The legend begins with becoming a white deer.

"......................"

At that moment, everyone's expression froze on the spot, as if they had been frozen in place.

The faces on each person were a mixture of embarrassment and horror.

One second they were gathered together, talking confidently about their plan to "catch the deer in a jar," exuding an air of self-assurance and arrogance. The next second, they discovered that the real culprit was right there not far away.

Everyone's mouth was half-open, but no one could utter a sound.

They never dreamed that the auspicious white deer would stand silently atop the city wall, at a distance close enough to hear everything that had just been said.

The air was deathly silent.

Ma Mang was the first to come to his senses.

He let out a heavy sigh of relief, wiped his forehead, and said nonchalantly, "Damn it, what's the panic? I almost forgot, this white deer is just an animal after all. How could it understand human speech? No matter how much we talk, it will only hear the noise."

The moment he finished speaking, Wei Shuo and Feng Zhan's faces darkened instantly. They turned to him and hissed, "You frog in a well! The auspicious white deer is said to be intelligent and can understand human speech. Do you think you're some wild deer from the mountains?!"

"What?!"

Ma Mang's relaxed expression froze instantly, his eyes widening in shock: "Then...then this is terrible?!"

Wei Shuo and his companion were too lazy to pay any more attention to this fool. Their eyes were fixed on the snow-white figure on the city wall, and their hearts sank to the bottom.

They had planned everything meticulously, but none of them had anticipated that the white deer would be so fast. Not only did it reach the barbican before the defenses were completed, but it also silently crept onto the city wall.

On the city wall, Qi Ji was also somewhat surprised.

He had been secretly following the two scouts all the way to Luohui City, intending to investigate the city's strengths and weaknesses; he was not foolish enough to barge straight through the main gate.

He could see through the trick of using barbicans to lure the enemy in at a glance, and it couldn't trap him at all.

Qi Ji had no idea that as soon as he landed on the city wall, he would hear the entire scheme this group had plotted against him.

The scheme wasn't particularly clever, but it was certainly vicious enough.

However, now that we've heard everything, there's no longer any ambiguity about who's friend and who's foe.

"Hmph, another bunch of idiots trying to catch me. Do they think I'm just some ordinary wild animal that they can grab whenever they want? In that case, let me see what you're capable of."

"Yo~~~~"

A deep, majestic deer cry rang out from Qi Ji's mouth.

With his muscles tensed, Qi Ji pushed off the battlements with all his might, his body carrying immense force as he plunged straight down towards Wei Shuo and the others below!

"Get out of the way!"

Wei Shuo and the others screamed in alarm and hurriedly scrambled to both sides.

Only Ma Mang was oblivious, instead grinning maliciously as he drew his long sword and prepared to slash at the leaping figure: "You beast, you still dare to be so fierce—"

"Pfft!"

The heavy deer hoof, carrying the force of its descent, stomped down hard, landing directly on Ma Mang's chest along with the long sword.

The cracking sound of bones exploding mixed with a muffled thud rang out, and before Ma Mang could even utter a scream, he was stomped into the ground.

"Boom!"

The bluestone ground cracked in a spiderweb pattern around him, and amidst the flying dust, he was beyond dead.

"That idiot."

Wei Shuo caught a glimpse of this scene out of the corner of his eye and immediately cursed the guy for being stupid.

When Ma Mang's men saw their leader die instantly, they were all stunned. Then one of them shouted at the top of his lungs, "Fire arrows! Fire arrows and kill it!"

"Don't shoot, we're still inside the barbican."

Wei Shuo and Feng Zhan's expressions changed drastically, and they shouted to stop them.

With the city gates still closed, the arrows would only hurt their own men first. The two dared not delay and leaped towards the archway connecting to the inner city.

Of the group, Zhu Zhen was the last to run.

His face was ashen, and the fear in his heart was so intense it felt like his chest was about to burst.

He was originally a remnant of the Black Tiger Gang. Because the gang was purged by the Bilin Kingdom government, he blamed all his hatred on Qi Ji. This time, he also tried his best to persuade everyone to set up the siege trap in order to avenge the destruction of the gang.

