ey has brought him to a monastery of yours,” Monkey replied, “and I find that although you accept incense from its monks, you allow a black bear spirit to live in the neighbourhood, and have let him steal my master’s cassock. I’ve tried to take it off him a number of times but got nowhere, so now I’ve come to ask you to demand it from him.”

“What nonsense, you ape,” the Bodhisattva retorted. “Even if a bear spirit has stolen your cassock, what business have you to ask me to go and demand it for you? It all happened because you wanted to show it off, you big-headed and evil baboon, in front of petty-minded people. On top of that, in your wickedness you called up the wind to spread the fire that burnt down my monastery. And now you have the nerve to try your tricks here.”

These words from the Bodhisattva made Monkey realize that she knew all about the past and the future, so he hastily bowed down in reverence and pleaded, “Bodhisattva, forgive your disciple his sins, everything you say is true. All the same, my master will recite that spell again because that monster won’t give back the cassock, and I couldn’t bear the agonizing headache. That’s why I came to bother you, Bodhisattva. I beg you in your mercy to help me catch that evil spirit, get the cassock back, and carry on towards the West.”

“That monster’s magical powers are certainly no weaker than yours,” the Bodhisattva said. “Very well then, out of consideration for the Tang Priest I’ll go there with you.” Monkey thanked her and bowed again, asked her to come out, and rode on the same magic cloud as her. In next to no time they reached the Black Wind Mountain, where they landed the cloud and headed for the cave on foot.

As they were on their way, a Taoist priest appeared on the mountain slope. He was carrying a glass salver on which were two pills of the elixir of immortality. Monkey was immediately suspicious of him, so he struck straight at his head with the iron cudgel, sending blood splattering out from brain and chest.

“Are you still as wild as this, you ape?” the shocked Bodhisattva asked. “He didn’t steal your cassock, you didn’t even know him, and he was no enemy of yours. Why kill him?”

“You may not know him, Bodhisattva,” Monkey replied, “but he was a friend of the Black Bear Spirit. Yesterday they and a white-clad scholar were sitting talking in front of the grassy mountainside. Today is the Black Spirit’s birthday, and tomorrow he was coming to the ‘Buddha’s Robe Banquet’. That’s why I recognized him. I’m sure that he was coming to greet that monster on his birthday.”

“If that’s the way it is, very well then,” said the Bodhisattva. Monkey then went to lift up the Taoist to take a look at him, and he saw that he had been a grey wolf. There was an inscription under the glass salver that lay beside him. It read, “Made by Master Emptiness-reached” .

Brother Monkey laughed and sand, “What luck, what luck. This helps me and will save you trouble too, Bodhisattva. This monster has confessed of his own free will, and the other monster there can be finished off today.”

“What do you mean?” the Bodhisattva asked.

“I have a saying,” he replied, “that goes ‘beat him at his own game’. Are you willing to let me do things my way?”

“Tell me about it,” the Bodhisattva said.

“The two pills of immortality you see on that salver will be the present we take to visit him with,” said Monkey, “and the words inscribed underneath—‘Made by Master Emptiness-reached’—are the bait we’ll set for him. If you do as I say, I have a plan for you that does not call for force or fighting. The fiend will collapse before our eyes, and the cassock will appear. If you won’t let me have my way, then you go West, I’ll go East, we can say good-bye to the Buddha’s robe, and Sanzang will be up the creek.”

“You’ve got a cheek, you ape,” replied the Bodhisattva with a smile.

“No, no, I really have got a plan,” Monkey protested.

“Tell me about it then,” said Guanyin.

“You know it says on the salver, ‘Made by Master Emptiness-reached,’ Well, Master Emptiness-reached must be his name. Bodhisattva, if you’re prepared to let me have my way, then change yourself into that Taoist. I shall eat one of those pills and then change myself into a pill, though I’ll be a bit on the big side. You are to take the tray with the two pills on it and go to wish the fiend many happy returns. Give him the bigger of the pills, and when he’s swallowed me, I’ll take over inside him. If he doesn’t hand the cassock over then, I’ll weave a substitute out of his guts.”

The Bodhisattva could only nod her agreement.

“What about it then?” said the laughing Monkey, and at this the Bodhisattva in her great mercy used her unbounded divine power and her infinite capacity for transformation to control her will with her heart and her body with her will—in an instant she turned into Master Emptiness-reached.

The wind of immortality blew around his gown,

As he hovered, about to rise to emptiness.

His dark features were as ancient as a cypress,

His elegant expression unmatched in time.

Going and yet staying nowhere,

Similar but unique.

In the last resort all comes down to a single law,

From which he is only separated by an evil body.

“Great, great,” exclaimed Brother Monkey at the sight. “Are you a Bodhisattva disguised as an evil spirit, or a Bodhisattva who really is an evil spirit?”

