現相驚妖 The Fiend Confounded
那妖怪見了，大驚道：「呀！渾家，你怎麼拿出這一副嘴臉來耶？」行者罵道：「我把你這個潑怪！誰是你渾家？連你祖宗也還不認得哩。」那怪忽然省悟道：「我像有些認得你哩。」行者道：「我且不打你，你再認認看。」那妖怪见了，大惊道：「呀！浑家，你怎么拿出这一副嘴脸来耶？」行者骂道：「我把你这个泼怪！谁是你浑家？连你祖宗也还不认得哩。」那怪忽然省悟道：「我像有些认得你哩。」行者道：「我且不打你，你再认认看。」
逐句解 Line by line
The fiend, at the sight, cried out in great alarm, "Ah!
大驚, dà jīng, greatly startled. He is still holding her when the face changes.
Wife, how is it you have put forth this face?"
渾家, hún jiā, wife — and he is still using the word, which is what makes the line funny. 這一副嘴臉, zhè yí fù zuǐ liǎn, "this set of features," where 副 is the counter used for things that come as matched sets: a face put on like a pair of spectacles. 耶, yé, a final particle of surprise.
Pilgrim railed, "Why, you vile fiend!
潑怪, pō guài: vile monster — flat abuse.
Who is your wife?
誰, shéi: who.
You do not even know your own ancestor."
祖宗, zǔ zōng, ancestor, forebear. Wukong's standing joke is to claim seniority over the demons he meets — not "I am stronger than you" but "I am older than your family."
The fiend, of a sudden coming to himself, said, "I seem indeed to know you a little."
省悟, xǐng wù, to wake up to something, to come to oneself — 省 read xǐng. "I seem to know you a little" is a memory beginning to surface, and it will matter more than either of them realises.
Pilgrim said, "I will not strike you yet — look again and see."
He declines to strike, so that the recognition can be drawn out. 認認看, rèn rèn kàn, look again and see.
The revelation lands with comic force. The demon, who a moment ago was embracing his wife, recoils from the face now in front of him, and Wukong presses the advantage with his standing conceit of being the fiend's "ancestor." The scene inverts the whole preceding deception: the deceiver unmasked in the very posture of intimacy.
The dawning half-recognition — "I seem indeed to know you a little" — opens the extended recognition dialogue that fills the next several passages, a favourite comic set-piece in which hero and adversary establish each other's identity by banter before coming to blows. Wukong's forbearance, declining to strike until the fiend has looked again, prolongs the game for the reader's pleasure.