What Do You Mean, "Reinforcements Are Coming From Behind"?

"Meteor?"

Chen Xian squinted his aged eyes, watching a red streak race across the sky from southeast to northwest.

He muttered under his breath, "Old saying goes, a meteor falls, a noble tires. Which noble is in such a hurry this late at night?"

"What meteor? What noble?"

Shangguan Hongyue, who had nearly finished gnawing an entire pork knuckle, heard this and looked up too.

The next second, the pork bone clattered to the ground as she shot to her feet: "No! That's wrong, it's not a meteor!"

A faint silver light instantly coated her eyes—the Sword Eye, a common technique at the Sword Master realm, allowing her to pierce the night veil and see distant truths.

Her gaze cut through layers of clouds like a sword's gleam, and she finally made out the true form of that racing streak.

"That... that's a disciple's protective sword light from our sect!"

"Damn it, he's burning his vital blood to force the sword—it's a sign of falling!"

Shangguan Hongyue's pretty face turned deathly pale.

Chen Xian's heart also skipped a beat: "What's happened?"

"I have to go help!"

The flying sword leaning against the table instantly rose. As Shangguan Hongyue was about to step onto it, Chen Xian urged, "Take this old man along."

Shangguan Hongyue paused, realizing the senior had no flying tool. She bit her lip: "Senior, forgive me! Saving lives comes first!"

Chen Xian felt his old waist tighten as a soft yet strong arm wrapped around him, lifting him onto the flying sword a meter off the ground.

"Hey, hey, hey! Slow down! This old man's lumbar disc..."

Before he could finish, his feet landed on the sword, which pulsed with silver light and suddenly widened. The moment he steadied himself, the sword shot up like an arrow from a bowstring, "whoosh," flying off.

The two of them and the sword sped away, leaving the gaping villagers behind.

This was Chen Xian's first real flight in the sixty years since he'd crossed over.

The experience was far from pleasant.

The howling wind pried open his lips, pouring straight down his throat through the gaps of his missing teeth, while his withered hair and beard flew wildly like weeds.

If not for a strange suction force under his feet keeping him stable on the sword, he would have fallen to his death from the sky.

But the intense weightlessness churned his stomach, and the wine he'd just drunk nearly came back up, held down only by sheer will.

Luckily, he stood behind Shangguan Hongyue, who couldn't see his pathetic state—otherwise, his "senior demeanor" would be ruined.

Her red dress flapped loudly, the hem slapping against Chen Xian's old face. A flash of white caught his eye, and when he focused, his face reddened: "So cultivators wear safety shorts too."

But Shangguan Hongyue was fully focused on driving the sword toward where the "meteor" had fallen, with no attention to spare for him.

Before long, the "meteor" crashed, its light vanishing.

Chen Xian forced his eyes open against the wind and saw that the fallen "star" had landed in Center Town.

Center Town—a simple name, clear as day. Surrounded by dozens of villages, it was the hub of human settlements for hundreds of miles and the only commercial center.

At this hour, shops would normally be shuttered and homes dark, but now the streets blazed with light.

A thunderous "boom!" had just blasted a five-meter-wide crater into the town's central stone square.

Countless townsfolk rushed over with torches and oil lamps, their faces pale with fear as they slowly gathered around the pit.

At the crater's center, the hard stone slabs had shattered into gravel, soil churned up, and a bloody, mangled figure lay sprawled in the rubble, a faintly glowing greatsword pinned beneath him.

"Aiyo! Who is this? Did heaven strike him down?"

"What heaven's strike? I think it's a legendary saint who fell from the sky and got banged up!"

"A saint this weak?"

"Shh! Look at that greatsword under him—longer and wider than our family's bench. Must be one of those cultivators the storytellers talk about, right?"

"Cultivators? Aren't they just in tales?"

"..."

The townsfolk pointed and whispered, but none dared approach. Everyone waited for the town's law enforcers to arrive.

Center Town, with tens of thousands of residents, had a proper system and enforcement office.

After a long wait, the enforcers hadn't come, but a silver streak of light tore through the night sky, landing steadily at the crater's edge.

The onlookers scrambled back, murmuring among themselves: "Two more! Enemies or friends?"

Shangguan Hongyue ignored the chatter. Before the flying sword had even fully stopped, she leaped down and rushed to the figure in the pit.

