Xu Yun aggressively pointed the pointy shovel at the stunned Fong Jue, who had just been celebrating his success at charades. He looked kind of funny because he was a scrawny kid in scholar's robes, but the anger in his eyes was no joke.

"You hurt my laoshi!"

"Um...my laoshi, too!" piped up a meek voice — Li Cheng, who was cowering behind Xu Yun. He gulped, staring up at the towering demon, whose body was like a morphing black cloud. "M-M-My...M-My laoshi, t-t-t-too..."

Xu Yun nodded fiercely. "That's right! Our laoshi! You hurt our laoshi, and you're going to pay for it! You also cursed all of these people and killed several of them!"

"Yeah!" The villagers chorused, shaking their fists and cursing at Fong Jue, who blinked down at them. "You're the bane of our existence! Scum!"

Xu Yun nodded in approval, finally lowering the shovel. He glared up at Fong Jue, crossing his scrawny arms.

"I'm going to go and get my laoshi now. Don't even try to stop me — or we'll all attack! What's more, we've all come down here in order to make you reverse the Frightful Aging Curse you set on the village of Yingxuan Shan!"

"Yeah!"

"That's right!"

"Reverse the curse, you stupid demon!"

It was a crazy scene. Who would ever think they would see a crowd of villagers with shovels headed by an eighteen-year-old scholar shaking their fists and cursing at a giant, morphing demon underneath a mountain? This was really too much...

Also...seriously, this was...well, shit. This was absolutely the worst possible situation.

"Hey! Xu Yun!" I snapped, pushing myself up and brushing dirt off my immortal robes, which were still black and white like panda fur. "What d'you think you're doing? This immortal laoshi told you not to come down!"

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Xu Yun's eyes widened. "Immortal laoshi Xia! You — you're okay! I thought—" he hiccuped, and suddenly started wiping his face fiercely to hide sudden tears. So he was putting on a brave face, huh? "I thought you were dead!"

He looked like he was about to run over to me, so I grimaced and held up a hand, telling him to stop.

"Stop right there, kid. Can't you see there's an ancient demon here?"

Xu Yun didn't move, glancing at Fong Jue, who was still staring at this group of villagers with great interest. I got a sudden bad feeling. Why were his glowing red demon eyes looking so excited all of a sudden?

"Yes — but Immortal Laoshi Xia, we have many people. I thought together, we could—"

"No!" I held my head, gritting my teeth. Seriously, this was giving me an immortal headache! Who did this kid think he was, a god or something?! "Stupid! Xu Yun! A crowd of angry people together is basically just food for a demon! This is why I told you not to come! Aish!!!"

After cursing a couple more times, I looked up sternly. "Xu Yun! How did you bring everyone down here? There was a barrier enclosing this Demonic Prison Realm beneath the mountain. Without breaking the Demonic Containment Array, there's no way..."

My eyes widened. I know, I know, my immortal heart couldn't just stop beating, but — it did. Metaphorically. Or technically. Logically? I don't know, it doesn't matter.

"Xu Yun! Did you break the Demonic Containment Array?! You—?!?!?!?!"

Xu Yun looked extremely regretful and embarrassed at that moment. "Was I—not supposed to? We dug a little into the mountain near your array, and then we found a skull...I read about Demonic-Containing Arrays before, so I thought—I thought, if we broke the skull, then...then we could come down and help you...so I broke it, and we dug down into the passage..."

AAAAAAAARGH!

SERIOUSLY?!

I wanted to smack my head against the wall right now. But with the lack of brainpower in here, clearly I needed to spare every brain cell I could.

That's why the mountain had been rumbling before! Not just because of Fong Jue's laugh — but also because the array imprisoning him under this mountain had been broken! Meaning—

At that moment, the cave started to rumble again.

Everyone turned around at the ominous sound. Fong Jue, the big, bad, grumpy and pro-charades demon king, was laughing again, holding his stomach and showing those shining white teeth. When he spoke, a shiver went down my spine.

He sounded extremely happy.

"Thank you, mortal! Now, I will no longer have to endure days of boredom! Instead—I can leave my prison, and wreak as much havoc as I wish!"