"Ah! Is it time?" Li Xiaoya froze at the words, secretly wiped his tears away, and answered inwardly.
"Yes! It's time. Everything goes according to plan!" the Five-Element Rainbow Ganoderma said anxiously, but seemed afraid of being discovered and immediately fell silent again.
"Ahhh!" Li Xiaoya pretended to stretch and slowly sat up.
"That was a good sleep!" Li Xiaoya put on his shoes and stretched as he spoke.
"Urgh! Suddenly I need the privy!" Li Xiaoya clutched his stomach. He hurried off the bed, put on his shoes, and headed toward the cave entrance. But a golden barrier covered the doorway, and the moment his body touched it, he was bounced back. Unable to get out no matter what he tried, he paced in anxious circles and shouted, "Daoist Daoling! Daoist Daoling! Let me out! I need the privy!"
"Daoist Daoling! Are you there? I need the privy! It's about to come out!"
"Dao! Ist! Dao! Ling...!"
At that moment, Heavenly Venerable Daoling was meditating in a secluded chamber. Hearing him, he opened his eyes, torn between annoyance and amusement. Mortals really are such a nuisance...!
With that thought, a red light flashed around him, and he vanished from the chamber. The next instant, he appeared right outside the chamber where Li Xiaoya was staying.
Li Xiaoya was still shouting inside. Heavenly Venerable Daoling smiled wryly and pointed a finger. A streak of yellow light shot into the chamber, and its door opened without a sound. Seeing Li Xiaoya clutching his stomach and pacing in circles, he chuckled despite himself. "All right, all right, stop shouting. My cave abode has no dedicated privy! I'll have someone below bring up a chamber pot."
Heavenly Venerable Daoling was quite right. Immortal cultivators mostly consumed refined medicines such as Grain-Avoidance Pills, so there was generally very little waste left in their bodies. Usually, they only needed to urinate once every two or three months to expel those impurities. A powerful Great Cultivator at the late Nascent Soul stage like Heavenly Venerable Daoling consumed high-grade Grain-Avoidance Pills of the sixth grade or above. Instead of relieving himself as often as ordinary people did, he essentially only needed to urinate once every year or two. Why would his cave abode contain something as foul-smelling as a privy? This was true not only of Heavenly Venerable Daoling's abode; no immortal cultivator included a privy in their dwelling, because there was simply no need.
"Ah! There's no privy? Then just let me go outside and relieve myself. I can barely hold it anymore!" Li Xiaoya said anxiously, trying to head outside.
"No! The Five-Element Rainbow Ganoderma is still possessing you. What if it escapes?" Heavenly Venerable Daoling refused outright.
"How long will that take? I can barely hold it anymore! If I really can't hold it in a minute, I'll just do it right here in this chamber!" Li Xiaoya stamped his feet in desperation, cold sweat beginning to bead on his face. He had once lived in the mortal world by swindling his way into free food and drink, and his acting skills were remarkably convincing. Whatever he played, he became.
"If you dare discharge that filth in my cave abode, I will make sure you never relieve yourself again for the rest of your life!" Heavenly Venerable Daoling said coolly.
A chill surged through Li Xiaoya's heart, and he shuddered. This fellow was no mortal; perhaps such a spell really existed. Plastering a smile across his face, he said, "Daoist Daoling! You're an immortal, with no need to eat, drink, or relieve yourself, but I'm only a mortal who eats ordinary grains. Please have mercy. I really can't hold it anymore! Let me go outside and relieve myself!"
"No, absolutely not. If the Five-Element Rainbow Ganoderma comes out of your body and escapes, catching that crafty little thing again will take a great deal of effort. It might even get away entirely, and then I would become a sinner against my sect! No! Just hold it. A disciple below will bring the chamber pot up shortly!" Heavenly Venerable Daoling shook his head like a rattle drum, his expression utterly refusing the idea.
"Then when I go outside, you can cover me with that golden-light spell and watch me, Daoist. That way, there's no fear of the Five-Element Rainbow Ganoderma escaping!" Li Xiaoya suggested.
