Chapter 221: Startled Soul Fall

"Miss Duanmu, you've done well. I can already see a new batch of transcendent materials being shipped in," Su Mu's gentle voice rang out in Duanmu Qing's mind.

"That's wonderful, Mr. Su! Do you know where Chu Shang hid the Divine Healing Potion I refined today?"

"The top floor, in his office safe. The passcode is..."

Duanmu Qing's mood instantly brightened. Using the transcendent materials Chu Shang provided to refine her own potions would definitely inflict a heavy loss on the Federal Pharmaceutical Company.

"Mr. Su, your method is amazing!"

Su Mu smiled faintly. "Don't celebrate just yet. The best part is still to come."

Duanmu Qing's eyes lit up. "What else do you have planned, Mr. Su?"

"The truly valuable things aren't transcendent potions."

"Then what is it?"

"The potion formulas in Chu Shang's head. The Federal Pharmaceutical Company has been growing for decades. Even without the Duanmu Family's help, their massive financial backing has allowed them to create quite a few new transcendent potions over the years. What we need to do next is take all those formulas for ourselves."

Duanmu Qing froze for a moment. "How do we take them?"

"Simple. We enter his dreams."

Late that night, after Chu Shang and his secretary tired themselves out and fell asleep, Su Mu brought Duanmu Qing into his dream.

Because the transcendent formulas involved too much specialized knowledge, he brought Duanmu Qing along just to be safe, ensuring they could steal the formulas more effectively.

The plan went incredibly smoothly. Even a Gold powerhouse like Chu Shang wouldn't set up defenses in his dreams. With Duanmu Qing's help, they stole a portion of the classified formulas developed by the Federal Pharmaceutical Company.

Su Mu didn't take too much at once. Forcing Chu Shang to recall a large number of complex formulas in a short time could easily wake him and arouse his suspicions.

It was much like a person trying to finish a math test in a dream.

But he wasn't in a hurry. He had plenty of time and could take it slowly.

Days passed like this. Duanmu Qing worked proactively, fulfilling her daily tasks with guaranteed quality and quantity. Perhaps she worked a little too diligently, though, as she ended up exhausting all the raw materials for the Divine Healing Potion.

Chu Shang sourced other rare transcendent materials and had her refine different potions instead, which she agreed to without complaint.

During this time, to complete the task Su Mu had given her earlier, Duanmu Qing deliberately claimed she wanted to improve the formula for the Ceaseless Recovery transcendent potion. She tricked Chu Shang into giving her the required raw materials and successfully refined it.

Chu Shang later locked this Ceaseless Recovery potion in his safe as well, planning to ship it out with the rest when the time came.

But that very night, Su Mu swapped the potion out, and it ended up in his own hands.

Looking at the Ceaseless Recovery potion he had obtained without the slightest effort, Su Mu downed it in one gulp.

Buzz!

The massive web of the Bronze Law appeared once more. The star representing Ceaseless Recovery cast down its light, bathing Su Mu. With this, he had finally reached Bronze 3!

That's right, Bronze 3.

Because he had too many laws in his body—severely exceeding the standard limit—he couldn't judge his rank based on their sheer quantity. For convenience, he simply gauged his level based on the "real man's three-piece set": Great Force Bombardment Punch, Heart of Steel, and Ceaseless Recovery.

He excluded Immaculate Heart, Myriad Phenomena, and Endless Demonic Sound entirely, not factoring them into his assessment at all.

"I finally have the capital to advance to Silver," Su Mu muttered to himself. The laws in his body were too chaotic. Aside from the Follower of Strength path, which was clear, he had no idea how to advance the other laws to the Silver tier.

This was especially true for the laws inherent to his dreamscape; he couldn't find any relevant information about them in the current world.

"Speaking of which, based on past experience, shouldn't a new dreamscape-inherent law have appeared by now?" Su Mu frowned slightly. Although connecting to Ceaseless Recovery primarily enhanced his physical body, it also provided a slight spiritual boost.

"It seems my spiritual strength still isn't high enough."

He couldn't help but marvel. This third law was even harder to manifest than he had imagined. To feed the Void Devourer, he had already upgraded his spiritual strength dozens of times. Yet, even with the additional spiritual power provided by Ceaseless Recovery, it still wasn't enough.

This piqued his curiosity.

So, Su Mu stopped waiting and initiated a cycle of explosive spiritual growth.

Namely, constantly falling asleep and waking up, waking up and falling asleep.

After repeating this cycle six times, the long-awaited third law finally appeared!

When this third law emerged, the spiritual boost it brought caused his spiritual strength to skyrocket another tier, faintly brushing against the absolute limit his current body could contain.

But once he understood what this third law was, he couldn't help but sigh in realization; it had all been worth it.

The third law of the dreamscape—Startled Soul Fall!

Startled Soul Fall's ability was incredibly simple: it could directly affect the soul!

The reason humans could feel warmth, pain, sourness, sweetness, bitterness, and spiciness was because the physical body made contact first, then transmitted those sensations to the soul.

The undead siren didn't have a soul, so it couldn't perceive any of this. That was the underlying logic.

And the function of Startled Soul Fall was to bypass the physical body entirely and transmit these sensations directly to the soul.

To give a simple example, if Su Mu used Myriad Phenomena to simulate a ball of fire and threw it at an enemy, the enemy would only be startled; they wouldn't actually feel the burn of the flames.

But when paired with Startled Soul Fall, the agonizing pain of the burning fire would be transmitted straight to their soul. In reality, it wouldn't inflict the slightest bit of physical damage—only the sensation.

Su Mu increasingly felt that the laws he obtained in his dreamscape were meant to be used as a matching set. It was somewhat similar to a Chosen One like Yang Dongqing, where their independent awakenings formed a self-contained system.

Now that he had Startled Soul Fall, his Illusion Technique was becoming truly flawless.

With all three laws unleashed at once, it wouldn't be an exaggeration to call it complete sensory manipulation.

He tested his new ability for a long time, only stopping that night when he brought Duanmu Qing into a dream to steal another transcendent formula.

As always, they guided Chu Shang's dream, causing transcendent formulas to surface within his mind. This time, they stole the formula for the Rage Potion.

The Rage Potion was considered a best-seller for the Federal Pharmaceutical Company, used as a trump card by many transcendents. Although it came with the side effect of heavily overdrawing the user's potential, in a life-or-death struggle, a bottle of Rage Potion that temporarily boosted one's strength could absolutely serve as a lifesaver.

It didn't take long to successfully steal the Rage Potion formula, but when Duanmu Qing saw it, she couldn't help but freeze.

"What's wrong? Is there a problem with the formula?" Su Mu asked.

Duanmu Qing shook her head, lightly biting her bottom lip. "The formula is fine. I just didn't expect the main ingredient of the Rage Potion to be blood."

"Blood?"

"The blood of a Gold transcendent on the Giant Demon path! Even though it's diluted, it's still unbelievable. There are a lot of Rage Potions circulating on the market. Even if a single drop of Giant Demon blood can produce a hundred bottles of Rage Potion, just how much blood have they been using?"

Su Mu's eyes flickered. He remembered the Giant Demon transcendent path he had obtained from Yan Moxie.