In the beginning, when the ink of creation was still wet on the pages of the cosmos, the One Above All decided to try something new. It wasn't born from a grand design or a divine purpose. It was, for all intents and purposes, a cosmic doodle. From the stubborn heart of a fallen star and the unyielding spirit of primordial stone, a monkey was forged.
The creator entity looked upon its handiwork, a perfect, unassuming stone egg, humming with the chaotic potential of a thousand nascent galaxies. As the final spark of life settled within, a thought, singular and profound, echoed through the void. A thought that would set the course for millennia of divine headaches.
'What the fuck did I just do?'
…
The world in 20,000 BC was a patchwork quilt of divine real estate. On the high plains of a still-young Earth, the lands were carved into territories jealously guarded by gods and their pantheons. Here, a mortal could be smote for an ill-timed sneeze, and divine tempers flared with the destructive force of supernovas. Yet, amidst this celestial turf war, one mountain stood apart, a sanctuary of serene beauty: Mount Huaguo, the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit. Its eternal bounty was said to be a blessing from the great, smooth stone that rested upon its highest peak, a silent guardian in a world of divine noise.
For eons, the stone sat, absorbing the yin of the moon and the yang of the sun. It was a patient, silent observer of the gods' petty squabbles and humanity's first, stumbling steps.
Then, on a day that began like any other, the mountain shuddered. The earth trembled, not with anger, but with a deep, resonant anticipation. The wind howled, not in fury, but as if trying to draw a veil over the peak, to hide what was to come. A sudden, chilling hum silenced the birds in the trees and the beasts in the forest.
And then came the sound.
It was not a roar of a newborn beast, nor the cry of a fledgling god. It was a laugh. A wild, joyous, and utterly irreverent cackle that seemed to mock the very seriousness of creation itself.
"Kekekekekekeke."
The great stone had cracked. From within its fractured shell, a monkey emerged, his fur the color of burnished gold, his eyes gleaming with a light that was older than the mountain itself. He felt the warmth of the sun on his new skin, the taste of the sweet, untainted air in his new lungs, and was overcome with a profound sense of gratitude. He was born, and it felt glorious.
With an innate, almost instinctual reverence, he bowed low to the four cardinal directions, a silent thank you to the gods for the gift of his existence. He waited, expecting a sign, a whisper on the wind, a gentle hum of reciprocation from the heavens.
He waited.
And waited.
Nothing. The gods, in their distant, self-important realms, were silent.
The monkey straightened, a flicker of something new in his golden eyes. Annoyance. "Hmph. Ungrateful fucks," he muttered to the empty sky. "Fine. If you're not gonna say 'you're welcome,' I'll make sure you can't ignore me."
He turned back to the split stone, the cradle of his birth. He could feel the residual energy humming within it, a perfect, swirling balance of yin and yang. He touched the stone, and with a will that was entirely his own, channeled that power, drawing it from the rock and into himself. The energy surged through him, a torrent of cosmic power that he directed upward, focusing it into his eyes.
Two beams of brilliant, golden light erupted from his pupils, shooting into the heavens like twin spears. They pierced the clouds, tore through the firmament, and for a fleeting moment, made the celestial palaces of the gods tremble.
The monkey lowered his gaze, the golden light receding back into his eyes, now a permanent, shimmering gold. He felt good. Really good. He patted himself on the chest, a self-congratulatory gesture for a job well done.
"Now that's how you make an entrance, kekekekeke." he declared to the silent mountain.
And with a final, triumphant cackle, he turned and began his descent, ready to see what kind of trouble this new world had to offer.
…
High above the mortal realm, in a palace carved from celestial jade and woven starlight, a grand banquet was in full swing. The Jade Emperor, ruler of the heavens, sat upon his Dragon Throne, a benevolent, if slightly bored, smile on his face. Below him, the great hall of the Jade Palace shimmered with the light of a thousand floating lanterns and the even brighter light of the assembled gods and immortals.
The air hummed with the delicate music of a celestial orchestra, the scent of immortal peaches, and the low murmur of divine gossip. Nezha, the eternally youthful warrior god, was discreetly trying to start a food fight with a stoic-looking general. The Queen Mother of the West was engaged in a polite but firm debate with a celestial minister over the proper brewing temperature for divine tea. It was a scene of perfect, orderly, and frankly, rather dull, celestial harmony.
"Another toast!" the Jade Emperor's voice boomed, rich and commanding. "To another millennium of peace and prosperity!"
Goblets of wine were raised. A chorus of "To the Emperor!" echoed through the hall.
It was in that precise moment of self-congratulatory bliss that the universe decided to deliver a rebuttal.
WHOOSH!
