Although the Great Sage had been driven off by the Tang Monk, he could not put an end to his longing and his sighs. Before long the great Eastern Ocean rose into view, and he said, “It has been five hundred years since last I travelled this road!” And there before him lay the sea-water.
Misted waves rolling boundless, mighty billows drifting long.
The misted waves, rolling boundless, meet the River of Heaven; the mighty billows, drifting long, thread the veins of the earth.
The tide comes surging and turbulent; the flood-waters soak the curving bay.
The tide comes surging, like a thunderclap roaring through the three months of spring;
the flood soaks the winding bay, like a wild gale blowing through the nine tens of summer.
The blessed elders who ride the dragon must cross it always with knitted brows;
the immortal lads astride the crane pass over it, back and forth, in unfeigned dread.
Near the shore stands no village or shrine; along the water float but few fishing boats.
The waves roll up snow of a thousand years; the wind breeds autumn in the sixth month.
Wild fowl come and go as they will; sand-birds sink and rise as they please.
Before the eye no angler appears; at the ear only the gulls are heard.
In the depths the roaming fish are glad; at the sky's rim the passing geese are forlorn.
The Pilgrim gave a single bound of his frame and vaulted clear across the Eastern Ocean, reaching the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit in no time at all. Pressing down his cloud-head and staring wide-eyed about him, he saw the mountain's flowers and grasses all gone, its mists and rosy clouds utterly spent; the peaks and crags had crumbled, the forests and trees were scorched and withered.
How had it come to this? Only because, when he had raised his uproar in Heaven and been hauled up to the upper realm, this mountain had been set ablaze and ruined by the Manifest Sage, the god Erlang, who had led against it the seven sworn brothers of Plum Mountain. At this the Great Sage's grief was doubled. There is an old-style poem on the ruin and desolation of the mountain to bear witness.
Looking back on the immortal mountain, tears fall from both his eyes; facing it in its ruin, his grief and sorrow only deepen.
In those days he thought the mountain could take no harm; only today does he learn that the very ground can fail.
Hateful, that Erlang came to wipe me out; loathsome, how that lesser sage lorded it over my folk.
In his cruelty he dug up your ancestors' hallowed graves; for no cause he broke the foundations of your forebears' tombs.
The rosy mists that filled the sky are all swept clean away; the winds and clouds across the land are scattered thin and gone.
On the eastern ridge no striped tiger's roar is heard; on the western hill, where now the cry of a white ape?
In the northern streams no track of fox or hare remains; in the southern valley the river deer and the wild sow pass without a shadow left behind.
The blue-grey stones are burned to a thousand clods of earth; the emerald sands are turned to a single heap of mud.
Outside the cave the tall pines all lean and topple; before the cliff the green cypress stand sparse and few.
Cedar and fir, pagoda-tree and juniper, chestnut and sandalwood, all charred; peach and apricot, plum and mei, pear and jujube, all done for.
Cudrania gone and mulberry vanished — how now to raise the silkworms? Willows thinned and bamboo few — hard for the birds to roost.
On the peak the wondrous stones are turned to dust; at the ravine's bottom the springs run dry, all grown to grass.
Before the cliff the blackened earth has buried iris and orchid; beside the path the reddened mud is overrun by vine and creeper.
The birds that flew here in days gone by — to what place do they fly now? The beasts that ran here in that time — over what mountain do they run?
Leopards shun, and pythons loathe, this place of ruin and collapse; cranes keep away, and snakes turn back, from the midst of the wreck.
It must be that in days past he harboured thoughts of evil, and so today he suffers these hardships and this grief.
Just as the Great Sage stood at the height of his grief, he heard from the grassy slope before him, in the hollow of tangled brush, a sudden noise; and seven or eight little monkeys sprang out, rushed forward in a throng, and pressed about him, knocking their heads to the ground. “Grandfather Great Sage,” they cried aloud, “have you come home today?”
“Why is it you do not romp and play,” said the Handsome Monkey King, “but skulk one and all in hiding? I have been here a good while and seen no sign of you — how is this?”
