Red Boy and Sun Wukong

Learning that the pilgrims would pass Mount Hao, Red Boy turned himself into a child hung from a tree by ropes and cried out for rescue. Sun Wukong saw that the mountain wind and the footprints were wrong, and Tang Sanzang made him carry the child on his back all the same.

On Wukong’s back Red Boy worked the mountain-moving art, carried off Tang Sanzang while he was pinned, and took him to the Fire Cloud Cave to be steamed. Wukong and Bajie attacked the cave door, and Red Boy loosed the samadhi fire from his mouth and had the small demons push out the five-element carts, so that the whole mountain was smoke and flame.

Wukong asked the four dragon kings for rain, but ordinary water could not hold the true fire; chilled by it, he fainted beside a stream. Coming round, Wukong went to the southern sea for Guanyin.

Red Boy even took Guanyin’s own shape to try to deceive him, and was drawn at last onto the true Guanyin’s lotus throne, with bands locking his limbs and neck. He followed her to the southern sea bowing at every step, and only then did Wukong break the cave door and carry Tang Sanzang out of the Fire Cloud Cave.