The story turns. The Great Sage and his two brothers brought their clouds down to earth and went straight in to the court, where the king, his ministers and the heir apparent stood drawn up in ranks to bow them in and give thanks. Pilgrim recounted to the assembled lord and ministers the whole matter of how the Bodhisattva had subdued the demon and gathered in the monster, and every one of them bowed in homage without end.
They were still in the midst of the celebration when the officer of the Yellow Gate came in to report. “Your Majesty, there are four more monks arrived outside.”
Eight Rules was instantly flustered. “Brother, could it be the demon working some trick again — forging the shape of Mañjuśrī to fool us, and now come back transformed as monks to match wits with us?”
“How could there be such a thing?” said Pilgrim, and gave the order at once to summon them in.
The officials passed on the command and had them enter. Pilgrim looked, and it turned out to be the monks of Precious Grove Monastery, come bearing in the Heaven-Soaring Cap, the Jasper Belt, the Ochre-Yellow Robe and the Carefree Shoes.
“Well come, well come!” said Pilgrim, delighted. He had the acolyte brought over, and the exchange was made piece by piece: off came the head-wrap and on went the Heaven-Soaring Cap; off came the cloth habit and on went the Ochre-Yellow Robe; the sash-cord was undone and the Jasper Belt fastened in its place; the monk’s sandals were slipped off and the Carefree Shoes stepped into. Then he had the crown prince bring out the white-jade tablet of state and set it in the king’s hand, and invited him there and then to ascend the hall and style himself sovereign. As the old saying goes: a court cannot go a single day without its lord.
But the king would by no means consent to sit. Weeping, he knelt at the centre of the stair. “I have been dead three years. Now, by the Master’s favour, I am saved back to life — how could I dare presume to style myself sovereign again? Let one of these masters become ruler instead. I would gladly take my wife and children outside the walls and live as a commoner, and be content.”
Tripitaka would by no means accept it either; his heart was set on nothing but worshipping the Buddha and seeking the scriptures. So they asked Pilgrim next.
Pilgrim laughed. “Not to deceive you all — if old Sun were willing to be an emperor, I’d have been emperor of every nation under Heaven, all Nine Provinces over, long since. It’s only that we’ve grown used to being monks, lazy and easy-going as we are. Were I to become emperor, I’d have to keep my crown unshaved and let my hair grow long, not sleep at dusk, not rest at the fifth watch; on hearing of frontier alarms my heart and spirit would know no peace; on seeing famine or calamity I’d fret and grieve with no relief. How could the likes of us ever get used to that? You go on being your emperor, and I’ll go on being my monk — off to cultivate my merit and my works.”
The king, unable to decline any further, had no choice but to ascend the Precious Hall, face south and style himself sovereign. He granted a general amnesty to the realm, conferred honours on the monks of Precious Grove Monastery and sent them home, and only then opened the Eastern Hall and set out a banquet in Tripitaka’s honour. At the same time he sent out an edict summoning painters, to have the likenesses of the four pilgrims taken and set up for veneration in the Hall of the Golden Bells.
The master and his disciples, the realm being settled, were unwilling to linger, and wished to take their leave and press on westward. The king, with the three consorts of the palace, the crown prince and all his ministers, would have offered the master the treasures of the state — gold, silver and fine silks — in gratitude; but Tripitaka would not accept so much as a hair’s worth of it. He had only his travel papers renewed, and urged Wukong and the others to saddle the horse and set off early.
The king could not bear to let them go. He had the court carriage made ready and invited Tripitaka to sit within it, set the two ranks of civil and military officials to lead the way, and himself, with the three consorts and the crown prince and the whole royal household, walked the wheels out beyond the city walls with his own hands, descending from the dragon-carriage only when it was time to part.
“Master,” said the king, “on the day you return with the scriptures from the Western Heaven, be sure to look in once more within this unworthy one’s borders.”
“Your disciple receives the charge,” said Tripitaka.
And the king, tears welling in his eyes, turned back with his assembled ministers.
That company of the Tang Priest, four monks in all, took to the winding, goat-gut road, their hearts set on nothing but paying homage at Vulture Peak. They came upon the turn from autumn’s end to winter’s first chill, and this is what they saw:
Frost withers the red leaves, grove on grove grown gaunt;
rain ripens the yellow millet, plot on plot brimming full.
