Journey 042: Boy Oh Boy
A child gives the pilgrims the runaround.
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Transcript
Welcome to the Chinese Lore Podcast, where I retell classic Chinese stories in English. This is episode 42 of Journey to the West.
Last time, Sun Wukong revived the dead king of the Wuji Kingdom, and then the pilgrims took him back to his palace, where they confronted the demon that had murdered him and assumed his likeness and his throne. With his cover blown, the demon fled. Sun Wukong chased after him. They fought in the air for a bit, but that demon was no match for Wukong, so he retraced his flight path and fled back into the palace. He charged back into the main hall, where the king, the officials, and the pilgrims were waiting, twisted his body and assumed another form.
A moment later, Sun Wukong charged in, and to his surprise, he was confronted with two versions of his master, San Zang, both standing in front of the steps to the throne room, both looking exactly alike.
Wukong raised his rod and took aim at one of them, but that San Zang shouted, “Wukong, no! It’s me!” Wukong then shifted his aim toward the other San Zang, but that version also shouted, “Wukong, no! It’s me!”
Ah crap.
Now, you would think Sun Wukong’s fiery golden demon-detecting eyes shouldn’t have a problem telling human from demon like they always do, but plot convenience demands otherwise in this case. With the two San Zangs looking, acting, and sounding exactly alike, Wukong was at a loss. He asked his fellow disciples, Zhu Bajie and Sha Zeng, which was which. But Bajie said, “You were making all that racket in the sky. I looked away for a second, and the next thing I knew, there were two masters. I don’t know which one is real and which one is fake.”
Wukong then uttered an incantation and summoned the 18 gods who were tasked with protecting San Zang in secret, as well as the local earth and mountain spirits. He told them, “I’m trying to tame a demon, but he’s taken my master’s form and looks just like him. Since you all have a secret understanding, you go ask my master to go up into the throne room, and then I’ll capture the demon.”
But the demon overheard this, so he quickly ran up into the throne room. Sun Wukong thought the one left standing at the bottom of the steps was the demon, so he raised his rod and made for the real San Zang. Thankfully, all the protector gods intervened and told him that the demon had preemptively gone into the throne room. Wukong pursued the demon into the room, but then the demon dashed back out, grabbed San Zang, ran into the crowd and did a little spinaroo with him, and once again, no one could tell which was which.
This left Wukong in a fit, but then he saw Zhu Bajie chuckling to the side. Wukong raged, “You useless moron! Now you have two masters to order you around! Why are you so amused?!”
Bajie laughed, “Oh brother, you call me dumb, but you’re even dumber than me. What’s so hard about finding out which is the real master? Just put up with a headache for a bit, and ask the two masters to recite the band-tightening spell. Sha Zeng and I will each take hold of one of them. Whichever one doesn’t know the spell must be the demon. What’s so hard about this?”
“Brother, bless you!” Wukong exclaimed “Only three people know that spell. It originated from the Buddha, who taught it to the Bodhisattva Guanyin, who then passed it on to my master. No one else knows it. Alright, masters, please recite the spell.”
So the real San Zang started muttering the incantation, and Sun Wukong’s head started hurting. When it was the demon’s turn, he of course didn’t know it, so he just mumbled nonsense and was immediately found out.
“This must be the demon!” Zhu Bajie shouted as he raised his rake to attack. But in order to raise his rake, he had to first loosen his grasp on the imposter, and in that moment, the demon took off again, flying into the air. Bajie let out a shout and flew after him. Sha Zeng also took out his Buddhist staff and joined the pursuit. San Zang stopped reciting his spell, and Wukong, shrugging off the headache, took to the air as well as all three disciples surrounded the demon and engaged in a dogged fight.
Bajie and Sha Zeng blocked the demon in, and Sun Wukong soared above them and was about to deliver the killing blow when suddenly, an auspicious cloud approached from the Northeast and a voice called out, “Sun Wukong, stop!”
Wukong looked and saw that it was the Bodhisattva Manjusiri, or Wenshu if we go by his Chinese name. He is one of the Four Great Bodhisattvas of Chinese Buddhism. Those of you who listened to my Water Margin series might remember that when one of that novel’s more colorful characters, Lu Zhishen, became a monk to hide from the law, he did so at a well-known monastery dedicated to this Bodhisattva.
So anyway, Wukong recognized Wenshu, so he put away his rod, greeted the Bodhisattva, and asked what he was doing there. Wenshu said, “I’ve come to help you tame this demon.”
