Question about a word

Okay, I have always thought that one of the meanings of the word manifest has been "to create or believe in something that is not real"

I looked up the definition for the word for a paper that I have to write for a test tomorrow in english class on Lord of the Flies.

********SPOILER********(Lord of the flies)
The beastie is not real it is a "manifest" of the boy's fear of each other. It is also a fear of the parachutist that lead them to believe there was a beastie, but really was a parachutist.

Anyway, I have used the word "manifest" many times already in my outline for the paper tomorrow, and I need another word besides "distort." I looked up synonyms to the word "manifest", and I got things that were like, bold, clear, to prove. I looked up the definition bot online and in a book, and they both said meant to make clear, prove, and the cargo of a ship. But never the definition that I thought from the movie.

Is the definiton the give in this movie a real definition of manifest? And if anyone has a synonym for manifest with the definition that I think, then I would really appreciate it.

Thanks in advance :)