Chapter 49: Wukong Returns to Flower Fruit Mountain
Bai Ze, riding the Golden Ox Star, hurried back to the White Bone Cave Dwelling.
“Mother!”
Bai Fu Ren was already waiting at the entrance. Bai Ze jumped off the yellow ox and threw himself into his mother’s arms.
“It’s good that you’re back safe!”
Over the past day, Bai Fu Ren had been constantly worried. Although Bai Ze’s strength had increased and he had the White Bone Clan’s Corpse Separation Technique, she still feared that something might happen to him.
Bai Fu Ren asked, “How was it? Quickly tell Mother, how did things go?”
Bai Ze said, “After my instigation, that Great Sage Sun has already been driven away by Tang Sanzang. Now, in the pilgrimage group, there are only Pigsy and Sha Wujing left.”
“That’s great!”
Bai Fu Ren was delighted. She put Bai Ze down on the ground and said, “Now that the Great Sage Equal to Heaven is gone, Mother will go capture Tang Sanzang and cook him to eat.”
“……”
Bai Ze’s face was full of black lines. As expected, his mother’s obsession with eating Tang Sanzang’s flesh was not so easy to dispel.
After all, the matter of eternal life, let alone for the current Bai Fu Ren, even for the Jade Emperor, held great appeal.
The Jade Emperor’s lifespan was said to be as long as the heavens, but that was just a metaphor. In reality, before truly becoming a sage, lifespans were limited.
It was just that, as the ruler of the Three Realms, the Jade Emperor had various ways to prolong his life.
Now, with an easy way to obtain eternal life presented before them, who wouldn’t be tempted?
However, Bai Ze could sense that his mother was not as eager as before.
After all, her status had changed. As an Imperial Princess, even without eating Tang Sanzang’s flesh, she could have an extremely long lifespan and maintain her youth.
Therefore, Bai Ze was not ready to make it clear now, to persuade his mother to give up the idea of eating Tang Sanzang’s flesh.
After all, their mission as a tribulation had not been completed.
Bai Ze said, “Okay, okay, next we’ll capture Tang Sanzang and cook him to eat.
However, today I’ve already used the Corpse Separation Technique twice. If I encounter danger a third time, I’ll die.
How about we go capture Tang Sanzang tomorrow morning?”
Bai Fu Ren pondered for a moment and said, “Alright, then tomorrow morning we’ll capture Tang Sanzang and cook him to eat.”
On the other side, Sun Wukong, filled with anger, rode the clouds and flew away from Tang Sanzang.
He went straight to the Spirit Platform Mountain of the West He Continent, to visit Patriarch Bodhi at the Slanting Moon Three Stars Cave, his teacher who had imparted his skills.
His vast abilities, the seventy-two transformations, Samadhi True Fire, Somersault Cloud, and Vajra Indestructible Body, were all learned from Patriarch Bodhi.
Now, after hundreds of years of separation from his master, Sun Wukong was extremely eager.
Sun Wukong somersaulted one hundred and eight thousand miles. Before long, he arrived at Spirit Platform Mountain and stood before the Slanting Moon Three Stars Cave.
However, weeds grew everywhere, the ground was covered in dust, and the cave dwelling was long deserted.
This made the monkey recall that when he left his master’s cave dwelling, he had promised his master that one day when he became successful, he would definitely return to show his master filial piety.
However, Patriarch Bodhi had only patted his head and said meaningfully, “In the future, if you cause trouble, as long as you don’t mention my name, that will already be a great blessing for me.”
Therefore, Sun Wukong had never mentioned his master to outsiders.
“Has even you, old man, left me?”
In one day, having lost two masters, Sun Wukong felt grief in his heart and shed two tears.
He walked around the training ground of the past, the voices and smiles of his fellow disciples appearing before him.
“Forget it, let the past be the past. I should go back to my Flower Fruit Mountain and take a look.”
Since he was suppressed under the Five Elements Mountain, he had not returned to Flower Fruit Mountain for a single day. He did not know how his monkeys and their descendants were doing.
Great Sage Sun rode the clouds and went to the East Victory Divine Continent. Thousands of mountains and rivers passed by in an instant. At this moment, he was already above Flower Fruit Mountain.
However, the scene of monkeys and their descendants playing that he had imagined was not there. Instead, some mountain spirits and wild demons were running rampant in the forest.
At this time, he actually saw a big demon blocking a little monkey, about to eat it.
“Halt!”
Great Sage Sun descended from the sky and killed the demon with one blow of his staff.
“Senior, senior, thank you, senior.”
