Power gap
Despite the warning from Erwin, it didn't seem like the man was ready to let go. More so, it didn't look like he knew he had already been found out. This was because despite living in a world where humans weilded powers that were once foreign to them and himself not having any, he had a fair idea about the laws that guided it.
Like every human, he had most likely aspired to go to an academic like Backwood and maybe become something useful to the new age like most of the kids dreamt of. But the most critical part of being a human came at the age of fourteen when it is expected that one's Mana she'll would break and thus introducing Mana to the once ordinary human cells and thus, powering it with its own unique ability. But this case was not the same for everyone. Not everyone ever broke their shell and got their dreams fulfilled and even the that did were probably subjected to a power they thought wasn't going to bag them their desired place in the world ladder.