Day by day, all the plans slowly unfolded as expected.
First, Zhang Ming showed off his tremendous strength in front of the female monkeys... ahem, the troop: he knocked down a tree with one punch and kicked a crater into the ground!
He also vividly recounted the story of "Handsome Monkey King, Great Sage Sun, Raising Havoc in Heaven."
"That Great Sage Equal to Heaven stormed Sacred Mountain and roared, 'My fate is mine to decide, not heaven's!' Then he laid into that old Dragon King with his fists and feet."
"In pain, the old Dragon King fell to his knees and cried, 'Spare me, Great Sage! Spare me!'"
Sure enough, subjected to this cultural invasion, every monkey's eyes shone. They yearned intensely to be like the Great Sage, riding his Somersault Cloud and covering 108,000 li in a single somersault.
Cries of "Great Sage!" and "Great Sage!" filled the canyon.
Even Stone Mama, the interpreter, was hooked, wanting to hear stories about the "Great Sage Equal to Heaven" all day long.
After all, Zhang Ming's accounts were wildly altered. After being adapted to local conditions, they were different from the originals.
Having drawn the attention of every monkey in the valley with a story, Zhang Ming waved his hand and hired a large batch of Three-Tailed Monkeys to start... farming!
He declared, "This is an essential step toward becoming the Great Sage!"
It was not that he was exploiting their labor, but... these monkeys were simply too unruly. Accustomed to living freely, how could they endure hardship?
Even in the myth, the Great Sage, with his heaven-defying talent, had trained on Mount Fangcun for ten years. For the first seven, he had merely learned speech and manners, discussed scriptures and the Dao, practiced writing, and burned incense. Only in