Pathway to Japanese Literature

Sagojo's Emergence

When autumn arrived with withered willows where cold cicadas cried and the Great Fire Star flowed westward, Xuanzang, with trepidation, was urged by his two disciples to brave perils and hasten their journey—when suddenly before them appeared a great river.
Great waves surged and swirled, the river’s breadth beyond measure.
Upon climbing the bank and gazing out, they beheld a stone monument standing beside them.
Above were carved the three characters "Quicksand River" in seal script, while on the front there were four lines in small regular script.

Eight Hundred Leagues of Quicksand Realm

Three Thousand Leagues of Quicksand Depths

Goose feathers float not

Reed flowers sink sure

Reed flowers sink unmoving

――Journey to the West――

I

At that time, the total number of monsters dwelling at the bottom of Quicksand River was approximately thirteen thousand—among them, he alone was weak-hearted. According to him, it was punishment for having devoured nine monks that these nine skulls clung unceasingly about his neck—yet none among the other monsters could see such skulls. “We can’t see them,” they would say. “That’s just your delusion.” At this, he would look back at them with disbelieving eyes before sinking into a sorrowful expression that seemed to ask why he was so different from everyone else. The other monsters whispered among themselves: “He hasn’t even properly eaten humans—let alone monks.” “No one has ever seen such things.” “Though we have seen him catch crucian carp and small fish to eat…” They bestowed upon him the nickname “Monologue Sagojo.” For he constantly felt anxiety toward himself—tormented by regret that carved into his flesh—and this sorrowful self-reproach, endlessly ruminated upon in his heart, would inevitably leak out as muttered soliloquies. Even when from a distance it appeared to be nothing more than small bubbles escaping his mouth, in truth he was murmuring in a faint voice: “I’m an idiot,” or “Why am I like this?” or “It’s over—I am,” and sometimes even “I’m a fallen angel.”

At that time, it was believed that not only monsters but all living things were reincarnations of something.

That Sagojo had once served as the Rolled Curtain General of Lingxiao Palace in the heavenly realm—there was not a soul in this riverbed who did not speak of it. Therefore, even Sagojo himself—a man of profound skepticism—had no choice but to feign belief in it. But, to tell the truth, among all the monsters in the riverbed, he alone secretly harbored doubts about this theory of reincarnation. Suppose the one who served as Rolled Curtain General in the heavenly realm five hundred years ago has become the present me—but can we truly say that Rolled Curtain General of old and this current me are the same? First of all, I don't have a single memory of that past heavenly realm. What part connects that pre-memory general to me? Is it our bodies? Or our souls? But then—what exactly is a soul? When he voiced these doubts, the monsters would sneer “Here we go again” and laugh derisively. Some mocked him; others looked on with pity and said: “It’s a disease. A terrible disease causes this.”

In truth, he was diseased.

Sagojo knew neither when this disease had begun nor what had caused it. But when he noticed, by then these loathsome things had already amassed oppressively around him. He came to loathe doing anything; everything he saw and heard weighed on his spirit. With every matter, he found himself loathsome, and had become unable to trust himself. For days and days he shut himself in a cave, refusing to eat, his eyes gleaming wildly as he sank into brooding. He would suddenly stand up, pace about while muttering to himself, then abruptly sit back down. He remained unconscious of each individual movement. What points needed clarifying for his anxiety to subside? Even this he could not grasp. Everything he had until then accepted as natural now appeared incomprehensible and suspect. What had once been perceived as a unified whole now came fragmented—and as he pondered each disjointed part, the overarching meaning grew increasingly elusive.

An aged fish monster—who was a doctor, an astrologer, and a prayer master—once looked at Sagojo and spoke thus.
“Oh, how pitiful.”
“You’ve contracted a karmic disease.”
“Once this disease takes hold, ninety-nine out of a hundred are doomed to lead miserable lives.”
“Originally unknown among our kind, this affliction began appearing rarely ever since we started devouring humans.”
“Those stricken cannot accept anything as it is.”
“Whatever they see or encounter—immediately they ask ‘Why?’”
“They strain to ponder that ‘Why?’ known only to the ultimate, genuine God.”
“No creature can survive dwelling on such thoughts.”
“Is it not our world’s unspoken pact among living beings to avoid such ponderings?”
“The gravest trouble comes when this patient doubts ‘self’ itself.”
“‘Why do I call myself me?’”
“‘Why shouldn’t others be me instead?’”
“‘What in blazes am I?’”
“When these thoughts begin—that marks this disease’s most malignant symptom.”
“Well?”
“Didn’t I strike true?”
“A pity—this disease has neither cure nor physician.”
“You must heal it yourself.”
“Barring some extraordinary providence, you’ll never see your complexion clear again.”

II

The invention of writing had long since spread from the human world and become known in theirs as well, but by and large, they maintained a custom of despising written characters.
Living wisdom could not possibly be recorded with such dead things as written characters.
(With pictures, perhaps one might manage to depict it.) This was generally held to be a folly akin to trying to grasp smoke in one’s hands while preserving its form.
Therefore, understanding written characters came to be rejected as a symptom of waning vitality.
That Sagojo remained perpetually gloomy was undoubtedly because he comprehended written characters—or so it was believed among the river monsters.

