Im confused as to what Mana Nodes do?
When they are improved they provide a mana resource for whatever improvement you put on them. So if you make a Mana Node into A Body Mana Node it provide Body Mana.Mana is used for different things, the biggest use is that it is used it determines what spell spheres your casters start with for free. So if you have Death mana, Body mana and Fire mana resources caster you build will start with rank 1 in Body, Death and Fire magic.