Five young warrior monks are hidden in a water barrel. Fu, the one who is force to hide in the bottom of it, asks why he need to hide in here rather than fighting the invaders, while the Malao, Seh, Hok, and Long told him to stay quiet. It turned out that Cangzhen temple, their home, is under attacked by unknown forces. Their mentor, Grandmaster, managed to get the five inside of the barrel before fighting the invader off with other monks.They did not hide for long. The leader of the army and a former Cangzhen monk, Ying, is ordering his men to find the five and kill them all. The five young warrior monks are blown from the barrel and almost killed by a soldier, only for Grandmaster killed him first. From Grandmaster's words, they understood the entire situation: Ying is leading an army with an order to eradicate the temple and its monks, while in search for the four lengendary dragon scrolls. The five monks, along with Grandmaster, are the only survivors. Just as they are about to escape, Ying emerged from the entrance and confronted them.
Apparently, Ying and Grandmaster are on bad term. Ying held him responsible for everything he lost, and Grandmaster reminded him that he had lost himself in search for glory. Frustrated by idle talk, Ying draws a "qiang" - or musket from his robe and aim it at Grandmaster. Seeing his overconfidence as an opening, Grandmaster swept Ying off the floor while order the five monks to escape, with a hint to find their past.
While reaching the main entrance of the temple, The five decided to split and go on separate way in case that Ying is pursuing them. Fu, however, turn back and fight, hoping to frustrate Ying by retrving the dragon scrolls. He faced Tonglong, second-in-command of Ying, in a sword fight, with Fu emerged victorious and taking the scrolls with him. Just as he decided to leave, Ying is waiting for him. Grandmaster, while skilled, it no match for energetic and vengeful Ying. Even Grandmaster's last ditch effort could not save Fu. Just as Fu is about to get killed, Tonglong unintentionally distracted Ying with "information concerning the scroll", and Fu slipped into darkness.
Ying is infuriated with Tonglong's Captain Obvious action, and he ordered the army to hunt the five down while they garrison in the ruins of Cangzhen. However, rumors that the ghost of Cangzhen monks is haunting the soldier spread among the camp. This forced Commander Woo, a superstitious officer, to give a proper burial to the dead rather than working on his task. Meanwhile, Ying told Tonglong why he left the temple and how he feels that Grandmaster is not what he appears to be like, while giving the task to capture Hok, seeing that the rumor is justified.
While running in the wood, Fu encountered a hunting band whos is hunting a mother tiger and its cubs. Enraged, Fu intervened and attempted to stop them. Unfortunately, due to Fu's temper and hunters' arrogance, the negotiation failed and the mother tiger died. In rampage, Fu kills off almost the entire hunting expedition team, and knock a young boy deaf with a blow. The victories is short-lived, as Fu get captured by a hunting trap later in retaliation.
Caged, Fu received the hatres from the townpeople and the audience of the governor. Feeling guilty for his reckless action, Fu attempted to apologize, only to get brush off by the governor and the dragon scrolls confiscated. Furious at his plan and effort came to nothing, he complained to a drunkard who sits right next to the cage, only to hear the surprise: The hunters are to kill the tiger in revenged for murdering the governor's wife, and the boy whom Fu knocked deaf is governor's son, Ho. The revalation caught Fu off guard and speechless.
When the inital hate past, Ho's friend, Ma, approach Fu with comtempt, but soon awed at Fu's kung fu skill and want to learn from him. Fu initially refused, but agreed to his demand and taught him the "no-shadow kick". Thanks to Ma, the kids begin to approach Fu and asked him to teach kung fu. Even Fu's victim, Ho, forgives him seeing his rage and assult justified. At the same time, Fu's capture reached the ears of Ying, and he ordered Captain Yue, the Emperor's nephew, to bring him back. realizing his transfer is near, Fu made a last-minute effort to escape and succeed.
