25 Cross-dress to Test their Sincerity

When I, Sun Wukong, and Lingji make it to the Yellow Wind Hill, Zhu Bajie is clinching to a tree, dancing in the air. His big belly is shaking to waves of fat by the wind. The pig skin on his pig head has been crumpled into a lump. If he wasn't fat like this, he would have been blown to nowhere.

I thought it was amusing enough to see Zhu Bajie dancing in the air. Today I have had enough fun to watch. Beyond my expectation, there are hundreds of little Sun Wukong in the air as well. This scene is a panic.

A while ago, when he was flouncing on the ground, I gave him three hairs. He could pull them off and blow his breath at the hair to transform them into three hundreds of little monkeys to fight by his side.

However, according to the law of conservation of mass, hair is hair. They fly in the air without any direction after a big wind like a spinning wheel spinning in the sky. These little Sun Wukong are moving around in the sky and trying to hit and catch something. Full of noise and clamor, they are using their tiny voices: 'Poooh! You shall wait and see Dasheng finding Guanyin bodhisattva to surrender you!'

...

What a scene it is.

It is like the son goes to fight someone; he cannot win so he just leaves his words of "Wait here and I will find my dad to beat you!".

Sun Wukong sees my arrival and he takes back his hair and plugs them back to his head. He throws the Wind-freezing Pearl and the Flying-dragon Staff to me and says: 'Bodhisattva, let me lure that yokai out and you surrender him!'

He threw the treasures to me and I throw them to Lingji: 'When I have my dress on, I don't fight.'

Lingji makes a "I understand it!" face and he rolls up his sleeves, ready to fight.

I look at his hell-bent posture and ask: 'You know that I am a guy, right?'

Lingji is focusing looking at the progress of the battle below and he is prepared to surrender yokais. He responds to me: 'Of course I know. How could I not know it? It was just that Golden Cicada chatted to me all day long and he said "Guanyin sister" for too many times so I am brain-washed. Ayyy, that chatterbox had better get eaten by that yokai. I don't want to be brain-washed again after a few hundreds of years.'

As he is speaking, Sun Wukong is shouting below: 'Yokai! Come out to fight me!'

That yokai also shouts at him: 'You the monkey couldn't fight me in the past! Where did you find your confidence after just a few days? Did you call your dad here?'

I pat away the dust on my dress and think: his dad is standing on the clouds; don't you want to come up to see if the dress of his dad is pretty? Why not come to count how many flowers there are on the dress? Hmm?

Sun Wukong says: 'Why not! I have brought my dad here to fight you! Do you dare to come out?'

Before I could be affected, I hear Lingji wiping tears aside: 'This monkey is really grateful.'

???

Lingji says: 'I detested him for being a disobedient monkey. He looks ugly as well. He is weird and silly. I didn't expect him to call me daddy just after I helped him once. He is a really good monkey. It seems that I made a right decision.'

...

After that, he rolls up his sleeves again angrily: 'Watch and I shall surrender this mouse yokai for him!'

Then, he chokes with sobs and shouts at the battle: 'Don't be scared, son! Daddy is up here to support you!'

...

I look at him kindly and remind him: 'The wind is too big. He cannot hear you.'

We are watching that Sun Wukong has lured the yokai out. They go into the fight. Lingji was supposed to save him but he suddenly begins to play with the Flying-dragon Staff. He murmurs to himself: 'How do I use this gadget? I have slept for too long and I have forgotten.'

He looks at the Wind-freezing Pearl and then at the Flying-dragon Staff in his hands. He just says: 'It is okay. Let me just drop them to the battle.'

...???

Can you be more carefree as a bodhisattva?

Then, I watch in this fierce wind covering mountains and hills that Lingji just drops his Flying-dragon Staff down.

This doesn't seem to be respectable at all!

Both of us are standing on the clouds nervously and we poke our heads out to watch. The wind has finally stopped.

The Yellow Wind Demon boosts his cheeks and blows air one time after another, but there is no wind.

