The legend begins with becoming a white deer.

"Little White, Little White, just hit this one!"

Yao Yao stood on tiptoe, her fingertips firmly pointing at the horizontal branch of the pear tree in front of her, which was nearly two meters above the ground. With her other hand, she gently shook the soft hair on Qi Ji's neck. Her crisp voice was full of encouragement, and her round eyes were full of anticipation.

Qi Ji raised the deer's head in the direction she pointed, his ears filled with the sounds of branches swaying in the pear orchard, the cries of deer, and the crisp sound of pears falling to the ground.

It all started just a moment ago.

The lead doe, following the scent of fruit, led the herd into the wild pear grove on the sunny slope.

The tree is full of plump mountain pears with sweet and delicious flesh. However, they are still some time away from being fully ripe and falling off naturally. The stems are firmly attached and will not fall off easily.

Fortunately, the pear trees are not very tall, so the adult sika deer instinctively find suitable branches, leap up and use their heads to knock the pears down to eat.

"Yo"

"Yo yo"

"Yo-woo"

Three fawns were jumping and calling out around the pear tree, their tender cries echoing one after another.

They tried to jump and kick like the mother deer, but their jumping ability was far inferior. They couldn't even lift their hooves higher than a fist, let alone bump into tree branches. Frustrated, they kept circling the tree trunk.

Qi Ji withdrew his gaze, took half a step back, pushed off the ground with his hind leg to gather strength, and then suddenly jumped.

The deer's hoof flew more than two meters into the air, and its head struck the horizontal branch that Yao Yao was pointing to precisely.

With a sharp thud, the branches shook violently, and two plump mountain pears fell to the ground.

Yao Yao clapped her hands and jumped up instantly, her eyes crinkling with laughter: "Wow, Xiao Bai, you're amazing! You jumped so high!"

The doe that was bumping into the branches all stopped and their surprised gazes fell on Qi Ji.

Although they have limited intelligence, they instinctively know that a half-grown fawn could never have such jumping ability, yet Qi Ji did it.

Seeing this, the three fawns got excited and tried to imitate Qi Ji by arching their backs and jumping. But no matter how hard they tried, their hooves barely lifted off the ground by more than twenty centimeters before they fell back down and could only squat dejectedly to the side, whimpering.

Qi Ji landed back on the ground, bent down and picked up a fallen pear, biting through the peel and chewing it.

The sweet juice spread in my mouth. And you know what? Although sika deer are purely herbivores, they can't always eat grass. Occasionally changing their diet and eating some natural fruits is a good choice.

"This pear tastes great, much better than the grass I've been eating lately," Qi Ji said, wagging his tail as he ate, clearly very satisfied with the taste of the wild pear.

Yao Yao picked up another pear, ran to the nearby stream to wash it clean, and came back to sit down next to Qi Ji, taking a big bite against his warm body.

"So sweet, Xiaobai is amazing!"

As she chewed, she freed her soft hand to stroke Qi Ji's smooth deer fur, her voice filled with undisguised joy.

Yesterday's arduous journey over mountains and valleys had exhausted this pampered little girl's strength, and she devoured a not-so-small mountain pear in no time.

Just then, a strong doe in the distance lunged forward with all her might, causing the thick branch to shake violently. More than a dozen wild pears fell down at once, rolling all over the ground.

Yao Yao's eyes lit up, and she immediately ran over to pick the roundest and plumpest one. She then ran to the river to wash it clean, and came back to sit next to Qi Ji, taking small bites of it.

"Hehe, this is the first time I've ever picked fruit to eat in the wild like this."

She bit into a pear, dangling her short legs, her voice filled with excited anticipation: "This is so much fun! This pear is so sweet, it tastes just as good as the ones the imperial kitchen prepares for me."

Upon hearing the words "Imperial Kitchen in the Palace," Qi Ji paused slightly while chewing a pear, and his perky deer ears twitched almost imperceptibly.

Yao Yao was completely unaware of the incredible information she had just revealed. She simply treated the little deer beside her as her most reassuring listener. Holding the pear in her hand, she chattered on and on about the old days, the topic unfolding layer by layer according to her heart, without any deliberate effort.

"Back when I was in the palace, whenever pears ripened, the imperial kitchen would send me lots and lots of pears, as well as other fruits—red, purple, golden—filling a whole plate. I can't even remember the names of many of them now."

