Chapter 122: The Unforgettable Voice

At this moment, among the more than five hundred students in the class, someone finally voiced their doubt: “Teacher Sun, what use is all this to the world we are about to face and the direction we need to move forward in?” Huafeng recognized the speaker as the pale, frail boy in white from the plane, surprised that he had persisted this far into the academy.

“Yeah! Teacher Sun, you praise Journey to the West and Sun Wukong so highly—what’s the metaphor or hidden meaning behind it?” a girl in red asked.

“Teacher Sun, is it just because you share a surname with Sun Wukong that you keep filling our classes with this nonsense?” a tall, muscular black student with limited Chinese asked awkwardly.

“Teacher Sun, I think you’re just wasting everyone’s time. What you’re doing is meaningless!” another straightforward girl in red said bluntly, leaving no room for the teacher’s dignity.

“Teacher Sun…”

“I think you…”

Voices multiplied from all directions, creating a noisy swarm around Teacher Sun, like flies buzzing incessantly.

“Enough! Stop the noise! I will answer each of your questions one by one. As for the explanations and outcomes you want, you will understand them in the future. For now, in my classroom, all I ask is that you listen quietly, and don’t jump to conclusions about what you don’t understand! I, Sun Xing, am most annoyed by students who buzz around like flies. You are elite students selected from various countries—how can you be so clueless?”

Sun Xing’s voice was not loud, yet every student present heard him clearly. Despite the endless chatter, no sound could overshadow his.

Huafeng felt the voice pierce straight to his heart, and as Sun Xing spoke, time and space around them seemed to pause for a moment.

After a brief silence, Sun Xing’s voice continued to resonate within everyone’s hearts. Unknowingly, Huafeng, Yunmeng, Bai Feng, and others found themselves drawn into the scene he painted.

“In the Southern Song period, the ‘White-Clad Scholar Monkey Traveler’ appeared in the ‘Tang Monk’s Journey to the West Poetic Commentary,’ marking the first textual appearance of Sun Wukong. This figure is considered the prototype created by Wu Cheng’en. The Monkey Traveler, appearing as a guardian during the pilgrimage, lifts the story beyond its historical roots, enriching it with miraculous and enchanting elements. Originally a celestial immortal demoted to Flower-Fruit Mountain for stealing the Queen Mother’s peaches, he is a learned scholar devoted to protecting Tang Sanzang on his journey to the West. He calls himself the ‘Eighty-Four-Thousand Copper-Headed Iron-Foreheaded Monkey King of Purple Cloud Cave on Flower-Fruit Mountain,’ possessing knowledge of past and future, aware that the journey to the West involves a million miles crossing thirty-six kingdoms fraught with peril.

He wields great magical power, capable of transporting Tang Sanzang and his five companions to the Crystal Palace in the heavens for a feast. The three magical treasures bestowed upon him by the Great Brahma King—the invisible hat, the golden ring-staff, and the alms bowl—play vital roles in the journey, subduing demons, overcoming obstacles, and accomplishing the pilgrimage.

Throughout the entire pilgrimage to the West, he remains steadfastly loyal, journeying alongside the monk from the East all the way to the West. Although the ‘White-Clad Scholar Monkey King’ of ‘Purple Cloud Cave on Flower-Fruit Mountain’ often presents contradictions in divinity and form, name and reality, the Monkey Traveler in the ‘Poetic Commentary’ already embodies the embryonic form of Wu Cheng’en’s Sun Wukong. It should be noted, however, that in the ‘Poetic Commentary,’ the artistic elements of man, deity, and monkey are not yet perfectly unified. It is not until the ‘Journey to the West Pinghua’ and the Yuan dynasty play ‘Journey to the West’ that new leaps in these aspects occur.

Compared to the Song dynasty, the Yuan dynasty represents a crucial stage in the formation of ‘Journey to the West.’ In addition to oral storytelling like ‘Journey to the West Pinghua,’ theatrical performances contributed greatly to the book’s composition and refinement. Works such as the Jin Court’s ‘Tang Sanzang,’ Yuan Wu Changling’s ‘Tang Sanzang’s Journey to the West,’ and the late Yuan to early Ming dynasty’s Yang Jingxian’s ‘Journey to the West’ play provided extensive material for Wu Cheng’en’s final composition of the novel.

The Yuan dynasty’s greatest contribution to ‘Journey to the West’ was to dilute the religious overtones of the pilgrimage story, enhancing its traditional cultural content, and standardizing the cultural choices of ‘Journey to the West’ in forms more appealing to the audience.

Folk art representations of Sun Wukong during this phase emphasized three main traits: (1) opposition to the Heavenly Court; (2) boundless transformations; (3) the difficulty of rescuing people. The ‘opposition to the Heavenly Court’ refers mainly to the relatively complete story of Sun Wukong’s havoc in Heaven. ‘Boundless transformations’ means Sun Wukong could not only change into various things but that these transformations were connected to his natural monkey characteristics. ‘The difficulty of rescuing people’ denotes that Sun Wukong not only subdued demons but also saved people from danger and injustice. For instance, in the ‘Journey to the West’ play, when Lord Pei’s daughter is abducted by the Black Pig Demon, Sun Wukong volunteers to capture the demon and rescue her, reuniting father and daughter.

