If you have a math degree, you can definitely try to read the papers.
I’m not sure why you say you are not the target audience.
I think the blog post series goes relatively deep, and if you really understand all of it,
it will smooth your way to reading the academic papers a bit;
also other posts by Christian Reitwiessner and Vitalik Buterin from Ethereum.
Having said that, reading math papers especially in a field you’re not too familiar with, and perhaps especially for the first times after finishing undergrad,
is a slow process, and maybe there’s no way to smooth it out too much.
But I encourage you to just “take that plunge”.
I also encourage you to post any technical questions that come up while reading the blog posts and papers, and link me to them.
This is a relatively new field and maybe there will be a good book about this stuff in the future.