"Huh? What hard work? You forced me into it!" Li Xiaoya grumbled inwardly at those words.
"Quite good indeed. You've made great progress. Keep working hard," Heavenly Venerable Daoling said mildly, his voice betraying neither joy nor sorrow.
"As you command, Master!" Li Xiaoya stepped forward and replied delightedly.
"All right, you may go. There are still a little over three months left. Prepare for the trip to Spiritlight Lake! Remember to come here at the start of the month," Heavenly Venerable Daoling instructed calmly.
"Huh? As you command, Master!" Li Xiaoya was taken aback. He had thought Heavenly Venerable Daoling had something to tell him, but instead, he was simply being sent away.
"Follow me." The puppet Li Xiaoya had seen last time suddenly appeared at the entrance and spoke stiffly.
"Your disciple takes his leave!" Li Xiaoya said respectfully, then followed the puppet out.
Only after Li Xiaoya and the puppet disappeared through the entrance did Zhang Facai complain, "Ah, Master, just what is going on with Li Xiaoya? Giving him so many pills merely to purify his magic power-isn't that far too wasteful? That would be enough for more than a dozen disciples at peak cultivation to attempt a breakthrough to the core condensation stage!" He seemed entirely unafraid of Heavenly Venerable Daoling.
"You'll understand in time. By the way, why did it take so much less time than expected?" Heavenly Venerable Daoling said mysteriously, changing the subject.
"It was nothing. That brat brought it on himself. He insisted on ten days, so I obliged him!" Zhang Facai chuckled, then seemed to remember something. "Oh, and Eldest Senior Brother gave him a strange spiritual artifact. It doesn't seem to be anything ordinary. That artifact had something to do with it too."
"A strange spiritual artifact?" Heavenly Venerable