In golden halls the mandarin duck figurines were smashed.
As the apes howled the moon seemed small;
Vast was the sky as wild geese called.
The eighteen arhats
Applauded in secret;
Each of the thirty-two devas
Was struck with panic.
The Great Sage Monkey was in such high spirits that his cudgel never missed. Realizing that she was no match for him, the evil spirit frowned suddenly and thought of a plan as she extricated herself and made off.
“Where do you think you're going, you baggage?” Monkey shouted. “Surrender at once.”
The evil spirit paid no attention and fled. When she was hard-pressed by Monkey's pursuit she took the embroidered shoe off her left foot, blew on it with a magic breath, said the words of a spell, called out, “Change!” and turned it into a likeness of herself that came back at him waving a pair of swords. Meanwhile she turned her real body with a shake into a pure breeze and went.
This was Sanzang's star of disaster. She headed straight for the abbot's quarters, lifted Sanzang up into a cloud, and, on the instant, before anyone could see anything, she was back at Mount Pitfall and inside the Bottomless Cave, where she told her underlings to prepare a vegetarian marriage feast.
The story switches back to Brother Monkey, who fought with desperate anxiety until he was able to seize an opening and smash the evil spirit to the ground with a single blow, only to find that she was in fact an embroidered shoe. Realizing that he had fallen for a trick he went straight back to see the master. But was the master there? There were only the idiot and Friar Sand muttering together. His chest bursting with fury, Monkey put all thought of what he ought to do out of his head and raised his cudgel to lay about him.
“I'll kill the pair of you,” he shouted, “I'll kill the pair of you.”
The idiot was desperate, but there was no way for him to escape. Friar Sand, however, as a general from the magic mountain who had seen a great deal, adopted a very mild and conciliatory approach when he stepped forward, knelt down and said, “Elder brother, I understand. I'm sure that after you've killed us two you intend to go straight back home instead of rescuing the master.”
“When I've killed you two I'm going to rescue him myself,” Monkey retorted.
“How can you say that?” replied Friar Sand with a smile. “Without us two it would be a case of
You can't spin a thread from only one strand
Or clap with the palm of a single hand.
Who'd look after the luggage or the horse for you? We'd do much better to forget our differences and fight side by side like Guan Zhong and Bao Shuya than to have a battle of wits like Sun Bin and Pang Juan. As the old saying goes,
To kill a tiger you need your brothers' help;
Have fathers and sons fight together in battle.
I hope you will spare us, brother, so that tomorrow morning we can all work together with a single mind in our search for the master.” Although his magical powers were tremendous Monkey knew what was right and needed at the time, so that Friar Sand's entreaties made him change his mind.
“Get up, Pig and Friar Sand,” he said. “But when we hunt for the master tomorrow you'll have to make a real effort.” The idiot was so grateful at being let off that he would gladly have promised Monkey half the sky.
“Brother,” Friar Sand said, “leave it all to me.” The three brother disciples were so anxious that none of them could sleep. They wished they could make the sun rise in the East with a nod of the head and blow all the stars out of the sky with a single breath.
After sitting there till dawn the three of them packed up and were about to get out, only to find the gateway barred by one of the lamas, who asked, “Where are you going, gentlemen?”
“This is most embarrassing,” Monkey replied with a smile. “Yesterday I boasted to all the monks that I'd capture the evil spirit for them. So far from me capturing her she's made my master disappear. We're off to look for him.”
“My lord,” said the lamas with horror, “our trivial problem has got your master involved. Where will you look for him?”
“I know where I'll look,” Monkey replied.
“Even though you're going please don't be in such a hurry,” said the lamas. “Have some breakfast first.” Two or three bowls of hot gruel were brought in that Pig cleaned up with great gusto.
“What fine monks,” he said. “When we've found the master we'll come back here to see you again.”
“What you mean is come back to eat their food,” said Monkey. “Go and see if the girl is still in the devarajas' hall.”
“She's gone, my lord,” the lamas said, “she's gone. She has spent only one night there and is gone the next morning.” Monkey cheerfully took his leave of the lamas and made Pig and Friar Sand lead the horse and carry the luggage as they headed back East.
“Brother,” said Pig, “you're wrong. Why are we going East?”
“You wouldn't know,” said Monkey. “That girl who was tied up in the Black Pine Forest the other day-I saw through her with my fiery eyes and golden pupils, but you all thought she was a good person. And now it's her who's eaten the monks and her who's carried the master off. You all did a fine thing rescuing that 'lady Bodhisattva'. As she's carried the master off we're going back the way we came to look for her.”
“Good, good,” sighed the other two with admiration. “You're much cleverer than you look. Let's go.”
The three of them hurried back into the forest, where this was what could be seen:
Piles of cloud,
Heavy mists,
Many a layer of rock,
A twisting path.
The tracks of foxes and hares cross each other;
Tiger, leopard, jackal and wolf move in and out of the undergrowth.
With no sign of a monster to be seen in the wood
They do not know where Sanzang might be found.
In his anxiety Monkey pulled out his cudgel, shook himself and made himself look as he had when he made great havoc in Heaven, with three heads, six arms and six hands wielding three cudgels. With these he lashed out furiously and noisily among the trees.
“Friar Sand,” said Pig when he saw this, “not finding the master has made him go off his head.” In fact Monkey had beat a way through the trees and flushed out two old men-the mountain god and the local deity-who went up to him, knelt down and said, “Great Sage, the god of this mountain and the local deity pay their respects.”
“That rod certainly gets results,” said Pig. “He clears a path with it and flushes out the mountain god and the local deity. If he cleared another path he'd even flush out an evil star.”
“Mountain god, local deity,” said Monkey, “you're a disgrace. You're hand in glove with the bandits here. When they make a good haul they buy pigs and sheep to sacrifice to you. On top of that you're accomplices of the evil spirit. You helped her kidnap my master and bring him here. Where's he being hidden? If you want to be spared a beating tell me the truth right now.”
“Great Sage,” the two gods said with alarm, “you are misjudging us. The evil spirit doesn't live on our mountain or come within our jurisdiction. But when the wind blows at night we have heard a thing or two about her.”
“Tell me everything you know,” said Monkey.
“The evil spirit carried your master off to a place over three hundred miles due South of here,” the local deity replied. “There's a mountain there called Mount Pitfall with a cave in it called the Bottomless Cave. He was taken there by a disguised evil spirit from that cave.” This news gave Monkey a shock that he did not reveal.
Shouting at the mountain god and the local deity to dismiss them he put his magical appearance away, turned back into himself and said to Pig and Friar Sand, “The master's a long way from here.”