I was just getting into the juicy part of my new discoveries. The applications.

"The first method to get stronger is that you get smart." I dropped to the wall and leaned against the window.

Her reaction wasn't quite what I expected.

"Are you calling me dumb?" Her enthusiasm clearly dropped.

"Yes. I guess."

"Was that whole speech to call me dumb once? I could have been studying, you know?" Her fingers started to twirl in a disgusting motion.

'She's gonna tickle me out of spite, isn't she?'

I had to salvage my situation!

I should talk as concisely as I can.

"Partially. But let me explain before I get abused. Remember how I talked about enlightenment a minute ago?" I changed the topic right back to track.

"Yeah?"

"So you force all mana to do unnatural things. But that takes a lot of your internal mana. Instead, if you were to optimise it by knowing exactly what to do not only could you extend your internal pool of mana but also use more complicated spells. Not to mention, it might aid your transformation into a devil."

There was a glimmer in her eyes again. Nice bait.

"So how do I get smart."

.

.

.

"That was an incredibly dumb question. You should probably give up."

HoW Do I Get SMArT?

Almost barfed there. It was like talking to a three-year-old.

'Mama how do I become an astronaut?' level of dumb.

"There's nothing like a dumb question! Just explain it!" She insisted.

"Uhhh… ugh." I really didn't want to deal with her curiosity cuz it was pointless. There was no way she would actually become smart with that negative IQ of hers.

But if I didn't explain in to her she wouldn't get off my case.

"To get smart for becoming strong you'd need to study molecular and mana science along with chemistry and physics. You would at the very least need them to a science degree level.

You don't study that far in nobility schools like this one so you'd have to look into the books from other schools. Basically, become a scientist." My words felt empty because I didn't believe that Yuuno could do it.

But if she could she would have an almost infinite pool of mana.

This was the exact reason why I almost never ran out of mana in my previous life.

Mana efficiency.

I consumed mana smartly at a rate that was lower than the one I generated it.

Her face pondered for a bit before she took notes of what I told her on the side of the notebook she was studying in previously.

"I see. If it's for getting strong I can study." She shook her fist a little to excite herself. Was this musclebrain behaviour? Or was she just a simple-minded person? For some reason, it felt like I was talking to an ape. "Now, what's the other method?"

Finally! The mis en place was now over and we were ready to get into some heated cooking!

"Oh, that?" A smile crept on my face. This was my golden goose. I could guarantee my safety for years with this... "I came up with an entirely new method of mana training. I call it The Dark Breathe of Mana Inductance."

"Chuuni."

"Shut up and listen! What you'll do to train from now is cover your entire body with mana and try to create an equilibrium with the environment. That's the hard part. After that it's easy.

Once you get to equilibrium, you need to let out all the mana outside in a short burst and when the mana reenters your body, some extra mana from the environment would also enter without you needing to interfere or consciously draw it in. Create multiple instances of that and boom! You're overpowered." EZ.

It was a method that should work in theory, and with me here as a lifeguard of sorts nothing should go wrong. Fingers crossed.

"You just said equilibrium like it was nothing." Well, yeah... for someone like her it might've been hard, but not for me. It wasn't that big of a problem, though.

"It's not like you have to reach absolute equilibrium, that's impossible. Just a semi-perfect equilibrium. You know what, just let me teach you." I grabbed her biceps and turned her around. I placed my palms on her shoulder blade. "Concentrate and let your mana out. Like you're meditating for restructuring."

"Okay?"

Her pores stood up as if she had goosebumps and quickly settled down. I felt her pure crystal clear mana through my hands.

I could circulate mana in my body so I started taking some of her's inside. Hehe… that sounds sorta nasty. Anyways, I started to regulate her output.

[Can you hear me? Or does it take all of your brain's computing power to pull this off?] I wasn't trying to make fun of her. For a first-timer this stage was legitimately mentally taxing.

[I can hear you just fine.]

[Great… lower your mana output by like 10 times.] Transmitting thoughts directly so that she wouldn't need to use her external senses and snap out of this state.

[That's hardddd. I'm already holding back a lot.]

Pch... all kids do nowadays was complain. Time to hype!

[SAY IT WITH ME! OOO OOO!]

[AAA AAA!]

We howled like gorillas.

But everyone is an ape on the inside.

Her torso tensed and she squeezed in her mana. If I were to compare this situation to something, it was like controlling the exact minuscule amount of piss you'd let out while having a full bladder raring to go. Nonetheless, she managed to get her mana to a tenth of its initial amount.

[A little higher.]

[You've got to be kidding me…]

[ooo ooo…]

[AAA AAA!]

After a few more repitions of this tuning, her mana hit the correct amount. Well, almost the correct amount. She was now in somewhat of an equilibrium with the environment.

Her pores stook up again.

Must have been the adrenaline.

[WOAAAHHH!! This feels soooo good.] Nice! It wasn't overwhelming for her.

[Remember this feeling… you should be able to get to this even without me.]

[Unnhnnn… I got the gist of it. Basically, you calibrate your body.]

That was one way to phrase it.

[Now that that's done, here's the easy part… you let your mana out in short bursts.]

[How short are we talking here? Full nozzle sorta short? Or sprinkler bursts?]

[Think pissing but someone is right outside the toilet so you pee in a way that doesn't make too much noise.]

It really sucked but taking a piss was the best analogy for mana.

[Gotcha.]

I leaned back and then little bursts of mana started making their way around the room. With every burst, her internal mana would get lower and then immediately shoot up as the excess mana from the outside went in.

Perfect.

The mana got so intense that her white hair started to glow and her body started to ascend a centimetre off the ground.

IT WAS WAY MORE EFFECTIVE THAN I THOUGHT IT WOULD BE! I WAS A GENIUS AFTER ALL!

"That's it! STOP!"

I slapped her back and brought her back to reality and the ground.

Some of her silver hair started to reflect light weirdly. But The Dark Breath was a success!

"WHAT WAS THAT?"

"The Dark Breath of Mana Induction."

"I went into a trance right there."

"You did. But you'll get used to it once you do this a couple of times.

"And my mana- MY MANA! It's like the amount I built up in 3 whole months in a couple of seconds! Why did you stop me?!"

"Precisely because you built up three months' worth of mana in a couple of seconds." I pointed at her stomach. More specifically the area to the left of the pancreas where most mana is stored. "I didn't expect mana induction to be this big of a success. So I presumed that you'd blow up if you went over a minute." Sometimes my genius frightened me.

"Over a minute? I barely did it for 15 seconds!"

"Not taking any chances with you. You will not exceed 15 seconds, and you'll have me be there to monitor you when you do this. Got it?"

Her shoulders drooped. The thought of getting this much power from something that takes this little effort must have been enticing to her.

Mind you, she was sick of fighting in her previous life. The reason she's trying so hard is to protect her loved ones in case war breaks out.

She isn't a muscle headed monkey brain because of her passion, she has a clear motivation and goal. Getting to that with as little effort as possible is probably her ideal life.

"Okay, Mom." She quipped. Haha... Just because I was concerned about her, I got labelled a Mom. Very funny.

"Also you'll do this once a week and internalise the new mana over that week. Got it?"

"Yes, Mom."

"Great! Now let's sleep. Get Mommy her futon.~" I chuckled.

"Get it yourself." Tch.

Didn't work.

And we slept as if nothing happened. Even though we grasped what would hopefully someday be considered the single greatest discovery of mankind.