三頭六臂 Three Heads and Six Arms
三個人附葛扳藤，尋坡轉澗，行經有五七十里，卻也沒個音信。那山上飛禽走獸全無，老柏喬松常見。孫大聖著實心焦，將身一縱，跳上那巔嶮峰頭，喝一聲叫：「變！」變作三頭六臂，似那大鬧天宮的本像。將金箍棒幌一幌，變作三根金箍棒，劈哩撲辣的，往東打一路，往西打一路，兩邊不住的亂打。八戒見了道：「沙和尚，不好了，師兄是尋不著師父，惱出氣心風來了。」三个人附葛扳藤，寻坡转涧，行经有五七十里，却也没个音信。那山上飞禽走兽全无，老柏乔松常见。孙大圣着实心焦，将身一纵，跳上那巅崄峰头，喝一声叫：「变！」变作三头六臂，似那大闹天宫的本像。将金箍棒幌一幌，变作三根金箍棒，劈哩扑辣的，往东打一路，往西打一路，两边不住的乱打。八戒见了道：「沙和尚，不好了，师兄是寻不着师父，恼出气心风来了。」
逐句解 Line by line
The three of them, clinging to creepers and hauling on vines, sought over slopes and round gullies, and after they had traveled some fifty or seventy li, still found no word or sign.
Fifty to seventy 里 of scrambling and nothing to show for it. 附葛扳藤, "clinging to creeper and hauling on vine," is the standard phrase for going up country no path reaches. 扳 is bān, to haul or grip; 行經 takes xíng.
On that mountain there was not a single flying bird or running beast — only old cypress and tall pine, common to the eye.
And the detail that should worry them: not one bird, not one animal, on a mountain the description earlier in the chapter had stocked with apes, deer, tigers and dragons. Everything alive has left. 那山上 takes the pointing nà; 常見 has 常 as cháng.
The Great Sage, truly heartsore, gave his body a leap, sprang to the top of that jagged peak, and shouted a cry: "Change!"
Patience exhausted, he goes up a peak and changes shape. 著實心焦 takes 著 as zhuó, "truly, thoroughly" — a fourth job for a character that has already done three in this chapter. 將身一縱 uses the object-marking 將, jiāng, and shifts 一 to yí before the falling tone of 縱; 那巔嶮 takes the pointing nà; 喝一聲 has 喝 as hè, the shouting one, and shifts 一 to yì before the level tone of 聲.
and turned into a figure of three heads and six arms, like his true form from the Great Uproar in Heaven.
Three heads and six arms — the battle form from the assault on Heaven five hundred years ago, and the oldest and most formidable shape he owns. 似 is sì, "like"; 那 is the pointing nà. 大鬧天宮, "the Great Uproar in Heaven," is the episode that fills the novel's opening chapters and got him imprisoned under a mountain for five centuries.
He gave his gold-hooped cudgel a shake and turned it into three gold-hooped cudgels, and with a whickety-whack laid about him — beat out a path to the east, beat out a path to the west, striking wildly and without pause on both sides.
One cudgel becomes three and he thrashes the mountain flat. 劈哩撲辣 is a sound-word for the racket of it — the Chinese equivalent of a whickety-whack. 將金箍棒 uses the object-marking 將, jiāng; 幌一幌 shifts 一 to yì before the dipping tone of 幌; both 打一路 shift it to yí before the falling tone of 路; 不住的 lifts 不 to bú before the falling tone of 住 and takes the linking 的, de.
Eight Rules, seeing it, said: "Sha Monk, this is bad — Elder Brother, failing to find the Master, has flown into a raging mind-storm out of vexation."
Pigsy's diagnosis is wrong about the purpose and shrewd about the mood. 氣心風 is roughly "a temper-fit of the mind," a colloquial for someone who has snapped. 尋不著 takes 著 as zháo, the one that marks an attempt landing or failing to — "looked and did not find."
The search turns up nothing, and Wukong's response is characteristic: where patience fails, escalate to spectacle. He puts on the three-headed, six-armed form of the assault on Heaven, multiplies his cudgel and thrashes an empty mountain, beating out paths east and west. It is less a search than a summons — the display is meant to flush out whatever local powers are keeping their heads down, and, as the next passage shows, it works.
Pigsy's misreading supplies the comedy and, sideways, the truth. Watching his brother flail, he concludes the man has been driven mad by frustration — an 氣心風, a temper-fit — which is wrong about the intent and quite right about the state, since the display does spring from real vexation at a fruitless hunt. The scene also quietly restores Wukong's stature after the low point of the parting-talk: the disciple who a moment ago spoke of giving up is revealed again as the Great Sage of old, whose mere show of temper commands the terrain. The timing matters, because what follows will need exactly this authority — first to make the mountain's spirits talk, and then to go to the door of a demon who fights with fire.