorry was a Manholer.
There had to be other people at the main residence who understood mana as well.
Guards.
Knights.
Teachers.
Or anyone else who regularly used mana.
Zeldryn would probably only need to ask a few simple questions and get his answers.
What was a Mana Hole?
How did someone sense it?
How did someone absorb mana?
Done.
But instead, he was stuck far away from the main residence.
And then there was the old Zeldryn's reputation.
Asking someone to teach him something he was supposed to already know would only create even more questions.
Zeldryn gritted his teeth.
For a moment, he felt irritated by the circumstances of the body he had ended up in.
But a few seconds later, Zeldryn took a breath.
“There's no point complaining,” Zeldryn told himself.
Complaining wasn't going to make Zorin suddenly appear in his room.
It wasn't going to summon a mana teacher who could explain everything to him.
And it certainly wasn't going to make a finished novel suddenly provide additional explanations.
For now, Zeldryn only had the information he could still remember.
So that was what he had to use.
Zeldryn returned to his theory.
First, make mana particles appear inside his mind.
After that...
Do nothing.
Don't pull them.
Don't push them.
Don't try to direct them.
Just let them move on their own.
Simple.
Almost too simple.
But there was no harm in trying.
Zeldryn adjusted his sitting position.
He placed both hands as comfortably as possible.
He slowly took a breath.
Then exhaled.
Only then did Zeldryn close his eyes.
The sight of the table, the candle, and the room slowly disappeared into darkness.
Zeldryn didn't do anything immediately.
He first tried to calm his mind.
The sound of the night wind could still be heard through the gap in the window.
The heat inside the room was still there.
His body still carried pain from the injuries he had suffered earlier.
But one by one, Zeldryn began shutting those sensations out.
He did the same thing he had done that afternoon.
He focused his mind on mana.
This time, it was much easier.
Zeldryn didn't need nearly as much time as he had during his first attempt.
Within the darkness of his mind, a tiny point of light slowly appeared.
Golden-yellow.
A single mana particle.
Zeldryn recognized it immediately.
But before he could think about anything else, a second point appeared.
Zeldryn was slightly surprised.
Then came a third.
A fourth.
A fifth.
Their numbers continued to grow.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
More and more.
Zeldryn became confused.
That afternoon, he had only managed to make a single particle appear inside his mind.
Now there were far more.
Some of the particles looked fairly bright.
Others were dim.
A few were almost transparent.
All of them moved through the darkness of his mind.
A sense of excitement slowly rose inside Zeldryn.
But the moment his attention began to shift toward that excitement, one of the particles grew dim.
Then another began to fade.
Several golden-yellow points slowly disappeared.
Zeldryn immediately realized what was happening.
Focus.
Zeldryn reminded himself in his mind.
He quickly pushed his excitement aside.
His attention returned entirely to mana.
Slowly...
One particle appeared again.
Then another.
The particles that had vanished began returning one by one.
This time, Zeldryn didn't allow his emotions to interfere with his concentration.
He simply watched them.
Nothing more.
Once the number of particles became stable again, Zeldryn remembered his theory.
Let them move.
He didn't try to pull a single particle.
He didn't try to move them.
Zeldryn even tried to keep his mind as relaxed as possible.
He allowed the particles to move however they wanted.
Some moved left.
Some moved right.
Several seemed to pass straight through each other.
Others moved in directions Zeldryn couldn't understand.
Just like the mana particles he had seen in the real world.
Zeldryn simply waited.
One minute passed.
Nothing happened.
The particles continued moving randomly.
Zeldryn maintained his concentration.
Two minutes.
No change.
Three minutes.
Still the same.
Not a single particle showed any sign of behaving differently.
Zeldryn began to doubt himself.
But he continued waiting.
Four minutes.
Then five.
Still nothing happened.
Zeldryn started thinking.
Was his theory wrong?
Maybe the word “let” in the novel didn't mean what he thought it meant.
Maybe there was still another step he needed to perform.
Or perhaps he really did need someone to teach him.
Looks like I'll have to find someone el...
Zeldryn's thought suddenly stopped.
!?
One of the mana particles changed.
Zeldryn immediately focused his attention on it.
At first, he thought his concentration had slipped again.
But no.
The particle really was beginning to disappear.
Only this time, it was different.
Previously, whenever Zeldryn lost focus, the color of the particles became dimmer.
Their light slowly faded.
Then they vanished.
This particle wasn't doing that.
Its color remained golden-yellow.
Its light hadn't dimmed at all.
But its form was slowly disappearing.
As though the darkness surrounding it was swallowing the particle whole.
Zeldryn did nothing.
He simply watched.
A few moments later, the particle disappeared completely.
Zeldryn was confused.
What was that?