Written characters were not revered, but that did not mean thought was disregarded.
Among the thirteen thousand monsters, there were no small number of philosophers.
However, because their vocabulary was exceedingly limited, the most difficult existential questions were pondered through the most innocent of words.
They had each set up their thinking shops at the bottom of Quicksand River, to such an extent that a vein of philosophical melancholy pervaded this riverbed.
A wise old fish purchased a beautiful garden and meditated beneath a bright window on eternal, regretless happiness.
A noble fish clan sat beneath vivid green algae with beautiful stripes, strumming a harp while praising the universe’s musical harmony.
Ugly, dull, and foolishly honest—yet making no effort to conceal his anguish—Sagojo became prime sport among these intellectual monsters.
A seemingly astute monster faced Sagojo and declared with mock solemnity:
“What in creation is truth?”
Then strode off in long strides without awaiting reply, sneering lips twisting.
Another monster—a mackerel spirit—came expressly upon hearing of Sagojo’s ailment.
Having concluded this “fear of death” fueled his affliction, he arrived to jeer:
“Where life persists, death absents itself.
When death arrives, self dissolves.
What then remains to fear?” Such was his argument.
Sagojo readily conceded its soundness—
For death held no terror for him,
Nor lay his malady there.
The mackerel spirit departed foiled.

In the world of monsters, body and mind were not as distinctly separated as in the human world, so mental afflictions immediately manifested as intense physical suffering that tormented Sagojo.
When he could no longer bear it, he finally resolved himself.
"No matter how arduous the effort, no matter how ridiculed and mocked I might be at every destination—at any rate, I shall first personally meet all the sages dwelling in this river's depths, every doctor, every astrologer, and seek teachings until I attain satisfaction within myself."

He donned a shabby robe and set out.

Why are monsters monsters and not humans?
They are cripples who have developed a single attribute of themselves to such an extreme degree—utterly disrupting any balance with others—that it becomes grotesquely-ugly and inhuman.
Some were excessively gluttonous, their mouths and bellies growing grotesquely large; some were excessively lewd, the organs employed for such purposes becoming abnormally developed; some were excessively chaste, all parts below the head having completely atrophied.
They were all absolutely fixated on their own dispositions and worldviews, knowing nothing of reaching higher conclusions through discussions with others.
This was because their own characteristics had grown too pronounced for them to follow the logic of others' thoughts.
Therefore, at the bottom of Quicksand River, hundreds of worldviews and metaphysics—never harmonizing with others—swayed and undulated like countless algae: some with the serene delight of despair, some with bottomless brightness, some with sighs of desire unaccompanied by hope.

III

The first one Sagojo visited was a man known as Black Egg Taoist, the most renowned master of illusion magic at that time.
In the not-too-deep riverbed, rocks were piled high to form a cave, and above its entrance hung a plaque inscribed with "Slanting Moon and Three Stars Cave."
The master of the hermitage was said to have a fish’s face and a human’s body, excel in illusion magic, exist or vanish at will, summon thunder in winter, create ice in summer, make fliers run and runners fly.
Sagojo served this Taoist for three months.
Illusion magic itself meant nothing to him, but he had reasoned that if one could master such arts to that degree, they must surely be a true sage—and if they were a true sage, they would have comprehended the Great Dao of the universe and thus possess the wisdom needed to cure his affliction.
However, Sagojo could not help but be disappointed.
Black Egg Taoist—seated deep within the cave upon the back of a giant turtle—and the dozens of disciples surrounding him spoke of nothing but divinely wondrous and unfathomable magical arts.
...and nothing but practical talk about using those arts to deceive enemies or obtain treasures from such-and-such a place.
There was not a single soul who would engage in the useless contemplation Sagojo sought.
In the end, after being ridiculed and made a fool of, Sagojo was driven out of Three Stars Cave.

Next, Sagojo went to the Sand Rainbow Hermit’s abode.
This was an aged shrimp spirit whose back was already bent like a bow, living half-buried in the riverbed’s sand.
For another three months, Sagojo attended this old hermit, tending to his daily needs while gaining exposure to his profound philosophy.
The aged shrimp spirit had Sagojo massage his bent back and spoke with a grave expression as follows.

“The world is utterly futile.”
“Is there even a single good thing in this world?”
“If there were any, it would be only that the end of this world will eventually come.”
“There is no need to think up complicated reasons.”
“Look around you.”
“Ceaseless flux, anxiety, torment, fear, disillusionment, strife, weariness.”
“Truly, it is a turbid, obscure, chaotic swirl with nowhere to return.”
“We stand and live only upon the moment called the present.”
“Moreover, the present beneath our feet immediately vanishes into the past.”
“The same holds true for the next moment and the next moment after that.”
“It is like how a traveler standing on an unstable sandy slope finds the ground crumbling away beneath their feet with each step taken.”
“Where should we find rest?”
“If we try to stop, we cannot avoid falling—so our lives are but an endless forced descent down this slope.”
“You call this happiness?”
“Such a thing is merely a conceptual fantasy—by no means does it denote any actual state of being.”
“Hopeless hope is merely something that has obtained a name.”

Seeing Sagojo’s anxious expression, the hermit added as if to console him.