Wukong thanked him, and Wenshu took out a magic mirror. This was a Demon-Reflecting Mirror, able to reveal a demon’s true form and freeze him in place. Wukong then called Zhu Bajie and Sha Zeng over, and they all looked in the mirror. They saw that the demon was in fact a ferocious blue-maned lion, and Wukong recognized it as Wenshu’s mount.
“Bodhisattva, how did your lion come to be a demon here? Why did you not domesticate him?” Wukong asked.
“He didn’t escape,” Wenshu explained. “He was sent here by the Buddha’s decree.”
“That beast turned into a demon and usurped the throne, and he had a decree from the Buddha?!” Wukong exclaimed. “Considering how much suffering I’ve had to endure protecting the Tang monk, where is my decree?!”
“You don’t understand,” Wenshu said. “This monarch of the Wuji Kingdom had always been kind to Buddhist monks, so the Buddha sent me here to take him to the West to become a golden arhat. I couldn’t reveal my true identity, so I turned into a mortal monk and asked him for some food. But after I asked him some tough questions that he couldn’t answer, he thought I was a wicked man, so he tied me up and threw me into the palace moat for three days and three nights. Thankfully, some arhats rescued me. When I informed the Buddha, he dispatched this demon to come here and push the king into the well to soak for three years as payback for the watery calamity he put me in for three days. ‘Every mouthful we eat or drink is predestined,’ as they say. But now that you all are here, you have rendered service.”
But Wukong was not satisfied. He said, “You may have settled your score with the king, but how many people has that demon harmed?”
“He hasn’t harmed anyone,” Wenshu said. “Ever since he took over, in these three years, the weather has been fair, the country stable, and the people peaceful. So what harm has he done?”
“That may be, but he has been sleeping with the women of the harem, sullying their bodies and violating the rules of morality. Is that not harm?”
“Oh he hasn’t sullied them at all. He’s a castrated lion.”
Zhu Bajie reached under the lion’s nether regions and checked, and he laughed, “This demon is like a teetotaler with a red nose. He’s been saddled with an undeserved reputation.”
“Alright, in that case, you can just take him with you,” Wukong relented and told Wenshu. “But if you hadn’t come, I would not have spared his life!”
Wenshu now muttered an incantation and shouted, “Beast, show your true form now!”
The demon immediately reverted to his true lion form. Wenshu put a lotus flower on the lion to tame it, hopped on its back, and flew off on a beam of light.
Wukong, Bajie, and Sha Zeng then flew back to the palace, where they were greeted by a grateful king and his equally grateful officials. Wukong then recounted how Wenshu had tamed the beast and hey, you know what? The demon that killed you, impersonated you, and stole your throne for three years really wasn’t that bad. Quite a good king for everyone else, actually.
Just then, the officer watching the palace gate came to report that another four monks were seeking an audience. Bajie panicked and said to Wukong, “Brother, did that demon use some trick to impersonate the Bodhisattva Wenshu to fool us, and now he’s turned into a monk to come fight us in a battle of wits?”
“That’s nonsense!” Wukong scoffed. “Let’s see what these monks want.”
The visitors were summoned, and they turned out to be monks from the royal monastery where the pilgrims had stayed. They presented the royal regalia that Wukong had told them to clean. Wukong was delighted, and told the king to change out of his lay brother’s clothes and back into his kingly attire. He then ascended the throne, and the prince returned his white jade scepter.
But the king refused to sit down on his throne. Instead, he kneeled in the center of the hall, wept, and told the pilgrims, “I was dead for three years, but you masters have brought me back to life. How can I dare to proclaim myself king again? One of you should assume the throne, and I am willing to move out of the city with my family and live as mere civilians.”
But San Zang of course refused. The king then asked Sun Wukong to take the throne, but Wukong chuckled, “To tell you all the truth, if I wanted to be king, I could’ve been king for all the kingdoms and empires under heaven. But we’re used to the lazy life of monks. To be a king, I’d have to grow my hair out, and I won’t get any sleep. I would be restless with every report from the borders or every natural disaster. How can we get used to that? No, you go back to being king, and we’ll remain monks and keep working on our cultivation.”
So the king relented, sat down on his throne, and received homage from his court. He declared an amnesty in his kingdom, and bestowed rewards on the monks from the royal monastery. Then, he held a huge feast for the pilgrims. He also summoned artists to paint their likenesses, to be kept in worship in the throne room.
