Tang Sanzang and Guanyin

Rulai gave Guanyin the brocade cassock, the nine-ringed staff and three bands and sent her east to find a pilgrim. Guanyin came to Chang’an as a scabby wandering monk, called out at the land-and-water assembly that the lesser vehicle could not release the dead, then showed her true bodhisattva form and told Emperor Taizong and Xuanzang where the greater vehicle was to be found.

Xuanzang took the charge and set out west, wearing the cassock and carrying the staff Guanyin had handed down. She had already set Sha Seng, Bajie, the white dragon horse and Wukong to wait at the Flowing Sand River, Gao Village, Eagle Grief Stream and Five Elements Mountain.

When the cassock was stolen at Black Wind Mountain, when Red Boy set his fire on Mount Hao and when the goldfish became a spirit in the Heaven-Reaching River, and Tang Sanzang was held in a cave, Guanyin came in turn to take the demons. After the pilgrims reached Vulture Peak she checked the register of ordeals before the Buddha, found one still wanting, and the eight vajra guardians set the party down beside the Heaven-Reaching River on the road home.