However, the overall tone of the ‘Journey to the West’ play, while praising Sun Wukong’s abilities and sense of justice, does not affirm his rebellion against Heaven. When the Jade Emperor sends heavenly generals to capture him, the play swiftly aligns with the Heavenly Court’s legitimacy. The mighty Great Sage Equal to Heaven is easily captured by celestial soldiers and immediately kowtows, begging for mercy. Near the play’s end, the following lines appear: ‘Violating Heaven’s laws, Great Sage Equal to Heaven, stealing immortal wine—these crimes are not minor. Theft of the elixir warrants beheading; punishment in the netherworld denies ascension. The Supreme Lord values benevolence; desist from reckless greed and anger. Henceforth, reform from evil to good; worship the Lord of Heaven and the Three Pure Ones.’

The play’s portrayal reveals ambiguous affections, causing characters’ personalities to appear inconsistent.

In the ‘Journey to the West’ play, Sun Wukong is titled the ‘All-Heavenly Sage’ (with his elder brother called the ‘Great Sage Equal to Heaven’), showcasing a clear rebellious streak. He boldly proclaims, ‘Since the opening of heaven and earth, the two principles have been my essence. The Three Realms have strained themselves over me. Gods and ghosts in all directions fear me; ghosts of the Five Mountains chatter fearfully… Nine heavens cannot capture me; I defy ten thousand demon lords.’

His daily life is described as ‘joyfully climbing vines and stirring kudzu; angrily disturbing seas and overturning rivers,’ living freely. He even steals the Golden Elixir from the Supreme Lord Laozi, forging ‘bronze sinews and iron bones, with fiery golden eyes.’

Later, though the Jade Emperor dispatches celestial soldiers to suppress him, Sun Wukong fights courageously without yielding. Though defeated and imprisoned under a mountain, his rebellious spirit remains. When Tang Sanzang rescues him, he immediately wishes to return to Flower-Fruit Mountain.

Notably, the play depicts Sun Wukong’s vast magical abilities and transformations. A single somersault covers 108,000 miles; he can transform into three heads and six arms and can nimbly climb trees to ‘turn into a burnt caterpillar.’ His weapon is a ‘living golden staff’ he wields effortlessly, shrinking it small enough to tuck behind his ear when unused.

These abilities—the ‘somersault cloud,’ ‘living golden staff,’ ‘burnt caterpillar,’ climbing vines and stirring seas—were inherited by the novel in shaping Sun Wukong.

However, the play’s Sun Wukong still retains strong demonic traits. After Tang Sanzang frees him from under the mountain, and he becomes his disciple, he secretly calls Tang Sanzang a ‘fat monk’ behind his back and feasts before him. Upon encountering Princess Iron Fan, he immediately seeks to marry her, uttering vulgar words that anger her and cause her to refuse lending her fan. Though these scenes are minor and absent from Wu Cheng’en’s novel, they reveal significant transformations in Sun Wukong’s image from the time to the novel.

In ‘Journey to the West,’ Sun Wukong undergoes a development from ‘ape’ to ‘man.’ ‘Ape’ signifies the mythological and demonic monkey figure, while ‘man’ refers to a mythological artistic image possessing human thoughts, emotions, and personality traits. Ming dynasty’s Wu Cheng’en preserved this evolving aspect in his re-creation of Sun Wukong.

‘Journey to the West Supplement,’ comprising sixteen chapters, was authored by Dong Shuo (courtesy name Ruoyu, Dharma name Nanqian) at the end of the Ming dynasty. This sequel is considered uniquely distinctive. Lu Xun praised it in ‘A Brief History of Chinese Fiction,’ noting its ‘rich and varied storytelling, skillful illusions, and sudden surprises that often astonish, interspersed with elegant wit, far beyond what contemporary writers dared attempt.’ Some scholars even suggest it exhibits traits of Western stream-of-consciousness novels.

The story picks up after the Tang monk and his disciples cross the Flaming Mountain. Sun Xing’er, while fasting, is beguiled by a mackerel spirit, falling into a ‘Green World’ illusion created by a demon claiming to be the Little Moon King. To find Qin Shi Huang’s borrowed Mountain-Banishing Bell, intended to drive away demons from the journey’s path, and to locate his master Tang Sanzang, he explores in and out of the ‘Green World,’ eventually falling into the ‘Ten-Thousand Mirrors Pavilion.’ Through the pavilion’s mirrors, he enters the ‘world of the ancients,’ then the ‘future world.’ At times, he becomes a poppy flower, bargaining with the Chu warlord Xiang Yu to learn Qin Shi Huang’s whereabouts; at others, he serves as the King of Hell, judging and executing Qin Hui and taking Yue Fei as his third master.

Emerging from the mirror, he experiences numerous adventures in the Little Moon King’s palace and the ‘Green World.’ Finally, awakened by the Void Lord’s call, he escapes the false world, returning to the familiar mountain path just in time to see the mackerel spirit, transformed into a little monk, coaxing Tang Sanzang. With a single strike, Sun Wukong reveals the fish’s corpse. The narrative is richly imaginative and intricately woven.

Throughout the day, Huafeng felt Teacher Sun’s voice linger like an incantation, rarely ceasing except for brief breaks.

Yunmeng, equally weary, nestled beside Bai Feng, casting a look of utter resignation at Huafeng, prompting him to suppress a sudden urge to laugh aloud.