第 16 回

One evening, Tang Seng and his disciples walked to the front of a big mountain.

They saw a temple on the mountain, named Guanyin Chan Temple.

Tang Seng walked to the gate, explained his identity to a young monk guarding the door, and wanted to borrow a place to stay for one night.

The young monk immediately went in to report.

Soon, a very old abbot came out and invited them into the temple.

The abbot also had someone prepare vegetarian food to entertain them.

Tang Seng thanked him repeatedly.

The abbot asked Tang Seng if he had brought any treasures.

Tang Seng modestly said no.

Sun Wukong wanted to show off, so he took out the brocade kasaya given by Guanyin Bodhisattva to show everyone.

The monks saw this treasure and praised it incessantly.

The old abbot liked it even more, and he asked Tang Seng to lend him the kasaya for one night.

Tang Seng was embarrassed to refuse, so he had to agree.

At night, Tang Seng and Sun Wukong were both asleep.

But the old abbot was in his own room, touching the kasaya over and over with trembling hands.

The more he looked at it, the more he liked it, and he only regretted that it wasn"t his own thing, so he actually cried sadly.

His disciples saw this and suggested to him: "We might as well set a fire, pretending it was an accidental fire, and burn that Tang dynasty monk to death."

This way, the treasure can belong to us.

The old abbot nodded in agreement.

The disciples then quietly went out and brought back a lot of firewood, piled it around the room where Tang Seng was staying, and then lit a fire.

Sun Wukong was awakened.

He transformed into a bee and flew out to investigate, discovering the monks' bad intentions.

Sun Wukong immediately flew up to the sky and borrowed the fire-proof cover from the Pagoda-Bearing Heavenly King Li.

He used the fire-proof cover to protect the room where Tang Sanzang was staying.

The big fire could not burn in at all, instead it spread outward.

The entire Guanyin Temple quickly turned into a sea of fire.

The monks had no time to put out the fire and cried out in misery.

On the nearby Black Wind Mountain, there lived a black bear monster.

He saw the temple on fire and flew over to watch the excitement.

He happened to see the brocade kasaya in the old abbot's room.

When the demon saw the treasure, how could it let it go.

He stirred up a strong wind and stole the kasaya.

The next day, after the big fire went out, Sun Wukong retrieved the fire-avoiding cover, returned it to Heavenly King Li, and then quietly went back to the room to continue sleeping.

Tang Sanzang woke up and saw thick smoke billowing outside; the temple had already turned into ruins.

He hurriedly woke Sun Wukong to check.

Sun Wukong smiled and recounted what happened last night.

Tang Sanzang blamed him for not involving others and urged him to quickly go find the kasaya.

As for that old abbot, he lost the kasaya and burned down the temple; in a moment of despair, he actually hit a pillar and committed suicide.

The monks were crying around the old abbot's corpse; when they saw Tang Sanzang and his disciples approaching, they were so scared that they shouted: the vengeful ghost has come to claim lives.

They were so scared that they fled in all directions.

Sun Wukong caught them all and brought them back, saying loudly: "Quickly return my kasaya."

The monks kept kowtowing, all saying they didn't know where the kasaya was.

Sun Wukong then searched in the temple by himself.

But he searched everywhere and still didn't find the kasaya.

He thought to himself, could it have been stolen by a monster?

So he asked the monks if there were any monsters nearby.

The monks quickly said that there was a black bear spirit on the nearby Black Wind Mountain, who was very powerful.

Sun Wukong ordered them to take good care of Tang Seng and the white dragon horse, then he rode his somersault cloud and flew to Black Wind Mountain to find that monster.