Inside the depths of his Core, Alwin found Niwla and Winal hunched around a Mental Whiteboard.

Niwla paced right in front of it, muttering something under his breath. Meanwhile, Winal sat atop his throne of Mental Hands. The structure had recruited even more Mental Hands to accommodate his now larger Crimson Gold King Ant form.

Hovering beside the board were a pair of Mental Hands carrying some Mental Markers. They twitched, eager to write something down, though all that was currently written was:

Light Mana? Light Essence?

It was clear that Niwla and Winal were growing more mental by the second as they attempted to figure out how to refine Light Essence.

Niwla spotted Alwin and lit up—figuratively, of course.

"Alwin, we might need to rely on you for the refining process again."

"No!" Alwin drew out the word before replying with a short and snappy, "Okay."

Niwla then continued, "I tried mimicking how you created Light Mana a while ago, but nothing happened."

His own set of Mental Hands pointed to a bucket of Mana that had a Mental Light Bulb hovering right above it. When Alwin moved in for a closer look, the liquid inside was simply a translucent light blue, a far cry from the bright white associated with Light Mana.

"Even when Winal tried, the results were the same."

Winal simply shook his ant head, antennae drooping like wilted flowers. It might've been because deep down they were the same person, but something told Alwin that Winal was a bit down after disappointing Uchronia… again. And now, not even being able to create Light Mana was like a second punch to his ant gut.

Alwin hopped up to him and gave him a pat on the side of his flaming cheek. But since Alwin was too lazy to conjure up some Mental Hands, he simply tackled Winal's head—harder than a tap but softer than a full-blown tackle.

"Don't worry, Winal. Light Mana isn't as easy as Fire Mana. Even someone like Lapis was surprised when I did it way back when. Now, let your big brother take over."

Winal cracked a soft smile and whispered a barely audible, "Thank you."

Alwin rolled over to Niwla's bucket of Mana and tackled—an actual one—the Mental Light Bulb away.

"Let the master show you how it's really done."

Niwla channeled his inner Uchronia and rolled his eyes at the statement.

Alwin brought out his own Mental Light Bulb and, using his Mental Hands, positioned it right above the bucket of Mana. Almost immediately, the liquid inside began to shine. A soft, glowing circle in the middle that slowly radiated outward like ripples in a pond.

"How?" Niwla asked, dumbfounded.

"Magic," Alwin said.

"I know that, but how?"

Niwla rushed over to inspect the Mental Light Bulb, looking the device up and down as if he had never seen such a thing before. From the glass casing, to the glowing metal filament in the middle, down to the support wires.

As he continued to inspect the bulb, Alwin noticed something happening to the bucket of Mana.

The places where Niwla's fat turkey body obscured the light source, the Mana lost its shine almost immediately. Not Dark Mana, it had reverted back to regular, bland, translucent blue Mana. And when the surface was no longer blocked, it would regain its shine and transform into Light Mana.

Note to self: don't block the light source unless you want to undo all of the progress made.

"How?" Niwla squawked. "My light bulb is exactly the same as your light bulb. They're both incandescent light bulbs. So why doesn't mine produce Light Mana like yours?

"If I knew, I would tell you. It'd mean less work for me."

"It doesn't make any sense." Niwla shook his head.

"It makes sense to me. If you want Light Mana, you need light. Just like how if you want Dark Mana, you need darkness."

"If you said in order to create Fire Mana you need to ignite it, or to create Ice Mana you'd have to freeze the Mana, I'd get it. But not this. Especially with such convoluted methods. I mean, a light bulb and cardboard boxes? It shouldn't be that easy. Even Fire and Ice Mana took much more effort."

"What can I say?" Alwin smirked and wiggled his eyes. "I'm just a genius. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got some work to do."

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

"I thought you didn't want to do any work?"

"I don't, but the faster we get this done, the faster we can trigger a Tribulation and the sooner I can see how those Tribulation beings would react. The looks on their faces are going to be hilarious!"

"Yeah, maybe we shouldn't upset the beings that are infinitely stronger than we are."

"I'm not upsetting them, I just want to see their faces when they realize we're trying to become weaker. I mean it is a pretty dumb idea."

"That's… you know what? Never mind. You'll realize why we're Devolving when you can see it for yourself."

"Whatever you say," Alwin said as he hopped away to an isolated corner in his Core.

Niwla and Winal stood side by side, gazing into the bucket of Light Mana as they attempted to figure out the mechanisms behind how Alwin could transform Mana into Light Mana using nothing but a light bulb.

It was just a normal incandescent light bulb, nothing too fancy. But Alwin was a genius, so only he could do something like that.

