The Difficulty of Comprehending Laws at the Planet Level

While Babata was giving Hong a crash course, a sliver of Shen Mu's consciousness was linked to the Virtual Universe network, browsing information on water-element treasures.

Of course, he was mainly looking at A9-grade treasures for the Azure Dragon Avatar to devour.

A-grade resources were generally inexpensive—one could even say cheap.

For example, A8-grade Black Iron cost only 4 Silver-Blue Coins per ton. Even a thousand tons cost less than 4 Black Dragon Coins.

What Shen Mu valued most was the Azure Wave Fruit, the raw material for the Azure Wave Essence Babata had mentioned. One ton cost 10 Silver-Blue Coins, putting it in an entirely different price bracket from Azure Wave Essence.

That was because producing 1 gram of Azure Wave Essence required refining 100,000 tons of Azure Wave Fruit, along with other materials. The material cost alone was just under 3,000 Black Dragon Coins.

The Inner World of Shen Mu's Azure Dragon Avatar was similar to that of the Golden Horned Beast. It only needed to devour water-element resources corresponding to its current realm in order to evolve rapidly.

As long as it devoured around a hundred tons of water-element resources of the same grade each day, it would be "full."

While remaining "full" every day, advancing from Planet-Level first stage to Star-Level first stage would take no more than a year and a half.

The Azure Dragon Avatar had now reached Planet-Level seventh stage. As long as it consumed enough resources to keep itself "full" every day, it would not be long before it advanced to Star-Level.

"To be safe, I'll calculate it as one year. Devouring 100 tons of Azure Wave Fruit a day means roughly 35,000 tons, or 350 Black Dragon Coins. Pocket change."

After sampling some of the universe's specialty delicacies, Shen Mu and Hong set off to purchase the resources they needed for cultivation.

There were many places in the universe that sold cultivation resources. The nearest one to Shen Mu and the others was a Rare Treasure Shop.

This Rare Treasure Shop covered an enormous area, comparable to a large plaza on Earth.

It sold everything. Divided into sections, there were combat suits, beast taming supplies, Mental Power Weapons, strange fruits, robots, spaceships, and all manner of miscellaneous goods—each category had no small selection.

Naturally, everything was merely a virtual projection. Only after selecting an item for purchase could one see the real thing.

The moment Shen Mu and Hong stepped into the hall, a female Jade Core Clan attendant approached them.

"Two esteemed gentlemen, how may I serve you?"

Shen Mu casually swept his gaze around before saying, "I want to purchase some cultivation resources. The transaction value will exceed ten million Black Dragon Coins."

"P-please wait a moment. Our supervisor will personally serve you from here on."

A transaction worth tens of millions of Black Dragon Coins was no longer something a Planet-Level attendant like her could handle. A Star-Level supervisor had to personally come forward.

A moment later, an elderly man roughly 2.6 meters tall, with red and blue markings on his face, walked over with a smile.

"Gentlemen, what kind of treasures would you like to purchase?"

Shen Mu said, "You have Azure Wave Essence here, right?"

"Of course." The old man gave a slight wave of his hand, and the virtual projections beside Shen Mu and Hong changed into the phantom image of a strange green, mercury-like liquid that faintly glimmered with specks of unusual light. Its price was displayed beside it.

"9,000 Black Dragon Coins per gram. The price is acceptable. I'll take 5 kilograms."

The old man's smile became even more sincere. "No problem. Five kilograms of Azure Wave Essence will cost 45 million Black Dragon Coins. May I ask what method of payment you will be using?"

At that moment, Hong spoke calmly. "We don't have Black Dragon Coins. We only have Cosmic Coins and Qianwu Coins."

Upon hearing Hong's words, the old man's expression shifted slightly. "If you pay in Qianwu Coins, you will only need 37,500 Qianwu Coins."

"If you use Cosmic Coins, we can offer a price of 9 standard Cosmic Coins."

This was a fairly reasonable price. It was calculated according to the black-market exchange rate of 1 Qianwu Coin for 1,500 Black Dragon Coins. Factoring in the exchange rate of over 3,000 between Cosmic Coins and Qianwu Coins, 1 Cosmic Coin could roughly be exchanged for 5 million Black Dragon Coins.

But according to the official exchange rate of 1 Qianwu Coin for 1,000 Black Dragon Coins, 1 Cosmic Coin could at most be exchanged for 3.5 million Black Dragon Coins.

"Alright, no problem."

Hong lightly raised his hand. The space ring on his fingertip flashed faintly, and then a crystalline, strange object appeared in his palm.

"Please wait a moment. I will cut this Cosmic Crystal for you two right away."

In the end, Hong's Cosmic Crystal was cut into 21 standard Cosmic Coins, with some fragments and powder left over, worth around 1,000 Qianwu Coins.

About ten minutes later, the 5 kilograms of Azure Wave Essence Shen Mu had purchased, along with the remaining Cosmic Coins, were delivered into his hands.

"Do you have Azure Wave Fruit here?"

As Shen Mu put away the Cosmic Coins and Azure Wave Essence, he looked at the old man and asked.

