Tangseng and his three disciples have traveled to the wild country west of China. They arrive at a strange city where Daoism is revered and Buddhism is forbidden. The few remaining Buddhist monks are enslaved, but every night they receive a dream message that the Great Sage Equal to Heaven will come to save them. This of course is the Monkey King Sun Wukong, the eldest disciple. Sun Wukong gleefully causes trouble in the city, and finds himself in a series of deadly competitions with three Daoist Immortals.
This is the 15th book in the best-selling The Journey to the West series of stories for students learning to read Chinese. It is based on the epic 16th-century novel of the same name by Wu Chen'en. That novel was inspired, by an actual journey by the Buddhist monk Tangseng, who traveled from Chang'an westward to India in 629 A.D. and returned seventeen years later with priceless knowledge and spiritual texts. Over the course of the book, Tangseng and his companions face the 81 tribulations that Tangseng had to endure to attain Buddhahood.