Now, he had to suffer from his success as he was the only one able to create Light Mana and presumably the only one who could figure out how to refine Light Essence.

If only Niwla were here to help with the brainstorming, but something told him that he wasn't going to leave that bucket of Light Mana till he could bridge the gap between their skills.

Alwin got out his own Mental tools and in the blink of an eye, there was a Mental Light Bulb hovering over a bucket of now Light Mana. Sure, that was the Light Mana taken care of, or was it?

His earlier observations told him that all he had was a surface-level understanding of Light Mana—quite literally, he might add.

Alwin got out his handy, dandy Mental Remote Controller and aimed it at the Light Mana. Using the Mental Hands, they navigated through the numerous buttons—it felt like more had been added somehow—until he found the coveted 'Status' button.

Pressing down on it revealed even more information about the Mana in front of him, via a floating status screen.

Light Mana: 0.5%

Spirit Mana: 99.5%

Yup, it was just as he feared. Only the top layer of Mana had been successfully converted into Light Mana. A simple light bulb wasn't strong enough to penetrate through the liquid and transform the rest of the Mana into Light Mana.

Alwin had an idea.

He conjured up another Mental Bucket. Though instead of the standard steel bucket, this one was made out of one hundred percent see-through glass. He filled it to the brim with Mana, then positioned the Mental Light Bulb overhead again.

White light poured down, bathing the liquid. The whole bucket lit up, shining bright like a star.

Success!

Or was it?

Alwin had another hunch, and the Mental Remote made its appearance once again.

Light Mana: 2%

Spirit Mana: 98%

Yup. Once again, only the surface had been transformed into Light Mana, while the rest of the Mana remained stubbornly unchanged. If he couldn't even convert the whole bucket into Light Mana, then refining Light Essence was nothing more than a pipedream.

It was still down to the same problem: a simple light bulb wasn't strong enough to penetrate through the depths of the liquid.

Alwin sighed. Why couldn't it be a chain reaction? Like, light from the Light Mana would convert the nearby Mana into Light Mana. It would've made everything so much easier.

But no, Mana just had to be stubborn like that.

What he needed was something stronger than a single light bulb.

A million light bulbs!

That could work, but something told him that that was going to put a strain on more than his electricity bill.

No, he needed more. Something beyond a light bulb. Stronger than even a giant light bulb. Brighter than the biggest light bulb imaginable.

And then it hit him.

A Mental Light Bulb popped up right above his head.

The Mental Hand grabbed the glowing Mental Light Bulb and began to float all the way up to the top of the Core. Alwin stared at that glowing bright dot ascending to the heavens. The higher it reached, the more intense its glow became, forcing Alwin to squint.

Though it was too far to see clearly now, he could feel the Mental Hands had reached the top of the Core. He issued his commands, and they began to screw the Mental Light Bulb into the sky.

With every twist, the shine intensified until a final click echoed across the Core.

The bulb flared. His connection with the Mental Hands was severed as they vaporized out of existence. The luminosity produced by the Mental Light Bulb skyrocketed, flooding everything in blinding brilliance.

Alwin flinched and shut his eyes, but it didn't help. The light punched straight through. Not even the black eyelids of his Yin-Yang Slime form could block it out.

Niwla and Winal rushed over screaming. It was mostly Niwla screaming.

"Alwin! What did you do?"

"Well, we needed more light. So I got more light."

"By creating a sun?" he screamed.

"It's not a sun. It's a lightbulb pretending to be a sun. Just as bright but without all the strain of an actual sun."

"That's not how any of this works!"

"Says who?"

"Says…" Niwla paused, his eyes staring into the distance as he racked his brain for an answer. "I don't actually know. But I know enough to know it just shouldn't work like that."

"Well, when you find out who says I can't do this, let me know. If not, I've got some Light Mana to make."

Niwla turned around and walked away, muttering to himself. His stroking wings on his chin as he tried to make sense of the absurdity of it all.

Winal, on the other hand, remained next to Alwin. A pair of Mental Hands from his throne detached and started signing.

"Is there anything you need help with?"

"Just give me a sec, Winal."

Alwin turned to the status screen produced by the Mental Remote, and a smile broke out on his face.

Light Mana: 100%

Yes!

He had successfully converted an entire bucket's worth of Mana into Light Mana. Sadly, the light of his artificial sun still wasn't strong enough to refine that Light Mana into Light Essence.

As he broke into his jiggly dance of victory, a glint of light bounced off the glass bucket right into his eye.

Another idea had literally just struck him.

He turned to Winal, eyes gleaming and tearing from the bright light.

"Magnifying glasses. A lot of them."

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.