“But, young one. You need not fear such things. Those swept away by waves drown, but those who ride them can cross beyond. It is not impossible to transcend this transience of existence and reach the indestructible and immovable realm. The true sages of antiquity transcended right and wrong, transcended good and evil, forgot themselves and all things, and reached the realm of neither death nor birth. But as has been said since ancient times: if you think such a state is pleasant, you’re gravely mistaken. In exchange for there being no suffering, there are none of the joys that ordinary creatures possess—flavorless, colorless. Truly insipid, like wax or sand.”

Sagojo interjected modestly.
"What I wish to ask about isn't matters like personal happiness or establishing imperturbability, but rather the ultimate meaning of self and the world."
The hermit answered while blinking his rheumy eyes.

"The self?"
"The world?"
"Do you believe an objective world exists when separated from the self?"
"The world, you must understand, is but an illusion projected by the self between time and space."
"When the self perishes, the world vanishes—this you must grasp."
"To imagine the world persists after the self's demise—what vulgar delusion! A most egregious error."
"Even should the world disappear, this mysterious self—this enigma whose true nature escapes us—would endure eternally."

On the morning of exactly the ninetieth day since Sagojo had begun his service, after several days of violent abdominal pain and diarrhea, the old hermit finally succumbed.
...rejoicing that through his own death he could obliterate the objective world that inflicted upon him such repulsive diarrhea and agonizing abdominal pain.

Sagojo tenderly tended to his remains and, with tears, embarked on a new journey.

Rumor had it that Master Zuōwàng perpetually slept while maintaining his zazen posture, only being roused once every fifty days.
And he was said to believe the dream world during sleep to be reality while regarding his occasional waking moments as dreams.
When Sagojo had traveled all the way to visit this master, the master was sleeping.
In the murky depths of Quicksand River’s deepest valley where scarcely any light reached from above, Sagojo struggled to discern anything until his eyes adjusted—but soon, a monk-like form seated in full lotus position and sleeping on a dimly lit platform at the bottom faintly floated into view before him.
In a place where no sounds from outside could be heard and fish rarely came, Sagojo had no choice but to sit before Master Zuōwàng and close his eyes. When he did so, he felt a faint ringing that made his ears seem to grow distant.

On the fourth day after Sagojo’s arrival, the Master opened his eyes.
Right before his eyes, Sagojo hurriedly stood up and performed a bow, which the Master neither truly saw nor ignored—he merely blinked two or three times.
After continuing their silent sitting for a while, Sagojo timidly opened his mouth.
“Master.”
“I must apologize for my abruptness, but may I pose one question?”
“Pray tell, what is this ‘self’?”
“Ho! A Qin-era crushing drill!” With that fierce cry, Sagojo’s head was immediately struck by a staff.
He staggered but resumed his seat, and after a while, this time with full caution, repeated his earlier question.
This time, the staff did not come down.
Parting his thick lips yet without moving his face or body in the slightest, Master Zuōwàng answered in words that seemed to drift from a dream.
“You are the one who feels hunger when long deprived of food.
“You are the one who feels the cold when winter comes.”
Then, having closed his thick lips, he looked toward Sagojo for a while before eventually closing his eyes.
And thus, he did not open them for fifty days.
Sagojo waited patiently.
On the fiftieth day, Master Zuōwàng, having awoken once more, saw Sagojo sitting before him and spoke.
“You’re still here?”
Sagojo respectfully answered that he had waited fifty days.
“Fifty days?” The Master fixed Sagojo with those dreamlike, languid eyes of his but remained perfectly still and silent for a time.
At last, the heavy lips parted.

“Foolish are those who fail to realize that time’s measure exists solely in the perceiver’s actual experience.
“They say humans have crafted instruments to gauge time’s length—this will plant seeds of grave delusion in days to come.
“The Great Spring’s eight millennia and the morning mushroom’s single dawn hold equal duration.
“Time is but a mechanism within our skulls—mark my words.”

Having uttered this, the Master closed his eyes once more.
Knowing those eyes would not reopen for fifty days, Sagojo bowed reverently to the slumbering sage before taking his leave.

“Be afraid.”
“Tremble.”
“And believe in God.”

At the busiest crossroads of Quicksand River stood a young man who was shouting.

“Consider how our brief lives are engulfed within infinite eons stretching endlessly before and after us.”
“Consider how the narrow space we inhabit is hurled into an infinite vastness—unknown to us and knowing nothing of us.”
“Who can behold their own insignificance and remain unafraid?”
“We are all death-row prisoners bound by iron chains.”
“Every single moment, a few among us are killed before our very eyes.”
“We have no hope; we merely await our turn.”
“Time is pressing in!”
“Do you intend to spend that brief span in self-deception and intoxication?”
“Accursed cowards! Do you intend to spend that time relying on your wretched reason and wallowing in self-conceit?”
“Arrogant fools who know not your place!”
“With your meager reason and will, can you not even control a single sneeze?”

The fair-skinned youth flushed his cheeks and shouted hoarsely. Where in that feminine, noble bearing could such ferocity hide? Astonished, Sagojo gazed into those burning, beautiful eyes. He felt a fiery holy arrow from the youth’s words pierce toward his very soul.

