Journey to the West

⋇⊰ Chapter 3 ⊱⋇

Shortly after the death of the Demon King of Confusion, the monkeys practiced the military arts every day. Sun Wukong asked the little monkeys to cut down bamboo to make spears, carve swords out of wood, and learn to use banners and whistles. They learned to advance and retreat, and build a camp with a stockade around it.

They spent a lot of time playing at this.

Once Sun Wukong was sitting in his seat of meditation when he wondered: "What would happen to us if our games were taken for the real thing? What if it alarmed some human monarch or gave offense to some king of birds or beasts? They might say that we were having military training for a rebellion, and attack us with their armies. You would be no match for them with your bamboo spears and wooden swords. We must have sharp swords and halberds. What are we to do about it?"

When the monkeys heard this they all said with alarm, "Your Majesty has great foresight, but there's nowhere we can get them."

When it was the turn of four older monkeys to speak−−two bare−bottomed apes and two gibbons−−they came forward and said, "Your Majesty, if you want sharp weapons they can be very easily obtained."

"How could it be easy?" asked Sun Wukong.

"To the East of our mountain," they replied, "there is a lake some 70 miles wide that is the boundary of the country of Aolai. That country has a princely capital, and huge numbers of soldiers and civilians live in the city. It must have workshops for gold, silver, bronze, and iron. If you went there, Your Majesty, you could either buy arms or get them made; then you could train us to use them in the defense of our mountain. This would give us long−term security."

Sun Wukong was delighted with the suggestion, "Wait here while I go there," he said.

The Monkey King leaped onto his somersault cloud, crossed the 70 miles of lake, and saw that on the other side there was indeed a city wall, a moat, streets, markets, 10,000 houses, 1,000 gates, and people coming and going in the sunlight.

"There must be ready−made weapons here," Sun Wukong thought, "and getting a few by magic would be much better than buying them." So he made magic with his fist and said the words of the spell, sucked in some air from the Southeast and blew it hard out again. It turned into a terrifying gale carrying sand and stones with it.

Where the storm blew, the prince of Aolai fled in terror, and gates and doors were shut in the streets and markets. Nobody dared to move outside. Sun Wukong landed his cloud and rushed straight through the gates of the palace to the arsenal and the military stores, opened the doors, and saw countless weapons: swords, pikes, sabers, halberds, battleaxes, bills, scimitars, maces, tridents, clubs, bows, crossbows, forks, and spears were all there.

At the sight of them, he said happily, "How many of these could I carry by myself? I'd better use the magic for dividing up my body."

The Monkey King plucked a hair from his body, chewed it up, spat it out, made the magic with his fist, said the words of the spell, and shouted "Change!" It turned into hundreds and thousands of little monkeys, who rushed wildly about grabbing weapons. The strong ones took six or seven each and the weaker ones two or three, and between them, they removed the lot. He climbed back up on the clouds, called up a gale by magic, and took all the little monkeys home with him.

The monkeys, big and small of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit, were playing outside the gates of the cave when they heard the wind. At the sight of countless monkey spirits flying through the air, they fled and hid. A moment later the handsome Monkey King landed his cloud, put away his mists, shook himself, replaced his hair, and threw all the weapons into a pile beside the mountain.