The demon king said: "My father king had my eight characters forever on his lips, saying I have a life-span undying as heaven itself — how is it that today, all at once, he has forgotten them?

And the deferral fails, because a father who talks about his son's horoscope constantly cannot suddenly mislay it. The 八個字 are the 八字, the eight characters — two each for the year, month, day and hour of birth, the string of data on which a whole life's fortune-telling is built, rather like a birth certificate that doubles as a horoscope. (Before the fourth-tone 旦 dàn, 一 in 一旦 reads yí.)

This stands to no reason — he must be a fake."

豈有此理 — "where is the sense in that" — is still the standard Chinese cry of outraged disbelief. The demon has reached his verdict.

At a grunt, the host of demons closed in with spear and saber, thrusting at Pilgrim recklessly, head and face alike.

The grunt, and the ambush. 哏的一聲 is "at a grunt," the signal arranged two blocks ago; 沒頭沒臉 is "head and face alike," thrusting anywhere and everywhere, and 沒 here is méi, not the mò of submerging; 劄來 is "thrust at."

This Great Sage warded them off with his gold-banded cudgel, showed his true form, and said to the fiend: "My worthy boy — you've no reason on your side. Where under heaven is there a son who beats his own father?"

The best line in the chapter, and it lands with the disguise still half off: where under heaven is there a son who beats his own father? Wukong has spent the whole episode borrowing the language of filial duty, and he keeps hold of it even as he drops the face. 沒 in 沒理 is méi, no reason; 那 in 那裡兒子好打爺的 is the questioning nǎ, "where is there"; 兒 in 兒子 is ér.

That demon king, his whole face flushed with shame, dared not look up.

And it works — the demon is shamed by the very reverence he had been performing. 那 in 那妖王 points, so nà; 羞慚 is abashed.

Pilgrim turned into a golden light and passed out of his cave.

The ruse has nothing left to give, so he leaves in a flash of golden light.

The imps said: "Great King — Sun the Pilgrim has got away."

The imps report the escape.

The demon king said: "Enough, enough, enough — let him go, then; I've swallowed a loss at his hands this time.

The character 罷 comes four times in this one speech, and they do not all read alike. The tripled 罷罷罷 is bà, the cry of a man giving up — enough, enough, enough — while the 罷 of 讓他走了罷 is the soft ba that makes a suggestion of it: let him go, then. 吃他這一場虧 is to swallow a loss at somebody's hands.

Just shut the gates, hold no more parley with him, and simply set to scrubbing the Tang Monk and steaming him to eat — and be done."

And the last 罷, in 蒸吃便罷, is bà again — the "and be done with it" sense. 打話 is to parley. The demon's answer to being tricked is simply to get on with the meal.