Chen Xian climbed off the sword slowly, relieved to feel solid ground, and took in the man in the pit by the surrounding torchlight.

The man's gruesome state made even this old man, who had seen countless births and deaths, feel a chill.

He wore a long robe, the same red as Shangguan Hongyue's dress—likely the uniform of the Profound Cloud Sword Sect's disciples.

His body bore no fewer than ten wounds, with flesh turned outward and even penetrating injuries; his long robe was soaked through by the gushing blood, dyed a startling red. One of his opponent's arms was also broken, the joint twisted backward into an exaggerated angle.

The wounds varied in shape, suggesting they were caused by a siege of different weapons.

Chen Xian approached the man, scrutinized him carefully, and came to this conclusion.

"Brother Lin? Is it Brother Lin Xiaoyan!"

Shangguan Hongyue somehow produced a handkerchief from nowhere, wiped the blood and grime from the man's face, and suddenly cried out in surprise.

Then, a wooden box appeared in her hand; trembling, she opened it and took out a cyan pill.

Seeing that Brother Lin was unconscious and unable to swallow, she crushed the pill into powder and, using her own Dao power, sent it into his mouth.

Even from over a meter away, Chen Xian could smell a rich fragrance of grass and wood, indicating the pill's potency was extremely strong.

Sure enough, as soon as the medicine entered his mouth, nearly all the wounds on Lin Xiaoyan's body stopped bleeding simultaneously. Within a few breaths, he began to cough violently.

"He's awake, he's awake!"

"Aiyo! A miraculous medicine!"

The onlookers marveled. For someone so gravely wounded to be saved, this legendary cultivator truly possessed extraordinary means.

"Cough... cough, cough!"

After spitting out several mouthfuls of black blood, Lin Xiaoyan slowly opened his eyes. In his blurry vision, he caught a familiar flash of red—the uniform of an inner disciple.

Then his gaze gradually focused, landing on the face before him.

"Hong... Hongyue, Junior Sister?"

A faint joy appeared on his face, but his voice was as low as a broken bellows.

"It's me! Brother Lin, what happened? You're a Heavy Sword Master at the sixth level of the Sword Master realm—who could have wounded you like this?"

Shangguan Hongyue's eyes were red.

Lin Xiaoyan did not answer immediately. Instead, he turned his neck with difficulty and saw Chen Xian standing to the side, leaning on a single crutch.

He froze for a moment. Although the old man displayed only the first level of the Dao Apprentice realm in cultivation, the aura faintly emanating from him actually suppressed his own Heavy Sword Intent.

Could this be some executive elder of the sect?

Lin Xiaoyan suddenly acted as if he had found a savior: "Senior... Senior!" He gripped Shangguan Hongyue's sleeve tightly with his backhand, his eyes wide open, as if bursting with the last radiance before death: "Reporting... Senior!"

Seeing his blood surging, Shangguan Hongyue quickly pressed him down: "Brother, don't rush! Speak slowly!"

"The Mortal District... the 73rd Hanging Sword Array has been broken!"

Lin Xiaoyan's words struck Shangguan Hongyue's ears like a thunderclap: "The Blood Demon Sect... those bastards, they're blood... blood sacrificing the entire mortal district, they've already slaughtered... three cities!"

Before he finished speaking, Shangguan Hongyue was struck as if by lightning, her whole body stiffening.

The Hanging Sword Array was the formation laid down by the Sword Sect to protect the mortals in the Xiongguan Mountain Range, a barrier to isolate blood beasts and demon cultivators.

If the array was broken, it meant that a pure land had become a slaughterhouse for demon cultivators.

Blood Demons were the most cruel among demon cultivators; she could almost see the scene of mountains of corpses and seas of blood.

"Junior Sister, this... take this!"

Lin Xiaoyan used the last shred of his strength to pull out a jade token engraved with profound runes.

The token glowed faintly with purple light, exuding a mysterious sensation as if it could pierce through reality and illusion.

"Array-Piercing Talisman!"

Shangguan Hongyue recognized the token at once. With the Array-Piercing Talisman, she could directly cross the Hanging Sword Array without waiting until noon the next day.

"Hurry... hurry back to the sect... the Blood Demon Sect's pursuers are right behind..."

After speaking the last word, Lin Xiaoyan's head lolled to the side, and he fell unconscious again.

Chen Xian was stunned.

What did that mean?

He could leave now?

And what did "pursuers behind" mean?