The sun warms the plum trees on the ridge, opening their dawn hues;
the wind shakes the mountain bamboo, stirring its cold-weather sound.
The master and his disciples left the kingdom of Wūjī behind, resting by night and travelling by day; and when close upon half a month had passed, there rose before them a towering mountain, one that truly scraped Heaven and blocked out the sun. Tripitaka’s heart quailed upon his horse. He reined in hastily and called out to Pilgrim.
“Master, what would you have me do?”
“Look ahead — there is another great mountain, steep and sheer. We must be careful and on our guard, for fear some evil thing may come to trouble us again.”
Pilgrim laughed. “Just keep to the road and don’t fret so. Old Sun has it well in hand.”
The elder, his mind somewhat set at ease, whipped up the horse and pressed on toward the crags, which indeed proved extremely steep and forbidding. This is what was to be seen:
How high? So high its summit joins the blue-grey firmament;
how deep? So deep its gorge resembles the very halls of the dead.
Before the mountain, white clouds are forever seen tumbling and roiling;
black mist comes billowing and boiling.
Red plum and kingfisher bamboo; green cypress and jade-dark pine.
Behind the mountain stands a soul-clutching tower ten thousand zhàng tall;
behind the tower, a weird and ancient demon-hiding cave;
within the cave, a spring that drips tinkle-tankle;
below the spring, a stream that winds and wanders.
One sees fruit-offering apes leaping at heaven and thrusting at earth;
antlered deer crisscrossing this way and that;
foolish, staring roe-deer gawking at passers-by.
At dusk, tigers seek their lairs on the southern slopes;
at dawn, dragons churn the waves and rise from the water.
One steps to the cave-gate and it echoes with a great crash;
birds start up and flush away in a sudden flutter.
One watches the beasts of the wood go padding and prowling;
and at the sight of this pack of birds and beasts, one’s very heart goes thump with fright.
A rolling clatter of drum-and-gong: deep booms come tumbling, boom over hollow boom;
then sharp notes and deep, rolling and ringing, cavern answering cavern — a very peal of the immortals.
Blue stone turned to a thousand blocks of jade;
kingfisher-gauze mist wrapped round ten thousand banks of smoke.
Master and disciples were in the very midst of their dread when they saw, in a hollow of the mountain, a single billow of red cloud rise straight up into the ninefold empyrean and gather there into a mass of fiery vapour. Pilgrim, greatly alarmed, ran forward, seized the Tang Priest by the leg and pushed him down off the horse. “Brothers, don’t move on — a monster is coming!” In his fluster Eight Rules drew his nail-rake and Sha Monk whirled up his treasure-staff, hemming the Tang Priest round in their midst.
The tale divides in two. Within that red glow there was indeed a demon.
Years before, he had heard people tell that the Tang Monk journeying west from the Eastern Land to fetch the scriptures was the reincarnation of the Elder Golden Cicada, a good man of ten lifetimes’ cultivation, and that whoever ate a single morsel of his flesh would have his years prolonged and his life extended, enduring as long as Heaven and earth. Day after day he had lain in wait among the mountains, and had not expected that this very day the Tang Monk would come.
He hung in the middle air, watching intently, and saw the three disciples hemming the Tang Priest round upon his horse, each of them at the ready. “Fine monks!” said the sprite, praising them without end. “Just now I watched a white-faced, plump monk astride a horse — truly that holy monk of the Tang court. But how has he come to be guarded so close by three ugly monks? Every one of them flexing his fists and rolling back his sleeves, each gripping a weapon, as though they meant to fight somebody. Ah! I don’t know which of them has the sharp eyes — but one of them must have recognised me. In this guise there’ll be no thinking of eating that Tang Monk’s flesh.”
He mused a good while, taking counsel with himself, heart questioning heart. “If I would seize him by force, there is no getting near. But if I beguile him by some show of goodness, then he may yet come into my hands. Only let me lure his heart into confusion, and while I work my goodness upon him I’ll seize him for certain. Now let me go down and play him a little game.”