Having set things right in the Wuji Kingdom, the pilgrims were ready to get back on the road. The king, his family, and the court officials presented them with mountains of treasures, gold, silver, and silk. But San Zang declined it all, asking only for their travel papers and telling Wukong to get the horse ready to go immediately. So the king instead asked San Zang to sit in his royal carriage, while he, his officials, his queen, and his prince accompanied the carriage on foot all the way out of the city. Only then did they let San Zang get out.
“Elders, on your way back from fetching scriptures, you must stop in at my kingdom once more,” the king said.
“I shall obey,” San Zang replied. The king, with tears in his eyes, then took his leave and led his entourage back into the city, while San Zang and company resumed their journey West.
In the blink of an eye, a couple weeks had passed. One day, the pilgrims came upon — what else? — another imposing mountain. San Zang, as usual, was alarmed and told Wukong, hey we need to be careful. But Wukong, as usual, laughed it off. So San Zang pushed his worries to the back of his mind and spurred on his horse, trotting to the foot of the mountain.
There, the pilgrims sized up the mountain, and it looked treacherous. Its peaks reached for the sky, while its chasms plunged toward hell. Clouds seemed to always billow, and black mist hung persistently. The nooks and crannies seemed to conceal spirits and demons. Monkeys and deer roamed, tigers and dragons lurked, and the sound of cave doors opening sent birds and wild beasts flying and darting.
As the pilgrims looked on, a red cloud emerged from a crevice in the mountain and rose into the sky, where it seemed to condense into a ball of flames. Sun Wukong was alarmed. He rushed toward the horse, grabbed San Zang by the leg, and pushed him off the saddle, shouting, “Brothers, stop! A demon approaches!”
Zhu Bajie hurriedly grabbed his rake, and Sha Zeng brandished his staff, as the disciples surrounded San Zang. But a moment later, Wukong looked up again and saw that the red cloud and fire ball had all but dissipated.
“Master, you can mount the horse and get back on the road now,” he told San Zang.
“But you just said a demon was approaching,” San Zang said. “How can we travel?”
“Just now, I saw a red cloud rise from the ground into the air, where it turned into a ball of fire. I figured that was a demon. But then the red cloud quickly dissipated. It must have been a demon just passing through and it didn’t dare to harm us. So we can keep moving.”
Zhu Bajie chuckled, “Brother, you and your slick tongue. A demon who’s just ‘passing through’. Ha!”
“What do you know?!” Wukong scoffed. “If the demon lord of some cave was holding a feast, he would invite demons from all the nearby caves and mountains, and they would come from all directions. But they would just be focused on going to the banquet and have no intention of harming people. That’s why I said it’s a demon passing through.”
Well, regardless, San Zang knew they had to cross the mountain to continue their journey, so he got back on the horse and continued forward. After traveling for a bit, he suddenly heard someone shouting, “Help me!”
“Disciples, where could that shouting be coming from, here in the middle of the mountain?” he asked with surprise.
“Oh master, just keep going; don’t worry about it,” Wukong said.
“Yes, but …”
“Don’t worry about other people’s business; just keep moving.”
San Zang relented and kept going. But within less than a mile, he again heard someone shouting for help. He said to Wukong, “That doesn’t sound like a demon. If it were a demon, they might shout, but there would be no echo. We’ve heard this cry for help twice now; it must be someone in trouble. We should go save them.”
Umm … dude, when has that EVER been true of any demon in disguise pleading for “help”? But I guess there would be no novel if San Zang would just listen to Sun Wukong and ignore every shady plea for help on the way West.
Wukong, though, tried again to dissuade San Zang. “Master, put away your compassion for today. You can be compassionate again once we’ve crossed this mountain. You know the saying about clinging to grass and attaching to trees: Things can cultivate themselves into spirits. Most kinds are ok, but there is one exception—the python. If such a snake cultivates itself for many long years, it can become a malevolent spirit, able even to know a person’s childhood name. If it hides among the grass or in a mountain hollow and calls out to someone, all is well if the person does not answer. But if he answers even once, the creature will seize his vital soul. That very night it will follow him and, without fail, take his life. So keep moving. As the ancients said, “If you escape, give thanks to the gods.” You must not listen to this cry for help.”
Thus prodded, San Zang listened to Wukong and kept riding on. Wukong, meanwhile, thought to himself, “That damn demon just keeps calling out. Where is he? Let me make sure he never comes face to face with my master.”