Hearing this, the monkeys one and all shed tears and answered, “Since you, Great Sage, were seized and carried to the upper realm, we have suffered bitterly at the hunters' hands — truly it has been hard to endure. How could we withstand their stiff crossbows and mighty bows, their yellow hawks and vicious hounds, their nets and snares, their spears and hooks? And so, each of us clinging to his life, we dared not show our heads to play, but only burrowed deep in the caverns and shunned our nests far off. When hungry we crept to the slope to steal a bite of grass; when thirsty we came down to the gorge to sip the clear spring. Just now, catching the sound of your voice, Grandfather Great Sage, we hurried out to meet you, and beg only that you take us under your care.”
When the Great Sage heard these words, his sorrow grew keener still. “How many of you are left on this mountain?” he asked.
“Old and young together,” said the monkeys, “only a thousand or so.”
“In my day I had a host of forty-seven thousand fiends,” said the Great Sage. “Where have they all gone now?”
“After you left us, Grandfather, this mountain was set alight by the Bodhisattva Erlang, and better than half of us were burned to death. Those of us who crouched in the wells, or bored into the gorges, or hid beneath the iron-plank bridge, kept our lives. But when the fire had died and the smoke cleared and we came out, there were no more flowers or fruit to keep us fed; we could barely stay alive, and half of what was left went off to other places. This half of us endured the hardship and stayed on the mountain — and these last two years the hunters have carried off half of us again.”
“What do they carry you off to do?” asked the Pilgrim.
“Speak of these hunters — how hateful they are! Those of us struck by their arrows and pierced by their spears, or poisoned and beaten dead, they carry off to flay and bone, to stew in soy and steam in vinegar, to fry in oil and roast with salt, and eat as a relish with their rice. And some who fall into the nets, or are caught in the snares, they take away alive — making them leap through hoops and put on shows, turn somersaults and stand on their heads, sift gongs and beat drums in the middle of the street, all manner of antics for men's amusement.”
When the Great Sage heard this, his anger flared the more. “Who is in charge within the cave?” he said.
“Marshals Ma and Liu are still here,” said the fiends, “and Generals Beng and Ba are in charge.”
“Go and let them know I have come.”
The little fiends rushed in through the gate to report, “Grandfather Great Sage has come home!” Hearing the news, Ma, Liu, Ben and Ba hurried out through the gate to kowtow and usher him into the cave. The Great Sage took his seat in the midst of them, and the throng of monsters bowed in ranks before him and said, “Grandfather Great Sage, of late we heard that you had won back your life and were guarding the Tang Monk on his way to fetch the scriptures from the Western Heaven. Why do you not press on westward, but have come back instead to your own mountain?”
“My children, you do not know it — that Tang Sanzang cannot tell the worthy from the worthless. Along the whole road I caught the demons and seized the fiends for him, spending the utmost skill of my life, and time and again I struck the goblins dead; yet he said I did violence and worked evil, would have me no longer for his disciple, drove me back here, and set down a writ of banishment as proof, never to employ me again.”
The host of monkeys clapped their hands and laughed aloud. “What luck, what luck! Why be a monk any longer? Come home to us, and take us along to play a few years more.” And they cried, “Quick, set out the coconut wine, and give our Sire a homecoming feast!”
“Hold the wine a moment,” said the Great Sage. “Let me ask you — those hunters, how often do they come up onto my mountain?”
“Great Sage,” replied Ma and Liu, “whatever the season, they are here day after day, forever pestering us.”
“Why have they not come today?”
“They should be coming any moment.”
The Great Sage gave his orders. “Little ones, all of you go out and gather up for me the loose stones on the mountain, the ones scorched brittle by fire, and pile them up. Heap them twenty or thirty to a mound, or fifty or sixty to a pile — I have a use for them.”
The little monkeys, all in a swarm, went scrambling to and fro and heaped up many mounds. When the Great Sage saw it done, he ordered, “Little ones, go and hide inside the cave, and let this old Monkey work his art.”
The Great Sage climbed to the summit to look, and there on the southern side came the boom-boom of drums and the clang-clang of gongs; more than a thousand men and horses flashed into view, all with hawks and hounds on the leash and blades and spears in hand. The Monkey King looked closely: these were men of fearsome approach, stalwart fellows, valiant indeed.