Fine monster! He scattered the red glow at once and brought his cloud down. Going into a fold of the mountain slope, he gave his body a shake and changed — turned himself into a seven-year-old wayward child, stark naked with no clothes on his body — bound the child hand and foot with hempen cord, hung him high in the topmost boughs of a pine tree, and set him crying out over and over with all his voice: “Save me! Save me!”
The Great Sage, lifting his head of a sudden to look again, saw that the red cloud had wholly scattered and the fiery vapour was entirely gone. “Master,” he called, “please mount up and take to the road.”
“You said a monster was coming,” said the Tang Monk. “How is it you now dare to travel on?”
“Just now I saw a billow of red cloud rise up from the ground and gather in mid-air into a mass of fiery vapour — that was surely a demon. But this while the red cloud has scattered. I think it’s a demon merely passing by, one that dares not harm us. Let’s be off.”
Eight Rules laughed. “Elder Brother, your talk is most artful. Since when is there any such thing as a demon passing by?”
“What would you know of it? Suppose the demon-king of this or that mountain and cave lays on a banquet and invites the sprites of all the various mountains and caves to the feast — then the spirits of all four quarters, east and west and south and north, come to the gathering. And so this one has a mind only for the feast, and no thought of harming anyone. It is nothing but a demon passing by on its way.”
Tripitaka, half-believing and half-doubting, could only take hold of his saddle, mount, and press on toward the mountain along the road. They had not gone far when they heard a voice calling: “Save me!”
The elder was greatly startled. “Disciple, here in the middle of the mountain — what person is it that cries out?”
Pilgrim came forward. “Master, just keep to the road, and don’t trouble yourself over any sedan-chairs — man-chairs, mule-chairs, bright-chairs or sleeping-chairs. In a place like this, even were there a chair, there’d be nobody to carry you.”
“It is not a chair to be shouldered and carried,” said the Tang Monk. “It is a cry of calling out.”
Pilgrim laughed. “I understand. Pay no heed to idle matters, and let’s just get on down the road.”
Tripitaka complied, whipped up the horse and pressed on. They had not gone a full li when again they heard the voice calling: “Save me!”
“Disciple, this crying voice is no ghost or demon-sprite. Were it a ghost or demon-sprite, there would be an outgoing voice but no echo in reply. You hear him call once, and call again — he must surely be a person in distress. We ought to go and save him.”
“Master,” said Pilgrim, “for today just fold up this compassionate heart a little and put it away. Wait till we’re past this mountain, and then show your mercy again. This is a place of much peril and little luck. You know the saying about how things clinging to grass and fastening to trees can become sprites. All the rest may pass; only there is one sort — the python — that, once it has cultivated itself over long years and deep days and become a sprite, is well able to learn a person’s little name. If it lies in the grass-thickets or in a hollow of the mountain and calls out to someone, and the person does not answer, all is still well. But if the person answers so much as once, it will snatch away his primal spirit, come following that very night, and unfailingly harm his life. Let’s go, let’s go. The ancients say: ‘Get yourself away, and give thanks to the gods.’ On no account listen to him.”
The elder, left with no choice but to comply, plied whip to the horse and rode on.
Pilgrim thought to himself: “This vile monster — no telling where he is, only crying and crying away. Let old Sun send him a Mao-You Star Method, and make the two of them never meet face to face.”
Fine Great Sage! He called Sha Monk forward. “Hold the horse close and walk on slowly — let old Sun ease himself a moment.” Watch him: he let the Tang Priest go a few steps ahead, recited a spell and worked a method of moving mountains and shrinking the land, pointed his gold-hooped cudgel behind him; and once master and disciples had passed the peak and gone on forward, the monster was left stranded behind them.
He stretched his stride again, caught up with the Tang Priest, and pressed on along the mountain road — and then saw the Tang Priest hear, once more, a voice calling from behind the mountain: “Save me!”
“Disciple, that person in distress has poor luck indeed. He never got to meet with us, and we’ve walked right past him. Listen — he’s calling behind the mountain now.”
“He was in front all right,” said Eight Rules. “It’s only that the wind has shifted round.”
“Never mind whether the wind’s turned or not,” said Pilgrim. “Just keep to the road.”
And so they went on without a word, longing to cross the mountain in a single stride; and no more will be said of it here.
