Wu Cheng-en - Journey to the West (vol. 1)

“There's a monk inside the chest,” shouted Pig at the top of his voice, at which the boy raised the lid of the chest with his head and stepped out, beating his wooden fish and repeating the name of the Buddha. The civil and military officials were so delighted that they all cheered; while the terrified Taoists were at a loss for words.

“This monk is being helped by gods and demons,” said the king. “How else could he have got into the chest as a Taoist boy and stepped out as a Buddhist monk? Even if a barber had got in with him he could only have shaved his head; but he's wearing a well-fitting habit and repeating the Buddha's name too. Teachers of the Nation, you must let those monks go.”

To this the Great Immortal Tiger Power replied, “Your Majesty, this is a case of a chess-player meeting his match, or a general coming up against a master strategist. We would like to try the martial arts we learned as boys in the Zhongnan Mountains against him.”

“What martial arts?” the king asked.

“We three brothers all have some divine powers,” Tiger Power replied. “We can put our head back on when they have been cut off; open up our chests, cut out our hearts, and make ourselves whole again; and take a bath in boiling oil.”

“But those are all certain death,” exclaimed the king in horror. “We have these powers,” said Tiger Power, “which is why I can give you a clear undertaking that we will not give up until we have been allowed a tournament with him.”

Monkey had just turned himself back into the tiniest of insects and gone over to investigate when he heard all this. Reverting to his real form he roared with laughter and said, “What luck, what marvellous luck. Business has brought itself to my front door.”

“But those are all ways of getting yourself killed,” said Pig. “How can you talk about business coming to your front door?”

“You still don't know my powers,” said Monkey.

“But all the transformations you can do are more than enough,” said Pig. “You can't have powers like that too.”

To this Monkey said,

“Cut off my head and I'll still go on talking,

Lop off my arms and I'll sock you another.

Chop off my legs and I'll carry on walking,

Carve up my guts and I'll put them together.

“When anyone makes a meat dumpling

I take it and down it in one.

To bath in hot oil is really quite nice,

A warm tub that makes all the dirt gone.”

When Pig and Friar Sand heard this they roared with laughter. Monkey then stepped forward and said, “Your Majesty, this humble monk can be beheaded.”

“What do you mean, you can be beheaded?” the king asked.

“When I was cultivating my conduct in the monastery many years ago,” Monkey replied, “a dhyana monk who came there taught me a method of being beheaded. I don't know if it's any good, and I'd like to try it out today.”

“That monk is too young to have any sense,” said the king with a smile. “Having your head cut off isn't something that you can try out for I fun. Your head is the chief of the Six Positives, and when it's cut off you're dead.”

“Your Majesty,” said the Great Immortal Tiger Power, “this is just the way I want him to act so that we can get our revenge on him.” Believing him, the foolish monarch ordered that a place for public execution be prepared.

As soon as the order was given, three thousand men of the royal guard were drawn up outside the palace gates. “The monk shall be beheaded first,” said the king. Monkey cheerfully agreed: “I'll go first, I'll go first.”

Then he put his hands together and shouted, “Teacher of the Nation, I hope you'll forgive my effrontery in going first.” Monkey then turned round and went outside.

“Be careful, disciple,” said Sanzang, catching hold of him as he passed, “this is no place for fooling about.”

“What's there to be afraid of?” said Monkey. “Stop holding me; let me go.”

The Great Sage went straight to the execution ground, where the executioners grabbed him and tied him up so that he was like a ball. When he was placed high on the earthen mound a shout of “Behead him!” was heard, and his head was cut off as the sword whistled down. The executioners then kicked it and sent it rolling thirty or forty paces away like a ripe watermelon. No blood came from Monkey's throat as a shout of “Come here, head” rose from his stomach.

The Great Immortal Tiger Power was so appalled by this display of magical skill that he said a spell and ordered the local deity, “Hold on to that head. When I've beaten this monk I shall request His Majesty to rebuild your little shrine as a big temple and replace your clay statue with a gold one.” Now the local deity was under Tiger Power's control because Tiger Power had the five-thunder magic, so he held Monkey's head down.

“Come here, head,” Monkey called again, but his head was no more able to move than if it had taken root there. Monkey was now feeling anxious, so he made a spell with his hands, burst out of the ropes that were binding him, and shouted, “Grow!” In a flash another head grew on his neck, so terrifying the executioners and the soldiers of the guard army that they all shivered and shook.

The officer supervising the executions rushed into the palace to report, “Your Majesty, when the little monk's head was cut off he grew another one.”

“So that's another trick our brother can do,” said Pig to Friar Sand with a mocking laugh.

“As he can do seventy-two transformations,” said Friar Sand, “he has seventy-two heads.”

Before he had finished saying this Monkey came back and called, “Master!”

“Was it painful, disciple?” asked a greatly relieved Sanzang.

“No, it wasn't painful,” said Monkey, “it was fun.”

“Brother,” asked Pig, “do you need sword-wound ointment?”

“Feel if there is a scar,” said Monkey.

The idiot put out his hand and said with a smile of wide-eyed astonishment, “Fantastic. It's completely whole-there's not even a scar.”

While the brother-disciples were congratulating each other they heard the king calling on them to take their passport and saying, “We grant you a full pardon. Go at once.”

“We accept the passport, but we insist that the Teacher of the Nation must be beheaded too to see what happens,” said Monkey.

“Senior Teacher of the Nation,” said the king, “that monk's not going to let you off. You promised to beat him, and don't give me another fright this time.” Tiger Power then had to take his turn to go to be tied up like a ball by the executioners and have his head cut off with a flash of the blade and sent rolling over thirty paces when it was kicked away.

No blood came from his throat either, and he too called out, “Come here, head.”

Monkey instantly pulled out a hair, blew a magic breath on it, said, “Change!” and turned it into a brown dog that ran across the execution ground, picking the Taoist's head up with its teeth and dropping it into the palace moat.

The Taoist shouted three times but did not get his head to come back. As he did not have Monkey's art of growing a new one the red blood started to gush noisily from his neck.

No use were his powers to call up wind and rain;

He could not compete with the true immortal again.

A moment later his body collapsed into the dust, and everyone could see that he was really a headless yellow-haired tiger

The officer supervising the executions then came to report, “Your Majesty, the Senior Teacher of the Nation has had his head cut off and cannot grow a new one. He is lying dead in the dust and is now a headless yellow-haired tiger.” This announcement made the king turn pale with shock. He stared at the other two Taoist masters, his eyes not moving.