Zeldryn asked himself.
But before he could search for an answer, another particle began doing the same thing.
Its color didn't fade.
Its light remained unchanged.
But slowly...
It too was swallowed by the darkness.
Huh?
Zeldryn became even more confused.
Ten seconds later, another particle followed.
Around eight seconds after that, another disappeared.
Zeldryn started paying attention to the intervals.
Twelve seconds.
One particle.
Five seconds.
Another.
Fifteen seconds.
Another particle disappeared.
Twenty seconds.
Another.
Fourteen seconds.
There was no consistent pattern.
Sometimes it happened quickly.
Sometimes it took longer.
But slowly, the number of mana particles inside Zeldryn's mind continued to decrease.
Zeldryn still didn't do anything.
He remembered the only clue he had.
Let them move.
So he simply waited.
Minute after minute passed.
The number of particles continued decreasing.
Five minutes.
Ten minutes.
Zeldryn maintained his concentration.
He didn't know whether what was happening was correct or whether he had made some kind of mistake.
But the way these particles disappeared was clearly different from what happened when he lost focus.
Because of that, Zeldryn decided to keep waiting.
Twenty minutes passed.
Only a small number of particles remained.
The darkness inside his mind, which had previously been filled with golden-yellow points, slowly became empty again.
One by one.
The particles continued disappearing.
Until around thirty minutes later...
The final particle vanished.
Darkness once again filled Zeldryn's entire mind.
There was no more golden-yellow light.
Not a single particle remained.
Zeldryn still didn't open his eyes.
He remained still.
What just happened?
Zeldryn asked himself.
He genuinely didn't know.
Had all those particles been successfully absorbed?
Had they moved toward his Mana Hole?
Or had they simply disappeared?
Nothing he remembered from the novel could give him an immediate answer.
Maybe that part had never been explained.
Maybe it had been explained and Reka simply forgot.
Considering he had read more than five thousand chapters in only three months, either possibility was completely believable.
Zeldryn tried to think about what he should do next.
But suddenly...
Something felt strange in his lower abdomen.
Just below his navel.
At first, it only felt like a faint pressure.
Zeldryn didn't pay much attention to it.
But several seconds later, the pressure grew stronger.
That area began to tighten.
Tighter.
And tighter.
Zeldryn frowned.
What is this?
Zeldryn questioned it in his mind.
The pressure continued increasing.
Stronger.
Even stronger.
Until finally...
“ARGHHH!”
Zeldryn screamed.
His eyes snapped open.
His hand instinctively moved toward his lower abdomen.
The pain arrived so suddenly that Zeldryn didn't even have time to understand what had happened.
His body immediately bent forward.
“ARGH... DAMN IT!”
Zeldryn screamed again in pain.
He tried forcing his attention away from mana.
Maybe the pain was happening because he was still concentrating.
If he stopped focusing, perhaps the pain would stop too.
But it didn't.
Not at all.
The pain remained.
In fact, it became even worse.
Zeldryn gritted his teeth.
It felt as though his lower abdomen had been struck by a blunt object with tremendous force.
The problem was that pain from a blow usually reached its peak and then gradually faded.
This was different.
The pain wasn't going away.
It wasn't weakening.
It wasn't decreasing in the slightest.
It felt as though the same crushing impact was still there, refusing to end.
“ARGHH!”
Zeldryn grabbed his clothes tightly.
His body bent even farther forward.
The pain from the bruises and wounds that had been covering his body suddenly felt insignificant compared to this new agony.
The area below his navel felt like the center of everything.
Then the pain began spreading through the rest of his body.
His stomach.
His waist.
His chest.
His arms.
His legs.
Zeldryn began struggling to breathe.
“Hah... hah...”
His breathing became uneven.
Sweat covered his face.
His hands began trembling.
Reka had experienced pain during his life in the modern world.
He had been injured.
He had fallen.
He had gotten sick.
But never like this.
Never had he felt pain so intense that even thinking became difficult.
Zeldryn tried supporting himself against the table.
His fingers gripped the edge tightly.
But his strength slowly began disappearing.
Zeldryn's vision started to blur.
The candle flame on the table, which had been perfectly visible only moments ago, began swaying inside his vision.
One flame became two.
Then merged back into one.
Then grew even blurrier.
Zeldryn tried forcing his eyes to focus.
It didn't work.
“What... is happening...?”
Zeldryn forced the words out of his mouth.
There was no answer.
The room remained unchanged.
Only the sound of his rough breathing filled the silence.
Zeldryn's vision slowly became darker.
The candlelight began shrinking.
Smaller.
And smaller.
His body lost its strength.
The fingers gripping the table slowly slipped loose.
Zeldryn's vision grew darker.
Darker.
And darker...
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