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03 Revolt Against Heaven

Seeing them all sound asleep, the Great Sage brought out the hundred delicacies and the eight rare viands, and sitting beneath the colonnade, jar at his elbow and vat beside him, drank deep and long. When he was thoroughly drunk, Wukong thought to himself, ‘This is bad, this is bad. When the guests arrive and find me here, it will go hard with me. Better to go home to the palace and sleep.’ And he staggered out of the Jade Pool. Wukong, his head full of wine, reeled and wandered where he would, and by mischance came to the Palace of the Supreme Ultimate in the Heaven of Parted Sorrows. He was about to turn back when it struck him: since I am here, why not go in and pay a call on the Supreme Lord Lao? Wukong straightened his robes and cap and went in, only to find the place deserted. It turned out that the Supreme Lord Lao and the Ancient Buddha Burning Lamp were expounding the Way upon the Vermilion Terrace of the three-storeyed pavilion, and the immortal boys, generals and clerks of the palace had all gone to listen. Wukong blundered into the chamber of the elixir. There was no one there, but the fire in the furnace still burned, and beside it stood five gourds, filled with the golden elixir of immortality ready-refined. Wukong was overjoyed. ‘Fine stuff indeed is the elixir of the immortals. Fortune has thrown it in my way today — let me taste what it is like.’ He tasted a few pellets and found them wondrously good, so he tipped all five gourds of elixir into his mouth at a gulp, as though they were roasted beans. When he had finished, the wine had cleared from his head — and then he knew what a great disaster he had brought upon himself. If the Jade Emperor came to hear of it, his life would not be worth a straw. Knowing that he could not escape punishment, Wukong resolved to flee back to Flower-Fruit Mountain. Passing the Jade Pool, he thought again: the wine and fruit of the Jade Pool are rare things; let me take some back for my children to taste. So he plucked a hair and turned it into a sack, filled it full, and made his way to Flower-Fruit Mountain. Meanwhile the seven fairy maidens, held fast in the Peach Orchard by the Great Sage's spell of binding, were released after a full day and night, and hastened back to the palace to report all that had passed to the Queen Mother. The Queen Mother was beside herself with rage and went to the Jade Emperor to demand justice. Before long another heavenly officer came to report: ‘May it please Your Majesty, someone has thrown the Peach Banquet into confusion. The immortal wine and the immortal fruit have all been eaten to the last drop.’ The Jade Emperor was about to question him further when the Four Heavenly Masters came to announce, ‘The Supreme Patriarch of the Tao has arrived.’ The Jade Emperor and the Queen Mother went out to receive him. The Lord Lao, his brow streaming with sweat, reported, ‘The nine-times-revolved golden elixir which this old Daoist brewed in his palace for Your Majesty's Elixir Assembly has been stolen, every grain of it. I beg Your Majesty to make inquiry.’ Hardly had the Lord Lao finished when the Barefoot Immortal came hurrying in and told how Sun Wukong had tricked him into going to the Hall of Bright Pervasion. At this the Jade Emperor had the whole matter in outline, and sent the Investigating Spirit Officer to seek out Sun Wukong's whereabouts. The Investigating Spirit Officer made his search and returned to report: ‘He who has thrown the heavenly palace into confusion is the Great Sage, Equal of Heaven, and he has already fled back to Flower-Fruit Mountain.’ The Jade Emperor flew into a rage, and at once dispatched the Four Heavenly Kings, together with the Heavenly King Li and Nezha, to lead troops down and seize him. The Jie-di, the Four Duty Officers, the star lords of east and west, the two gods of south and north, the Five Sacred Peaks and the Four Great Rivers, and the star ministers of all the heavens — a hundred thousand heavenly troops in all — set forth in dread array against Flower-Fruit Mountain. The hundred thousand troops came on in a rolling cloud of yellow dust and a haze of slaughter, and arrived at Flower-Fruit Mountain. The Heavenly King Li ordered the eighteen nets of heaven and earth to be cast, so that the mountain was ringed watertight, and sent the Nine Bright Stars to open the attack. Wukong was drinking in the cave with the demon kings when a scout came to report that nine fierce gods were shouting challenges before the cave. ‘Why such alarm?’ said the Great Sage, and ordered the Unicorn Demon King to lead his men out to meet them.

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