The moment the Handsome Monkey King saw him, he threw himself down and kowtowed beyond counting, crying only:

倒身下拜 is to throw yourself flat (倒 dǎo) and 磕頭 (磕 kē) is to knock the forehead on the ground — kowtows 不計其數, beyond counting (不 in its bú tone before the falling tone of 計). The monkey who accepted the homage of an entire mountain is face-down on the floor.

'Master! Master! Your disciple pays homage with all his heart, pays homage with all his heart!'

志心朝禮 is to pay homage with a single undivided will (志心, wholeheartedness), and he says it twice over. 朝 here is cháo, to attend court or do homage, not zhāo, morning — one character, two lives.

The patriarch said: 'From what region are you? State your native place and name clearly first, then bow again.'

那 here is nǎ, the interrogative "which," in the older form used before 哪 split off. 鄉貫 is your native place and household registration and 姓名 your surname and given name: the master is essentially asking for papers. Note the order, too — identify yourself first, then bow. He will not accept homage from someone he cannot place.

The Monkey King said: 'Your disciple is from the Water-Curtain Cave of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit, in the country of Aolai in the Eastern Continent of Superior Spirit.'

He gives the full provenance from the chapter's opening — 東勝神洲, the Eastern Continent; 傲來國, the land of Aolai; then the mountain and the cave. It is the cosmic geography of the second passage recited back as a home address, which is exactly what it is to him.

The patriarch shouted an order: 'Throw him out! He's nothing but a cheat and a humbug — what fruit of the Way could the likes of him cultivate?'

喝令 is to bark an order (喝 hè, to shout, not hē, to drink). 撒詐搗虛 pairs two verbs for lying: 撒詐, to deal in deceit, and 搗虛, to cook up falsehood. 那裡 is nǎ lǐ in its rhetorical use, "how on earth could he…?", and 道果, the "fruit of the Way," is the whole object of cultivation. The rejection is instant and total — and it is a test.

The Monkey King hastily kowtowed without stopping: 'Your disciple's words are honest, with not a shred of deceit.'

磕頭不住, kowtowing without stopping (不 in its bú tone before the falling tone of 住), and 決無虛詐, not a shred of deceit. Notice what he does not do. Called a liar to his face, the king who once walked into the Dragon King's palace and demanded a weapon simply panics and insists he is telling the truth.

The patriarch said: 'If you're honest, how can you speak of the Eastern Continent of Superior Spirit?

怎麼說 — how can you claim it? The master's objection is geographical, and it is the reader's objection as well. Nobody walks here from the Eastern Continent.

That place is separated from here by two seas and a whole Southern Continent of Jambudvīpa — how could you ever have got here?'

隔 is to be separated by; 重 here is chóng, a layer or fold, so 兩重大海 is two seas one behind the other; and 那 is nà, the demonstrative, this time. The route he names is precisely the monkey's own journey read backwards — eastern sea, Jambudvīpa, western sea. The master is not guessing. He is checking the story against a map he already knows.

The Monkey King kowtowed: 'Your disciple drifted over oceans and crossed seas, traversing realms and roaming about for a dozen years and more, before I finally found my way to this place.'

登界遊方 is to cross realms and wander abroad, 遊方 being the standard term for a religious seeker on the road. 十數個年頭 is a colloquial "a dozen-odd years," and 方才訪到 is "only just found" (才 cái). Everything the last five passages told at length he compresses into one sentence, and complains about none of it.

The patriarch said: 'So you came step by step — well enough. What is your surname?'

逐漸行來的也罷 — "so you came by degrees, then; very well" (行 xíng; 罷 bà, a small sigh of a word, grudging acceptance). Step by step is a believable answer, and it also happens to describe cultivation itself. Then the fateful question, four characters long: 你姓甚麼, "what is your surname?" — which the monkey is about to mishear completely.

The Monkey King said again: 'I have no temper. If a man curses me, I'm not vexed; if he strikes me, I'm not angered.

And here is the chapter's best joke. 姓 (surname) and 性 (nature, temper) are perfect homophones, both xìng, so the monkey hears "what's your temper like?" and answers 我無性 — I haven't got one. Curse him, 不惱, he is not vexed (惱 nǎo); hit him, 不嗔, he is not angered (嗔 chēn, and that one is a Buddhist technical term, one of the three poisons). Both keep 不 in its bù form before non-falling tones.

I just make an apology and let it go. All my life I've had no temper.'

陪個禮兒 is to offer an apology and let the matter drop (陪禮, to make amends; 兒 the diminutive er), and 罷了 closes it off. Then the boast: 一生無性, "all my life, no temper." Anyone who has read the next ninety-nine chapters will enjoy that sentence. It is also, at this moment, more or less true of him — the rage comes later, and it comes from Heaven.

The patriarch said: 'Not that kind of nature. Your parents — what was their surname?'

The master untangles it: 不是這個性, "not that kind of nature" (不 as bú before the falling tone of 是), and asks again about the parents. But there is a floor under the joke. The monkey genuinely has no 姓, because a surname is something inherited and he has nobody to inherit from — so the only xìng he can report on is the other one.

The Monkey King said: 'I have no parents either.' The patriarch said: 'No parents — then were you born on a tree?'

我也無父母 — "I haven't got those either," with a deadpan 也. The master's guess, 想是樹上生的, "born on a tree, then?", nods at the folk-tales of strange births, and it sets up the real answer by not being strange enough.

The Monkey King said: 'I wasn't born on a tree, but I did grow out of a stone.

長 here is zhǎng, to grow — and this is the first time in the entire chapter the character has been read that way, after a long run of 長春, 長生, 長年, all cháng, "long, everlasting." The reading shifts at the exact moment the monkey stops being described and begins describing himself.

All I remember is that on the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit there was a magic stone, and the year it split open, I was born.'

我只記得, "all I remember" (塊 kuài, the measure word for lumps of stone; 便 biàn). The immense cosmology of the chapter's opening — the stone conceived by Heaven and Earth since the world began, splitting to release an egg — comes back as one plain sentence from the creature it produced. He does not know it was cosmic. He just remembers it happening.