Two beams of brilliant golden light tore through the very fabric of the celestial realm. They didn't just appear; they invaded. They ripped through the palace's protective wards, seared through the perfumed air, and began to wreak havoc with a mischievous, almost intelligent, malevolence.
The banquet descended into chaos.
"What in the heavens is that?!" a minor god shrieked, diving under a table as one of the beams zipped past his head, singeing the end of his meticulously styled beard.
The beams danced through the hall like a pair of angry, golden hornets. One shot upward, shattering a priceless jade screen that depicted the birth of the cosmos. The other swooped low, knocking the ornate crown off a flustered celestial official, sending it spinning across the floor like a common coin.
"Guards! To me!" the Jade Emperor roared, his face a thundercloud of fury and embarrassment.
The celestial guards, clad in shimmering silver armor, drew their weapons, but the beams were too fast, too erratic. They moved with a logic that defied divine understanding, zipping around pillars, under tables, and through the terrified ranks of the immortal guests.
Nezha, for his part, was having the time of his life. "Ehehehe, now this is a party!" he cheered, using his Fire-Tipped Spear to playfully bat at one of the beams as it flew past.
The golden lights made one final, audacious loop around the Dragon Throne, forcing the Jade Emperor himself to duck, before they vanished as suddenly as they had appeared, leaving behind a trail of shimmering dust and a hall full of stunned, silent deities.
The Jade Emperor slowly straightened, his face a mask of cold, imperial rage. "Find out what that was," he commanded, his voice dangerously quiet. "Now."
Two figures stepped forward and bowed low. One was Clairvoyant Eye, a general whose gaze could pierce through mountains. The other was Favorable Wind Ear, whose hearing could catch a whisper from a thousand miles away.
"Your Majesty," they said in unison. "We will investigate at once."
With a shimmer of divine energy, they were gone.
The two generals returned minutes later, their expressions a mixture of confusion and disbelief.
"Well?" the Jade Emperor demanded, his patience worn thin.
Clairvoyant Eye stepped forward. "Your Majesty, the disturbance originated from the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit, on the mortal plane."
Favorable Wind Ear continued. "We have located the source. It is... a monkey. Born from a stone egg, newly awakened."
A low murmur rippled through the hall. A monkey? All this chaos, for a monkey?
The Jade Emperor's eye twitched. "And what is this creature doing now? Amassing an army? Forging a weapon to challenge the heavens?"
Clairvoyant Eye hesitated. "...No, Your Majesty."
"Then what?!"
"He is... drinking from a river," Favorable Wind Ear reported, his voice flat. "And eating some fruit."
The Jade Emperor stared. The entire celestial court stared. The image was too absurd to comprehend. The divine equivalent of a nuclear alarm being triggered by a toddler throwing a tantrum.
For a long moment, the only sound was the faint, lingering hum of celestial energy.
Then, the Jade Emperor threw his head back and laughed. It was a loud, dismissive, and utterly arrogant sound.
"A newly born essence," he declared, his good mood restored. "It knows nothing of the world, nothing of the power it wields. It is a trifle. Nothing to concern ourselves with."
He waved a dismissive hand. "Let the banquet continue! This little... interruption is beneath our notice."
The music started again, the servants refilled the wine, and the gods, taking their cue from their ruler, began to laugh and chat once more. But beneath the forced revelry, a few of the wiser immortals exchanged uneasy glances.
The golden light had been chaotic, yes. But it had also been powerful. And on the mortal plane, a monkey, born of stone and stars, finished his drink, a new, thoughtful, and very dangerous grin spreading across his face.
…
The stone-born monkey, who had not yet bothered to give himself a name, descended Mount Huaguo with the swagger of a god who owned the place. The world was his personal fruit basket, and he was determined to sample everything.
He plucked a sun-warmed lychee, its bumpy red skin a strange delight against his tongue before he crushed it with his teeth. 'Sweet.' He tossed the pit over his shoulder. Next, a starfruit, its crisp, watery flesh a burst of mild flavor. 'Boring.' He moved on. A durian, its scent a challenge he met with a ferocious grin. He tore it open with his bare hands, ignoring the thorns, and devoured the creamy, pungent flesh. 'Smells like a god's ass, but tastes like heaven's own custard!'
He never picked the same fruit twice. His newborn soul craved novelty, a riot of taste and texture. He was a glutton for experience, a connoisseur of the world's untasted wonders.
Perched on a low-hanging branch, a monkey with fur as black as polished obsidian watched the golden newcomer with suspicion. He was in the middle of grooming a particularly stubborn knot when the stone monkey spotted him.
"Oi, you soot-furred little shit!" the stone monkey called out, his voice a cheerful, grating rasp. "What are you gawking at?"
The black monkey paused, one hand still buried in his fur. "Who in all the hells are you? I've never seen your ugly mug 'round these parts."
