原文 Original text
繁體 Traditional
Reader's edition
回本廟去了 Back To Your Own Shrine
行者聽言道：「土地，你且回去，等我自家拿他罷。」那土地老兒磕了一個頭，戰兢兢的回本廟去了。行者听言道：「土地，你且回去，等我自家拿他罢。」那土地老儿磕了一个头，战兢兢的回本庙去了。
逐句解 Line by line
行者聽言道：「土地，你且回去，等我自家拿他罷。」
行者听言道：「土地，你且回去，等我自家拿他罢。」
Pilgrim listened and said, "Local god, off you go back. Let old Sun deal with them himself."
罷 is bà, the softening word — let me just handle it. 自家 is oneself, in person. He dismisses the witness the moment the witness has finished being useful, which is characteristic and not unkind.
那土地老兒磕了一個頭，戰兢兢的回本廟去了。
那土地老儿磕了一个头，战兢兢的回本庙去了。
The old local god knocked his head on the ground once, and went trembling back to his own shrine.
兒 takes the full ér in 老兒 — the old fellow, a person. 戰兢兢 is the same three characters that described him coming out, so he leaves shaking exactly as he arrived. Nothing about the encounter reassured him.
He gets one kowtow and a dismissal, and goes home shaking. The doubled word for his trembling is the same one used when he came out, which is the chapter's way of saying the interview did not go well for him.
It is worth noting what he was actually put through. Summoned by force, spun round his own shrine, told his beating was being held on account, interrogated, and sent away. He gave accurate, useful, well-reasoned information throughout, and nobody thanked him.