Hou died...
This time he gained something big, the disciple's power might be possible to fight against!
Saviour opened his eyes in his bed once more with Arm shouting for him.
"Saviour wake up, time for your speech about the evacuation"
He didn't jolt up but laid there and thought for a while.
"What's taking you so long?" Arm started to open the door with a complicated expression. On the surface he was frustrated but he was also a little worried.
'Back to the loops, now I just need to think how to use this 'loophole' in the disciples power against it...'
"Yeah I'll be up soon, let me rest another few minutes" Hou mumbled to Arm as if he was still waking up, of course it was an act though.
As soon as Arm left again, Hou used a piece of paper and drew out the layout of this battle.
It had two layers, above and underground, Hou roughly drew out the burrows and then drew out town and the beast tide.
'In the next day the beast tide will arrive, and if I start to evacuate from here, then Runna will be captured here. This is where the disciples entered...' Hou looked at the map and pointed out locations, thinking of the order of things he needed to do to save everyone.
'hmm, the burrows have no exit, the disciple has to break through the floor, that means its an enclosed space... perhaps this can be used for my benefit, even monsters needed to breath, I can light a fire in the burrows, therefore causing the disciple to leave early to breathe. But how can we defeat it afterwards, and with minimal to no deaths, if I hide, he cant drain my power! no... that's not right, it targets the gateway not me...'
As Hou was planning he could make progress but the power of the disciple was too strong, he couldn't come up with a plan to defeat it.
'THATS IT! I figured it out, I need to stop thinking that it should be allowed to run free, sunlight and miasma repel each other! I should be able to create gateways that expel sunlight and it should have enough volume to complete stop the disciple's power, from there the soldiers simply needed to whittle it down.'
Hou went through the motions and did as he did last loop, he convinced Arm with his past vision and got everyone ready to fight.
This time however, he didn't send any soldiers away. Hou ordered them with the killer move they created last time and got them to stand ready, at the same time Hou opened a gateway.
Large amounts of wood was thrown into the burrows and Hou threw a flaming torch in, closing the gateway. Now all he needed to do was to wait...
Hou opened another gateway and watched the town from above, looking where the disciple would emerge. Hou looked above and waited.
Only an hour later, a rumbling was heard, the disciple had moved. From the north of town, the ground burst open, rocks flying high in the sky, Hou instantly activated his abilities, teleporting the soldier nearby.
Hou teleported in front of the disciple and activated a spherical gateway all around the disciple. It was a gateway to the inner world, divine kingdom as he would call it in this period of time, of the sun cultivators.
The gateway was being drained by the disciple but the fact that it was linked with the inner world even in a dream it was too much.
The disciple was flooded by Sunlight and it weakened, anytime it tried to leave, Hou would moved the gateway with it.
The disciple turned into what looked like a miniature sun while the soldiers arrived and used the killer move on it, Arm carried a large spike and stabbed at the small sun. As soon as his 'sword' came close the sun vanished and the weakened disciple was left unprotected.
Arm's muscles grew, like a flower budding they became bulbous, he pushed the spike through the monster. The disciple's black blood flew out from the other side and it corroded the stone below it. While the disciple was still dumbstruck Arm dropped the spike, it stuck itself straight out the disciple's hard body.
Arm reached out his hand, glowing with sunlight he stepped forward and grasped the disciples head, using all his strength and other's buffs he smashed it to bits.
Arm was covered in the disciples corrosive blood but he did not mind and even though his hand was burning he put his hand up, raiding it to show the deformed monster's face.
They had won.
Time seemed to freeze, even Hou's own mind seemed to stop.
The world morphed into a flurry of colours and darkness covered Hou's vision.
An undetermined amount of time passed and Hou found himself floating in space. Or not space but some kind of void with vague swirling colours moving but you could not see them, only feel it.
Hou floated in the void and tried moving, he could not move, and he realised he had no body. He was a floating consciousness, and as he was understanding his condition something appeared...
A glowing form appeared in front of Hou, it seemed to morph from wolf to fox to other forms.
A spirit!
This was a spirit like what Master Yue talked about, it seemed unstable though, as it wobbled a sound exploded out.
The spirit's form shattered and a light tainted Hou's consciousness, or perhaps soul.
His soul seemed to change and become stronger, there was some kind of special authority that was passed onto Hou's soul when the spirit shattered.
Before Hou could think, he woke up.
Hou sat up looking at the fire he made beforehand and sensed that no time had passed at all,
"Master, what was that, I was in the past or an alternate past, and I saw a spirit?!"
"Calm down, I will explain it all, first focus on yourself, do you notice anything different?"