Cultivating the Five Prison Sword Art

With lingering questions, Xu Ziming carefully examined the contents of the Nebula Mental Tempering Method.

He discovered that to practice this technique, one had to use their own body to automatically sense and absorb energy from the galaxy during the dead of night.

Beyond tempering the mind, it could actually utilize the power of starlight to elevate one's Life Energy Level.

But the crux of the matter was: how could a mortal body sense starlight from tens of thousands of light-years away? It was practically impossible.

However, just because a human body couldn't do it didn't mean the Equipment Slot couldn't.

Almost without hesitation, Xu Ziming purchased this mental tempering method, just as he had done countless times before.

Two seconds after the purchase, the Nebula Mental Tempering Method was stored within his wristband.

Why didn't it appear directly in front of him? Because he was still inside the Battle Net space.

Just as he prepared to log out of Battle Net, Xu Ziming's wristband received a friend request. He glanced at the ID.

It was the female streamer he had just defeated. Seeing that bizarre name—"Found out ex-boyfriend was cheating, desperately went to a parlor and ended up with the mistress"—Xu Ziming almost couldn't resist rejecting it.

Still, he accepted the request, and once he clicked confirm, he logged out of the Battle Net space.

On the other side, after Wu Mengmeng was defeated, her entire stream chat began to scroll rapidly, mostly with people watching the spectacle.

"Streamer, aren't you going to add him and go another round?"

"Streamer, when I saw you acting cute just now, I thought you were one of my bros. It scared me so much I almost punched the screen."

"What's even the point of living anymore, you guys tell me?"

"Get lost, get lost! Get out of here once you're done playing!" Wu Mengmeng watched the barrage of comments flying across her stream. It took a full ten minutes before she finally pressed the button to send the friend request.

To her surprise, after sending the request, there was no response for several minutes.

"Hahaha, the other guy doesn't even care about the streamer."

More messages flashed across the screen. Just as Wu Mengmeng was about to give up, the request was accepted.

On the other side, when Wu Mengmeng saw that Xu Ziming had finally accepted her friend request, she jumped up.

"See that? My charm, no need for words!"

Saying this, she quickly sent a message to Xu Ziming.

"Let's play another round. This time, I'm going to prove myself!"

[The other party is offline. Your message will be sent once they are online.]

"What!"

Xu Ziming was unaware of what had transpired on the other end, for as soon as he exited Battle Net, he took out the Nebula Mental Tempering Method.

The moment his hand touched the Nebula Mental Tempering Method, the Equipment Slot information popped up.

[Detected equippable item: Nebula Mental Tempering Method]

[Estimated obtainable trait: Star God's Favor (Blue)]

[Trait effect: Receive the favor of the great Star God. The body can easily establish a connection with planets, increasing the speed of extracting star energy by 100%.]

[Permanent solidification condition: Master the mental method and complete one hundred mental tempering sessions.]

Perfect. The Equipment Slot had indeed solved the biggest problem with practicing the Star God Mental Tempering Method.

Just then, his wristband rang. He raised his hand to see it was a call from Fang Xingyun.

"Senior Fang, is something the matter?"

"Little Ming, I saw that you chose the Star God Mental Tempering Method. I forgot to tell you about this technique—almost no one has ever succeeded in practicing it."

Fang Xingyun's tone was uncharacteristically serious. "I only managed to succeed because I encountered some fortuitous opportunities. According to big data projections, an average person needs at least ten years of effort just to sense a planet."

"And that's only the basic connection. So, let's just pretend you didn't pick it; I'll have the system restore your selection count on the backend."

"Many thanks, Uncle Fang, but I would still like to try practicing this technique."

"Very well, give it a try then. Just don't let it interfere with your college entrance exams."

With that, Fang Xingyun hung up.

Great, another technique obtained for free. Old Fang is a stand-up guy.

Though, it made sense; Fang Xingyun had invested so much into him that he wouldn't intentionally make things difficult for him.

In reality, who would go out of their way to help someone only to make themselves hated?

If such people exist, then ignore what I just said.

Since the best time to practice this mental tempering method was at night when the stars were out, and it was only nine in the morning, Xu Ziming didn't start practicing the technique immediately. Instead, he opened the Five Prison Sword Art.

Although he had already passed out by the time Ma Mingyu arrived at the scene yesterday, he could still vaguely sense that incredibly powerful sword intent lingering in the air.

Presumably, this was the next realm of swordsmanship: the Sword Intent realm.

Cultivating Sword Momentum depends on the individual, but cultivating Sword Intent depends on the level of the technique.

Different techniques lead to different Sword Intents, yet the same Sword Intent manifests with varying combat power in different hands.

Regardless, at the same level of sword mastery, Xu Ziming possesses strength that is absolutely crushing.

Taking out the Five Prison Sword Art, Xu Ziming did not gain any new traits, as the trait provided by this sword technique remained "Sword Saint Body Technique".

Having gone through this many times, Xu Ziming had gained experience; weapons and techniques of the same grade generally provide the same traits, or at least, he had yet to encounter any differences.

Thus, this had become something like the "Golden Eyes" used to identify treasures in urban appraisal novels—a truly magical tool for picking up scraps.

Unable to contain his impatience, he flipped open the manual of the Five Prison Sword Art and began to read it word for word.

This was a sword technique with an extremely strong personal style; describing it as the Five Prison Sword Art seemed somewhat inappropriate.

This was because the character "Prison" was merely an auxiliary ability contained within the technique.

The true strength of this sword art clearly lay in the intense killing intent and deterrent power it inherently possessed.

Presumably, it was by relying on this ability that Ma Mingyu became a god of slaughter on the battlefield, striking fear into the hearts of the alien races.

Having learned of the technique's potency, Xu Ziming naturally found it difficult to suppress his desire to cultivate; it was not just him, even his body was stirred with excitement.

Starting from the first form, Xu Ziming began to practice in earnest.

[Five Prison Sword Art (Not Yet Initiated: 1%)]

Clumsily imitating the postures depicted in the manual, Xu Ziming quickly completed one cycle, aided by his Sword Saint Body Technique and Natural Sword Bone.

A single practice session increased his proficiency by 1%; at this rate, he would successfully initiate it by nightfall.

He completely lost track of time, practicing to his heart's content within the cultivation room; the Five Prison Sword Art was different from the Basic Sword Method.

The Basic Sword Method focuses primarily on the fundamental movements of swordsmanship, emphasizing the basics.

One must commit a multitude of techniques to memory, such as thrusting, lifting, parrying, hacking, and pointing.

As an advanced sword art, each form of the Five Prison Sword Art connects one or two small techniques from the Basic Sword Method to unleash a much greater effect.

The first skill is entrapment! It is named Dragon Trap.

It is the very essence of the "Prison" in the Five Prison Sword Art; had Xu Ziming not been unconscious, he would have witnessed the sword move Ma Mingyu used with his final strength to trap the Flame Spirit Clan commander.

Clearly just a manifestation of sword qi, it was nonetheless able to trap a monster nearing its third Life Evolution in place, leaving it unable to move.