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09 Old Gao's Village

"You have no judgment!" roared the demon. "This rake is the Gilded Rake of Supermost Treasure, hammered by Taishang Laojun's own hand, and it once guarded the Cinnabar Palace for the Jade Emperor. When I had attained to the rank of a Grand Luo Immortal and was made Marshal Tianpeng, the Jade Emperor gave me this treasure for a weapon. Let your head be bronze and your skull be iron — one stroke of this rake and I promise you your soul dissolves and your breath is gone." Wukong did not believe it. He put away his iron rod. "Boast less. Old Sun will stick his head out here for you to strike. We shall see whether the soul dissolves or not." The demon thought to himself: the mad monkey asks for death! He raised the rake and struck with all his strength. There came a puff, and a blaze of golden light — but not so much as a scrap of Wukong's scalp was broken. The demon's hands went numb and his legs gave way. "What a head!" he cried, again and again. "When old Sun wrecked the heavenly palace and Erlang took him," Wukong said with pride, "the gods hacked at him with axes and hammered him with maces, struck him with thunder and burned him with fire, and never harmed a hair of him. In Lord Lao's eight-trigram furnace the sacred fire tempered him into a head of bronze and arms of iron. Do not believe it? Try a few more strokes." The demon was convinced. He lowered his rake and did not strike. "Monkey," he asked, "since you wrecked the heavenly palace nothing has been heard of you for a long while. How is it you have suddenly come here to maltreat me?" "Old Sun has mended his ways and turned from the Tao to the monk's life," said Wukong. "He protects the Master Tripitaka, come from the great Tang in the east, on his way to worship the Buddha and seek the scriptures in the Western Heaven. Passing this way I heard how you had taken a man's daughter by force, and came to right the wrong." At these words the demon dropped his rake in haste and bowed. "Where is this pilgrim? I beg you, take me to him." "What do you want with him?" asked Wukong. "I received the precepts from Guanyin Bodhisattva. She bade me keep the vegetarian fast and wait here for the man who should go west for the scriptures. I have waited some years now with no word. Since you are his disciple, why did you not speak of the pilgrimage sooner?" Fearing this was some trick to slip away, Wukong said, "If you truly mean to guard the Tang Monk on his pilgrimage, swear an oath, and then I will take you to my master." The demon knelt and knocked his head toward the sky. "Amitabha! If I am not in earnest, may my body be hacked to pieces!" Wukong then told him to burn the cave. The demon obediently gathered dead branches and dry vines, set light to the place, and said to Wukong, "Now I have nothing to hold me. Take me to my master." Wukong took his rake and set off, dragging the demon by the ear. "Gently," said the demon, "you are pulling my ear out by the roots." "I cannot help that," said Wukong. "As the saying goes, 'a good pig must be roughly caught.' When we come before my master, if you prove true at heart, I will let you go." Still holding him by the ear, Wukong brought him through cloud and mist back to Gao Village. Before the hall he pointed. "He who sits at the head of the hall is my master." Squire Gao and the rest, seeing the demon brought captive, came forward and thanked Wukong again and again. The demon fell on both knees before the Tang Monk and knocked his head. "Master, your disciple is late in greeting you. Had I known you were at my father-in-law's house, I should have come to pay my respects long since, and spared us all this trouble." The Tang Monk, who understood none of it, asked Wukong, "How did you bring him to bow to me?" Wukong let go the demon's ear and rapped him with the rake-handle. "Speak to my master, and quickly!" And the demon told in full how Guanyin had urged him to amend his ways. The Tang Monk was overjoyed. He had Squire Gao bring out an incense table; he washed his hands, lit the incense, and bowed toward the south. "Great is the Bodhisattva's holy grace!" The old men added incense and bowed with him.

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