“All we can do is love God and despise ourselves.”
“Parts must not grow conceited, thinking themselves independent entities.”
“Make the will of the whole your own will absolutely, and live your self only for the whole.”
“Those who unite with God become a single spirit.”

This was truly the voice of a holy and noble soul, Sagojo thought, yet despite this, he couldn’t help sensing that what he now hungered for was not this divine voice.
He also reflected that maxims were like medicines—it availed nothing to offer a remedy for boils to one suffering from malaria.

At the roadside not far from that crossroads, Sagojo saw an ugly beggar. A dreadful hunchback—suspended from a spine arched so high it pulled all his internal organs upward, the crown of his head sunk far below his shoulders, his chin nearly concealing his navel. Moreover, at the sight of red festering sores covering his shoulders and back, Sagojo unconsciously halted his steps and let out a sigh. Then the crouching beggar—unable to move his neck freely—rolled his clouded red eyes upward and grinned, revealing a single long front tooth. Then, swinging his upward-pulled arms limply, he staggered over to Sagojo and said.

“How presumptuous of you to pity me.”
“Young one.”
“Do you think I’m some pitiful wretch?”
“It seems I can’t help but find you far more pitiful, though.”
“Do you think I resent the Creator just because He made me this shape?”
“Far from it.”
“Why, ’tis quite the opposite—I’m practically praising the Creator for making me such a rare form, I tell you.”
“Why, just thinking about what amusing forms I’ll take from now on seems like a pleasure in itself, I tell you.”
“If my left arm becomes a rooster, I’ll have it announce the hours, and if my right arm becomes a crossbow, then as Master Yügyo’s disciple—having transcended form to enter the realm beyond birth and death—I’ll be neither wet by water nor burned by fire, sleep without dreaming, and wake without cares, I tell you.”
“Why, just the other day, the four of us had a good laugh talking about this very thing.”
“We take nothingness as our head, life as our back, and death as our buttocks, I tell you.”
“Ahahaha….”

Startled by the eerie laughter yet still, Sagojo thought that this beggar might indeed be what they call an Enlightened Being.
If these words were genuine, it would be remarkable.
However, there was something ostentatious in this man’s words and demeanor that made Sagojo suspect he was forcing himself to speak grandly while enduring pain; moreover, the man’s ugliness and the stench of pus gave Sagojo a physiological revulsion.
He was quite drawn in heart, yet there he refrained from serving the beggar.
However, as he wished to inquire about this Master Yügyo person mentioned earlier in the conversation, he let that slip.

“Ah, the Master,”
“The Master, you know—he’s holed up in a hermitage some two thousand eight hundred ri north of here, where this Quicksand River meets the Red River and Black River.”
“If that resolve of yours holds firm, he’ll give you plenty of teachings to chew on.”
“Since you’re going to the trouble, you’d best throw yourself into training.”
“Give him my regards too, if you would,” said the wretched hunchback, puffing up his pointed shoulders as much as his twisted frame allowed and speaking with forced grandeur.

IV

Aiming for the confluence of Quicksand River, Black River, and Red River, Sagojo journeyed northward.
At night, he would bed down in reed thickets to catch fleeting dreams; come morning, he resumed his northward trek across the endless sandy riverbed beneath the water’s surface.
Each time he saw fish merrily flashing their silver scales, he would lament, Why am I alone unable to find such joy? as he walked day after day.
Even along the way, whenever he encountered any notable ascetics or practitioners, he made sure to seek them out.

When he visited Kyūzen Ayuko—a catfish monster renowned for his gluttony and brute strength—this pitch-black, burly monster stroked his long beard and declared, “If you dwell only on distant concerns, you’ll surely invite near troubles. Enlightened beings do not take a grand view,” he taught. “Take this fish, for instance.” No sooner had Kyūzen Ayuko said this than he grabbed a carp swimming past his eyes and began explaining while voraciously chewing on it. “Now, pondering why this fish must pass before my eyes and be destined to become my meal—that’s conduct befitting an Enlightened being. But if you’d gone on thinking such things before catching it, your prey would’ve swum away. First catch the carp quickly and devour it; thinking afterward isn’t too late. You’re the man who gets tangled in absurdly lofty questions—why a carp is a carp, metaphysical comparisons between carp and crucian carp—and always fails to catch them. The light in your listless eyes declares it plainly. How’s that?” Sagojo bowed his head, acknowledging this truth. The monster had already devoured the carp and still fixed his greedy gaze on Sagojo’s neck when his eyes suddenly gleamed and his throat gulped. Sagojo jerked his head up, instinctively sensing danger as he recoiled. The monster’s razor-sharp claws grazed his throat with terrifying speed. The enraged face of the beast who had missed his first strike loomed large. Sagojo kicked violently at the water, stirring a mud cloud as he fled the cave in panic. “So this was how I learned harsh reality from that ferocious monster,” he thought, trembling.

When Sagojo attended the lecture of Prince Mukuchō—famous as a preacher of neighborly love—he was astonished to see this holy monk suddenly driven by hunger midway through his sermon and voraciously devour two or three of his own children (though being a crab monster, he hatched countless offspring from eggs at once).

