Chapter 24

Hou closed his eyes and like he did when controlling his will he looked inwards. 

As Hou looked at his soul it seemed like it had become different. He couldn't quite understand it but it didn't feel like he was seeing his soul but a whole other world.

Inside the world Hou could not see everything, like it was obscured but he could feel things. Inside the inner world were his wills, everytime he thought of something or did something wills were produced to let him do so.

Flying with his normal wills was something else. It felt like a will but it was stronger and not his own but he could control it all the same.

It was the spirits will!

"What you are sensing is your inner world, you should also see a spirit will, yes?"

"Yes it's feels much stronger than my other wills"

"To explain, every person has a soul, and all throughout the world in a separate dimension are spirits. Without special techniques they will not do anything. However when I put you in that dream, you entered into a spirit's world. Then once you completed the objectives in the dream realm, the spirit was weakened. To survive it had attached onto your soul. Now by feeding that will qi you can gain abilities, there are even ways to make the spirit will regain their power as a spirit. However once they are attached to a soul it is permanent, so the spirit will become your power."

"But what about the inner world, why did it come into existence?"

"When the spirit had attached onto you, you absorbed their inner world and your soul and the world merged becoming one. Now you are a real cultivator, you have an inner world and your innate spirit, the one you first took in. Now we should show you how to use the spirit will!"

Hou nodded and prepared to do whatever he needed to do.

"First around your inner world you should notice some sort of barrier? This is something I created when I reconstructed your body, I used the spirit wills I had left and used them to form a formation. This is what will truly cement you as my disciple. Before we merely controlled others qi, now we need to refine it since only your own qi can be used in your inner world. But this formation will instantly refine any foreign qi into your own once it enters your inner world!" 

"Amazing master! How can I now use the spirit will?"

"Without externally projecting your inner world, the spirit will can only be used on yourself. First try to activate the spirit will and if the power is compatible it will work regardless of external projection, that would be best case scenario"

Hou focused inwards and sent a few orbs of compressed sunlight into his inner world. Instantly his blood glowed and the qi turned from sunlight into blood like qi. Hou fed the spirit will his qi and waited for something to happen...

"First around your inner world you should notice some sort of barrier? This is..." Yue lectured Hou.

Hou was confused, had Yue not already said this?!

"Master! You already said this, remember?"

"I think I would remember if I said this already, just because I'm dead doesn't mean I'm senile!" 

Hou was even more confused, it really seemed like Yue had no idea he had already said that... Maybe he erased his memory... No that doesn't make sense, it should only work on himself not others...

"HOU! Listen what sort of dream did you have, no need for specifics just tell me the general idea?"

"Well it was a fight I ran away as a child but instead I fought... And I failed and died but came back everytime I died."

"..."

"Hou, this is... This is AMAZING! you actually got a time based spirit as your innate spirit! Maybe I did already say this, you must've activated the ability and returned back. Like when you died you returned, you can regress time. Or should I say you can travel your soul back in time!"

Hou stood silent, he had not seen Yue so excited and amazed. He steadied himself and asked,

"Master but is this not useless for fighting, I can't defeat anyone with this other than learning their moves. It can't help me fight an incomparably strong enemy like the cultivator behind the miasma..."

"No but this is better, I've got a chance for you. You can return into the past with your inner world, this is something you'll have to choose but... If you return all the way back to your past before you met me, you will still have the gateway blessing. The blessing is a unrestricted spirit will, you can use it and see into the inner world of the sun cultivators. This is much more amazing than you understand. The sun cultivators had died, the inner world had no master, you can absorb it into your own and gain their strength, which while weakened will be much stronger than now. But... You will abandon this current timeline and I can't guarantee everything will be fine"

"Even you master, you cannot say whether it will work?!"

"Time spirits are so rare that I have not even seen more than a dozen in a millennium, and none as strong as this. But like I said I cannot guarantee what will happen, you're body is completely different and I will exist twice at the same time... You might become a lone soul without a body and I might duplicate or change into one, either way it cannot be predicted..."

"Master.... I want to do it. I know that it's risky but if I don't do this then I don't think I can become strong enough."

"Okay then we can't do it now, even with this powerful spirit will, it has just attached and is weak. We should nurture it and become stronger, I don't think the spirit will should be able to go that far back but I'm sure we can figure out a way to sacrifice it and create a single use strong effect like I did to create your body but to a greater effect!"

"So either way, I need to become stronger, much stronger. But not only stronger, I will become smarter, I'll trust on master to teach this foolish disciple your ways and together we can create a miracle and change the distant past!"