Fox-fur cloaks their shoulders and crowns; brocade and damask swathe waist and breast.
In their quivers, wolf-fang arrows; at their hips, bows of jewelled carving.
The men are like mountain-searching tigers; the horses, like dragons vaulting a ravine.
In packs they lead their hounds along; on every arm they perch their hawks.
In wicker baskets they haul the fire-guns; and fast on the wrist, the sea-east falcon.
Lime-poles by the hundred-odd loads; hare-forks a thousand shafts and more.
Ox-head nets to bar the trails; and Yama-snares, the buckling cords.
All at once the wild hallooing rises; scattered they spread like stars filling the sky.
When the Great Sage saw the men spreading up over his mountain, his heart blazed with fury. He worked a finger-spell and murmured an incantation under his breath; drawing in a breath toward the Xun quarter, he blew it out with a whoosh — and there rose a gale. A fine wind!
It flung up the dust and scattered the soil, toppled the trees and shattered the woods.
The sea-waves reared like mountains; the turbid billows pressed in, ten thousand folds deep.
Heaven and earth turned murky and reeling; sun and moon went dim and sunken.
One gust shook the pines like a tiger's roar; of a sudden it entered the bamboo like a dragon's moan.
Ten thousand hollows howled in fury as Heaven belched its breath; flying sand and hurtling stones struck men down at random.
The Great Sage, having raised this great wind, sent the broken stones riding upon it, flying and whirling wildly. Pity, then, those thousand-odd men and horses, each and every one of them.
Stones struck the aconite-heads to powder; sand flew and the sea-horses were all maimed.
Ginseng and cassia-officinalis scrambled before the ridge; blood dyed the cinnabar upon the ground.
The aconite-sons could hardly find their old homes; the areca-nuts, how were they to win their way back to their villages?
Their corpses, light as calomel-powder, lay strewn across the mountain field; and the red lady at home kept watch and waited.
A poem says:
Men slain and horses dead — how were they to go home? Their wild ghosts and lonely souls lay tangled thick as hemp.
Pity the dauntless, spirited captains — the wind told worthy from worthless none, and blood dyed all the sand.
The Great Sage brought down his cloud, clapped his hands and laughed aloud. “What luck, what luck! Ever since I submitted to the Tang Monk and became a monk, he was forever admonishing me: 'A thousand days of doing good, and the good is still not enough; a single day of doing evil, and the evil is already too much.' How true those words are. I followed him, killed a few demons, and at once he blamed me for doing violence. Yet today, come home, I have made an end of this whole crowd of hunters.”
He called, “Little ones, come out!” The wind having passed, the troop of monkeys heard the Great Sage's summons and came leaping out one and all.
“Go down to the southern slope,” said the Great Sage, “strip the slain hunters of their clothes and bring them home, wash out the bloodstains, and wear them against the cold; push all the dead men's corpses into that fathomless pool ten thousand zhàng deep; drag home the fallen horses, flay off their hides to make boots, and salt down the flesh to eat at leisure; take those bows, arrows, spears and blades to drill you in the martial arts; and gather up the parti-coloured banners and standards, and bring them for my use.” The monkeys received his commands one and all.
The Great Sage had the banners unstitched and washed, and pieced them all together into a single many-coloured flower-flag, on which were written fourteen characters: “Rebuilder of Flower-Fruit Mountain, Restorer of the Water-Curtain Cave, the Great Sage Equal to Heaven.” He raised a pole and hung the flag outside the cave. Day by day he summoned demons and gathered beasts, stockpiled fodder and stored grain, and made no more mention of the two characters “the monk.”
His connections were wide and his powers high; so he went to the Dragon Kings of the Four Seas to borrow some sweet-rain immortal water, and washed the mountain green again. In front he planted elms and willows, behind he set pines and nanmu; peaches, plums, jujubes and mei — nothing was left wanting. Free and at ease, contented in his settled life, of which no more need be said.
