未分勝負 No Victor Yet
他三個在半空中往往來來，戰經數十回合，不分勝負。各因性命要緊，其實難解難分。畢竟不知怎救唐僧，且聽下回分解。他三个在半空中往往来来，战经数十回合，不分胜负。各因性命要紧，其实难解难分。毕竟不知怎救唐僧，且听下回分解。
逐句解 Line by line
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.
Several tens of bouts and nothing decided. 難解難分 — hard to loosen, hard to part — is still an everyday phrase for two people locked in something neither can get out of, from a fight to an argument. 半空中 takes zhōng; both 分 take fēn; both 難 take nán.
In the end, there is no knowing how the Tang Monk was to be saved — so listen to the explanation in the next chapter.
畢竟 … 且聽下回分解 — in the end there is no knowing, so listen to the next instalment. This is the storyteller's sign-off that every chapter of the novel ends on, inherited from the platform where these tales were performed for money and the audience had to be brought back tomorrow. Here it leaves the master roped to a stake and the fight undecided, which is the cliffhanger doing exactly its old job.
The chapter ends suspended at a real impasse. Two disciples and the demon, evenly matched, fight to no decision while the master stays roped to the soul-fixing stake inside. Hard to loosen, hard to part describes both the deadlock and the larger problem: this ordeal cannot be settled by the forces now on the board.
That is the design of the whole chapter. It began by letting the Mind-Monkey go, removed the pilgrims' guardian, stripped the master of every protector one sensible decision at a time, and closes by demonstrating that Bajie and Sha Monk together are not enough. The unresolved combat is an argument in narrative form: the journey cannot go on without the disciple the master threw out, and the reader is made to feel that necessity before the next chapter starts to answer it.