Sun Wukong sees that the Yellow Wind Demon doesn't blow wind anymore, so he raises his cudgel and is going to kill him. Lingji steps forward immediately and shouts: 'Don't move, son! Let me surrender that demon!'

As he is speaking, he transforms the Yellow Wind Demon to its original form. It is just a yellow marten. He catches it and puts it in his sleeve.

Sun Wukong is still confused, and he turns around to ask me: 'What did he call me? What did he say?'

I look at him calmly and peacefully: 'He said, "Please don't do that, Dasheng" and he wanted to surrender that yokai for you.'

Sun Wukong obviously is a little confused. He is not really assured. He looks at me and then at Lingji bodhisattva. He digs his ears and asks: 'Are you sure, bodhisattva? Why it doesn't sound like what he said?'

I fatherly rub his messy hair with my hands and say: 'You misheard.'

Sun Wukong still doesn't believe it and asks again: 'Really? But my ears seldom fool me.'

I grandfatherly say: 'Your ears are damaged by the wind. Take care of them after this.' After that, I go back to the clouds and leave Sun Wukong alone being stunned. When he is stunned, Zhu Bajie has rushed into the Yellow Wind Cave and released and saved the Tang monk who was going to be cooked.

I believe that I can leave now, but my body hair stands up again. I hear the little monk crying out in my ears: 'Guanyin sister, I am saved! Did you come to save me!?'

No, I am not, and I did not.

I beg you. Don't bother me anymore.

The little monk asks happily his disciple Zhu Bajie: 'Did Guanyin sister come to save me?'

Zhu Bajie says: 'Yes. Guanyin bodhisattva just stood in the clouds and that yokai was too scared to maintain his transformation, so he went back to his original form, a palm-sized yellow marten. He was trying to escape and running on the ground!'

The little monk says confidently: 'I knew Guanyin sister would definitely come to save me!'

I am having a headache by his chats. I grab Sun Wukong to me: 'Tell your shifu to not find his Guanyin sister in the future if he needs to be saved no matter what. His Guanyin sister is going to die from his voice if he keeps doing so.'

Sun Wukong doesn't understand: 'But bodhisattva you have said that you would come to help me when I couldn't solve the problem—'

I respond quickly: 'Yes, I will save you, but it is totally different from saving him.'

Before, I thought Sun Wukong was scary enough. I had to go help him when whoever he beat. Now I believe that this crying baby Xuan Zang the little monk is scarier. Before when he was the Golden Cicada, he would be crying and shouting "Guanyin sister, hurry to save me! They are going to pull off my clothes and skin me alive!" to scare me.

I just don't understand. How can these yokais be so picky on food. Isn't Xuan Zang a tender young human!? Why don't you just eat him! Why do you even want to skin him?! Who do you think you are going to eat?! A porcupine?

Sun Wukong is trying to understand my words with his stone brain. After a while, he understood me: 'So I can ask bodhisattva to save me and my shifu cannot.'

I say: 'Yes. Tell him to speak to Buddha when he asks for help so that he will look sincere.'

Sun Wukong says: 'Okay, I will tell him. Thanks bodhisattva this time.'

I think and considerate: 'If you think you lack love from a father because you have no parents—'

Before I could finish my sentence, he suddenly glares his eyes big and glances at my dress quickly. He trembles and steps back. He looks at me as if I was some kind of monster.

...

I was going to say if he needed a father's love, I can recommend Lingji to him.

But I am not happy when he shows me such a reaction. What do you mean? Do you despise the white dress of Guanyin? Do you even know that this dress can help Guanyin save the world and enlighten beings?!

It is okay. I the Nanhai Guanyin bodhisattva do not get serious with him.

I say goodbye to Sun Wukong and return to Nanhai, looking for my disobedient disciple to clarify what he has done. But I walk around my lotus pond again and again, and I search in the black bamboo grove again and again, I just cannot even see his shadow.