Now the Tang Monk, having listened to his own wilful temper and let the Mind-Monkey go, climbed into the saddle and rode on. Bajie broke the trail ahead, and Sha Monk carried the baggage as they journeyed west. Once past White-Tiger Ridge they suddenly came upon a stretch of wooded hills — truly a place of clambering vines and twining creepers, of cypress green and pine blue.
“Disciples,” Tripitaka called out, “the mountain road is rough and terribly hard going, and the pine woods grow thick and the trees stand ranked all round. Take the greatest care — there may be demons and wild beasts here.”
Watch, now: that blockhead braced up his spirits, told Sha Monk to lead the horse, and himself broke the trail with his nine-tooth rake, guiding the Tang Monk straight into the pines. Just as they went along, the elder reined in his horse and said, “Bajie, I am really famished today. Where might we find some vegetarian food for me to eat?”
“Master, please dismount, and wait here while this old Hog goes to look.” The elder got down from his horse, Sha Monk set down his load, took out the alms-bowl and handed it to Bajie.
“I'm off, then,” said Bajie.
“Where are you going?” asked the elder.
“Never mind. On this errand of mine, I'll bore through ice to strike fire and fetch the meal, press oil from snow and beg the rice back home.”
Watch him: out of the pines he went, westward more than ten lǐ, and never once ran into a single household — truly a place of wolves and tigers and no human smoke. That blockhead, footsore and weary, mused to himself: “In the old days, when the Elder Brother was with us, whatever the old monk wanted was simply there. Now that it has fallen to me — truly it is as they say, 'Only the head of a house knows the price of firewood and rice; only in raising a son do you learn a parent's love.' In all fairness, there's nowhere to go begging.”
Then, as he walked, drowsiness came over him, and he thought: “If I just turn back now and tell the old monk there was nowhere to beg, he won't believe I've walked all this way. I'd better dawdle another hour or so before I go back to report. Well, then, well then — I'll just have a nap here in the grass.” And the blockhead burrowed his head into the grass and lay down to sleep.
At the time he meant only to doze a moment and then get up; but who could know that a man worn out with walking, once he flings down his head, will simply snore and snore away.
But let us say no more of Bajie sleeping here. The elder, meanwhile, sat in the woods with burning ears and twitching eyes, uneasy in body and mind. Quickly he turned and called to Sha Monk, “Wuneng went to beg food — why is it so late and he still not back?”
“Master, you still don't understand. He's seen how many households out here in the West feed monks, and with a belly that big, does he give a thought to you? He won't come back till he's eaten his fill.”
“Just so,” said Tripitaka. “But if he is off somewhere gorging on alms-food, how are we to meet up with him? The day grows late, this is no place to stay, and we had best find lodging.”
“No matter, Master — you sit here a while, and I'll go find him.”
“Quite right, quite right,” said Tripitaka. “Food or no food, let it go; finding lodging is what matters.”
Sha Monk gripped his precious staff and went straight out of the pines to look for Bajie.
The elder sat alone in the woods, thoroughly gloomy and worn, and could only force up his spirits, spring to his feet, gather the baggage into one place and tie the horse to a tree. He took off the bamboo hat he wore, planted his monk's staff upright, straightened his dark robe, and strolled slowly through the deep wood, thinking to dispel his gloom.
The elder looked his fill on the wild grasses and mountain flowers, and could not bear the clamour of birds returning to roost. Now the wood was all deep grass and narrow paths, and because his thoughts were tangled and troubled, he lost his way. For one thing he meant to ease his gloom; for another he hoped to find Bajie and Sha Monk. But the two of them had gone the road due west, while the elder, wandering a while, drifted off toward the south.
Coming out of the pines, he suddenly raised his head and saw, off in that quarter, a golden light flashing and glittering, coloured vapours rising and swirling. Looking closely, he found it was a jewelled pagoda, its gilded top ablaze with light. It was the light of the westering sun, shining upon that gilded top and making it blaze.
“I, your disciple, have been out of luck indeed,” he said. “Ever since I left the Eastern Land, I vowed that at every temple I would burn incense, before every Buddha bow, and at every pagoda sweep. Is that shining thing not a pagoda of yellow gold? How is it I never took that road? Below a pagoda there must be a temple, and within it monks. Let me go and see. As for this baggage and the white horse — no one travels this place, so they'll come to no harm. If there's a convenient spot up there, I'll wait for the disciples, and we can all lodge together.”