The saint who preached compassion and forbearance now caught and devoured his own child before everyone’s eyes.
And then, having finished eating, as though oblivious to what he had just done, he began expounding compassion anew.
It was not forgetfulness—the act of sating his hunger had simply never risen to his awareness at all.
There might indeed be something here for me to learn, Sagojo thought, grasping at strange logic.
Where in my life exists such an instinctive, selfless moment?
Believing he had received a precious lesson, he knelt and bowed reverently.
No—it’s precisely this compulsion to attach conceptual interpretations to everything that reveals my weakness, he reconsidered once more.
To internalize teachings not as preserved rations but in their living form—yes, yes—Sagojo bowed again with utmost reverence before respectfully taking his leave.

Kouiko’s hermitage was an unconventional training hall.
There were only four or five disciples, but each of them followed their master’s path, delving into nature’s secret mysteries.
They might be better described as enraptured souls rather than seekers.
Their practice consisted solely of observing nature and profoundly immersing themselves in its beautiful harmony.

“First, it’s about feeling.”
“It is to refine the senses as beautifully and wisely as possible.”
“Any thought divorced from the direct experience of natural beauty is but a gray dream,” said one of the disciples.

“Immerse your heart deeply and gaze upon nature,”
“Clouds, sky, wind, snow, pale blue ice, the sway of red algae, the finely shimmering light of diatoms in the night water, the spiral of a nautilus shell, amethyst crystals, the red of garnet, the blue of fluorite.”
“How beautifully they seem to speak nature’s secrets!”
His words were like those of a poet.

“Yet just as we are on the verge of deciphering nature’s coded script,” continued another disciple, “the happy premonition suddenly vanishes, and once again we must behold nature’s beautiful yet cold profile.”
“This too is because our sensory training remains insufficient,” he added, “and because our hearts have not yet plunged deeply enough.”
“We must continue striving without cease.”
“For in time, we will surely attain those moments where, as our Master says, ‘To observe is to love, and to love is to create.’”

All the while, Master Kouiko never spoke a word, holding a single piece of vivid green malachite in his palm as he gazed at it with a serene look filled with profound joy.

Sagojo stayed at this hermitage for about a month.
During that time, he too became a nature poet alongside them, praising the harmony of the cosmos and wishing to merge with its innermost life.
Though he felt out of place himself, it was because he was drawn to their quiet happiness.

Among the disciples, there was one exceptionally beautiful boy.
His skin was translucent like a whitefish, his large black pupils dreamily wide open, and the curls cascading over his forehead were as soft as pigeon down.
When a slight sorrow touched his heart, a faint shadow akin to wispy clouds passing before the moon would fall across his beautiful face; when joy was present, the depths of his quietly clear eyes would shine like jewels of the night.
Both the master and his peers loved this boy.
Guileless and pure, this boy’s heart knew nothing of doubt.
Yet he was too beautiful, too fragile—as though crafted from some ethereal essence—and this left everyone with an indefinable sense of unease.
The boy, whenever he had free time, would drip pale amber honey onto a white stone and use it to draw morning glory flowers.

Four or five days before Sagojo was to leave this hermitage, the boy left in the morning and never returned.
A disciple who had gone out with him made a strange report.
"While I was distracted, the boy dissolved into the water—I saw it with my own eyes," he said.
The other disciples laughed at this absurd claim, but Master Kouiko solemnly affirmed its truth.
"That may be so," he said. "Such a thing might indeed happen to that child—he was too pure."

Sagojo took his leave of Master Kouiko while pondering side by side the vigor of the catfish monster that had tried to devour him and the beauty of the boy who had dissolved into water.

After Master Kouiko, he went to Ban’i Ketsuba’s abode.
She was a female monster who had already lived over five hundred years, yet the suppleness of her skin differed not at all from that of a maiden, and her alluring figure was said to melt even hearts of iron.
This aged female monster—who made the pursuit of carnal pleasure her sole creed—had gathered dozens of handsome youths within chambers lining her rear courtyard. When indulging in these pleasures, she shut out all intimacy, severed social ties, secluded herself in the rear quarters where day merged seamlessly into night, and only emerged once every three months.
Sagojo’s visit coincided precisely with this once-every-three-months occasion, so he was fortunate enough to see the aged female monster.
Upon hearing he was a seeker of the Way, Ban’i Ketsuba expounded her teachings to Sagojo,
allowing a shadow of languid weariness to show somewhere in her radiant beauty.

“This is the path, you see.
“This is the path, you see.
“The teachings of sages and the practices of immortals—ultimately their purpose lies in sustaining such moments of supreme spiritual ecstasy.
“Just consider this.
“To be born into this world is truly a rare blessing amidst immeasurable eons as countless as the Ganges’ sands.
“Yet death descends upon us with astonishing swiftness.
“Given that we who possess this hard-won life await death’s easy arrival—what else could we contemplate but this path?
“Ah, that tingling rapture!
“That ever-renewing intoxication!” the female monster cried, narrowing her bewitchingly decadent eyes like one drunk.

“I’m afraid you’re far too unsightly for me to consider allowing you to stay—so I’ll tell you the truth: in my rear chambers, a hundred young men perish from exhaustion each year.”
“But let me make this clear—they all die joyfully and fully satisfied with their lives.”
“Not a single soul who remained with me ever died bearing a grudge.”
“Though there were those who, facing death’s approach, lamented being unable to continue these pleasures.”

