Those words came crashing down.
The Tongtian River suddenly fell silent for an instant.
It wasn't that the water had stopped.
It was that Wukong could no longer hear anything.
The rapids still surged.
The black hands still tugged at his legs.
Xuanzang lay slung over his left shoulder.
His right hand held Subhuti's arm in a death grip.
Wukong's grip was tight.
River water rushed over him like blade after blade of dull knives.
Wukong said nothing.
The Great King Linggan stood amid the black water, a smile on his face.
"What's wrong?"
The Great King Linggan spoke softly.
"Didn't you hear?"
"They don't want you anymore."
Wukong didn't look up.
Yet the Great King Linggan reached out and actually stroked Wukong's head.
The touch was gentle.
Just as Xuanzang's usually was.
That hand was soaking wet, black water dripping between its fingers.
Wukong's shoulders and back suddenly went rigid.
The Great King Linggan's smile deepened.
"But it's all right, Wukong."
The Great King Linggan suddenly spread his arms and stepped back several paces, his voice rising sharply.
"Once I eat them-"
"I'll be your only master!"
As his words fell.
The river suddenly swelled.
The roar of water surged in from every direction.
Black hands rose from the river, surrounding Wukong.
One layer.
Two layers.
Three layers.
The black hands writhed in the rapids, weaving themselves into an enormous mass of black water.
Outside that mass, the Great King Linggan's laughter drifted in.
"Hahahaha."
"Good monkey."
"Hold tight."
"Hold even tighter."
"Let go, and they're gone."
Phantoms began to emerge in the black water.
First came Wukong himself.
He stared at him, his mouth turned down and his eyes terribly red, like the monkey beneath Five Elements Mountain who had cried out for so long without anyone