Alas! The elder's hour of ill luck had come. Watch him stride out and go straight up to the pagoda. And there he saw:
The stone cliff rose ten thousand zhàng; the mountain, vast, touched the blue empyrean.
Its roots joined the thickness of the earth; its peaks pierced the height of heaven.
On either side, some thousands of mingled trees; before and behind, vines twining a hundred lǐ and more.
Flowers lit the grass-tips — the wind cast shadows; water ran through cloud-hollows — the moon had no root.
Fallen trees lay athwart the deep ravine; withered vines hung knotted on the bare peak.
Below the stone bridge ran the tumbling clear spring; upon the terrace-seat spread the bright, bright white bloom.
Seen from afar, it seemed the paradise of the Three Isles; seen close to, it had the look of Penglai's fairest scene.
Fragrant pines and purple bamboo ringed the mountain stream; crows and magpies, gibbons and monkeys, threaded the steep ranges.
Outside the cave-mouth, beasts came and went in rows; within the wood, birds flew out and in by flocks.
Green, green, the fragrant grasses flourished; bright, bright, the wild flowers bloomed.
This place, plain to see, was an evil ground — and the luckless elder came blundering straight in.
The elder stepped forward, and had just reached the foot of the pagoda gate when he saw a speckled-bamboo curtain hung within. He strode through the door, lifted it, and pressed on inside — then suddenly raised his head and saw, upon a stone couch, a fiend lying asleep on its side. And how did it look?
An indigo face, white tusks, a great gaping maw agape.
On either side the tangled, matted temple-hair, all as if dyed with rouge; three or four tufts of towering purple beard, so it seemed the sprouting shoots of the litchi.
A nose humped like a parrot's beak; eyes staring like the star of dawn.
Two fists, the shape of a monk's alms-bowl; two blue feet, like gnarled stumps and splintered snags on a sheer cliff.
Slung aslant, a pale-yellow robe-mantle, outdoing a brocade-woven cassock.
The blade he held, keen light flashing bright; the stone he slept on, fine and smooth and flawless.
He too has marshalled his imps in ant-array; he too has sat, an old fiend, in wasp-court state.
See his awesome majesty, stern and cold; the whole host bellows, calling out “Sire!”
He too has made, with the moon, a party of three to ladle wine from the pot; he too has felt wind rise beneath both arms as he tipped the tea-cup.
See how vast his magic powers: in the blink of a lowered eye he roams the world's far edge.
In wild woods the birds cry loud; in deep thickets lodge the dragons and snakes.
Immortal maidens till the fields and grow white jade; Daoist adepts subdue the fire and nurture cinnabar.
This little cave-mouth, though it reaches not to the Avichi hell; yet this staring, glaring fiend is very like an ox-headed yaksha.
When the elder saw it in such a shape, he was so frightened he stumbled back a step, his whole body gone numb and tingling, both legs weak beneath him, and he hastily turned to slip away. He had just barely turned around when the fiend — whose spirit-sense was truly keen — flung wide a pair of gold-pupilled devil's eyes and cried, “Little ones! See who's outside the door!”
A little imp poked out its head, took one look outside the door, saw it was a bald-headed elder, and hurried back in to report: “Great King, outside is a monk. Round-headed, broad-faced, both ears drooping to his shoulders; a body of tender, glistening flesh, a skin fine and delicate — truly a fine monk indeed.”
When the fiend heard it, he laughed aloud. “This is what they call 'a fly on a snake's head — food and clothing come of themselves.' You little ones, hurry after him, seize him and bring him to me, and here I'll richly reward you.”
Those little imps swarmed up all at once like a nest of bees. Tripitaka, seeing them, though his heart raced like an arrow and his two feet flew, was after all terror-struck and trembling, his legs weak and his feet numb; and what was more, the mountain road was rough, the wood deep, the day at dusk — how could his steps move at all? So the little imps bore him off bodily. It was just as the saying goes:
A dragon adrift in shallows is toyed with by the shrimp; a tiger fallen to the flats is bullied by the hounds.
