推位讓國 A Mind To Yield The Throne
國王更十分歡喜加敬。即請三藏四眾，同上寶殿，就有推位讓國之意。行者笑道：「陛下，才那妖精，他稱是賽太歲部下先鋒，來此取宮女的。他如今戰敗而回，定然報與那廝，那廝定要來與我相爭。国王更十分欢喜加敬。即请三藏四众，同上宝殿，就有推位让国之意。行者笑道：「陛下，才那妖精，他称是赛太岁部下先锋，来此取宫女的。他如今战败而回，定然报与那厮，那厮定要来与我相争。
逐句解 Line by line
The king was more delighted than ever, and more reverent with it.
更 is gèng, further — it measures an increase on a state already arrived at. The sentence counts two things separately: he is more pleased, and more respectful with it.
He asked Tripitaka and the other three up into the treasure hall at once, and had it in mind to step down and hand over the kingdom to them.
藏 is zàng in the monk's name. 推位讓國 is the formal phrase for stepping down in favour of a worthier man — the language of legendary sage-kings handing on the empire — and it is what this king reaches for after one afternoon's fire has been put out. Nobody has suggested it to him.
Pilgrim laughed and said: "Your Majesty, that fiend just now gave himself out as vanguard under Sai Taisui, come here to fetch palace maidens."
稱 is chēng, to call oneself, and it holds the claim at arm's length: Wukong repeats the creature's title without endorsing a word of it. 才 is just now, a moment ago.
"He has gone back beaten, and he is sure to report it to that creature, and that creature is sure to come and have it out with me."
The whole prediction is built from one contemptuous noun and one certainty, each used twice in twenty-two characters: 那廝, that fellow, and 定, bound to. 廝 is a menial, a servant-boy, and using it of somebody you have never met is roughly the force of that clown.
Rescued from a single fire, the king's response is to offer his throne. The narrative gives the offer four characters and no comment at all, and the disproportion is the comment — a monarch who spent the afternoon hiding in a pit beneath his own palace has lost all sense of what things are worth.
Wukong ignores it completely. His answer starts from the creature's own words and reasons forward: a vanguard was beaten, a vanguard reports, a master comes. He is the only person in the hall thinking about tomorrow, and he does it in two sentences hung on a repeated bound-to.