When mana overflowed or strained the mana veins, it caused the person to feel like they were burning up.

But once the veins get a qualitative upgrade and the user jumps to the next rank, there would be a huge gap in the veins since they would have used up all the mana if not most just to rank up, and this created a suction force that used the mana in the rest of the body to fill up the mana veins, which ends with the person feeling a cooling effect.

Unfortunately for Adrian, the coolness in his body didn’t last too long as it began to warm up extremely quickly before he felt the same burning sensation again.

[Mana overload reaching dangerous levels! Mana veins are not strong enough to contain such volume.]

[Suggesting immediate halt of the process for user’s safety.]

Adrian quickly put his hand back on the Mana Crystals to get back to the slower and stable process instead and it helped slightly. His mana veins didn’t take more damage but the already inflicted damage still existed.

’Okay I think I messed up but I can still use this mana to heal my mana veins. Wait... didn’t that brainless idiot use a similar situation to get stronger? If I’m not wrong, repeatedly damaging the mana veins and healing them with mana will make them sturdier. He had SSS rank mana veins so all it did was increase the durability of his veins but for a regular mage with low rank mana veins... this is the only way to increase the rank.’

With those thoughts in mind, he used the mana to repair his mana veins and a few more hours later, he let out a soft sigh.

His shirt was drenched with sweat and a line of dried blood was stuck between his nose and upper lip.

"It helps... like I expected but at this rate, it’ll take me a year or two to rank up my mana veins from D to C rank." he muttered as he got up and stumbled to his bed, only to pass out immediately.

Aria peeked into the room, having already lost count of how many times she did it.

He had promised to teach her mana engineering but the man had gotten so immersed in the process of making himself stronger that he had completely forgotten about everything.

Seeing him lying on the bed, she pouted and walked in. She put her hand on his chest and felt the mana veins in his body before looking slightly confused. She did it again and confirmed that her first reading was indeed true.

’I did expect that he would damage his mana veins, but I didn’t think that he would be able to fix them himself...’ she thought as she looked at his peaceful sleeping face and couldn’t help but wipe the blood on his face.

Then, she turned to look at the floor.

Before, she couldn’t see how many mana crystals he was using as he had his back facing the door but now, she sat there looking absolutely shocked.

Once the stage of shock passed, she didn’t feel happy or sad but instead, it was pure anger and annoyance.

This idiot of a man had used ten whole mana crystals while she had expected him to use just one. And even with one, she knew that there was a high chance of him damaging his mana veins but this was just plain stupidity.

’Ten mana crystals... I don’t know if he’s smart or just stupid.’

Adrian had only seen the main character of the novel use mana crystals so his views were skewed. He did not consider that he wasn’t the main character, but a side villain who was a father of the main villainess.

She picked up the mana crystals and used her mana to probe inside.

"There’s still a lot left." she muttered softly before putting them back down and walking out of the room.

She looked out the window into the dark night and shook her head before heading to her room and closing the door. She had made up her mind that tomorrow, her father would have to sit and spend time with her no matter what.

A month passed in a blink of an eye.

The population of Oresfall had increased from 220 to more than 2000. Most of the people were temporary residents who stocked up on ores for a week, sold them outside and came back here to repeat the process.

The only problem? Utter boredom.

Adventurers were used to dealing with constant threats and fighting life threatening battles, which made such a peaceful dungeon lack the magic of hard work. Yet, none of them left.

Instead, they banded up and began to renovate the old buildings to get them back into a working state and they did it without Adrian telling them to do a single thing.

But this wasn’t the entire population.

It was only half of the temporary population that had decided to be productive and helpful.

The rest? They had their own plans.

Most of these were just merchants and the guards that they had hired along with new gangs that sought to take control over the iron and steel trade in this barony.

They had probed for a while but after they saw that Adrian wasn’t taking any sort of action, they got bolder.

Robberies and fights were getting more frequent to the point where an innocent 16 year old kid was stabbed to death just because he refused to give them his iron ingot.

The news reached Adrian soon.

The people waited for him to take a stance, but all they got was silence.

A merchant sat inside a newly renovated house with mercenaries all around him.

"Those darn gangsters and annoying merchants..." he cursed, "Because of them, I can’t create a monopoly here. At the way things are going, the one who takes control of a gang and kicks the rest out, will be the one earning the most amount of money."

Suddenly, the door opened and a man came running.

"Boss! The Baron has made his move and we’re all doomed!"