Rebirth is no blessing. It is a curse. When Sun Wukong opens his eyes beneath the Five Elements Mountain for the five-hundredth year, memories of five hundred lifetimes flood his mind. Only then does he realize he has been trapped in the cracks of time for a full five hundred years.
It turns out he has already experienced five hundred cycles of the Journey to the West, each following a predetermined script to the ending of “Victorious Fighting Buddha.” This time, reborn with the memories of all five hundred lifetimes, he decides to escape the Buddha’s grasp and overturn the game of chess that has been played for billions of years.