Though good works meet with many a trial and block, who has known such as the Tang Monk in his westward hour?
Watch those little imps carry the elder in and set him down outside the bamboo curtain, then joyfully report: “Great King, we've caught the monk and brought him in.”
The old fiend stole a glance, and saw that Tripitaka held his head high, his features imposing — truly a fine monk indeed. And he thought to himself: “A monk this fine must be a personage from the upper realms, no trifling nobody. If I don't put on a show of majesty, how will he ever submit?”
All at once, borrowing the tiger's terror as the fox does, he made his red whiskers bristle up on end, his blood-red hair stand toward the sky, his eyes split wide, and roared out: “Bring that monk in!” The whole crowd of imps answered with a resounding “Aye!” and shoved Tripitaka on inside. This was a case of 'once you're under a low eave, how dare you not bow your head.'
Tripitaka could only press his palms together and make him a bow. “Where are you from, monk?” said the fiend. “Whence do you come? Whither do you go? Speak, and quickly!”
“I am by origin a monk of the Tang,” said Tripitaka, “sent by command of the Great Tang Emperor to journey west in search of the scriptures. Passing your honoured mountain, I came especially to pay reverence beneath the pagoda, never meaning to disturb Your Majesty — I beg your pardon. When I have fetched the scriptures back to the Eastern Land, your high name shall be recorded forever.”
When the fiend heard this, he roared with laughter. “I said you were a personage of the upper kingdom, and so you are! I was just wanting to eat you — how very well you've come, how very well; otherwise I might have let you slip by! You are meat for my mouth, bound to blunder in of yourself; released, you'd not get free — fleeing, you'd not escape!”
He called to the imps, “Take that monk and bind him.” And sure enough the little imps rushed forward in a mass, wound the elder round with rope and cord, and lashed him to the soul-fixing stake.
Knife in hand, the old fiend asked again: “Monk, how many are in your party? Surely you'd not dare go up to the Western Heaven alone?”
Seeing the knife, Tripitaka answered honestly: “Great King, I have two disciples, called Zhu Bajie and Sha Monk, both gone out of the pine wood to beg food. There's also a load of baggage and a white horse, both left back in the pine wood.”
“What luck again!” said the old fiend. “Two disciples, and you make three, and the horse four — enough for one good meal.”
“We'll go and catch them,” said an imp.
“Don't go out. Shut the front gate. When those two come back from begging, they're bound to look for their master to eat; and not finding him, they're bound to come seeking right up to my door. As the saying goes, 'Business that comes to your door is easy to do.' Just wait, and we'll catch them at our leisure.”
And the little imps shut the front gate.
But let us say no more of Tripitaka meeting disaster. Sha Monk, meanwhile, had gone out of the wood to look for Bajie, a good ten lǐ or more, without seeing a single hamlet. He stood upon a high mound looking about, when he heard someone talking in the grass; quickly he parted the deep grass with his staff, and there was the blockhead inside, talking in his sleep.
Sha Monk grabbed him by the ears and finally roused him. “A fine blockhead you are! The master sent you to beg food — did he give you leave to sleep here?”
The blockhead woke with a start and blurted, “Brother, what hour is it?”
“Get up, quick. The master says food or no food, never mind — he's told you and me to go find lodging somewhere.”
The blockhead, still half-dazed, held up the alms-bowl, gripped his nine-tooth rake, and came straight back with Sha Monk. But when they reached the wood and looked, their master was nowhere to be seen.
“It's all because you, blockhead, went off begging and never came back,” grumbled Sha Monk. “Some demon must have carried the master off.”
Bajie laughed. “Brother, don't talk nonsense. This wood is a nice quiet spot — there's surely no demon here. The old monk probably couldn't sit still and wandered off somewhere to take in the view. Let's go and find him.”
The two of them could only lead the horse, shoulder the load, gather up the rain-cape and the monk's staff, and go out of the pine wood to look for their master.
This time, too, it was not the Tang Monk's fate to die. The two of them searched a while without success, when suddenly they saw, off to the due south, a golden light flashing and glinting.
