主公在此 Your Master Is Standing Here
潑妖精，還我人來也。」連叫了數聲，那老妖睡著了，無人答應。行者性急起來，掄鐵棒，往內打進，口中不住的喊罵。那老妖方才驚醒，心中大怒，爬起來，喝一聲：「趕戰。」搖搖頭，便張口來啣。行者回頭跳出。妖精趕到外邊，罵道：「賊猴，那裡走？」行者立在高崖上笑道：「你還敢這等大膽無禮，你死活也不知哩，這不是你老爺主公在此？」那妖精趕到崖前，早被天尊念聲咒語，喝道：「元聖兒，我來了。」泼妖精，还我人来也。」连叫了数声，那老妖睡着了，无人答应。行者性急起来，抡铁棒，往内打进，口中不住的喊骂。那老妖方才惊醒，心中大怒，爬起来，喝一声：「赶战。」摇摇头，便张口来啣。行者回头跳出。妖精赶到外边，骂道：「贼猴，那里走？」行者立在高崖上笑道：「你还敢这等大胆无礼，你死活也不知哩，这不是你老爷主公在此？」那妖精赶到崖前，早被天尊念声咒语，喝道：「元圣儿，我来了。」
逐句解 Line by line
"Foul fiend, give me back my people!"
The line repeated exactly, as the calling for the servants was repeated in the dark hall earlier. The novel uses this doubling whenever it wants a shout to go unanswered.
He called out several times over, but that old fiend was fast asleep and nobody answered.
著 is zháo inside 睡著, sleep taking hold. 應 is yìng, the answering reading. This is the second time in the chapter that somebody stands in that cave shouting into silence, and the first time it was the fiend himself.
Pilgrim grew hot-tempered about it, swung his iron cudgel and beat his way in, yelling and cursing without a pause.
性急 - a hasty nature - is the standing diagnosis of this character throughout the book, and it is applied to him here at the moment a god has asked him to do something simple and wait.
Only then did the old fiend start awake; and in a great rage in his heart he scrambled up and shouted: "After him, fight!"
爬起來 is to scramble up on all fours, the same undignified verb the chapter used of him the night Eight Rules shouted. This creature is never once allowed to rise gracefully.
He shook his heads and opened his mouth to take him.
Six characters, and the same two motions he has used for every capture in the chapter - shake, open. It has worked every previous time.
Pilgrim turned his head and sprang out.
This time it does not. Five characters, and the difference is that Pilgrim is trying to be caught somewhere else.
The fiend chased him out to the open and cursed: "Thieving ape, where do you think you are going?"
The fourth time this chapter someone has flung 那裡走 at a retreating enemy, and 那 is nǎ every time - the asking reading used rhetorically. It has never once stopped anybody, and this time it is the pursuer who is being led.
Pilgrim stood up on the high cliff and laughed: "So you still dare be as bold and rude as this - you do not even know whether you are alive or dead. Is that not your own lord and master standing here?"
還 is hái in this one - still, even now - which is the other reading of the character he used for give-back at the head of this passage. And 主公 is a lord and master in the ordinary human sense, the word a retainer uses of the man he serves. Pilgrim is not threatening him. He is pointing at his owner.
That fiend ran up to the front of the cliff, and was met at once by the Heavenly Worthy reciting a spell and calling out: "Primal Sage child, I have come."
元聖兒 puts the small affectionate ending on the creature's grand title - Primal Sage, and then a word you would use of a child or a pet. The chapter's most terrifying figure is being called in the way you call a dog in from the garden.
The confrontation the chapter has been building for four thousand characters is over in nine segments, and the decisive weapon is a name.
Everything up to that point goes exactly as before. Pilgrim loses his temper instead of waiting as instructed, beats his way in, wakes the thing up. The fiend scrambles to his feet, shakes his heads, opens his mouth. It is the same motion that took six people out of a tower and two of the strongest fighters in the book, and it has never failed.
Then a god says a spell and calls him by a pet name. Primal Sage child, I have come. Nothing is struck, nothing is broken, and the creature that shrugged off an entire chapter is finished by being recognised.