Now that demon, having called out three or four times in a row from the mountain slope, found that nobody came at all. He pondered in his heart. “I’ve been waiting for the Tang Monk right here — I watched him come within less than three li — so how is it that after all this while he still hasn’t arrived? He must have taken a shortcut down some other road.”
He gave his body a shake, slipped free of the ropes, loosed the red glow once more and rose into the air to look again. The Great Sage, turning his face up to look back, recognised him for a monster, seized the Tang Priest by the leg and pushed him down off the horse. “Brothers, careful, careful — that demon has come again!” In a fluster Eight Rules and Sha Monk, each gripping rake and staff, hemmed the Tang Priest round in their midst.
The sprite, seeing it, marvelled without end from the middle air. “Fine monks! Just now I saw that white-faced monk sitting on the horse — but how has he come to be hidden away by those three again? This time, when we meet face to face, I’ll know for certain. First I’ll knock down the one with the sharp eyes, and only then can I catch the Tang Monk; otherwise I’d only spend my wits in vain and fail to take my prey, squander all my zeal, and come to nothing.”
So once more he brought his cloud down, and just as he had transformed the time before, hung himself high in the topmost boughs of the pine to wait. This time it was less than half a li away.
The Great Sage, lifting his head to look again, saw that the red cloud had scattered once more, and again invited the Master to mount up and ride on ahead.
“You said the demon had come again,” said Tripitaka. “How is it you now invite me to travel on?”
“This is still just a demon passing by, that dares not provoke us.”
The elder, harbouring anger once more, burst out: “This wretched ape, making a great fool of me! Just when there really are demons about, you say there’s nothing wrong; and in a clear, peaceful spot like this you go and frighten me, forever bawling out that there’s some demon or other. All show and little substance, taking no heed of consequence, you seize me by the leg and fling me down off the horse — and now you go explaining it away as some demon passing by. Suppose you’d hurt me in the fall — that would be too much to bear, this and this and this…”
“Master, don’t blame me,” said Pilgrim. “If you’d hurt a hand or foot in the fall, that could still be cured; but if you were carried off by a demon, where would we track you down?”
Tripitaka, greatly enraged, grinding out his fury, was about to recite the Tight-Fillet Spell; but Sha Monk earnestly remonstrated, and the Master had no choice but to mount and ride on again.
He had not yet settled firmly in the saddle when the cry came again: “Master, save me!” The elder lifted his head and saw that it was a small child, stark naked, hung up in a tree. He reined in his horse and cursed Pilgrim on the spot. “This wretched ape, what a heartless rogue — with not the least particle of goodness in him, his mind set on nothing but running riot and playing the ruffian! When I told you the crying was a human voice, you went on with a thousand words and ten thousand, bawling only that it was a demon. Look there — isn’t that a person hung up in the tree?”
The Great Sage saw that the Master had turned his blame on him, and moreover came face to face with the thing’s appearance. On the one hand he could make no move; on the other he was afraid of the Tight-Fillet Spell. He lowered his head, did not dare answer again, and let the Tang Priest ride up to the foot of the tree.
The elder pointed with the tip of his whip. “Whose child are you? For what reason are you hung up here? Tell me, that I may save you.”
Ah! Plainly he was a sprite, transformed to this likeness; but that Master, being of fleshly eyes and mortal frame, could not recognise him.
That demon, seeing him inquire below, played the fraud all the harder. Tears brimming in his eyes, he cried:
“Master! Off to the west of the mountain there’s a Withered Pine Gully, and on the far side of the gully a hamlet — I’m a person of that place. My grandfather was surnamed Hong, and because he had amassed vast gold and silver, a family fortune running to untold myriads, his nickname was Hong-a-Million. Being old, he long since departed the world, and the estate passed to my father. Of late, with extravagant living, the fortune gradually wasted away, and his name was changed to Hong-a-Hundred-Thousand.
“Single-mindedly he took up with the stalwarts of the four roads, lending out his gold and silver in hopes of interest. But who could know that those unregistered vagabonds, having swindled it all away, would leave both principal and interest gone for good? My father then swore a great oath to lend not a single cash. And those who had borrowed the gold and silver, being poor and at their wits’ end, banded into a savage gang, and with open torches and bared cudgels murdered their way to our gate in broad daylight, plundering all our goods and silks. They killed my father; and seeing that my mother had some beauty, they carried her off to be a stronghold-wife.
