I followed the slowly strengthening trail of demonic qi, avoiding red ghost fires.

Finally, I reached a magnificent set of double doors built into the underground stone and inlaid with blood-red carvings. Very demon-like of this Demon King. My divine sense told me that the demon king was inside these doors.

Okay, time to weigh my options.

Walking straight through the front door to face off with a demon king in a bad mood...wasn't sounding super appealing right now.

Instead, I put my hand on the wall and performed the Earth Reforming Technique, opening up a tunnel tall enough for me to walk through. Then I entered and closed it off behind myself so no little ghost fires that passed by would notice there was a giant freaking hole in the wall.

I tunneled forward, listening to the sound of muffled shouting coming from the room inside those giant doors. The shouting voice was muffled, but it was low and rumbling. Every time it growled, I felt vibrations under my feet, and little parts of the ceiling of the tunnel I was digging crumbled down.

Dang. That was one angry demon king.

Finally, I'd tunneled my way around to the back of the room. I reached out with my divine sense to see that there was some sort of throne in the room facing away from where I was in the wall right now. Perfect for a quiet entrance from me.

Silently, I opened the tunnel into the demonic throne room and stepped out, sealing up the tunnel behind me and concealing myself with the Shadow Walking technique, so that all that could be seen was my shadow—which didn't really matter here, since I was in a dark underground cave full of shadows anyways.

I crept around the throne to see what was going on.

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Dang...my immortal heart stopped for a second there.

Figuratively. Since I'm immortal and my heart can't stop like that. But anyways.

I finally had a full view of the moody Demon King who'd cursed Yingxuan Shan with the Frightful Aging Curse. And he...was one scary-ass demon.

I'd seen demons before, sure — glowing red eyes, talons, foaming mouths, fangs, etc, etc — but nothing like this. No; this Demon King bro had to be ancient. I'd never seen something like him.

He was sitting on his stone throne in his demonic form, literally a morphing black substance vaguely resembling the shape of a human body. His eyes glowed red, his teeth were sharp as knives, and he wore a crown of spiked metal. And he exuded pure demonic qi that was so freaking malevolent I almost choked.

Dang. Add this to the list of the craziest things I'd seen since ascending to immortality. And I'd seen some pretty crazy things.

Now, I could hear this raging demon king clearly. As he roared, pieces of rock fell from the ceiling and crushed the poor red ghost fires that were floating around the room. They squealed in pain and extinguished.

There was one ghost fire in the center of the room that had taken on a human form and was groveling at the foot of the Demon King's throne.

"My King!" the ghost fire sobbed, hiccuping in fear. "My King! I swear on my life — on my death, I mean — that I will never bring you water with ice in it again! Only heated water! This shameful ghost will go boil himself in a pot of oil! My King! Have mercy on this shameful being..."

The Demon King roared, sending more rocks falling from the ceiling and more ghost fires squealing.

"YOU THINK AN APOLOGY IS ENOUGH? I ASKED SPECIFICALLY FOR WATER WITHOUT ICE! NOT BOILING WATER! NOT HOT WATER! NOT COLD WATER! LUKEWARM WATER!!! YOU IMBECILE! YOU GAVE THIS DEMON KING A GLASS OF WATER WITH ICE IN IT AFTER THIS DEMON KING LOWERED HIMSELF TO SPECIFY FOR YOU?! A DISGRACE!"

The ghost fire servant wailed as the Demon King's killing intent increased exponentially.

"Have mercy! My King, you are having a bad day! Have mercy on this servant — "

The room started to shake. I had to grab onto the throne to keep my balance.

"YOU DARE TELL THIS VENERABLE DEMON KING THAT HE IS HAVING A BAD DAY? YOU UNRULY SERVANT, THOSE WILL BE YOUR LAST WORDS!"

"My King! AIEEEEEEEEE!"

With that, the Demon King vaporized the little ghost fire, extinguishing his pitiful soul.

I blinked.

Damn. So this demon king really did have a bad temper. Probably the worst demon temper ever.