Journey to the West
Singapore International School ( Hong Kong ), Fan , Xin Yan - 11
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More fire ? Really ?" complained the Monkey King . " When all this is over , I think I ' ll need a bath ."
Dragon Horse , a white horse that could turn into a dragon , snorted in response . Bajie , a talking pig , and Sha , a friar , just sighed . There was no getting out of this horrid land of fire ... or was there ?
Before , when the party had started out to retrieve scrolls in India , they had never thought it would be this bad . After trekking for weeks in marshes and brawling with numerous demons like the White Bone Demon , the team was thoroughly exhausted .
In the process of fighting the White Bone Demon , Xuanzang , the party ' s master , had kicked the Monkey King out of the team . He had thought the Monkey King was attacking supposedly needless things that the Monkey King knew was the White Bone Demon zooming around . Now , Monkey King was back as Xuanzang had realized his mistake . He never doubted Monkey King since then . Suddenly , behind all of the fire and smoke , came a shadow . " Hey , look ! Is that a demon ?" Monkey King ' s strident voice interrupted Xuanzang ' s stream of thoughts . " What is it ?" " It looks scary ..." " Can I eat it ?" " We will investigate it ," said Xuanzang calmly . " But we CANNOT AND WILL NOT eat it ." He gave Bajie a hard look . Bajie nodded sheepishly . " Okay ." It was just a pile of ashes . " Sorry , guys . False alarm ," called Monkey King . His furry hands suddenly flew to his face . Sha noticed the sudden movement . He began to suspect that this wasn ' t the real Monkey King . He knew that the real him would never have mistaken a pile of ashes for a demon . Never . And why would he cover his face ?
Sha wasn ' t the only one suspecting that the real Monkey King was absent . Xuanzang did too . After all , Monkey King was the second to join the team , so Xuanzang knew him pretty well . He had also noted how odd he was acting lately . It didn ' t quite match up to the one he knew .
" Hey , Sha , come on !" Bajie was cheerfully calling to him . " Don ' t look so moody . What ' s wrong with you ?" He wore a big smile on his fat pig face .
" I don ' t know ..." Sha muttered . He wanted to make sure no one could hear . " Have you noticed
Monkey King ' s behavior lately ? " Nope !" Bajie interrupted loudly . " Shhh ! Quiet !" Sha hissed . " Why ? " Well I have ," he continued , ignoring Bajie , " and it doesn ' t feel right . He ' s been acting really weird ." " What do you mean ?" This time , Bajie lowered his voice , sensing that this was important . " I don ' t think that this is the real Monkey King ," said Sha flatly . That night , a shadow loomed over the sleeping figure of Monkey King . The actual Monkey King had come . " Say goodbye while you can ," whispered Monkey King as he raised his heavy weapon , named
Jingu .
The sleeping monkey suddenly leapt up and dodged the Jingu at the nick of time . He took out a lighter version of Jingu , and swung it hard at Monkey King . Amused , Monkey King simply blocked the hit with his arm . " You ' ll have to do better than that , fake monkey !" Monkey King sneered . The others woke at the disruption . " So I was right !" exclaimed Sha and Xuanzang at the same time . They glanced at each other in surprise .