“Brother,” said Bajie, “the lucky are just plain lucky — look, the master's gone off to somebody's house. That shining thing is a pagoda, and who would dare treat a monk shabbily there? They're bound to lay on a vegetarian feast and keep him there to enjoy it. Why don't we step lively and catch up to eat some alms-food too?”
“Brother, there's no telling good from ill in this,” said Sha Monk. “Let's just go and see.”
The two of them came up boldly to the gate. “Why — the door's shut!” And they saw, set crosswise above it, a slab of white jade with six great characters carved upon it: “Wave-Moon Cave of Bowl-Bank Mountain.”
“Brother, this is no temple,” said Sha Monk. “It's a demon's cave-mansion. If our master is in here, we may never see him.”
“Don't be afraid, brother. Just tie up the horse, guard the baggage, and let me go ask after him.” The blockhead raised his rake and went forward shouting, “Open up! Open up!”
A gate-keeping imp within opened the door, took one look at the pair of them, quickly drew back, and ran inside to report: “Great King, business has come!”
“What business?” said the old fiend.
“Outside the cave-mouth there's a long-snouted, big-eared monk, and a sallow, luckless-looking monk, come knocking at the door.”
The old fiend rejoiced. “So it's Zhu Bajie and Sha Monk come seeking! Well, well — they know how to track, to come right up to my door. Since their looks are fierce and stubborn, we mustn't take them lightly.” He called, “Bring my armour.” The imps carried it out, he buckled it on, took his sabre in hand, and strode out the gate.
Now as Bajie and Sha Monk stood waiting at the gate, they saw the fiend come out in fearsome force. And how was he arrayed?
Blue face, red whiskers, crimson hair astream; gold-mounted armour, ablaze with abundant light.
A belt of tridacna-shell wraps his belly and lines his waist; a cloud-patterned cord clasps his chest and laces his mail.
At ease before the mountain, the wind roars and roars; roaming glum beyond the seas, the waves surge and surge.
A pair of indigo, sinew-scorched hands grips fast the soul-hunting, life-taking sabre.
Would you know this creature's name and style? Two ringing graphs proclaim him: Yellow Robe.
The old Yellow-Robe fiend came out the gate and demanded, “What quarter's monk are you, bawling at my door?”
“My boy, don't you know me?” said Bajie. “I'm your Old Grandfather. I'm the one the Great Tang sent off to the Western Heaven. My master is the imperial brother Tripitaka. If he's inside your house, send him out at once and spare me the trouble of raking my way in.”
The fiend laughed. “Yes, yes, yes — there's a Tang monk at my house, and I've not treated him shabbily at all: I've laid on some man-flesh dumplings for him to eat. Why don't you come in and have one too?”
The blockhead took him at his word and was about to go in. Sha Monk grabbed him and held on. “Brother, he's fooling you — since when do you eat human flesh?”
Only then did the blockhead come to his senses; he whipped out his rake and struck straight at the fiend's face; the creature dodged aside and threw up his steel sabre to meet the blow. The two of them both showed their powers, sprang up on their cloud-heads, and leapt into the sky to do battle. Sha Monk flung down the baggage and the white horse, raised his precious staff, and rushed in to help the attack.
Now, two fierce monks and one savage fiend, up in the clouds — what a battle it was! It was just like this:
The staff rose, the sabre met it; the rake came on, the sabre fended it.
One demon-captain flexing his might; two divine monks working their transformations.
The nine-tooth rake, a hero true; the demon-quelling staff, ferocious indeed.
Front and back, left and right, they came at once; yet Yellow Robe was plainly unafraid.
See how his burnished steel sabre gleamed bright as silver — truly his magic powers were vast indeed.
They fought till the whole sky was wrapped in fog and lost in cloud, and the cliffs crumbled and the ridges cracked across half the mountain.
The one, for his name and fame, would never let it rest; the others, for their master's sake, were resolute and unafraid.
The three of them went back and forth in mid-air, fought through several tens of bouts, and settled nothing. Each, because his very life hung on it, was truly hard to sunder and hard to part.
In the end, there is no knowing how the Tang Monk was to be saved — so listen to the explanation in the next chapter.