“At that time my mother could not bear to leave me, and clasped me in her arms, weeping bitterly and trembling in terror, as she followed the bandits. Not expecting it, they came to this mountain and meant to kill me as well. Thanks to my mother’s piteous pleading I was spared death beneath the blade, but they bound me with cords to this tree and left me only to freeze and starve. Those bandits carried my mother off, and I don’t know where they have taken her.
“I’ve hung here three days and three nights now, with not a single soul passing by. I don’t know from what former life’s cultivation it is that I have met with you, old Master, in this present one. If you would but show great compassion and save my life and bring me home, I’d pledge myself in bondage and sell my very life to repay your kindness. Even were yellow sand to cover my face, I would never dare forget.”
Tripitaka, hearing this, took it for the truth, and bade Eight Rules loose the cords and get the child down. That blockhead, who did not know people either, was about to step up and set to when Pilgrim, standing by, could hold back no longer and shouted out.
“That vile thing! There’s one here who knows you — no use forever conjuring tricks out of thin air and telling lies to fool people. Your family’s goods plundered, your father hurt by bandits, your mother carried off by men — save you and hand you over to whom? And what would you give me by way of thanks? This lie of yours has come apart at the joints!”
That monster, hearing it, was frightened at heart, and knew the Great Sage for a capable one, and secretly marked him down in his mind. Still trembling, he shed tears and said: “Master, though my parents are gone and the family wealth all spent, there are still some fields left untouched, and my kin all survive.”
“And what kin have you?” said Pilgrim.
“My mother’s father’s house is on the south of the mountain, my aunt lives north of the ridge; Li the Fourth at the gully-head is my mother’s brother-in-law, Hong the Third in the wood is my clan-uncle, and there are cousins besides, all living hereabouts in the village. If you’d but save me, old Master, then when we reach the village and see all my kin, I’ll tell everyone before the whole company of your saving grace, sell off some fields, and repay you richly and again.”
Eight Rules, hearing this, held Pilgrim back. “Brother, such a little child as this — why do you keep interrogating him? He says it was bandits who only robbed him of some loose property; surely they couldn’t have carried off the houses and fields as well. If we spoke with his kin, then even with our vast appetites we couldn’t eat up his ten mu of farmland. Let’s just get him down.”
The blockhead, his mind only on getting fed, cared nothing for good or ill. He used his precept-knife to cut through the cords and let the monster down; and the monster, before the Tang Priest’s horse, wept streaming tears and did nothing but knock his head on the ground.
The elder, tender of heart, called to him: “Child, mount up here, and I’ll take you along.”
“Master, my hands and feet are hung quite numb, and my waist and hips ache; and besides, being a country person, I’m not used to riding a horse.”
So the Tang Monk bade Eight Rules carry him. The monster stole a glance and said: “Master, my skin’s frozen through — I daren’t have this master carry me. His snout’s long and his ears big, the bristles behind his head are stiff; he’d jab me and fluster me.”
“Then let Sha Monk carry him.”
The monster stole another glance. “Master, when those bandits came to rob our house, every one of them had a painted face and false whiskers and brandished blade and cudgel. They so frightened me that at the sight of this ill-favoured master I’ve quite lost my wits — I daren’t have him carry me either.”
So the Tang Monk bade Sun Pilgrim carry him. Pilgrim laughed a ha-ha. “I’ll carry him, I’ll carry him.” And the monster, secretly rejoicing, was quite content to have Pilgrim carry him.
Pilgrim hauled him over to the roadside and gave him a testing heft — he weighed only some three catties and ten-odd taels. Pilgrim laughed. “You wretched monster, today you’re marked for death. How dare you play tricks in front of old Sun? I know you for a you-know-what.”
“I’m the child of a good family, unluckily fallen into this great calamity. How am I any sort of ‘you-know-what’?”
“If you’re the child of a good family, how are your bones so light?”
“My frame’s a small one.”
“How old are you this year?”
“I’m seven years old.”