Before this, he only regarded Qi Ji as a wild beast, no matter how strong he was, as a target for him to hunt.

But when that snow-white figure swooped down with the force of a raging storm, and when Ma Mang was crushed in front of him with a single hoof, Zhu Zhen's obsession with revenge was instantly shattered, leaving only the most primal instinct for survival.

"Don't target me...don't target me..."

Zhu Zhen prayed frantically in her heart, her legs twisting and turning as if she wished she could grow two more legs.

But the next second, intense pain exploded from his back.

An overwhelming force slammed into his back, sending Zhu Zhen flying like a pebble into the air.

"Bang--!"

After a dull thud, his body slammed heavily against the inner wall of the barbican. The immense impact dented the bricks and stones, and he was almost embedded in the wall, drooping limply and falling silent.

After dealing with Zhu Zhen, Qi Ji continued his pursuit of Wei Shuo and his companion who were fleeing ahead.

The two sides are not even in the same league in terms of speed.

The archway was right in front of them, only a few feet away, but to Wei Shuo and Feng Zhan it seemed as far away as an insurmountable chasm.

The icy aura behind them locked them in, and the shadow of death drew ever closer, almost as if it would descend upon them at any moment.

The two exchanged a quick glance, both seeing a resolute determination in each other's eyes.

"Let's give it our all!"

With a shout, the two turned around abruptly.

Wei Shuo drew his longsword, and Feng Zhan's trident flashed with cold light. The two of them pushed their internal energy to the limit at the same time. Two condensed crescent-shaped streams of true energy, one on the left and one on the right, slashed towards Qi Ji with a whistling wind!

This was the culmination of their life's work, a single, all-out attack.

Faced with these two formidable air blades, Qi Ji didn't even attempt to dodge.

He lowered his head slightly, and his pair of warm, jade-like antlers pushed forward—

"Rip!"

Like a thin sheet of paper being slashed by a sharp blade, the two seemingly powerful crescent-shaped streams of true energy instantly dissipated without even causing the slightest obstruction.

The antlers continued their momentum, slamming solidly into Feng Zhan's chest.

"Wow--"

Feng Zhan coughed up blood and flew backward like a kite with a broken string, his chest deeply caved in and his flesh torn apart.

His body whizzed through the archway, crashing heavily onto the inner city floor. He slid several feet down the stone slabs, leaving a long trail of blood, before finally lying motionless.

With Feng Zhan dead, Wei Shuo's last bit of courage completely collapsed.

He instinctively rolled to the side to avoid the attack. His usually fierce and ruthless face was now bloodless, and his whole body was trembling uncontrollably.

"Yo"

Qi Ji shook his head, ignoring the fleeing henchmen around him. His amber eyes coldly locked onto Wei Shuo, and he lightly stomped his hoof on the ground.

A soft "thump" sounded like a heavy hammer blow to Wei Shuo's heart.

Wei Shuo's face turned pale. He dropped his long sword with a clatter, then knelt down on the ground with a thud, begging for mercy incoherently: "Your Excellency Bai Lu, spare my life! Your Excellency Bai Lu, spare my life! I... I never intended to harm you! It was all Ma Mang and Zhu Zhen who bewitched me. I was forced into this..."

He cried and pointed at the corpse on the ground, completely shirking responsibility.

Qi Ji looked at him indifferently, his eyes showing no emotion whatsoever.

He walked slowly over and lifted his heavy forelegs.

Wei Shuo's face was covered in tears and snot, and the extreme fear made his mind tremble.

He couldn't understand how a carefully planned trap in a fortified city could turn into a prison that trapped them in the blink of an eye.

If he could do it all over again, he would never agree with those two idiots, Ma Mang and Zhu Zhen.

But there are no "what ifs" in this world.

"Bang!"

With a muffled cracking sound, Wei Shuo's body lay on the ground, a mixture of red and white.

The remaining bandits, seeing their leaders die one after another, were terrified and fled towards the inner city in a panic, leaving behind only bloodstains and several mangled corpses in the barbican.