reading notes: the money king, part a

• on a place called the moutains of flowers and fruits, there was a rock that held all the power of the earth
• out of this rock came a stone egg that birthed a stone ape, which had golden streams from his eyes that reached heaven 
• the lord of the heavens was frightened and sent out two gods to find out what happened, who reassured him that it was just from the magic rock 
• the ape grew up and played with other apes in the valley, until one day they came across a waterfall
• they said whoever could go through the waterfall without injury would be king, so the stone ape tried
• he found an iron bridge with a tablet that stated that they had found the heavenly cave,
• they all went there and everything was made of stone, and the stone ape was named king 
• 300 years passed, and one day the king of the apes was sitting with his friends when he began to weep at the fear of death 
• the old ape told him that buddhas are exempt from death, and the king of the apes said that he would go to find them 
• the king of the apes left the next morning on a raft on a journey through the great sea
• once he made it to asia, he saw a fisherman and knocked him down and stole his clothes 
• he wandered around famous places and learned how to act human 
• he was gone for nine years until he came to the western sea, and found the place where the buddas were 
• he met a woodworker who pointed him to the Moutain of the Heart, where a saint resided named the Discerner
• he found the cave and a disciple let him in and led him to the saint, who gave him the name Sun Wu Kung 
• he was taught by the saint for seven years and the saint told him his truth
• this caused sun wu kung to dance, and the master scolded him for his wild nature 
• the master agrees to teach him the truth, and offers him many different ways to learn it, but the ape refuses unless it will give him eternal life
• the master pretended to be angry and struck him three times which the ape knew meant that he should meet him in secret and he would give him the truth 
• the master was confused at why the ape was in his room, and the ape told him why, so he agreed to show him the way to eternal life 
• he spent three years mastering the way of eternal life, and the master warned him that three dangers will pursue him, and if he can survive he will live eternally 
• sun wu kung talked with the disciples about his teachings, which were supposed to be secret
• the master said because he shared his secrets, his heart was not under control, and he must leave 
• he exiled the ape and said that he could not tell anyone that he was his disciple, or he would lock his soul in hell 
• he returned home and told his friends that he had found the way to eternal life 
• they told him that the devil king came and took away his children while he was gone 
• he went to the cave of the kidneys to get his children back, but the devil king could not even see sun wu kung because he was so large 
• sun wu kung began to attack the devil king, and transformed into hundreds of apes to fight
• he killed the devil king and got his children back, burning the cave to the ground 
• he begin to train the apes for conflict, and then went to aulai empire to get metal tools for combat 
• sun wu kung turned his hairs into thousands of apes and cleared the whole supply of weaponry
• he had 77,000 weapons and apes, but no weapon strong enough for him, so he went to the dragon king 
• the dragon king offered him weapons that weighed thousands of pounds, but were still too light for him 
• the dragon queen pointed out that there was an iron rod glowing red that he could take. the ape picked it up and it was too heavy, but it shrunk or grew with his commands
• he threatened the dragon king to kill him if he did not provide him armor. they satisfied him with armor and he went back home 
• one night when he was asleep, two men came and dragged his spirit to the nether world 
• the princes of the dead were terrified and gave him the book of life 

he saw that he was supposed to live 324 years, so he struck the apes out of the book so that they would all be immortal 

Ape King 

Source: DeviantArt

Bibliography

R. Wilhelm, The Ape Sun Wu Kung. Un-textbook