“One catty a year — that’d be seven catties. How is it you don’t come to a full four catties in weight?”
“When I was little, I lacked for milk.”
“Well, no matter,” said Pilgrim. “I’ll carry you. If you need to make water, be sure to tell me.”
Tripitaka had gone on ahead with Eight Rules and Sha Monk, and Pilgrim, bearing the child, followed behind, the whole company pressing straight on westward. There is a poem in witness:
As the Way of virtue mounts high, so the demon-barriers mount high;
the Chan-spring is of itself still, and from stillness the demon is born.
The heart-sovereign, upright and true, walks the central Way;
the Wood-Mother, foolishly stumbling, is stubborn without and nimble.
The Will-Horse, saying nothing, harbours love and desire;
the Yellow Dame, wordless, frets alone.
The guest-heresy, having gained its aim, rejoices in vain;
in the end it will yet be dissolved by the orthodox.
The Great Sage, bearing the demon, grumbled in his heart at the Tang Priest’s ignorance of hardship. “Travelling this steep and perilous mountain country, even empty-handed one can hardly walk, and yet he has old Sun carry a person. Never mind that this fellow is a demon — even were he a real person, with no father or mother and no telling to whom I’d deliver him, I’d rather just dash him dead and be done.”
That monster knew it already, and at once worked a magic: from all four sides he drew in four breaths and blew them onto Pilgrim’s back, so that it felt to weigh a thousand catties. Pilgrim laughed. “My boy — you’re working a weight-magic to crush your old sire!”
The monster, hearing this and fearing the Great Sage would harm him, loosed the corpse at once — sent out his primal spirit, sprang up and away, and stood poised in the ninefold empyrean. And Pilgrim’s back grew heavier still.
The Monkey King, flaring into rage, snatched him up and smashed him down on a flat stone by the roadside, dashing the corpse-frame into something like a meat-patty; and still fearing he might make trouble again, tore off all four limbs for good measure, flung them to both sides of the road and reduced the whole to fragments.
That thing, plain to see in the middle air, could not hold back the fire that rose in his heart. “This monkey-monk is an utter rogue! Granted I’m a demon meaning to harm your master — you’d not yet even seen how I’d set to work, so how could you damage me like this? Lucky I had a plan and got out by sending forth my spirit; otherwise it would have been killing without cause. If I don’t seize the Tang Monk this very moment, but yield one more time over, all the more will I let him linger and grow wise.”
Fine monster! Up in the middle air he stirred up a whirlwind — a single roaring blast that rolled stones and flung sand, truly savage and fierce. A fine wind it was:
In seething fury it rolls up the reek of water and cloud;
black vapours, thick and rising, shut out the light of day.
Ridge-trees, root and all, are wrenched clean up;
wild plums, trunk and all, are laid flat to a man.
Yellow sand blinds the eye, and a man can hardly walk;
jagged rocks maim and wound — how can the road be crossed?
Rolling and roiling, the level ground goes dark;
over all the mountain, birds and beasts send up a howling.
It blew so that the Tang Priest could barely stay on his horse, Eight Rules dared not look up, and Sha Monk bowed his head and covered his face. The Great Sage, knowing full well the monster was working the wind, leapt forward to give chase — but the monster had already ridden the wind’s crest, snatched the Tang Priest away, and was gone without trace or shadow, no telling to what quarter he was borne off, and nowhere to track him down.
In a little while the wind’s roar abated and the light of day grew bright. Pilgrim came forward to look, and saw only the white dragon-horse trembling and neighing out loud, the luggage-load flung down at the roadside, Eight Rules groaning at the foot of the cliff, and Sha Monk crouched calling out before the slope.
“Eight Rules!” shouted Pilgrim.
That blockhead, hearing Pilgrim’s voice, lifted his head and looked — the gale already stilled — scrambled up, and caught hold of him. “Brother, what a great wind!”
Sha Monk came forward too. “Brother, this was a whirlwind.” And then: “Where is the Master?”
“The wind came on so hard that we all buried our heads and shielded our eyes, each of us dodging the gale,” said Eight Rules. “The Master was lying low on the horse too.”
“And where has he gone off to now?”
“He was like one made of lampwick-rush,” said Sha Monk. “I think he’s been rolled away by the wind.”
