多官膽戰 The Lid Comes Off
二臣請國王開看,國王即命打開。方揭了蓋,豬八戒就忍不住往外一跳,諕得那多官膽戰,口不能言。二臣请国王开看,国王即命打开。方揭了盖,猪八戒就忍不住往外一跳,諕得那多官胆战,口不能言。
逐句解 Line by line
The two officers begged the king to look inside, and he ordered it opened at once.
Two short clauses, and the novel does not slow down for either. The setup has been running for a page and a half; the payoff gets one sentence of preparation.
The cover had barely been lifted when Zhu Bajie, unable to hold still, sprang straight out — at which the assembled officers shook with terror and could not get a word out.
Of the four of them it is of course Bajie who comes out first, and at speed. 諕 is xià, to frighten — a variant way of writing 嚇, which this chapter uses for the very same action a few lines further on. The 得 after it is de, the little hinge that attaches a result to a verb: frightened them so that they shook.
The chest has been the chapter's engine since it was stolen two chapters back, and it empties in a single sentence. The novel spends its words on the approach and almost none on the arrival.
Bajie leaping out is played for fright, not comedy, and the difference matters. To the court a pig-headed monster has just erupted from the recovered evidence in the middle of a throne room.