The little monkey spirit saw that the one who had saved him was of the same kind, rolled over and clasped its fists in thanks.
◈◈◈
Being called senior, Sun Wukong was startled, but after a moment of thought, he understood.
He had left Flower Fruit Mountain for more than five hundred years. How could these younger generations recognize him?
“Humph!”
Sun Wukong sat grandly on a large rock and said, “You little monkey spirit, you don’t even recognize your own ancestor?
Listen well, I am the Handsome Monkey King of the Water Curtain Cave in this Flower Fruit Mountain, Sun Wukong, also known as your Great King.
Quickly call your clan elders to come and pay respects.”
“Ah? The Great King has returned?”
The little monkey spirit happily circled on the ground, then climbed up the tree trunks and left.
The legend of the Handsome Monkey King had been passed down through generations within the ape race. That was the most glorious time for their clan.
The clan elders had said that one day the Great King would return. They had not expected that he would really return today.
About half an hour after the little monkey spirit left, a group of monkey spirits arrived, chattering.
An old ape crawled to Sun Wukong’s feet, “Great King, you’ve finally returned. This old servant has missed you so much!”
Sun Wukong looked around at the arriving monkey spirits and gasped, jumping and squatting on the stone, “How can they all be unfamiliar faces? Where did everyone go?”
The old ape immediately cried out, “Great King, all the old companions have died. This old servant barely managed to survive with the young ones.”
Sun Wukong said, “I have already crossed out your names from the Book of Life and Death in the Underworld. How could you all have died?”
The old ape said, “Thanks to the Great King for crossing out our names from the Book of Life and Death, this old one has become an undead being, able to barely survive until today, fortunate enough to witness the Great King’s majestic appearance.
But those old companions, they did not die because their lifespans had ended and their souls were taken by the Underworld.
After you were suppressed under the Five Elements Mountain, the heavenly soldiers and generals thoroughly cleansed Flower Fruit Mountain. The seventy-two demon kings under our ape clan were all eliminated one by one.
This old servant hid with forty thousand clan members in a well, and that was how we escaped this tribulation.”
Sun Wukong said, “Forty thousand clan members, how come only you are left now?”
The old ape said, “Our clan lost the Great King and was also massacred by the heavenly soldiers and generals. Our strength has fallen to the bottom.
And who hasn’t eaten the Peaches of Immortality that the Great King brought back from the Heavenly Court? Who hasn’t eaten the Immortal Pills refined by Old Lord?
In the eyes of others, we old apes are walking elixirs.
Although the seventy-two demon kings near Flower Fruit Mountain were annihilated, the villagers within ten miles have all set their sights on us.
For hundreds of years, our ape clan compatriots have been captured. This old one is the only one left of the old companions.
And even these young ones, their bloodlines are already several generations removed from us, but their bodies still have remnants of the Immortal Pills and Peaches of Immortality. Our clan is still called ‘monkey medicine’ by those humans.”
Hearing this, Sun Wukong was so angry that he jumped up, scratching his ears and cheeks, his eyes and mouth spewing magma, looking like an ape demon.
“Great King, it’s bad, it’s bad, the hunters are coming again!” a little monkey spirit reported.
Sun Wukong’s eyes flashed with fierceness. He said coldly, “Go, let me meet them and let them know the power of this Great King!”
Sun Wukong led a group of disciples and their descendants down the mountain.
At this time, several figures with bows and arrows on their backs, barefoot, came running from afar.
These people were all ten zhang tall. This was the East Victory Divine Continent, which was different from the Eastern Tang Dynasty.
The humans of the Eastern Tang Dynasty were knowledgeable, intelligent, and had high comprehension, so the most powerful cultivators appeared in the Eastern Tang Dynasty.
The humans of the East Victory Divine Continent, on the other hand, had strong bodies and moved like the wind. Each of them was over ten zhang tall. Sun Wukong and his disciples and their descendants only reached the chests and abdomens of the humans of the East Victory Divine Continent.
But these giants had very low intelligence, averaging only the level of a ten-year-old child from the Eastern Tang Dynasty.
At this moment, a hunter at the front leaped over a cliff several dozen meters wide. Then, he drew his bow, and the huge bow made a teeth-grinding sound.
The arrows on the bow were as thick as javelins.
All the apes were terrified. An arrow shot by these humans of the East Victory Divine Continent could even blast a small mountain. The apes’ small bodies could not withstand it.
The old ape was usually very afraid, but now that their Great King had returned, it was not as afraid.
The giant’s arrow shot out, the target was Sun Wukong!
