Then the petty demons from the gate came in to announce, “Your Majesty, the hairy-faced monk has killed the Tiger of the Vanguard and dragged his body to the gates, where he's insulting us to provoke us to fight.”
The old fiend was angrier than ever when he heard this, and he said, “This wretch doesn't know what he's doing, killing my Commander of the Vanguard although I haven't eaten his master. Hateful beast. Bring my armour. I've heard of this Brother Monkey, and now I think I'll go out to have a look at this nine-headed, eight-tailed monk. I'll capture him to avenge my Tiger of the Vanguard.” The junior devils brought the armour as fast as they could, and when the old fiend had put it all on properly, he took his steel trident and led his devilish host out of the cave. He was full of martial dignity as he came out, and you can see how he was equipped:
His golden helmet shone in the sun,
And light was reflected from his golden armour.
A pheasant's tail floated above his helmet,
And the thin silk robe over his armour was pale goose-yellow.
The belt that girded his armour was dragon-brilliant;
His shining breastplate dazzled the eye.
His deerskin boots
Were the color of locust-tree blossom;
His brocade kilt
Was patterned with willow leaves.
With a sharp steel trident in his hand,
He was no less awesome than the Little Sage Erlang.
As he came out of his cave the old fiend shouted at the top of his voice, “Are you Brother Monkey?”
Monkey, who was jumping up and down on the tiger monster's corpse and brandishing his cudgel, replied, “Your grandfather, Monkey, is here. Send my master out.” The evil spirit looked carefully at Monkey and saw that he had a miserable little body and a pinched face, and did not even stand four feet tall.
“Poor little thing,” he said with a laugh. “I'd imagined that you were some sort of invincible hero, but now I see what a little sick devil you really are, all skin and bone.”
Monkey smiled back and said, “You've no eyes in your head, my child. I may be tiny, but if you hit me on the head with the handle of your trident, I'll grow another six feet.”
“Make your head hard then,” the monster replied, “here it comes.”
The Great Sage did not flinch as the monster hit him, then with a bend of his waist he grew six feet taller, making himself ten feet tall altogether, to the astonishment of the monster, who put his trident down and shouted, “Brother Monkey, why do you come and do these defensive transformations at my gate? Stop fooling around, and come over here so we can compare tricks.”
“My child,” Monkey replied, “as the saying goes, 'If you have any warm feelings, don't raise your hand in anger; and if you raise your hand in anger, put all feelings aside.' I have a very heavy hand, and I'm afraid that you may not be able to stand my cudgel.” No longer wishing to talk, the monster whirled his trident round and lunged at Monkey's chest. With unrushed expertise Monkey did a “Black Dragon Pawing the Ground” movement to parry the trident with his cudgel before striking at the monster's head. There followed a fine duel between the pair of them at the mouth of the Yellow Wind Gave:
The demon king was furious,
The Great Sage showed his might.
The furious demon king
Wanted to catch Monkey in revenge for his Vanguard Commander;
The mighty Great Sage
Intended to capture the evil spirit and rescue his master.
When the trident came the cudgel parried,
When the cudgel struck the trident blocked.
One was supreme commander of the mountain,
The other was the Handsome Monkey King, Protector of the Law.
At first they fought in the dust,
But then they rose into mid-air.
The steel-tipped trident
Was bright-pointed and deadly sharp;
The As-You-Will cudgel
Was black and banded with gold.
Whoever was run through would go to the Underworld;
If either was hit he would surely meet King Yama.
All depended on a fast hand and a quick eye;
Strength and vigor were essential.
Each was mindless of life or death,
Who would survive, and who would be killed?
After some thirty rounds of combat between the old fiend and the Great Sage the issue was still not settled. As Monkey wanted to win glory he used an “extra body” trick: plucking a hair out, he chewed it into little bits, blew them all out, and shouted, “Change!” They turned into well over a hundred Monkeys, all dressed like him and wielding iron cudgels. They surrounded the monster in mid-air, and in his fright he countered with a trick of his own. He turned his head sharply to the Southeast opened his mouth three times, and blew. A yellow hurricane suddenly arose. It was really terrible.
As it howled and moaned all was changed;
Without sign or shadow the yellow dust whirled,
Whistling through forests, toppling mountains, and uprooting trees,
Picking up dust to blot out the tumbling ridge.
The Yellow River's waters were all in turmoil,
While the Yangtse's waves were blown backwards.
The Polar palace was rocked in the sky,
The Senluo Palace in the Underworld was all but blown down.
Heaven was filled with the shouting of Arhats,
The Eight Great Vajrapanis were all yelling wildly.
Manjusri's black-coated lion fled,
Samantabhadra's white elephant was nowhere to be found.
The True Martial Emperor's tortoise and snake were missing,
Zi Tong's mule was blown away by its saddle-cloth.
Travelling merchants called on Heaven,
Boatmen made vows to the gods as they sought safety.
Lives were washed away in the torrent,
Fortune or death was decided by the waters.
The cave palace on the magic mountain was murky dark,
And Penglai, island of joy, was wrapped in gloom.
Lao Zi could hardly manage to look after his furnace,
The Star of Longevity put away his fan of dragon's beard grass.
The Queen Mother, on her way to a Peach Banquet,
Had the pendants at her waist blown in a tangle.
Erlang could not find his city of Guanzhou;
Nezha could scarcely draw his sword from its scabbard.
Heavenly King Li lost sight of the pagoda in his hand,
Lu Ban the carpenter dropped his gold-tipped awl.
Three stories of the pagoda at Thunder Monastery fell,
And the stone bridge at Zhaozhou collapsed.
The red wheel of the sun sent out no light,
And all the stars in the sky were dimmed.
The birds of the Southern hills were carried to the North,
The waters of the East lake flowed to the West.
Husband was parted from wife,
Mother snatched from child.
The dragon king searched the seas for his yakshas,
The thunder god hunted everywhere for his lightning.
The Ten Kings of hell looked for the judge,
While the bull-headed demons searched for the horse-faced.
This hurricane overturned Potaraka Island,
Rolling up all of Guanyin's scriptures.
The white lotus went flying beyond the seas,
And the twelve courts of the Bodhisattva were all blown down.
Pan Gu, who had seen all winds since creation,
Had never seen one as fine as this,
Howl, howl-
As mountains and seas trembled,
Heaven and Earth were all but blasted asunder.
The hurricane that the monster had summoned up made all the little Monkeys that the Great Sage had produced from his hair whirl round in mid-air like so many spinning-wheels, and, far from being able to use their cudgels, they could not even control their own bodies. At this critical moment Monkey shook his hair and put it back on his body, then advanced to give battle with his iron cudgel held high. The monster blew another yellow hurricane at him, and it was so strong that Monkey had to shut his fiery eyes with their golden pupils tight. Opening them was out of the question. Unable to use his iron cudgel, he had to flee from the scene of battle, at which the monster put his wind away and went back to his cave.