A New World, an immersive game experience-Chapter 1018 Tournament 3, The experiments

While Eldrian and friends were having a good old time, Constantin was down in the labs, continuing the grind.

Ever since he had succeeded in casting magic on Earth, he had become the focus of further research. Honestly, Constantin himself was unsure what to make of it all. A large part of him didn't want to be the lab rat, but another part was simply glad he wasn't being treated as badly as Eldrian had been treated in the end.

Sure, Eldrian had been given time to do as he wished—for a while. The company, and especially those higher up, hadn't come for him right when he first succeeded in casting magic on Earth. Naturally, Eldrian had also hidden this fact for a while.

However, once he had somehow managed to pull mana from ANW to Earth, that had changed everything. It was such a massive breakthrough that forceful measures had been taken. And everything had gone to hell.

Constantin wasn't being treated like that. Some part of the reason was that his usage of magic was still undeveloped. Sure, he could reach out, sense, and guide mana. But his spells were still basic.

Still, having someone capable of casting magic was a massive win. After all, while those who made up the top brass in the company all had access to 'magic', theirs was not magic as commonly known. 𝙗𝒆𝒅𝒏𝙤𝒗𝒆𝙡．𝙤𝒓𝙜

Magic limited to one field, to one power, to one effect. While powerful and amazing, was lacking. Or so those who had this wonderful gift felt. Ignoring the fact that having such a special ability was a gift in itself.

Constantin, thus, was most certainly a win for the company. Especially for Zaphreal, who was the leader of the 'conservative' group within Miracle, which Constantin was part of. Or rather, had been grouped under due to Zaphreal claiming most, if not all, of the ANW department and relative personnel under his own faction.

This group was aiming for controllable increases of mana, which, while still carrying some dangers, was less likely to go from one to a million. The others, the 'idealists', or as they call themselves 'dreamers', were going for developments meant to start at, at least, one hundred. And, in all likelihood, it was going to go from one hundred to a billion.

Now, as for what Constantin was doing. His current job was rather simple. To guide mana into metals and crystals of all kinds. And while he did that, the researchers were observing the metals through various versions of mana detection devices.

Their current aim was to prove that mana somehow altered material properties. This was a known fact, after all. Mithril was magically evolved silver. It was far stronger, yet—to their knowledge

—it was still silver. Chemically, or rather, atomically.

The question then, naturally, was what mana did to the metal to take it from silver, to Celestial Silver, to Mithril.

Today marked the end of an entire week of this same experiment. At the moment, progress was slow. Or rather, nothing of importance had happened. And this was for two reasons:

Reason one: Constantin didn't know how to evolve metals. He knew of the theory, and he had enchanted some things before with the system's help. But even that was difficult without the system's help. Crucially, however, enchanting and evolving were not the same thing.

In fact, the commonly accepted knowledge was that the artificial evolution of magic materials was impossible.

Reason two: Constantin was quick to become mentally fatigued. Guiding mana wasn't a task free of energy expenditure. Sure, Eldrian always did it like it was second nature, like it was as simple as moving a finger. But it wasn't. It took effort. And a massive amount of it.

These two reasons both reduced the chances of Constantin succeeding in changing the properties of the material he was trying to evolve—though really he was just trying to enchant it—, while also limiting the number of times he could do it.

"What about that thing?" Constantin asked, pointing towards the mana 'magnet' while fighting for his consciousness.

Magic fatigue was something most players had long since moved past—due to their avatars' stat increases. For him, with his normal human body... it was torturous.

However, it wasn't as bad as when they had first started this experiment. He was getting better at guiding and controlling mana. And he was becoming more comfortable with the entire process. In other words, it was taking him less and less mental effort to execute some magical phenomena.

"Why can't we just make more of them? Do we even know how it collects mana?" Naturally, the researchers taking part in these experiments—or rather, anyone who knew of the labs— were more informed than most Miracle employees. Most devs still didn't know that magic was real. Joren was the one and only exception.

"You know we don't." Replied one of the researchers. A middle-aged man seeking some sort of acclaim in this research. Desperate to prove his 'genius'.

While Zaphreal tried to limit those who participated in the experiments to trustworthy individuals, that didn't mean they were all completely sane. You had to be a little insane to believe in magic. And to make it your life goal required an extra sprinkle of insanity, along with a good helping of 'drive'.

"I do," Constantin admitted. "But why not? Shouldn't we be putting all our effort into examining it?"

Honestly, Constantin would much rather be practicing magic in ANW. If they gave him a few months, he would be able to master more than just a few basic spells. He might even learn how to create magic metals.

Though, honestly, that wasn't something 'normally' possible. Magic metals, in fact, all magic materials, only come into existence over time. To rush it, to make it. That wasn't really something possible.

Well, not normally. Eldrian's spell, Creation, could do it. Though he had yet to realize the full potential of this spell of his.

"We've tried. You've tried, too."

He sure had. Constantin sighed, recalling his best efforts at making sense of the mana 'magnet'. Since he could now sense mana, he had thought he might be able to sense, or feel, something in the thing.

that it wasn't a type of mana crystal, Mov Crystal, or Magic Crystal. In fact, that little fact ruled out most known magical materials. After He had not.

Sure, he could feel that mana was denser around it. That, somehow, mana was gathering towards it. But the thing itself had seemed to be devoid of mana.

As useless as that piece of information might seem, it did confirm that it wasn't a type of mana crystal, Mov Crystal, or Magic Crystal. In fact, that little fact ruled out most known magical materials. After all, the defining factor for something to be called a magical material was that it contained mana.

"If you really want to know, you should go ask Julius. He was the one who figured out the final piece of the puzzle." Qiren said. "Now, back to work. We won't find success if we don't try."

It was strange how that 'mad scientist' had just burst into their lab one day, saying he had found it. What he had found, they still didn't know. Heck, they hadn't even known him.

However, when they had tried to stop him, Zaphreal had told them to let him do what he wanted. And like that, the world's first mana 'magnet' had been born. With everything in the dark but Zaphreal and his mad scientist buddy.