On the Execution Platform, the gazes of countless gods and Buddhas were cold and piercing. I watched as the kind-faced monkey in his cassock raised the staff that the gods and Buddhas called the Ruyi Jingu Bang (Golden Cudgel). I had witnessed my fellow disciples die one by one under the staff of this monkey, so full of Buddhist aura. I knew he was no longer the Great Sage Equal to Heaven, clad in golden chainmail, wearing a phoenix-winged purple-gold crown and lotus-silk cloud-walking boots. No longer the monkey from the Three Star Cave at the foot of Fangcun Mountain. He was… the Victorious Fighting Buddha. Just as the monkey's staff was about to fall on my head, the sword appeared! The sword that terrified the gods and Buddhas appeared.