While casting a gaze that seemed to pity Sagojo’s ugliness, Ban’i Ketsuba added these final words.

“Virtue, you see, is the ability to enjoy.”

Because of his ugliness—grateful that it had spared him from joining the hundred companions who perished each year—Sagojo continued his journey.

The sages’ teachings were far too varied, and he found himself utterly at a loss as to what to believe.

“What is the self?” he asked.
“First, roar,” replied a sage.
“If it comes out ‘Buu,’ you’re a pig.
If it comes out ‘Gyaa,’ you’re a goose.”

Another sage taught this.
"If you do not even attempt to forcibly define what the self is, then knowing the self is not particularly difficult."
He also said: "The eye sees all things, but cannot see itself."
"The self is ultimately something that cannot be known by itself."

Another sage expounded: “The self is always the self. There existed something called ‘self’ through infinite time before your present consciousness arose—though none remember it now—and this became what you now call ‘I.’ Through endless time after your current consciousness perishes, there will again exist something called ‘self.’ None can foresee this now; when that time comes, they will have utterly forgotten this present awareness.”

There was also a man who said the following: “What is a single continuous self? It’s the accumulation of memory’s shadows.” This man also taught Sagojo: “The loss of memory constitutes the entirety of what we do every day. Because we’ve forgotten that we’ve forgotten things, everything feels new—but in truth, that’s because we thoroughly forget everything. Not just yesterday’s matters, but even those from a mere moment ago—all perceptions, all emotions of that instant—we forget them completely in the very next moment. All that remains afterward are faint copies of a tiny fraction of those things. So, Sagojo, the present moment—that thing—what an astonishing thing it is!”

Now, after nearly five years of repeating the folly of shuttling between many physicians who prescribed different remedies for the same condition, Sagojo finally realized he had grown not a whit wiser.
Far from becoming wiser, he felt he had somehow turned into something floaty-and-insubstantial—something incomprehensible, as if he were not himself.
Even though his former self had been foolish, at least compared to now, it had been more solid—a sensation that was almost physical—and he felt that he had at least possessed his own weight.
But now, it had become something utterly weightless—something that would scatter with the slightest breath.
Although various patterns had been painted on from the outside, it had become something utterly devoid of substance.
This won’t do, Sagojo thought.
He also had a premonition that there might be a more direct answer beyond the search for meaning through contemplation.
The foolishness of myself, who had sought answers as clear as mathematical solutions to such matters.
Around the time he began noticing such things, the water ahead grew reddish-black and murky, and he arrived at the dwelling of Yügyo-shi, the sage he had been seeking.

Yügyo-shi appeared at first glance to be an utterly ordinary sage—if anything, even simple-minded.
Even when Sagojo came, he neither put him to use nor imparted any teachings.
Since the rigid are disciples of death and the pliant are disciples of life, he seemed to abhor the rigid attitude of “I shall learn! I shall learn!”
However, very occasionally—not addressing anyone in particular—he would mutter something.
At such times, Sagojo would hurriedly strain to listen, but the voice was too low and he usually couldn’t make it out.
For three months, he was ultimately unable to hear any teachings.
“A fool knows more about himself than a wise man does about others; therefore, one must cure their own disease themselves” was the only phrase he ever managed to catch from Yügyo-shi.
At the end of the third month, Sagojo finally gave up and went to his master to take his leave.
And then, at that very moment—unusually—Yügyo-shi began prolixly imparting teachings to Sagojo.
“On the Foolishness of Grieving Over Not Having Three Eyes”
“On the Misfortune of Those Who Cannot Rest Unless They Seek to Control Even the Growth of Their Nails and Hair Through Will”
“On Those Who Are Drunk Not Being Injured Even If They Fall From a Carriage”
“However, it cannot be said that thinking is categorically bad—for while the happiness of those who do not think resembles a pig that knows no seasickness, only the act of thinking about thinking itself must be strictly avoided.”

Yügyo-shi spoke of a fiend endowed with theosophical wisdom whom he had once known.
That fiend knew everything without exception—from the movements of celestial bodies above to the life and death of microorganisms below—and through profound and subtle calculations could not only trace back all past events but also predict any future occurrence that was to take place.
However, this fiend was terribly unhappy.
For this was because the fiend had one day suddenly thought, “Why must all events in the world—which I can foresee in their entirety—occur precisely as they do? (Not in terms of process or manner, but in the fundamental why),” and discovered that even with his profound and subtle calculations he could ultimately never uncover their ultimate reason.
Why are sunflowers yellow?
Why is grass green?
Why does everything exist as it does?
This doubt tormented and plagued the fiend with vast supernatural powers, ultimately leading him to a wretched death.

Yügyo-shi also spoke of another spirit.
This was a very small and wretched fiend who always claimed he had been born to search for a certain small, sharply gleaming thing.
No one understood what this gleaming thing might be, but regardless, the little fiend earnestly sought it—lived for it—died for it.
And though that small sharp gleaming thing was never found in the end, Master Yügyo-shi recounted that this little fiend’s life was thought to have been an exceedingly happy one.
Yet while telling these tales, he offered no explanation of their meaning.
However, at the very end, Master Yügyo-shi said these words.

