A large silver wolf has attacked him from behind. Hou however felt confident after gaining his abilities. He wanted to test them out and defeat the enemy in front of him.
First he spread his blood fog by activating the red moss on his left hand; across the patch of forest they were in a crimson blanket covered the two fighters.
Hou had a reconstructed body and so could see perfectly but also the wolf he was fighting was an apex predator given mystical abilities, It took could see through it. Although it did not impair the wolf's vision, it did become noticeably slower.
The wolf once again started charging out Hou but he activated his leg parasites and jumped to the side, but he had underestimated the wolf's intelligence. It had baited him and also preemptively jumped to the side. Luckily the wolf chose the wrong side and Hou was safe, but now he was much more weary of close combat.
Hou activated the cactus parasite on his left wrist and the flower on his right palm simultaneously. As the wolf repositioned itself it was assaulted with a vortex of small missiles.
The wolf was a mystically enhanced being, and naturally had a very strong coat of fur. The cactus needles bounced of the fur and made no difference than that of an annoyance.
The flower petals on the other hand caused light scratches to appear, if he used it on the same spot he could draw blood.
Hou was feeling weak once more, he had all these abilities but they were too weak, but he continued to fight hoping an opportunity would arise.
Just as the vortex and projectiles stopped, the wolf started to quickly circle Hou, creating a trail of dust behind it. Hou was on edge as he had to follow the wolf's movements lest he was stabbed in the back.
The wolf tried to get a hit in but Hou used a powered jump and shot another set of petals to the wolf's face. He decided to stop using the cactus as it was useless with this enemy, instead focusing his miasma qi usage with dodging and attacking with flower petals.
Instead of waiting, the wolf went in instantly for another attack. Hou was caught of guard but still reacted quick, he tried to activate the leg parasites but had no response.
With no other option, and an open beast's jaw in front of him, his hoped his strong body could block at least one attack as he went to punch the wolf away. Just then, the legs activated and the movement caused his already strong punch to become extremely strong, the wolf was knocked back.
'eh, what happened? Wasn't the leg parasites only capable of enhancing my leg strength?' Hou was confused at his sudden burst of power.
It was then Ancestor Yue's voice responded, "disciple you are not aware of fighting... Where does the power of a punch come from?"
"Well, it comes from.. the arms..? Does it..not?" Hou responded with confusion he was never a hands on fighter.
"Sigh wrong! Everything is connected, the strength of a punch comes from the whole body. When you happened to activate the legs while punching, the power generated moved up the body causing a tsunami of power to rise up and out to your punch. This was an effect of using a parasite it had a cooldown for each ability. Now that you are aware, try using that to fight and we'll go through it afterwards.
Even though the two of them had a whole conversation, it had only been two breaths, since they are connected from the soul, they can instantly transmit their thoughts.
The wolf shook it head and growled, the blood fog trembled and dissipated. Without a consistent supply of miasma qi from Hou it had started to weaken and finally broke.
Once again the wolf charged forth to Hou. Hou looked forward not with fear or apprehension but excitement, he focused his attention forward and waited.
He felt a change in the veins in his legs, his parasite had become able to be activated again. Hou breathed and counted his breaths.
One
...
Two
...
THREE!
The wolf was once again infront of him, Hou activated his legs and followed the potion to release the power in his punch.
The wolf once again was knocked back, it's jaw was bleeding dripping hot crimson blood as it breathed heavily.
Hou once again took stance and waited. Just as he expected the wolf charged at him again with no change in action. Hou knew what he need to do and counted his breaths...
One...two...THREE!
He started to once again activated his leg powered punch when the wolf suddenly ducked. AHou was left in an open position from his imperfect form and the wolf took its chance.
It bit down on Hou's side ripping apart his flesh, then it backed away looking fiercely at it's prey.
On the other side of this fight, Hou was dumbstruck that he felt for it's plan and it's sudden increase in speed. That was until he realised,
'I had grown complacent with it's slowed speed under the blood fog, I did not even think that it was hiding it's true speed. This is sure to be a lesson I will remember'
"This is a precious lesson, be like the wolf. It has natural instincts for fighting, unlike you. Embody the wolf's fighting instincts, float like a butterfly but sting like a bee. A fight involves both attack and movement in dodging. Move your feet, anticipate the movements of the enemy and move into a position where no matter what you always have a way to defend or attack" Yue was not a close combat specialist but even the weakest dragon could surpass a chicken.
Hou was enlightened as he gave an acknowledgement thought to Yue and once again focused on the fight.
This time he would become a beast, like Yue said 'Float like a butterfly and sting like a bee'.