So he told Sha Zeng, “Lead the horse and go slowly. I need to relieve myself.”
Once San Zang and company went a few steps ahead of him, Wukong uttered an incantation for moving mountains and shortening distances. He pointed behind him with his golden rod, and in the blink of an eye, the pilgrims had surged past the peak and left the demon far behind. Wukong then caught up to the rest of the party and continued forward.
But before long, San Zang heard the cry for help again, this time coming from behind them.
“Disciples, the person in trouble is cursed with bad luck. We must’ve passed him,” he said. “You can hear him calling from behind us.”
Bajie chimed in, “They were in front of us not that long ago. The wind must have changed directions.”
“Who cares which way the wind is blowing, just keep moving,” Wukong said.
So everyone in the party just kept their mouths shut and kept moving, wishing they could cross the mountain in one stride. As they were walking, Wukong happened to look up, and he saw another red cloud hovering overhead.
“Brothers, be on guard! The demon is coming again!” he shouted as he again shoved San Zang off the horse. Bajie and Sha Zeng again hurriedly gripped their weapons and surrounded San Zang.
But in the next second, Wukong looked up again and saw that the red cloud had once again dissipated. So he asked San Zang to get back in the saddle and keep going. But San Zang had had enough. He asked Wukong, “You just said the demon was coming again, so why are you telling me to keep going now?”
“It’s still that demon who’s passing through,” Wukong said. “He wouldn’t dare to mess with us.”
San Zang now scolded him angrily, “You damn monkey; you just keep jerking me around! When there were demons, you said all was fine. But then when we’re in a peaceful spot, you keep scaring me by shouting about demons every other step. Whether it’s real or fake, you keep pushing me off the horse. And then you say it’s some demon that’s just passing through?! If you make me fall and get injured, what then?!”
As San Zang grumbled, Wukong replied, “Master, don’t blame me. If you hurt your hand or foot, that can be treated. But if you get abducted by a demon, where would we find you?”
But that just made San Zang even angrier, as he threatened to read the band-tightening spell. He only relented after Sha Zeng pleaded time and again on Wukong’s behalf. Just as San Zang was climbing back into the saddle, he heard another shout of “Elder, save me!” San Zang looked up and saw a young boy, almost naked, tied up and hanging from a tree.
“Damn monkey, you’re too lazy!” San Zang chided Wukong. “You have no kindness in your heart at all! You’re always just thinking about acting out and committing violence. I told you it sounded like a person, but you kept insisting it was a demon. But look! Isn’t that a human being that’s hanging from the tree?”
With San Zang getting so crossed with him, Wukong acquiesced, partly because there was no opening for him to do anything, and partly because he was afraid San Zang might recite the band-tightening spell again. So he just lowered his head and made no reply.
San Zang now went to the foot of the tree, pointed up at the boy, and asked, “Whose child are you? Why are you hanging here? Tell me, and I can save you.”
“Oh elder, to the West of this mountain, there is a Dead Pine Ravine. Next to the stream there is a village. I’m from there. My great grandfather’s last name was Hong (2) — which by the way means red. Because he had great wealth, he got the nickname Millionaire Hong. He has been dead for a long time now, and his property was passed to my father. But in recent years he has thrown a lot of our money away, so he’s nicknamed Hundred Thousand Hong. He liked to make friends with heroes of the land and to lend his money out at interest. But then crooks swindled him and made off with his money. So then he swore an oath to never lend a single coin again. The people who had needed to lend money then had no recourse but to band together into a violent gang. They stormed our house, took all our wealth, killed my father, and abducted my mother because she was attractive. My mother couldn’t bear to leave me, so she carried me in her arms as she accompanied the bandits to their mountain lair. But then, at their lair, they wanted to kill me. Because my mother pleaded bitterly with them, they decided to not kill me with a blade, but to leave me hanging on this tree to die of cold and starvation. Then, those bandits disappeared to who knows where with my mother. I’ve been hanging here for three days and three nights, and no one passed through here. But I must have accumulated some good karma in a previous life, to be fortunate enough to encounter you. Elder, if you can exercise great compassion, save my life, and deliver me home, even if I have to sell myself, I will repay your kindness. I will never dare to forget it even when I’m buried under the sand.”