“Brothers,” said Pilgrim, “from here we ought to break up and go our ways.”
“Just so,” said Eight Rules. “Let’s break up early, each seek his own road, and the sooner the better. That road to the Western Heaven is without end or limit — when could we ever get there?”
Sha Monk, hearing this, gave a start of alarm, his whole body gone numb. “Elder Brother, what sort of talk is all this from you? Because we sinned in a former life, we were moved by the Bodhisattva Guanyin’s exhortation, who laid her hand on our crowns and gave us the commandments, changed our dharma-names and brought us into the fruit of Buddhahood; and we vowed of our own will to protect the Tang Monk up to the Western Paradise, to worship the Buddha and fetch the scriptures, and so redeem our sins by merit. And now, come to this, all at once to give it up — to talk this way of each seeking his own road — would it not betray the Bodhisattva’s good grace, ruin our own virtue and works, and draw people’s ridicule, saying we began but did not finish?”
“Brother, what you say is right too,” said Pilgrim. “But what’s to be done, when the Master won’t listen to a word one says? Old Sun, with these fiery eyes and golden pupils, knows good from ill. Just now this wind was the doing of that child hung in the tree. I knew him for a demon; you all didn’t see it, and neither did that Master — you took him for the child of a good family and had me carry him along. It was old Sun who planned to deal with him, and he then worked a weight-magic to crush me. It was I who smashed him to fragments. He must then have used a corpse-loosing method, stirred up a whirlwind, and carried my Master off. For this reason I blamed him for never listening to me, and so, disheartened and low, I said we should each go our separate ways. But since you, worthy brother, have such sincere intent, it puts old Sun in a hard place either way. — Eight Rules, what in truth do you mean to do about it?”
“Just now I spoke recklessly out of turn,” said Eight Rules. “In truth we shouldn’t break up. Brother, there’s no help for it — let’s take Brother Sha’s advice, and go find that monster and rescue the Master.”
Pilgrim turned his anger to cheer. “Brothers, let’s join our hearts as one again, gather up the luggage and horse, go up the mountain to find the monster, and rescue the Master.”
The three of them, clinging to creepers and hauling on vines, sought over slopes and round gullies; and after some fifty or seventy li they had still found no word or sign. On that mountain there was not a single flying bird or running beast — only old cypress and tall pine, common to the eye.
The Great Sage, truly heartsore, gave his body a leap, sprang to the top of a jagged peak and shouted a cry: “Change!” — and turned into a figure of three heads and six arms, like his true form from the Great Uproar in Heaven. He gave his gold-hooped cudgel a shake and turned it into three, and with a whickety-whack laid about him, beating out a path to the east and a path to the west, striking wildly and without pause on both sides.
Eight Rules saw it. “Sha Monk, this is bad. Elder Brother, failing to find the Master, has flown into a raging mind-storm out of vexation.”
When Pilgrim had thrashed away a while, he beat out a crowd of ragged spirits, who — draped in a patch here and a patch there, breechclouts with no seat and trousers with no leg-hems — knelt before the mountain and cried: “Great Sage, the mountain-gods and earth-spirits come to see you.”
“How is it there are so many mountain-gods and earth-spirits?”
The spirits kowtowed. “We report to the Great Sage: this mountain is called the Six-Hundred-Li Auger-Head Sentinel Mountain. We are a mountain-god every ten li and an earth-spirit every ten li — thirty mountain-gods and thirty earth-spirits in all. Yesterday we heard the Great Sage had come, but we couldn’t assemble in time, and so were late to greet you and provoked your wrath. We beg ten thousand pardons.”
“I’ll pardon your offence for now. Let me ask you: how many demons are there on this mountain?”
“Oh Father! There’s but the one demon, who has rubbed our very heads bald, left us short of incense and paper, with no blood-offerings at all — every one of us with clothes that won’t cover the body and food that won’t fill the mouth — and you ask how many more demons there could be!”
“Does this demon live before the mountain, or behind it?”
“Neither before it nor behind it. In this mountain there is a gully called the Withered Pine Gully; by the gully there is a cave called the Fire-Cloud Cave; and in that cave there is a demon-king of vast magic powers, who is forever seizing us mountain-gods and earth-spirits, making us stoke his fires and tend his gate, and in the black of night ring his bell and call his watches for him. And the little imps keep dunning us for some ‘customary fee’ besides.”
