原文 Original text
繁體 Traditional
Reader's edition
下回分解 To Be Continued
畢竟不知怎生尋得這兵器，且聽下回分解。毕竟不知怎生寻得这兵器，且听下回分解。
逐句解 Line by line
畢竟不知怎生尋得這兵器，且聽下回分解。
毕竟不知怎生寻得这兵器，且听下回分解。
In the end there is no knowing how the weapons were to be found again. Listen to the next chapter and it will be explained.
The formula that closes every chapter of the novel. 畢竟, when all is said; 怎生, in what manner — a vernacular question word of the storytelling tradition. 得 is dé here, attainment, following the question word: how the weapons might be got back. And 下回分解, the next session will divide and explain it, is the phrase that closes all hundred chapters and gives away that this was performed in instalments to a paying audience.
The chapter ends with the pilgrims disarmed and asleep, and a demon on a mountain forty kilometres off with all three weapons.
The closing formula is the oldest thing in the book. It belongs to the marketplace storyteller who stopped at the interesting part, and it has been kept in every printed edition since, including this one.