還不肯捨 Bhiksu Sees Them Off
卻說比丘國君臣黎庶送唐僧四眾出城，有二十里之遠，還不肯捨。三藏勉強下輦，乘馬辭別而行，目送者直至望不見蹤影方回。却说比丘国君臣黎庶送唐僧四众出城，有二十里之远，还不肯舍。三藏勉强下辇，乘马辞别而行，目送者直至望不见踪影方回。
逐句解 Line by line
Now the ruler of Bhiksu, his ministers and the common folk all escorted the Tang Monk and his three disciples out of the city, and when they had gone some twenty lǐ they were still unwilling to part.
The 二十里 is about eleven and a half kilometres — a Ming 里 runs to roughly 576 metres. That is a long way to walk somebody to the door. 捨 is to let go, and it carries the same reluctance as the modern phrase for parting with something you value.
Tripitaka, pressed, came down from the royal carriage, mounted his horse, took his leave and rode on; and those who watched him go stood there until not a trace of him could be seen before they turned back.
Chapter 79 ended with the king of Bhiksu restored and the eleven hundred and eleven children saved, so this send-off is a debt of gratitude being paid in the only currency a kingdom has. 勉強 here is not "reluctantly" in the sulky sense — it is the awkwardness of a monk who has been put in a royal carriage and would rather be on his own horse.
Every long stretch of this book opens the same way: the party leaves somewhere warm and walks into somewhere cold. The pattern is so regular that the narrator barely bothers to vary it, and that regularity is the point — the road is the one constant, and kingdoms are things that happen beside it.
What is unusual here is how long the send-off lasts. Twenty lǐ is not a gesture at the city gate; it is most of a morning's walk. The people of Bhiksu had been ready to hand over their children's hearts to a fraudulent physician, and the man who stopped it is riding away. The narrator lets them stand and watch until he is gone, which is a kinder ending than the kingdom deserved.