I ask Shancai and Longnv: 'Did you see Huian? Where did he go?'

Longnv says: 'I have told bodhisattva that you should watch him. Now he is gone again. He hasn't swept the leaves in the black bamboo grove either.'

Shancai says: 'Don't always badmouth about Huian fellow. He will come back soon for sure. You know that Huian fellow will never leave before he finishes sweeping the leaves in the black bamboo grove.'

I grab the black bear yokai to me and ask: 'Do you know where Huian went to?'

The black bear yokai says: 'I don't know. It has been my lucky day that he didn't come to beat me. How could I dare to look for him?'

At this moment, Shancai screams out of shock: 'Bodhisattva! Another petal is gone in the lotus pond!'

My eyes move to that pond of water. I can imagine that Huian squatting by the pond, stretching his arm, picked off a lotus petal and the reflection of his stuffy face on the water. His face is silent and dead. His eyes reflect the ripple of the pond, but then soon return back to stillness.

I see that he doesn't want me to know where he went.

For the first time in several thousands of years, I feel my heart empty as if I have done something wrong.

Three years after that, I have never seen Huian again, not even his shadow.

At that time, I ordered Longnv and Shancai to separately search for him in Western Paradise and Heaven. I also ordered the black bear yokai and the ditzy Daoist to look for him on Earth. But I heard nothing from him, it was three years of searching.

After Huian left me, it was like all the troubles had left with him. Sun Wukong only came to me once. That was when he met the honest guy by the Flowing-sand River. He wanted to fight that honest guy but the honest guy didn't want to fight him, so he came to me out of anger again.

I say to him: 'Wukong, you cannot beat him. He is your future fellow!'

Sun Wukong bites his cudgel angrily: 'I have told him but he doesn't believe that we are the scripture takers! Does he have a lump of something in his brain? Bodhisattva you are the only one who knows the details of the scriptures takers! Do I the Qitian Dasheng need to catch a fake monk to trick a yokai?! He acts like someone important, but I know he was exiled by the Jade Emperor!'

Coincidentally, Longnv is coming back from Western Paradise looking for Huian. She looks upset because she found no clues.

I say: 'Let Longnv go with you and he will recognize you guys.'

Sun Wukong despondently nods and hurries to the Flowing-sand River with Longnv.

Alone I am sitting on the Nanhai lotus seat. I suddenly feel that this Nanhai is too cold and empty. In such a big mountain, there is no sound from the birds. There is not even a wind. How quiet it is.

Before I can get upset, Sun Wukong tumbles back again madly: 'That yokai is a dumb one! What an idiot! I have requested Longnv to come with me to verify our identity! Guess what he said! He said only 'Huian Xingzhe and YOU! He doesn't believe any others'

...

*Sigh*. I cannot do anything about it. Anyway, he is an honest man. He has been honest for several thousands of years and he was always trolled by other. He is alert and scared now.

Sun Wukong hurries to say: 'I don't want Longnv or Shancai. Please let Huian Xingzhe come with me!'

His words poke my pain point. I have no choice but to tell him: 'Huian has an ongoing important duty that he cannot go with you. It is fine. I can go with you by myself.'

We ride on the clouds and leave Nanhai to the Flow-sand River. The water in the Flowing-sand River is fierce and wavy. There is no boat that can across the river. We don't know how long this river is, but the distance between two sides has reached eight hundred Li. There are even wild winds and the great waves never end. A leaf cannot even float on the surface.

On the clouds, Sun Wukong suddenly shouts and points at the shore of the Flowing-sand River: 'Bodhisattva, see! Isn't that Huian Xingzhe?'

I can only see the yokai, Zhu Bajie, and the white-bun-like little monk Xuan Zang. I just cannot see Huian.

Three of them are talking and saluting to a void on the shore—I know that Huian has the lotus petal on his face that I will not be able to see him even if he is right in front of me. Let alone if I can see him from the clouds.

I can only say to Sun Wukong: 'My eyes aren't working well recently. Tell me the situation below. Tell me the details.'

