"How do you mitigate the risks from the Level Up ritual?" Bob inquired, and Nathan continued his lecture.

  In summary, the main risk of Resurrection and Level Up stems from the fact that Mana can be dispelled, and artificial living tissues are made of Mana. Therefore, the simplest solution is to gradually replace the artificial tissues with real living tissues. By simply removing a minuscule amount of artificial tissue from the wound every day, living cells will gradually and naturally take over, treating the void left behind by the dispelled Mana like minor injuries.

  Moreover, the artificial living tissues on Bob's wound were special: They were tissues from the godly beasts, the Behemoth and the Leviathan, which have their own minds. If anyone attempts to dispel them from Bob's wound, the beasts will defend unyieldingly. Nevertheless, if Bob's adversaries were experts in magic-craft, they would eventually be able to find a way to defeat the minds of the godly beasts and dispel their artificial tissues.

  "Therefore, I will need to monitor your wound closely for the next few months." Nathan concluded the answer to Bob's question solemnly.

  "Are there any side effects for being a beastman?" Tiffany asked with concern.

  "No, there aren't any that I'm aware of." Nathan continued to answer professionally.

  There were no registered or legal beastmen in the Kingdom. Even outside of the Kingdom, the beastman race was a rarity. Humans, who often prioritized their own financial incentives, formed groups and discriminated against the beastmen race as they risked losing against the more powerful race in fair competitions. Many jurisdictions in the world, like Liliana's Kingdom, treated them like nuances and outlawed their existence. In response, beastmen often formed tribes away from human settlements, living in harsh conditions. There were several tribes of beastmen around the world, with the most famous being the Draconic Kingdom. As a researcher, Nathan had studied all the available documentations, research papers, and medical records regarding the many beastman races.

  "By the way, where did the Leviathan come from?" Bob asked Tiffany. He was unconscious when Levi transformed.

  "It was Saint Levi. She transformed into the Leviathan before running away." Tiffany answered.

  "Oh, really? Well, she was good at water spells, but I felt that the Behemoth was way stronger." Bob commented.

  "But you only fought against her human form. Her Mana increased significantly after she transformed." Tiffany pointed out.

  "Interesting. I am looking forward to transforming too." Bob said, eager to test his newfound strength.

  "Nathan, could you please teach me Magic as well?" Tiffany asked, as she was now the only one in her family who still possessed Divine Power.

  "Sure. Relax and let me remove the Blessing of the Goddess from you. Give me five," Nathan said.

  In only two seconds, Tiffany felt all of her Divine Power was drained from Nathan’s palm. She had exhausted most of her Divine Power casting the Kill Zone spell twice, so there wasn’t much left.

  "Typical knights who use up their Divine Power do not become able to use Magic afterwards. What did you do?" Tiffany questioned with curiosity.

  "I cast Dispel to remove Liliana's Blessing from you." Nathan explained. "Dispel can neutralize many basic spells, but not the more complex ones."

  "Not the complex ones? The Blessing of the Goddess' glyph doesn't look simple to me. Can it also remove curses and malignant status effects? Also, you didn’t chant." Tiffany asked a series of questions. Apparently, she was enthralled by Nathan's lecture.

  During the war, she saw and endured many status effects and curses that could not be cured immediately. Since Divine Power naturally rejects foreign Mana, all status effects and curses will fade eventually. The knights called this phenomenon the Blessing of the Goddess. Nevertheless, abnormal statuses were still an inconvenience. The Dispel spell could become a huge advantage in a fight or war.

  "I've been researching for a way to remove a strong curse in the past few years. The Dispel spell was just a side invention. It didn't work at all." Nathan explained, shaking his head in disappointment of the spell. "I created it in a way that doesn’t require chanting just for convenience."

  Stolen novel; please report.

  Then, Nathan changed the subject. "Next, let me teach you how to use Magic and train with it."

  "Why do you need to teach us? We've already learned how to train in school." Adrian asked, eagar to go play and relax after the long lecture.

  "Training to use Magic is different from training your Divine Power. You won't grow stronger by simply praying in a church anymore." Nathan explained.

  Mana is energy. Consequently, the two most direct measurements of raw strength are:

  1) Max mana quantity, or the amount of energy a person can stockpile, and,

  2) Max mana output, or how much energy a person can use per minute.

