Nobody lived on White Tiger Ridge. It took half a day to cross, and noon came and there was no village.
Wukong went south to beg for food. Before he left he drew a circle on the ground. “Stay inside this and nothing can come in.”
Sanzang could not sit inside it for long. Bajie said it was stifling and stepped out first, and the three of them walked out onto the road.
The One Carrying Food
A woman came up the mountain path. She was young and carried a bowl on her head, and she said she was taking food to her husband.
“You must be hungry too. Please eat.” Bajie put his hand out first and Sanzang stopped him.
Then Wukong came down out of the clouds. He saw her and raised his rod. “Master, that is not a person.”
It was over in one blow. The woman’s body lay on the road, but there were maggots inside the bowl.
Sanzang did not look at that. What he saw was one dead woman, and he rebuked Wukong in a low voice.
The Old Woman Looking for Her Daughter
They had not gone far when an old woman appeared. She looked eighty and leaned on a stick, and her daughter had gone out with food and not come back.
Sanzang’s face went white. It meant the woman just now had been her daughter, and he could not turn around toward Wukong.
Wukong raised his rod a second time. “That is the same thing as before.” There was no time to stop him.
The old woman’s body stayed on the road and Sanzang sat down where he was. Then he began the words that tighten the band.
Wukong went flat on the ground and held his head for a long time. Bajie added something from the side.
“My brother is good at tricking the eye. Kill them and then call them demons, and that is that.” He said that three times before the day was out.
The Name in the Spine
The third time an old man appeared and said he had come out looking for his wife and daughter. This time Wukong did not strike at once.
He called up the mountain god and the local god first and set them in the air to block any escape. He put witnesses in place and then raised his rod.
What lay on the road the third time was not a body. A pile of white bone lay scattered there, and four characters were cut into the spine, White Bone Demon.
Sanzang read them and for a moment said nothing. The belief was about to tip one way.
Then Bajie spoke again. “Turning them into bones is easy enough for him. He killed three people and covered your eyes.”
Sanzang lifted his head and began the words again from the beginning. This time he went past twenty.
One Sheet of Paper
Sanzang took paper and brush out of the baggage, sat down there and wrote a few lines. “From today you are not my disciple.”
Wukong took the paper in both hands. He did not offer one line of defense and asked for one thing only.
“Take the band off me.” Sanzang said he had never been taught the words for that, and Wukong did not ask twice.
He bowed four times, once in each direction. He asked Wujing to look after their master, and he said nothing at all to Bajie.
He rose into the cloud and then came back down. He stood in front of Sanzang and bowed once more, then went east and was gone.
Today, When You Cannot Show What You Saw
Their judgments were not different in this chapter. What they saw was different. Judgment narrows under discussion and this does not.
Wukong had eyes that could see it. He had no way to lend those eyes to anyone, so the grounds he offered were always that he had seen it.
The third time, grounds arrived. Four characters were cut into the bone, and the verdict went back after the evidence.
What turned it back was a remark that came later. It arrived after the evidence and it was stronger, because the listener had already been shocked twice.
So the cost of this chapter is not paid by the demon. The one who saw it takes a sheet of paper and leaves, and who ends up paying it is what the next chapter shows.