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30 The Kingdom of Lion-Camel

Wukong, having made his escape, went straight to the Lion-Camel Cave, plucked a handful of hairs and turned them into dozens of Wukongs, who laid about them with their rods and wiped out the tens of thousands of young demons to the last. At sunrise he hurried back to the city, but dared not challenge; instead he turned himself into a young demon and hunted for news through the streets and lanes. All over the city the word was, "The Tang Monk was eaten half raw by the great king last night." Wukong's heart was cut as with a knife and his tears flowed like water. He thought no more of rescuing Bajie and Sandy, but sprang into the air, returned to the hills east of the city and wept aloud. Wretched and forlorn, Wukong reasoned with himself. "We have guarded the Tang Monk through a thousand mountains of hardship, and now, it seems, our lives end here! Old Sun will go and see my Buddha, Tathagata, and get this settled." He turned and rode his somersault cloud straight for India. In a moment Wukong came to the foot of Vulture Peak. A great throng of arhats, obeying the Buddha's command, was already waiting before the gate. "Great Sage," they said, "Tathagata has summoned you." The four guardians at the gate stood aside and bade him enter. Wukong came to the foot of the jewelled lotus throne, saw Tathagata, threw himself down and bowed, and weeping told how the four of them had met with disaster on the Lion-Camel Ridge and in the Lion-Camel Kingdom. Before his tale was done, his tears flowed like a spring and his sobbing would not cease. Tathagata said with a smile, "Do not grieve, Wukong. I know these demons." Tathagata called Ananda and Kashyapa and said, "Each of you take a cloud and go, one to Mount Emei and one to Mount Wutai, and summon Wenshu and Puxian to me." The two honourable ones went off upon the command. Tathagata said to Wukong, "My all-seeing eye perceives that Wenshu and Puxian are the masters of the first and second demons. As for the third, he is, in a manner of speaking, kin to me." For when heaven and earth were first parted and all things came to be, the phoenix was chief among the birds. The phoenix, receiving the breath of union, hatched two young: the peacock and the roc. When the peacock came into the world it was exceedingly fierce and devoured men and beasts. In those days the Buddha had cultivated a golden body six zhang tall upon a snowy peak, when the peacock swallowed him into its belly. The Buddha would have come out by the lower gate, but feared to defile his true body; so he split open the bird's back, came forth and rode it up to Vulture Peak. He meant to take its life, but the other Buddhas pleaded with him, saying that to harm the peacock would be to harm his mother. So the Buddha kept the peacock on Vulture Peak and made it the Buddha-Mother, the Great Bright Peacock King, a bodhisattva. Hearing how the roc came to be, Wukong could not help laughing. "By that reckoning, the Buddha is the demon's own nephew!" Tathagata said, "That demon's powers are too great for you to overcome. I must go myself to subdue him." He asked the bodhisattvas how long their beasts had been away from the mountain, and Wenshu answered, seven days. Tathagata said, "Seven days on the mountain is a thousand years in the world. Who knows how many lives these two beasts have taken down there? Come with me at once and take them in hand." The two bodhisattvas flew at either side with all the host, and Wukong led the way. Before long they saw the city below them. "Buddha," Wukong reported, "that city breathing black vapour is the Lion-Camel Kingdom." Tathagata said, "Go down first and fight the demons in the city. You may lose, but you must not win, and I will take them in hand." Wukong brought his cloud down and stood on the battlements, hurling abuse. The three demon chiefs seized their weapons and rushed up onto the wall; at the sight of Wukong they said not a word but fell upon him all at once. After seven or eight rounds Wukong feigned defeat and fled. The three demons gave chase upon the clouds. Wukong darted aside and hid himself in the golden light of the Buddha. There stood the Buddhas of the past, the future and the present, with five hundred arhats and three thousand guardian spirits, spread out on every side; they ringed the three demon kings so close that not a drop of water could have trickled through. Wenshu and Puxian spoke the true words and cried, "Wicked beasts, will you not return to the right way? How long will you wait?" The old fiend and the second fiend were too terrified to hold out; they dropped their weapons, rolled on the ground and resumed their true shapes. The two bodhisattvas cast down their lotus thrones and leapt astride the beasts. The third demon would not submit. He flung aside his halberd, spread his wings and soared upward, reaching out his talons to seize Wukong. Tathagata pointed a finger upwards and a flash of golden light leapt out; the third demon could not beat his wings nor fly away, but hung above the Buddha's head, unable to escape. Then he resumed his true shape: a great golden-winged roc.

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