“You are immortals of the shade-ghost sort,” said Pilgrim. “What money or cash have you?”
“Just so. Having no money to give him, we can only catch a few mountain-roe and wild deer, and morning and evening lay them out to placate the pack of sprites; and if we have nothing to send by way of tribute, they come to tear down our temples and strip off our clothes, harassing us so we can’t live in peace. We beg the Great Sage to root out this monster for us, and save the living souls of the mountain.”
“Since you’re under his rule, always down there at his cave, you must know where the demon’s from, and what his name is?”
“To speak of him — perhaps the Great Sage even knows him. He is the son of the Bull Demon King, born of the Rākṣasī. He once cultivated himself three hundred years on the Fiery Mountain, refining the samādhi true-fire; his magic powers too are vast, and the Bull Demon King has sent him to guard the Sentinel Mountain. His milk-name is Red Boy, and his title is the Sage-Boy Great King.”
Pilgrim, hearing this, was filled with delight. He shouted the earth-spirits and mountain-gods away, resumed his own true form, sprang down from the peak, and said to Eight Rules and Sha Monk: “Set your minds at rest, brothers, and fret no more. The Master will come to no harm. The demon is kin to old Sun.”
Eight Rules laughed. “Brother, don’t tell tales. You are from the Eastern Continent of Superior Spirit, and this place of his is the Western Continent of Cattle-Goods. The road between them is long, ten thousand waters and a thousand mountains lie in the way, and two oceans besides. How should he be kin to you?”
“That crowd just now were all the earth-spirits and mountain-gods of this district. I asked them where the monster came from, and they said he is the son of the Bull Demon King, born of the Rākṣasī, that his name is Red Boy and his title the Sage-Boy Great King. Recall that five hundred years ago, when old Sun made his great uproar in Heaven, I roamed all the famous mountains under the sky seeking out the stout fellows of the earth, and that Bull Demon King once bound himself to old Sun as one of seven sworn brothers. There were five or six demon kings of the same sort, and only old Sun had been born small and neat — so we styled the Bull Demon King eldest brother. This demon is the Bull Demon King’s son, and I am acquainted with his father. Reckon it up, and I stand as his old uncle. How would he dare harm my Master? Let us go at once.”
Sha Monk laughed. “Brother, the old saying goes: ‘Three years without darkening the door, and kin are kin no longer.’ You have been parted from him five or six hundred years, you have never once exchanged a cup of wine with him, nor sent a festival gift to invite him — how should he acknowledge any kinship with you?”
“How can you take the measure of a man like that? The old saying goes: ‘A single duckweed leaf comes home to the sea; and living as men, where shall we not meet again?’ Even if he does not own the kinship, he surely will not harm my Master. I do not look to be kept to a banquet — but he is bound at least to give me back a Tang Monk in one piece.”
The three brothers each summoned up a devout heart, led the white horse with the luggage loaded on its back, found the high road and pressed straight ahead. Making no difference between day and night, they travelled a hundred li and more, when of a sudden they saw a pine wood. In the wood was a winding gully, and below the gully clear green living water came flying down; at the head of the gully stood a bridge of stone slabs, and it led across to a cave-dwelling on the far side.
“Brother, look over on that side,” said Pilgrim. “There are rocky cliffs all glittering. That must surely be the demon’s dwelling. Let us all take counsel: which of you will mind the luggage and the horses? And which will come with me to subdue the demon?”
“Brother,” said Eight Rules, “old Hog has no gift for sitting still. I will go along with you.”
“Good, good,” said Pilgrim, and gave the order: “Sha Monk, take the horse and the luggage and hide them deep in the wood, keep careful watch, and wait while the two of us go up to the door to look for the Master.”
Sha Monk obeyed the command. Eight Rules followed after, and he and Pilgrim came on, each gripping his weapon. Truly it was so:
Till the Infant be refined, the heretic fire prevails;
Mind-Ape and Wood-Mother uphold each other still.
In the end there was no knowing whether this venture would turn out well or ill; so listen to the explanation in the next chapter.