She nibbled on the pear core, casually placing it on a fallen leaf beside her. She then wiped the juice-stained corners of her mouth with her sleeve, her eyes crinkling into a smile. "Mother would also have the imperial kitchen make all sorts of pastries for me, no less delicious than the fruits. They were so tasty! My favorites were Yunxi pear cake, agarwood honey cake, and moonflower lotus seed cake. They were all so delicious. I used to eat them every day, and sometimes if I couldn't finish them, Mother would call me a picky eater."

Qi Ji looked at Yao Yao with amusement.

You said you couldn't remember the names of the fruits, but how come you remember the names of these snacks so clearly?

As Yao Yao spoke, her throat bobbed involuntarily, as if she was craving the delicious food she had been looking forward to.

"Although the palace is nice, it gets boring after a while."

Her voice lowered slightly, her brows furrowed slightly, then quickly relaxed: "Houses are one after another, and the walls are so high that I can't see outside. I can only play in my own palace every day and can't go anywhere else. I get so bored that I secretly look through the sketchbook that Zhihua has hidden. The outside world described in it is so interesting."

Qi Ji listened quietly, already having reached a firm conclusion in his heart.

The imperial kitchen, the Empress Dowager, the high walls of the palace gardens, and those desserts whose names alone tell you they are extraordinary.

This little girl, without a doubt, should be a true princess, born of noble birth.

Qi Ji couldn't help but grumble to himself, so the first human he met in this world after transmigrating into a deer had such a high status.

While he was internally complaining, Yao Yao had already regained her interest. She started counting the places she longed for on her delicate white fingers, beginning with the most familiar ones, her longing growing stronger with each passing moment.

"The first good place outside that I knew of was the Qingyang Dao Sect."

"Every year, my mother would send people to offer incense and pray for blessings. When they came back, she would always tell me that the place was built on a mountaintop shrouded in clouds and mist, and that the Taoist priests there all had extraordinary skills, such as being able to fly over rooftops and walk on snow without leaving a trace. I have long wanted to go and see it for myself."

"Flying over rooftops and scaling walls... Taoist priest..."

Upon hearing this, Qi Ji's deer-like eyes twitched. This description sounded a bit like something out of a martial arts novel.

"After reading more storybooks, I realized there were many more amazing places in the world."

Yao Yao leaned close to Qi Ji as if sharing some incredible secret: "Xiao Bai, let me tell you something. I heard that in the western Xuan Yin Kingdom, there's a place called Thousand Buddha Cliff. The entire mountainside is carved with thousands of Buddha statues. The tallest one is even taller than the Hall of Supreme Harmony in the palace. Standing at the bottom of the cliff and looking up, your hat will almost fall off. It's magnificent! The stories also say that deep within that cliff, there lives a red ape with four arms. It's incredibly strong, and even the Xuan Yin Kingdom's army doesn't dare to provoke it easily."

Qi Ji's originally leisurely chewing of the pear gradually slowed down.

Yao Yao didn't stop. When she got to the last place, her voice became a little timid. She subconsciously moved closer to Qi Ji and grabbed the soft hair on his neck with her little hand.

"And another thing, there's the Frosty Long River in the far north. Every winter, it freezes over for miles, and many great rivers turn into ice belts. It's so beautiful, but also very dangerous, because there's an Ice Soul White Tiger there. The stories describe it as being made of ice, very white. I wonder if it looks like you, Little White."

Yao Yao paused for a moment, then her tone revealed a hint of lingering fear.

"As the painting says, this white tiger is very fierce. Many years ago, an army of 100,000 people invaded its territory. In the end, less than 10,000 people escaped, and the rest all died there."

The moment those words were spoken, Qi Ji completely stopped all movement.

His deer-like eyes widened slightly, and he forgot to chew the fruit in his mouth as he looked at the little girl beside him who was still chattering away in shock.

Could it annihilate an army of 100,000?

This is no ordinary wild beast; it is clearly a supernatural and ferocious beast capable of shaking the very boundaries of a dynasty.

Adding to the Daoist master who could scale walls and leap across rooftops, and the four-armed red ape that could fight against an army, the complete outline of this world began to become clearer before his eyes.

This is not an ordinary ancient world, but a world where martial arts reign supreme and strange beasts roam freely.

And he is now just a sika deer with no arms (hooves).