The old man was briefly startled, then said, "Are you planning to raise a Planet-Level tamed beast?"

Ordinary Planet-Level martial artists would not directly consume Azure Wave Fruit. Only certain water-element tamed beasts fed on Azure Wave Fruit, which could accelerate their evolution and offered exceptionally high value for money.

"Yes. It's a pet I keep. Fifty thousand tons will be enough."

Fifty thousand tons of Azure Wave Fruit cost only a few hundred Black Dragon Coins. With a grand wave of his hand, the old man said he could give it to them for free.

After leaving the Rare Treasure Shop, Shen Mu and Hong prepared to return to Earth.

Before departing, they also bought Thunder God and Luo Feng an unregistered Virtual Universe network account each, letting them use them temporarily until the next time they traveled to the universe together, when they could register accounts of their own.

An unregistered virtual network account could only be used for one hundred years, yet it cost as much as 1.6 Qianwu Coins—twice the price of an account registered under one's real identity.

Finally, Shen Mu and Hong also opened an account at Cosmic Galaxy Bank. Only after depositing their meager funds into the account did they return to Earth.

The Black Dragon Mountain Spaceship sped through the universe, while Shen Mu and Hong's consciousnesses entered the Virtual Universe.

"This virtual universe can actually be accessed from anywhere? That's outrageous."

Inside a restaurant, Hong was talking with Shen Mu.

Unlike in the real world, conversations in the virtual universe could be set so that only the other party could hear them, eliminating any worry of being eavesdropped on.

"Brother Hong, let me show you something good."

Shen Mu lightly tapped the air with a finger, and a virtual screen appeared, displaying an introduction to the Slaughterfield.

The Slaughterfield was an exceedingly luxurious place for battle training within the virtual universe.

Paying users could submit any requirements they wanted to the "Virtual Universe System," but the fees were steep, varying according to one's level and realm.

For instance, Hong was Planet-Level ninth rank, so using the Slaughterfield for a single day would cost 500,000 Black Dragon Coins, or 350 Qianwu Coins.

Meanwhile, Shen Mu was Planet-Level fourth rank. His base strength was only one-sixteenth of Hong's, so a day in the Slaughterfield cost him just over 30,000 Black Dragon Coins.

At the same time, the fees for a Mentalist were five times those of a warrior.

"That price is way too outrageous. We have less than thirteen Cosmic Coins altogether. Even if we exchange them for Black Dragon Coins on the black market, we'd only have around 65 million. It wouldn't even last us a few months."

Shen Mu tapped the virtual screen again, changing its contents to an introduction to the Duel Space function within the Slaughterfield.

"Although the Slaughterfield is expensive, it also has a Duel Space. That's much cheaper, and you can fight Planet-Level geniuses from across the universe."

The Slaughterfield was designed to serve a single person. Inside, one could set up all kinds of opponents, making it the ideal place to train.

The Duel Space, meanwhile, was similar to matched battles—a place where warriors dueled one another!

The ones fighting were two real humans, rather than virtual constructs. Moreover, spending in the "Duel Space" was only one-tenth of that in the "Slaughterfield."

Most importantly, battles in the Duel Space could be wagered on.

Once both sides agreed to a wagered battle, the victor would receive 90% of the loser's stake, while the remaining portion was taken as the Duel Space's commission.

"Isn't this our money-making avenue right here?"

For Shen Mu, making money was only one aspect. The other was to use a streak of victories in the Duel Space to attract the attention of the Virtual Universe Company's experts.

During the half year since the East Sea Azure Dragon evolved, Shen Mu had focused on comprehending domains and Laws.

His domain had already touched upon the threshold of the third level and could break through at any time.

More importantly, after half a year of contemplation and studying Yunmo Star's manuals on the introductory stages of the Water Laws, Shen Mu had barely grasped a trace of the mysteries of the Water Source Law.

The Azure Dragon Avatar's decades of insights into the sea and water had originally been unsystematic. But after Shen Mu sensed the fluctuations of Laws, he gained clear guidance and linked together those decades of realizations. Only then did he comprehend a few principles—the accumulation of long effort finally bursting forth.

Though this wisp of Law comprehension was exceedingly shallow, Shen Mu had unquestionably crossed the Law Threshold. The greatest obstacle to becoming a World Master had been broken through.

According to Babata, comprehending Laws at the Planet-Level was an accomplishment for which there might not be a second example in the entire Qianwu Universe Country. Across all Planet-Level beings in the universe, perhaps a few similarly monstrous freaks could be found.

In any case, its old master Huyan Bo had lived for more than sixty million years and had never personally seen a super genius who comprehended Laws at the Planet-Level. At most, he had heard of them.

Whenever such a genius appeared, they would basically be taken in by an expert and carefully taught.

My setting is that comprehending Low-Level Laws at the Planet-Level is roughly as difficult as comprehending High-Level Laws at the Star-Level. That should be fairly reasonable, right, brothers? Generally speaking, comprehending High-Level Laws at the Star-Level would secure a place in the top ten of the Genius Battle. Luo Feng's generation was an exception.