“Blessed are those who know holy madness.”
“For he saves himself by killing himself.”
“Woe to those who do not know holy madness.”
“For he perishes by neither killing nor letting himself live.”
“To love is a nobler form of understanding.”
“Know that to act is a clearer form of thinking.”
“Pitiable Sagojo, you who cannot help but steep everything in the poisonous brew of consciousness.”
“The great changes that determine our fates are all carried out without our conscious awareness, I tell you!”
“Consider this.”
“When you were born, were you conscious of it?”

Sagojo reverently answered his master.
The master’s teachings were now deeply and keenly understood.
In truth, I had come to feel through my many years of wandering that contemplation alone only sank me deeper into the quagmire, yet here I was suffering because I could not break through my current self and be reborn.

Upon hearing that, Yügyo-shi said.

“When a mountain stream flows to the edge of a cliff, it first forms a whirlpool before becoming a waterfall that plunges down.”
“Sagojo.”
“You now hesitate just one step before that whirlpool.”
“Take one step into its vortex, and the fall to the abyss comes in a single breath.”
“There will be no time for contemplation, reflection, or hesitation along the way.”
“Timid Sagojo.”
“You watch those being swept into the swirling descent—your gaze mingling fear and pity—while wavering over whether to leap yourself.”
“You know full well you must eventually crash upon the valley floor.”
“You know full well that avoiding the vortex brings no happiness.”
“And still you cling to your bystander’s perch?”
“Foolish Sagojo—can you not see that those gasping in life’s terrible maelstrom are not half as wretched as they appear? (They find more joy in their thrashing than any skeptical onlooker ever could!)”

Although Sagojo felt his master's teachings pierce him to the marrow with their profound worth, he still took leave of his master while carrying something unresolved within him.

He resolved that he would no longer ask anyone for the way.
"Everyone puts on airs of understanding, but none truly comprehend a thing," Sagojo muttered to himself as he began his journey back.
"Let's keep pretending we understand each other."
"The fact that we don't understand—we all thoroughly grasp that much—seems to be the unspoken pact everyone lives by."
"If such a pact already exists, what an obtuse nuisance I must be—kicking up a fuss now by wailing 'I don't understand! I don't understand!'"
"Honestly."

Five

Being slow and indecisive by nature, Sagojo could not perform any dazzling feats like sudden enlightenment or great spiritual awakenings; yet gradually, imperceptible changes seemed to be taking effect upon him.

At first, it felt like placing a bet.
If I were permitted a single choice—if one path led to eternal mire while the other, though perilous, might lead to salvation—then anyone would surely choose the latter path.
And yet why had I been hesitating?
It was there that he first noticed the base utilitarian aspects within his own way of thinking.
The feeling that choosing a perilous path and suffering through it only to ultimately remain unsaved would result in an irreversible loss had, without my realizing it, been influencing my indecision.
To avoid wasted effort, I—lazy, foolish, and base—had resolved to remain on a path that, while not breaking any bones, would only lead to decisive ruin.

However, during his stay with Master Yügyo-shi, his feelings too had gradually been driven toward a single direction. What had once been driven was now beginning to transform into something that would move forward of its own accord. He had always believed that he had been seeking not his own happiness but the meaning of the world, but now it was beginning to dawn on Sagojo that this had been a grave mistake—that in truth, beneath such an unusual guise, he had been most tenaciously pursuing his own happiness. That he was not such a great being as to dwell on discussing the meaning of the world—this he came to feel not with self-abasement but with a tranquil sense of satisfaction. And before speaking such impertinence, in any case, the courage to attempt to unfold the self that even he himself must still be unaware of had emerged. Before hesitating, I will try. Without considering whether the outcome succeeds or fails, I will try with all my might for the sake of trying. Even if it ends in decisive failure, that’s fine. He who had always abandoned effort out of fear of failure had now been sublimated to a point where he did not mind wasted exertion.

Six

Sagojo’s body was utterly exhausted.

One day, he collapsed by the side of a road and fell into a deep slumber.
It was a coma of utter oblivion—everything completely forgotten.
He continued to sleep in a deep stupor for several days.
He forgot hunger and did not dream.

Suddenly, when he opened his eyes, he noticed that his surroundings were bathed in a bluish-white pallor.
It was night.
It was a bright moonlit night.
A large round spring full moon shone down through the water's surface, filling the shallow riverbed with a tranquil white radiance.
Sagojo rose up with that refreshed clarity that follows deep slumber.
The moment he did, he became aware of his hunger.
He grabbed five or six fish swimming nearby and stuffed them noisily into his mouth, then took up the gourd of sake hanging at his waist and drained it in one long draught.
It tasted wonderful.
Glug-glug—he drank with audible gulps.
When he'd emptied the gourd to its dregs, he set off walking in high spirits.

