氣數不盡 Our Allotted Span Not Ended
虎將上前道：「大王的洪福齊天，我等的氣數不盡，故此知覺了。」熊師上前道：「大王，這賊不是別人，定是那戰敗先鋒的那個孫悟空。想必路上遇著有來有去，傷了性命，奪了黃旗、銅鑼、牙牌，變作他的模樣，到此欺騙了大王也。」虎将上前道：「大王的洪福齐天，我等的气数不尽，故此知觉了。」熊师上前道：「大王，这贼不是别人，定是那战败先锋的那个孙悟空。想必路上遇着有来有去，伤了性命，夺了黄旗、铜锣、牙牌，变作他的模样，到此欺骗了大王也。」
逐句解 Line by line
A tiger general stepped forward: "The Great King's vast good fortune is level with heaven and our allotted span is not run out, and that is why it was found in time."
將 is jiàng, a commander. 不盡 takes bú on the negative — the same small collision as before, where the tone-change rule runs on the dictionary tone of 盡 while this edition reads that character as jìn, so the two do not agree and the reading has to be declared rather than calculated. It is the second and last such site in the chapter.
A bear commander stepped forward: "Great King, this thief is nobody else. It must be that Sun Wukong who beat the vanguard.
This is the second time the name has been spoken aloud inside this cave — Wukong gave it to the queen himself two scenes ago — and this time it comes from an animal in a garrison who has worked it out for himself. 定是 is it must be, the same certainty Wukong used at the chapter's opening when he predicted that the master would come after the vanguard.
"He must have fallen in with There-and-Back on the road, taken his life, seized the yellow flag, the brass gong and the ivory tablet, changed into his likeness, and come here to deceive the Great King."
遇著 takes zháo, contact achieved rather than a state held — the reading this edition uses for the whole family of meeting-with and running-into verbs. 模 is mú again.
Two subordinates step forward, and the difference between them is the whole of this chapter's interest in intelligence. The tiger general offers his king's good fortune and the household's unexhausted span — a theology of luck, and no information whatever. The bear commander reconstructs the entire operation.
And the bear is right in every particular. Wukong met the courier on the road, killed him, took the flag and gong and tablet, wore his likeness and came in to deceive the king. All five things happened, in that order, and the reader has watched each of them. Not one of the five happened inside this cave: the killing, the flag and gong, the tablet were all taken on the road outside, and the only part anyone here saw was a courier walking in at the gate.
It is worth setting beside the courier's own reasoning on the empty road. He laid out the campaign correctly and concluded that Heaven would not stand for it, and was killed for being incurious about a stranger. The bear does the same work from far less evidence, and gets there too late to matter.