Fu did not run far. Prior to his escape, the governor, although forgives Fu due to his attempt to amend the damage, told him that he cannot retract the envoy, fearing Ying's wrath will destory the town. He hid in the crowd and watch the army march to the square of the town. Yue order to bring the monk to him, but Governor offered him the scrolls, citing that Fu is useless without the scrolls. Unsatisfied, Yue ordered the Army to find Fu. Seeing this, Fu decided to take the responsibility and return to the cage, in return for Yue to spare the townpeople. However, Yue is convinced that Fu is a imposter of himself, and ask to take every boy around his age along as well. Just then, the drunkard showed up to rescue Fu and drive the soldiers off. The soldiers proves to be no match for the durnkard, even with qiang. Yue broke his leg falling from his horse, and decided to cut the loss and bring only Fu and the scroll away. The drunkard could do nothing but to watch the convoy left.
While marching back to Cangzhen, Yue and his men are set up by a band of monkeys leading by Malao. After rescuing Fu from the cage, the two fight the outnumbering soldiers with ease, before Ying intervened and capturing both of them, meanwhile, Tonglong returned with Hok, bounded on a pole. Ying order Tonglong to execute the three in the forest, but Tonglong asked Fu to stage a fight and letting the three go instead. Confused, Fu agreed, and the three fled without harm.Fu, Malao and Hok discuss what their next move should be. While Hok insisted to go to Shaolin Temple, another warrior monks residence, to seek sanctuary, Fu and Malao stay behind and try to get the scrolls back from Ying. In the meantime, Hok began to believe that Ying is justified for his action, and that Grandmaster is into shady business, while Fu disregard it as nonsense. They also discuss about Tonglong's suspicious action in letting them go, but they were cut off by a gunfire and decided to leave before Ying finds them.
During his escape, Malao encountered a band of monkeys led by a white-face monkey. They set up a caravan and raided it, but find themselves trapped by the escorts— the Bandits in the area who are hunting for Monkeys. Malao is also surprised to find Seh among their rank as well. Unwilling to stand the action, Malao challenged Hung, a bandit, to a duel. Using his skill and cleverness, Malao managed to beat the large man by narrow margin, securing the safety of the monkey horde and himself.
Turns out, Seh's involvement with Bandit was not unusual: his first stop is an outside informat which informs Cangzhen of the current event— Nggung. After a brief scuffle, Seh informs him of the destruction of Cangzhen Temple, much to the surpise of the informat. Nggung told him to join a group of bandit operating in the region, led by Seh's father Mong. Seh later come to contact with his father, and left for the Shaolin Temple for refuge and help.
After the trio split to go to Shaolin Temple, Fu and Malao decided to stole the scrolls back before they head toward there together. By drugging Ying's medicine,dragon bone, they sneaked into the camp and took the scrolls. As they walks out, however, Fu realized that one of the scroll is missing. He initially enraged at Malao's recklessness, but soon cool off, saying that he is also responsible for not giving him the full detail.
As Fu and Malao approach to Shaolin Temple, Seh meet up with Malao, while Hok is absent. They also find that Shaolin temple is also destroyed as well. Not long after their discovery, they find a lone monk name Tsung around the compound. After the initial conversation, Seh realized that Tsung is not a genuine monk as he appears to be. Soon enough, after learning about the dragon scrolls, Tsung attack them: it is revealed that Tsung was actually a renegade monk who was responsible for the destruction of Shaolin Temple. Using his leopard style, Tsung defeated the boys with a flash. Just as Tsung is about to finish them off, Ying intervened.
After realizing the scrolls were stolen, Ying led his men to Shaolin Temple. Enraged by Tsung's taunt of his inability to kill the boys and steal the scrolls, Ying attack Tsung in a series of lighting-quick blows. Both men exchanges blows quickly, with neither finding an opening to exploit. Eventually, Tsung was defeated by Ying, but Fu, mistakingly though Seh was dead, attack Ying from behind. This sudden move shift the balanced of power, with an exhausted Tsung had Ying at his mercy. Seh, however, used the confusion to steal the scrolls back and the three escaped. Thankfully, Tonglong arrived just in time to rescue Ying from Tsung's grasp, but Malao noticed that Tonglong may not be as loyal to Ying as he had thought...