The light was so bright that each grain of sand at the bottom could be clearly distinguished.
Along the water plants, a constant line of small bubbles glowed like mercury globules, swaying as they ascended.
From time to time, the bellies of small fish that caught sight of him and darted away would flash white before disappearing into the shadows of blue waterweeds.
Sagojo grew increasingly entranced.
Uncharacteristically, he felt like singing and was on the verge of raising his voice.
At that moment, a voice that seemed to be chanting from far away reached his ears.
He stopped and listened intently.
The voice seemed to come from outside the water, yet also from somewhere deep within the riverbed.
If he listened to the song that reached him faintly in a low yet crystalline voice,

江国春風吹不起

鷓鴣啼在深花裏

三級浪高魚化竜

痴人猶𡰷夜塘水

It seemed to be something along those lines.
Sagojo sat down where he was and continued listening intently.
In the transparent watery world dyed pale by moonlight, the monotonous song lingered faintly like a hunting horn’s call fading in the wind, echoing on and on.

He was neither asleep nor awake.
Sagojo crouched there blankly for a long time, with a feeling as though his soul ached sweetly.
Before long, he entered a strange world that was neither dream nor illusion.
The water plants and shadows of fish abruptly vanished from his view, when suddenly an indescribable fragrance of orchid and musk came wafting through.
No sooner had this happened than he saw two unfamiliar figures approaching him.

At the forefront stood an imposing man of peculiar bearing, gripping a khakkhara staff in his hand.
Behind him was one who wore jeweled necklaces about the head, bore a fleshy topknot upon the crown, and possessed a countenance of serene dignity that faintly glowed with a halo—clearly no ordinary being.
Then the foremost figure drew near and spoke.

“I am Mokusha Egan, second prince of the Pagoda-Bearing Heavenly King. This one here is none other than my master—the Great Bodhisattva Kannon of the South Sea. My master—who pours equal compassion upon all, from heavenly dragons and yakshas to gandharvas, asuras, garudas, kinnaras, mahoragas, humans, and non-humans—has deigned to observe your anguish this time and has specially descended here to ordain you. You should gratefully receive this.”

Into the ears of Sagojo—who had involuntarily bowed his head—resounded a beautiful, feminine voice: a celestial melody, a sacred chant, an oceanic murmur.

“O Sagojo, calmly listen to my words and contemplate them well. O presumptuous Sagojo. Even those who claim attainment without having attained, who declare realization without having realized—the World-Honored One denounced this as arrogance. Then what else can we call one like you—who sought to prove the unprovable—but the ultimate arrogance? What you seek remains beyond even Arhats and Pratyekabuddhas, who neither attain nor attempt it. O pitiable Sagojo. How has your soul fallen into such a wretched labyrinth? Had you gained right insight, pure karma would have formed instantly—yet you, with your feeble mind, fell into false views and now suffer the boundless agonies of three evil paths. Since contemplation cannot save you, henceforth abandon all thought and strive to save yourself through action alone. Time is but the name for human action. The world may seem meaningless when viewed whole, but gains infinite meaning when engaging its details directly. O Sagojo. First place yourself in a fitting position and devote yourself to fitting work. Cast aside completely that presumptuous ‘Why’ which oversteps its bounds. Without this, there is no salvation for you. Now this autumn, three monks shall cross Quicksand River east to west—the reincarnated Golden Cicada Elder Master Xuanzang and his two disciples. They journey under Tang Emperor Taizong’s decree to retrieve the true Mahayana Tripitaka from India’s Great Thunderclap Temple. O Sagojo, you too shall follow Xuanzang westward. This position suits you, this duty befits you.”

“The path will be arduous, but you must strive without doubt and simply persevere. Among Xuanzang’s disciples, there is one called Wukong. He is ignorant and unlearned, yet simply believes without doubt. You especially will have much to learn from this one.”

When Sagojo lifted his head again, there was nothing to be seen.
He stood blankly in the moonlit riverbed.
It felt strange.
In a dim corner of his hazy mind, he began idly pondering these thoughts.

"...Such things happen to those who seem likely to have such things happen, and such things happen when it seems likely they will happen."
If I were my half-year-ago self, I wouldn't have had such a strange dream as this one now...
Come to think of it, the Bodhisattva's words in this dream weren't any different from what Yügyo-shi or the Shrimp Hermit had said—yet how strange that tonight they struck me so deeply...
Well, I don't believe for a second that some dream could bring salvation...
However—I don't know why—I can't shake this feeling that the Tang monk from the recent dream's prophecy might actually pass through here...
"When it seems likely that such things will happen—that's precisely when they do happen..."

With that thought, he smiled for the first time in ages.

VII

That autumn, Sagojo indeed encountered and served Master Xuanzang of the Great Tang, and by his power was able to emerge from the water and transform into human form. And so, together with the brave and guileless Great Sage Equaling Heaven Sun Wukong and the indolent optimist Heavenly Marshal Zhu Bajie, he set forth upon a new pilgrimage journey. However, even on this path, Sagojo—who had not yet fully cast off his old affliction—still could not abandon his habit of soliloquizing. He muttered.

"This feels strange."
"It just doesn’t sit right."
"Does ceasing to force oneself to ask about things one doesn’t understand ultimately mean one has understood them?"
"How utterly vague this all is!"
"This isn’t much of a splendid molting!"
"Hmph, hmph. I just can’t seem to accept this properly."
"At any rate, I must be grateful that it no longer torments me as much as before..."

—"My Journey to the West"—