師父我來也 Master, I Am Here
此時有申時矣。那國王正扯著三藏，戰戰兢兢，只叫：「聖僧救我。」那些嬪妃、皇后也正愴惶，只見大聖自雲端裡落將下來，叫道：「師父，我來也。」三藏道：「悟空立住，不可驚了聖躬。我問你：假公主之事，端的如何？」行者立於鳷鵲宮外，叉手當胸道：「假公主是個妖邪。初時與他打了半日，他戰不過我，化道清風，徑往天門上跑，是我吆喝天神擋住。此时有申时矣。那国王正扯着三藏，战战兢兢，只叫：「圣僧救我。」那些嫔妃、皇后也正怆惶，只见大圣自云端里落将下来，叫道：「师父，我来也。」三藏道：「悟空立住，不可惊了圣躬。我问你：假公主之事，端的如何？」行者立于鳷鹊宫外，叉手当胸道：「假公主是个妖邪。初时与他打了半日，他战不过我，化道清风，径往天门上跑，是我吆喝天神挡住。
逐句解 Line by line
By now it was the hour of shen. The king was still clutching Tripitaka and shaking from head to foot, crying over and over: "Holy monk, save me!"
The narrator pins the time before anything else, and it is a small mercy to the reader: the fight has taken most of an afternoon. The 申時 is the shen double-hour, from three to five in the afternoon. The old Chinese day ran on twelve two-hour periods named for the earthly branches, and shen is the ninth of them — the monkey hour, which is probably not an accident on the day Wukong saves this kingdom. The king has not moved since he grabbed hold of the monk. Everything that has happened in the sky happened above a man frozen to a stranger's sleeve.
The imperial consorts and the queen were in a panic of their own when they saw the Great Sage come dropping down out of the edge of the clouds, calling: "Master, I am here!"
The entrance is the entrance he always makes, and after two hundred characters of terror it works like a light going on. 落將下來 — coming down — uses 將 as the small word that points a verb in a direction. ⚠ It is jiāng, and every one of the twelve appearances of this character in the chapter takes that reading; the jiàng of a general does not occur here at all.
Tripitaka said: "Stand still, Wukong — you must not startle the sacred person. Let me ask you: this business of the false princess, what is the truth of it?"
His first instinct is still court etiquette. There is a demon loose and a king in hysterics and he is worried about protocol. 聖躬 — the sacred person — is the formal term for the monarch's body, the same reflex that makes English say Your Majesty rather than you. ⚠ 端的 means the truth of a thing, exactly how it stands, and the second character takes the reading dì rather than the light de of possession. It is one of the vernacular's favourite words and this book uses it constantly.
Pilgrim stood outside the Zhique Palace with his hands folded at his breast and said: "The false princess is a fiend. At first I fought her half a day and she could not beat me, so she turned into a puff of clear wind and made straight for the gate of Heaven — and it was I who shouted to the gods of Heaven to block her."
He gives his report standing outside, hands folded, like an officer at a briefing. The manners are for his master's benefit and they are not entirely sincere. 叉手當胸 is the formal standing salute, hands crossed at the chest. This is the same monkey who ten minutes ago grabbed a princess by the hair in front of the court. ⚠ 吆喝 reads hè in the second character, to shout somebody down. Note also what he is claiming: he did not ask Heaven's guards for help, he shouted at them, and they did as they were told.
The chapter comes back down to earth, and it lands on a man who has not let go of another man's arm for an hour. The fight has been enormous and remote — Heaven's gate, a thousand rods, mist across the sun — and the view from below has been a king clutching a monk and saying the same three words.
Wukong's report is a small masterpiece of self-presentation. He stands at a respectful distance, folds his hands, and delivers an account in which he fought for half a day without being beaten, personally ordered the gods of Heaven about, and came back to check on his master. Every word of it is true.
And Tripitaka, faced with all this, asks the one useful question in the room: what is the truth of it? He is frightened, he is out of his depth, and he still knows to ask for the facts before anything else. That instinct is why the pilgrimage has a monk at the head of it and not a monkey.