Question on Turn Phase #4 - Charity

[Jammer134]

Brand new to the game here. One rule I'm confused about.

On the last Turn phase, the rules says: "If you have more than five cards in your hand, you must PLAY enough of them to get down to five, or GIVE the excess to the player with the lowest Level."

My question is, what does it mean by "PLAY"? So if I have some monsters in my hand, I can play those cards and fight them? If I win can I level up and collect more treasure? If I have multiple monsters, I could fight them all of them as well (as long as I'm over 5 cards)? If I get a ton of treasure cards from doing all this, can I sell a bunch off and go up another level or two, maybe even three?

Just confused on this phase. It seems like if you get a bunch of low level monsters in your hand you could really quickly gain multiple levels just in one turn.

Great game! Our family loves it!