"Insolence!" Heavenly Venerable Daoling flew into a rage at those words. To ask an immortal cultivator like him to stand guard while a mortal pissed and shat-no matter how profound his cultivation or how good his temper, he could scarcely resist using the Fireball Technique on this mortal who took a mile when given an inch and burning him to ashes.
"Uh! If you won't, then you won't! Why get so angry?" Li Xiaoya secretly stuck out his tongue, then asked resentfully, "Then how long do I have to wait, Daoist Daoling? I can barely hold it anymore!" Tiny beads of sweat appeared on his forehead as he spoke, making him look truly desperate.
"Soon! I've already sent instructions down!" Heavenly Venerable Daoling found the sight rather amusing, but his voice remained cool.
"Then hurry up. I can't hold it that long. It's all because your food here is so awful. Otherwise, why would I have diarrhea?" Li Xiaoya muttered reproachfully and sat down sulkily beside the stone bed.
Heavenly Venerable Daoling ignored him and went to the middle of the hall, where he sat cross-legged to meditate.
They did not have to wait long. Soon, a voice sounded outside the cave. Heavenly Venerable Daoling opened the entrance with a streak of yellow light, and a boy of fifteen or sixteen came in carrying a brand-new chamber pot. The moment he saw Heavenly Venerable Daoling, he bowed deeply and said respectfully, "This disciple, Lin Xuanzhen, pays his respects to the Supreme Grandmaster!"
Heavenly Venerable Daoling swept his broad sleeve, and an invisible force lifted the boy upright. "There's no need for such ceremony. Have you brought what I asked for?"
"Yes. Since there wasn't a chamber pot on the mountain, I cut down a large tree and made one!" Lin Xuanzhen handed it over, his face flushed with embarrassment.
The chamber pot looked like a solid wooden stump that had been hollowed out, with a fitted lid on top. Strangely, both its cut surfaces and its exterior were extremely smooth; there was no telling what method had been used.
"Give it to me! Give it to me!" Before Heavenly Venerable Daoling could say anything, Li Xiaoya could no longer restrain himself and rushed out, shouting.
"Uh!" Seeing Li Xiaoya come charging out like a whirlwind, Lin Xuanzhen did not know how to react. Although this person looked like an ordinary mortal, he had appeared inside Supreme Grandmaster Daoling's cave abode. In that moment of hesitation, Li Xiaoya had already snatched the chamber pot away.
"I'm dying here! What took you so long?" Li Xiaoya grabbed the chamber pot and ran back to the chamber where he had slept, shouting as he went without even looking back.
Cold sweat broke out on Lin Xuanzhen's forehead. What on earth is going on? Isn't this mortal far too bold? Though those thoughts ran through his mind, he did not dare utter a word and stood meekly where he was.
Seeing this, Heavenly Venerable Daoling smiled. "Your surname is Lin? What is your connection to the Lin Family of Peaceful Valley?"
"This disciple is a descendant of Peaceful Valley's one hundred and thirty-seventh generation," Lin Xuanzhen answered hastily.
"Mm! Then we are not strangers after all. I, too, am a cultivator from the Lin Family. I belong to its ninety-ninth generation!" A trace of nostalgia flashed through Heavenly Venerable Daoling's eyes as he spoke calmly.
"Ah! This disciple pays his respects to his great ancestral grandfather!" Lin Xuanzhen hurriedly dropped to his knees and kowtowed, his forehead striking the floor with a resounding thump.
"Get up! Our Lin Family has no such kowtowing worms!" Heavenly Venerable Daoling said with a smile.
Lin Xuanzhen hurriedly stood up and remained shyly to one side without speaking.
Heavenly Venerable Daoling looked him up and down, stroking his beard with a silent smile and nodding from time to time.
(Hehe! Some readers said that some of the dialogue in the last few chapters felt a little childish. I went back and looked, and it was mainly the protagonist Li Xiaoya's lines that were a little childish. I think they still fit the general mindset of a ten-year-old child. Also, some of the recent chapters will focus more on scenes from immortal cultivators' daily lives and such, mainly because I hope to build an immortal cultivation world that feels truly real, rather than merely vague and ethereal.)