Sun Wukong says: 'Huian Xingzhe hands a red calabash to my shifu and he turns around at us and kneels down. He kowtows for three times and then he just turns around and leaves. He has no facial expression. Bodhisattva, didn't you say that Huian Xingzhe had an important duty ongoing?

Since he saw me, he knew I was looking for him, but he still left me. Obviously, he doesn't want me to look for him.

I say: 'I have been living for so long that I forgot it. I have told Huian to bring the red calabash to send you guys across the river.'

Even though Sun Wukong is a monkey, he is not silly. He also has doubt arisen in his mind: 'Bodhisattva, are you in a cold war with your disciple? Ayy, it is ordinary, ordinary. My shifu doesn't like me either and he wants to drive me away everyday! Sometimes I want to kill him with my cudgel when he casts the headache spell as well, but we are shifu and disciple. As long as he is being my shifu for one day, he has been my father for all my life. I will calm myself after two days no matter how mad I was.'

I am almost going to smile by his logic: 'So now it is the monkey's turn to ease me?'

Sun Wukong says: 'The little Xingzhe is different from me. He is the spoiled prince of the Heavenly King Li. Of course, he will have a bad temper and be stubborn. This is not unexpected. He also wants to beat me as well!'

I say: 'He likes you if he wants to fight you. When you made havoc in Heaven, Huian told me that you were the only yokai he respected. Don't blame him.' I say to myself that being a shifu is so hard. My disciple left me and I still have to say good words about him in front of others in case others go after him for revenge.

Sun Wukong says: 'Bodhisattva, although Huian Xingzhe argued with you, he still sent us the calabash. Probably he will go back with you if you ask him. Do you want me to catch him back?'

I shake my head: 'If he wants to go back, he will. If not, even if you kill him, he will not come back. Go guard your shifu to Western Paradise. Don't forget to tell Sha Wujing to strand the nine calabashes together and put them in the middle. Then you guys can cross the river.'

He is going to leave and I hurry to pull him back: 'Wukong, if you see Huian in the future, please tell him that: I am not his father. I will not kill him if he did something wrong. I will not exile him after he broke the precepts. I am just his shifu. Shifu will cover up and take whatever revenge for him no matter what sins he has done. Could you tell this to him?'

Sun Wukong is shocked: 'Bodhisattva, don't scare me. I know what kind of person Huian is. He joined your Buddhism and he will never do something evil.'

I say: 'Don't ask me what he did. Just tell my words to him, could you?'

Sun Wukong hurries to say: 'Yes yes yes. If we have the fate of meeting each other again, I will tell Huian Xingzhe!'

He knows the method to cross the river, so they cross the Flowing-sand River with that little monk. As they step on the land of the other side, those skeletons floating and sinking in the water becomes nine winds of Yin. They fly to the surface of the black and heavy river and disappear in the distant pale sky silently.

I take back the calabashes and come back to Nanhai. I see three despondent shadows by the lotus pond. That pair of children is Shancai and Longnv. The fat big black furry belly is that curled up black bear yokai.

They see that I am back. Shancai pinches up the ears of the black bear yokai and runs to me angrily: 'This black bear yokai is lazy. Bodhisattva has told him to search for Huian fellow, but he was sleeping with the bamboo in Nanhai! Do you think you can become a panda by just putting some flours on your body!?'

Shancai is a little boy and the black bear yokai is a big yokai. Now his ears are pinched but he cannot escape. He can only grovel on the ground and explains: 'The four seas and the eight wilds are too big! How can I find one person in such a big area? Why don't you let me go to look for him in Western Paradise and you guys go to the Earth—'

Shancai gets mad and he keeps flapping his fur: 'Bodhisattva asked you to search and you even find yourself an excuse to sleep!'

I say: 'Let it pass. From now on, we don't look for Huian anymore.'

Shancai is stunned for a while: 'Not looking for him?'

