征不待時 War Does Not Wait On Time
二郎道：「既傷了老龍，正好與他攻擊，使那廝不能措手，卻不連窩巢都滅絕了？」八戒道：「雖是如此，奈天晚何？」二郎道：「兵家云：『征不待時。』何怕天晚？」二郎道：「既伤了老龙，正好与他攻击，使那厮不能措手，却不连窝巢都灭绝了？」八戒道：「虽是如此，奈天晚何？」二郎道：「兵家云：『征不待时。』何怕天晚？」
逐句解 Line by line
Erlang said, "Since the old dragon is killed, this is just the moment to press the attack, so that the fellow has no time to get his hands up. Would that not wipe out the whole nest together?"
都 is dōu, the totalising adverb, and both 了 are the particle le. 不 takes bù twice, before the rising 能 néng and before the rising 連 lián. 卻不…了 frames a rhetorical question expecting agreement.
Eight Rules said, "That may be so, but what of the day being late?"
No graph in this segment stands in any guard roster. 奈…何 is the classical frame for an obstacle one cannot get round, split about its object. It is the second time Eight Rules has produced this objection in the chapter, and the first time he has produced it to somebody other than Pilgrim.
Erlang said, "The soldier's saying goes: a campaign does not wait upon the hour. What is there to fear in a late day?"
The closing four graphs are a quote-closing tail joined backwards here — the segment before it shuts an inner quotation while leaving the outer one open, so the tail is genuinely hanging. 兵家 is the school of military writers, and 征不待時 is offered as their maxim; 不 takes bú before the falling 待 dài.
Erlang's proposal is the one nobody on the bank was willing to make. Strike now, while the head of the house is dead and the son-in-law has no time to set himself, and finish the whole family at once. It is put as a rhetorical question, and the thing it takes for granted is the extermination.
Eight Rules produces his objection for the second time in the chapter, and it is exactly the same objection: it is getting late. Pilgrim brushed it aside with 管甚麼天晚, never mind the day being late. Erlang brushes it aside with a maxim, which is more courteous and no more yielding.
The maxim is attributed to the 兵家, the military writers, and it is the second saying anyone has quoted as an authority in this chapter — the fiend produced 武不善作 before the first fight, and it too was a maxim about weapons. Two immortals and a pig are standing on a riverbank at dusk arguing about whether to commit a massacre this evening or in the morning, and the argument is settled by a citation.