“Monkey,” she replied with a laugh, “evil spirit and Bodhisattva are all the same in the last analysis—they both belong to non-being.” Suddenly enlightened by this, Monkey curled up and turned himself into a pill of immortality:

Rolling across the plate but not unstable,

Round and bright without any corners.

The double three was compounded by Ge Hong,

The double six was worked out by Shao Weng.

Pebbles of golden flame,

Pearls that shone in the daylight.

On the outside were lead and mercury,

But I cannot reveal the formula.

The pill he changed himself into was indeed a little larger than the other one. The Bodhisattva noted this and went with the glass salver to the entrance of the fiend’s cave. Here she saw

Towering crags and lofty precipices,

Where clouds grow on the peaks;

Blue cypresses and green pines

Where the wind soughs in the forest.

On towering crags and lofty precipices

The devils come and go, and few men live.

The blue cypresses and green pines

Inspire Immortals to cultivate the hidden Way.

The mountains have gullies,

The gullies have springs,

Whose gurgling waters sing like a guitar,

Refreshing the ear.

Deer on its banks,

Cranes in the woods,

Where the reticent Immortal’s pipe is casually played

To delight the heart.

Here an evil spirit can attain enlightenment,

And the boundless vow of the Buddha extends its mercy.

When the Bodhisattva saw this she thought, “If the beast has chosen this cave, there must be some hope for him.” And from then on she felt compassion for him.

When she reached the entrance of the cave, the junior goblins at the gates greeted her with the words, “Welcome, Immortal Elder Emptiness-reached.” As some of them ran in to announce her, the monster came out of the gates to meet her and say, “Master Emptiness-reached, how good of you to put yourself to this trouble. This is an honour for me.”

“Allow me to present you with this magic pill that, I venture to say, will confer immortality on you,” the Bodhisattva replied. When the two of them had finished exchanging greetings they sat down, and the monster started to talk about the events of the previous day. The Bodhisattva quickly changed the subject by passing the salver to him and saying, “Please accept this token of my regard for you.” She observed which was the bigger one and handed it to him with the words, “I wish Your Majesty eternal life.”

The monster handed the other pill to her and said, “I hope, Master Emptiness-reached, that you will share it with me.” When they had finished declining politely, the fiend picked up the pill and was on the point of swallowing it when it went rolling into his mouth. Then Monkey resumed his true form and struck up some acrobatic postures, at which the fiend fell to the ground. The Bodhisattva too resumed her true form and asked the monster for the Buddha’s cassock. As Monkey had now emerged through the monster’s nostrils, she was worried that the evil spirit might misbehave again, so she threw a band over his head. He rose to his feet, ready to run them through with his spear, but Monkey and the Bodhisattva were already up in mid-air, where she began to recite the spell. As the monster’s head began to ache, he dropped the spear and writhed in agony on the ground. The Handsome Monkey King collapsed with laughter in the sky, while the Black Bear Spirit rolled in torment on the earth.

“Beast, will you return to the truth now?” asked the Bodhisattva.

“I swear to, I swear to, if only you spare my life,” the monster repeated over and over again.

Monkey wanted to finish him off with no more ado, but the Bodhisattva stopped him at once: “Don’t kill him—I’ve got a use for him.”

“What’s the point in keeping that beast alive instead of killing him?” Monkey asked.

“I’ve got nobody to look after the back of my Potaraka Island,” she replied, “so I shall take him back with me to be an island-guarding deity.”

“You certainly are the all-merciful deliverer who doesn’t allow a single soul to perish,” said Monkey with a laugh. “If I knew a spell like that one of yours, I’d say it a thousand times over and finish off all the black bears I could find.”

Although the bear spirit had come round and the spell had stopped, he was still in great pain as he knelt on the ground and begged pitifully, “Spare my life and I promise I’ll return to the truth.” The Bodhisattva descended in a ray of light, placed her hands on his head, and administered the monastic discipline to him; then she told him to take up his spear and accompany her. The black bear’s evil intentions ceased from that day on, and his unbounded perversity came to an end.

“Sun Wukong,” ordered the Bodhisattva, “go back now. Serve the Tang Priest well, don’t be lazy, and don’t start trouble.”

“I’m very grateful to you for coming so far, Bodhisattva, and I must see you home,” Monkey said. “That will not be necessary,” she replied. Monkey took the cassock kowtowed to her, and departed. The Bodhisattva took Bear back to the sea, and there is a poem to prove it:

A magic glow shines round the golden image,

The thousand rays of glorious light.

She saves all men, giving of her pity,

Surveying the whole universe and revealing the golden lotus.

Many shall now preach the scriptures’ meaning,

Nor shall there be any flaw therein.

Subduing a demon and bringing him to truth, she returns to the sea;

The religion of Emptiness has recovered the brocade cassock.

If you don’t know how things developed, listen to the explanation in the next chapter.