I say: 'If he wants, he will come back. If he doesn't want us to find him, it is useless for us to try to search for him.'

The black bear yokai hurries to say: 'Yes yes! When Huian Xingzhe wants to come back, he will come back!'

Shancai says angrily: 'You shut the fuck up! I have felt not right about how could that white fox sneak into the Treasure Storage! How could he a yokai from Earth know so many secrets of Nanhai! It must be you who had told him to steal the treasures of bodhisattva! Now you don't want to look for Huian fellow and you must have hurt him, so you hide him! Then, why does he hide from us!? He has been in Nanhai for several hundreds of years. Your arrival has caused disorder of everything!'

Longnv also says: 'Yes, it must be this black bear yokai causing trouble! I know there is no one single good yokai!'

The black bear yokai's ears are pinched by them both at both sides and he screams out of pain. He cries out: 'Even if I want to steal the treasures of bodhisattva and want to harm Huian Xingzhe, I don't have such an intelligence! Also, also, bodhisattva's golden headband is still on my head. Am I seeking death?!'

Shancai says: 'He must be pretending! Yokais aren't stupid after cultivation!'

Longnv says: 'Yokais know how to lie the best! The more honest he looks, the more unreliable he is! He is just like that white fox!'

The voices of these two children are getting higher and higher in front of my lotus seat. Suddenly, the sound of wind comes from the black bamboo grove. It must be someone of a high position coming to Nanhai.

I hurry to ask Shancai and Longnv leave the black bear alone. Three beings walk toward me. The headmost one is Lishan Mother. Manjusri and Samantabhadra are following her behind. These three will not come to visit me for nothing. If there is nothing important, they will not come to me. Now they are coming together at me together. I am flustered.

Ah Huian, what kind of trouble you have caused?

Lishan Mother amiably walks to me and slips her arms through mine: 'Guanyin bodhisattva, I have discussed with Tathagata that we are going to test his sincerity because we are not sure if he is still as pure as before after ten lives on Earth.'

I was scared. I thought Huian had an accident.

I say: 'Testing is fine. Please teach me how to test him, Lishan Mother.'

Lishan Mother answers me briefly: 'Oh, four of us transform into four beautiful women to test them.'

...

...

...

I say: 'Pardon me. I didn't understand it. Please tell me more.'

Lishan Mother says openly: 'Heroes usually fall for the beauties. We will transform into beautiful ladies and lure them to marry us and see if they have a sincere heart for going to Western Paradise.'

...

I shiver.

My two disciples and my mountain guard also shiver.

I ask: 'I didn't quiet understand your meaning. Can I try to summarize your words? You said that you and three of us...three men were going to act like women to lure monks?'

These buddhas in Western Paradise are really relaxing! If you guys have so much free time, why don't you take Sun Wukong's troubles as well?

Lishan Mother amiably looks at me: 'No. In details, I will be your mother. The task of acting as women and luring them will be yours.'

...

I look at Manjusri and then at Samantabhadra. They both have a despondent look. They seem to have lost the hope of life.

You want three guys to lure Sun Wukong? Aren't you afraid that he will go mad and make havoc in Heaven again if he found out? Aren't you afraid that the Golden Cicada will revenge at you when he recalls his memory? How about Zhu Bajie, and also the honest guy Sha Wujing? We can test their sincerity, but we shouldn't deceive their feelings!

Are you sure you are not going to borrow a few real women from Earth? Why am I thinking that our Western Paradise is so poor?!

Manjusri says: 'Why can't you bear this, Guanyin bodhisattva? You are experienced. Look at me. I...'

Samantabhadra says: 'When I joined Buddhism in the past, I never expected today. If I knew it, why would I...'

...

Lishan Mother pats my shoulders as if she is assigning an important quest to me: 'Neither of them are experienced, so you will be handling the most important task, Guanyin bodhisattva. As the saying goes, able men are always busy.'

Why are you making me look like someone experienced? Are you having any misunderstanding of Guanyin?