  Max mana quantity depends on the capacity of the person's mana circuit in their internal organs. Increasing mana capacity involves regularly depleting one's mana reserve during training, which temporarily relaxes one's mana circuit, allowing them to rest. Afterwards, through eating and meditating in a Mana-rich location, the mana circuit can be filled up to its utmost limit, which stretches and strengthens it, permanently increasing its capacity. Lastly, Nathan stressed that the depletion step was crucial, because constantly stretching one's mana circuit without letting it rest could permanently injure in their organs and internal mana circuit, rendering the person unable to train further.

  Max mana output depends on cardiovascular and muscular strength. One can strengthen them by regularly casting spells and exercising. While straightforward, Nathan emphasized that cardiovascular strength was more crucial than muscular strength, as his experiments had found no gain in Mana output after achieving a certain level of muscular strength. Nevertheless, one's muscle will atrophy without regular exercise, so, weight lifting must become a routine in their training regime.

  Next, Nathan taught the family how to use Magic, or what people commonly referred to as Demonic Spells.

  Mana can store information. Therefore, one can store a list of Magic in their Mana Space using this property. Divine Spells, on the other hand, utilizes the same concept, but instead of using one's private Mana Space, the spells are stored in Liliana's Blessing.

  "Liliana's Blessing is that church in your Mana World." Nathan explained, "Now that the church in your Mana World was abolished, you could imagine a book to write down the glyphs of the spells, and put it somewhere else, somewhere safe." He warned the family at the end. "Don't tell anyone about it."

  Then, Nathan taught the family how to disguise their Mana as Divine Power. However, its hypnotizing side effects were no longer functional. The final lesson was to disguise Magic as Divine Spells. In short, they simply needed to add the glyph of the Blessing of the Goddess on top of every spell they cast, because this was how people tell Magic apart from Divine Spells.

  "Magic and Divine Spells are basically the same thing," Adrian commented. "What is the purpose of adding the Goddess' glyph to the spells?"

  "It has further applications in warfare." Nathan answered. "Let's save this for next time, as it will be another lecture."

  In about thirty minutes, switching between lecture and practice, the family got a pretty good grasp on Magic.

  After the lecture, Tiffany began to worry, "Nathan, should we move away from this place? Just in case someone might come."

  "No, it's okay." Nathan calmly reassured Tiffany. "I always keep track of most of the Kingdom’s elites and their plans. At the moment, there is no one coming. I came here because I received information about Levi."

  Nathan’s lecture lasted until 7 pm, after which, the family went back to their stone house. There were a lot of fish in the river so they had fish soup, steamed fish and pan-fried vegetables. Everyone was too tired to eat lunch earlier, but their hunger caught up with them at dinner. The family was famished from the day's events and devoured their dinner in silence. "Everyone, eat up. The best way to restore Mana is to eat." said Nathan. Seeing that there wasn’t enough food, Nathan went to the stove to cook more dishes.

  "Nathan, let me do it. Sit down and eat," Tiffany said, as she stood up. She had cooked extra portions already, but it wasn’t enough, and she felt bad about it.

  "Let me do it, Tiffany. I'm already full. Since you all depleted your Mana today, you need to eat more. Please keep eating, and I will keep the food coming," Nathan answered with enthusiasm as he started pan-frying more fish and cooking more spaghetti.

  After dinner, Adrian asked Nathan as they washed the dishes together, "Nathan, how did you become so strong?" He handed Nathan a dish after applying soap to it.

  "I need strength to protect my family so I train everyday." Nathan smiled at Adrian as he rinsed the dish.

  "Can you really become that strong through regular training alone?" Adrian wondered, as adults often oversimplified their answers. He then handed a soaped bowl to Nathan.

  "Yes, many people slack off from time to time; and most stop training after school. However, if you persevere and continue training, you will eventually become one of the strongest." Nathan replied as he rinsed the bowl. "Adrian, how old are you?"

  "Twelve." Adrian answered.

  "When I was young, I asked the same question too. My master told me that getting strong will take decades of training and it is not something that you can achieve in your teenage or early adult years. In fact, I am still young and not as strong as you think."

  By around 10pm, everyone had drifted off into a deep slumber, having depleted most of their Mana during the day. Nathan planned to watch the entire night by himself.

  He recalled Adrian’s earlier question and pondered upon it again.

  "Why do I become strong?" Nathan wondered as he gazed at the sky and sighed. "Clearly, I am not strong enough."

  He started recalling his past as he sat on the roof.