Hearing that sob story, San Zang told Zhu Bajie to go let the boy down and untie him. Just as dum-dum was about to do so, Sun Wukong couldn’t help it anymore and shouted at the boy, “Damn beast! I see right through you. Don’t try to pull one over on us! Since your home was raided, your father killed, and your mother abducted, then who are we going to leave you with? And how will you thank us? This is all lies!”
The boy wept and said, “Elder, even though my parents and possessions are gone, we still have some farm land and some relatives.”
“What relatives?” Wukong pressed.
“My other grandfather lives to the south of the mountain. My aunt’s home is north of the ridge. Li (3) the Fourth, who lives at the head of the ravine is married to my aunt. Hong the Third from the woods is a distant uncle. I also have cousins who live around the village. If you are willing to save me, once we get to the village and meet my relatives, I will tell them all about how you rescued me. We’ll sell some of our land to repay you.”
Zhu Bajie now took hold of Wukong’s arm and said, “Brother, why are you interrogating a little boy? There is reason in what he’s saying. Those robbers could only take his movable possessions, but they couldn’t have taken his house or fields. Once he tells his relatives how we saved him, no matter how big an appetite we have, we’d never be able to eat all they can offer. Just save him.”
And so, Bajie took out a monk’s knife and cut the ropes, letting the boy down. The boy, with tears streaming from his eyes, kowtowed in front of San Zang’s horse. San Zang told him, “Mount my horse, and we’ll take you home.”
“Elder, my arms and legs are numb from being hung up, and my back hurts too. Besides, I’m a simple peasant. I don’t know how to ride a horse.”
So San Zang asked Bajie to carry the boy. But the boy, wiping his eyes, said, “Elder, my skin is too tender after being frozen, and this master’s mane is going to prick me. I don’t dare to have him carry me.”
“Ok, then Sha Zeng can carry you,” San Zang said.
But the boy quickly said, “Elder, those bandits all had painted faces and fake beards. They look like this elder. I’m scared out of my mind. I don’t dare to have him carry me either.”
By the process of elimination, then, it was up to Sun Wukong, who accepted the task with a smile. The boy was also eager with that arrangement. Wukong gave the boy a little lift to test out how heavy he was, and found him surprisingly light.
“Damn demon, you’re destined to die today,” Wukong chuckled. “How dare you use your tricks in front of me? I know you’re one of those.”
“Elder, I came from a good family. I just ran into a calamity. What do you mean one of those?”
“If you’re really human, how can you be so light?”
“I’m a kid.”
“How old are you?”
“Seven.”
“Even at seven, you should weigh more than this.”
“I wasn’t breastfed as a baby.”
“Alright, whatever. I’ll carry you, but if you want to pee or poop, tell me first.”
So San Zang, accompanied by Zhu Bajie and Sha Zeng, traveled ahead, while Sun Wukong followed with the boy on his back. Hmm, didn’t we just see this a few episodes back when he was carrying the demon Silver Horns in disguise?
Well, get ready for more recycled script, because as he walked, Wukong was holding a grudge against San Zang. He thought to himself, “It’s hard enough just to walk across this treacherous mountain, and yet he wants me to carry this boy? Even if this boy is actually human, with his parents gone, who would we hand him off to? I should just kill him instead.”
So yeah, that’s basically a straight lift from the Silver Horns episode. As he was thinking this, Sun Wukong suddenly felt the load on his back increase a thousand fold. He laughed, “Oh son, you’re using some magic to try to pin me down?!”
As he spoke, Wukong furiously pulled the boy off his back, smashed him against a boulder, turning him into a meat patty. But he wasn’t done. Wukong then ripped the boy’s limbs off and left his carcass in a torn up pile on the side of the road. Yeesh! This is definitely not one of the more children-friendly chapters.
Just then, a powerful gale whipped up, sending rocks and sand flying into the air. Moments later, the wind stopped, and the sun reappeared. Wukong caught up to the rest of the party. He found Zhu Bajie struggling for breath at the foot of a cliff, Sha Zeng kneeling in front of a hill, the luggage cast aside on the road, the horse trembling and neighing, and its saddle noticeably devoid of San Zang.
Ah crap!
To see who’s got a hold of him this time, tune in to the next episode of the Chinese Lore Podcast. Thanks for listening!
Music in This Episode
- “Luỹ Tre Xanh Ngát Đầu Làng (Guzheng) – Vietnam BGM” by VPRODMUSIC_Asia_BGM
- “Ravines” by Elphnt (from YouTube audio library)
- “Loneliest Road in America (US 50)” by Jesse Gallagher (from YouTube audio library)