"Just crawled out of that big rock up on the peak," the stone monkey said with a shrug, taking a massive bite out of a mango. Juice dribbled down his chin. "What's it to you?"
The black monkey's eyes widened slightly. "Stone-born, eh?" He grunted, a pragmatic sound. "Well, another pair of hands means another mouth to feed, but it also means more fruit for the pickin'. The others are down on the plains. Come on, follow me."
The stone monkey, seeing no reason not to, followed.
He soon saw them, a sprawling tribe of monkeys, lazing in the sun, wrestling in the grass, and generally causing a ruckus. It was a chaotic, beautiful mess. And in the middle of it all, one monkey stood out. His fur was a brilliant, stark white, and he was meticulously sorting berries into different piles, a look of intense concentration on his face.
The stone monkey was instantly intrigued. He bounded over, holding out a strange, purple fruit he'd just picked. "Oi, Snow-pelt! Catch!" he shouted, tossing it toward him.
The white monkey looked up, his intelligent eyes widening in alarm. He didn't catch the fruit; he slapped it out of the air. "Hold! You mustn't eat that! The entire plant is a vile poison!"
"Kekekeke!" the stone monkey cackled, picking the fruit back up. "Stop spouting dung from your mouth! It's a fruit, not a viper's tit. It smells delicious." He shoved it toward the white monkey's face. "Eat it!"
The white monkey recoiled, holding up his hands. "The flesh may be harmless to a divine being, but the seeds within contain a potent toxin that will stop our mortal heart in seconds!"
"It's not toxic!" the stone monkey roared, his patience wearing thin. He grabbed the white monkey by the scruff of his neck, trying to force the fruit into his mouth. The white monkey, surprisingly strong, clamped his jaw shut and struggled.
"I didn't say it was toxic, I said it was poisonous!" the white monkey grunted, twisting his head away.
The stone monkey paused, his hand still trying to jam the fruit past the other's teeth. "What's the bloody difference?!"
"One is ingested, the other is injected or absorbed! It's a fundamental distinction!" the white monkey yelled, his voice muffled.
"Bah! You talk like a scholar with a stick up his ass!" the stone monkey bellowed in frustration. "It's just a damn fruit!"
From that day on, the stone monkey, who would soon name himself Sun Wukong, spent his early years among the tribe on Mount Huaguo. He was a force of chaos, a whirlwind of unhinged energy, and a constant, infuriating challenge to the one sensible monkey who knew the difference between a snack and a death sentence. The mountain now had a king, even if it didn't know it yet.
…
Time on Mount Huaguo passed in a glorious cycle of sun-drenched days and star-dusted nights. Years blurred into a comfortable rhythm of feasting, brawling, and general, unadulterated chaos.
One sweltering afternoon, the white-furred monkey, whose intellect set him apart from the rest of the screeching horde, sat by the river, sipping cool water from a cupped leaf. Beside him, the stone monkey, was skipping rocks with a ferocious intensity, trying to see if he could hit a particularly smug-looking crane on the far bank.
"Have you ever wondered," the white monkey began, his voice a low, thoughtful murmur against the babble of the stream, "where this water truly comes from? Its source?"
Stone monkey paused, a flat, perfectly shaped stone in his hand. He glanced at the river, then at his friend, a bored glint in his golden eyes. "You think too much. It's just wet." He then turned back and flung the stone. It skipped seven times before the crane, with an indignant squawk, flew away.
"But everything has a beginning," the white monkey pressed. "Surely, there is a great spring, a hidden fount from which all this flows."
That, finally, seemed to pique stone monkey's interest. The idea of a hidden source, a place they had never seen. An adventure. He dropped the rest of his skipping stones and grinned, a wide, wicked thing. "You want to find out, you navel-gazing ape?"
The white monkey smiled. "Why not?"
Stone monkey leaped to his feet. He spotted a large, burly monkey with thick brown fur napping under a nearby tree. "Oi! Lunkhead!" stone monkey roared, kicking the sleeping monkey squarely in the rump. "Get your lazy arse up and gather the tribe! We're going to see what shits this river out!"
The brown monkey jolted awake, grunting in confusion. "You want us to... swim?"
"Swim? Are you a fish now, you witless oaf?!" stone monkey snapped. "No, we'll follow the stream up the mountain! To its very source!"
The journey was a glorious catastrophe. The entire tribe, now whipped into a frenzy by the promise of a new discovery, followed stone monkey up the winding riverbank. They screeched, they howled, they threw fruit at each other and anything else that moved. One monkey, in the middle of telling a particularly vulgar joke, slipped on a mossy rock and tumbled into the current, only to be yanked out by the tail by his laughing companion.
They climbed higher and higher, the air growing cooler, the terrain more rugged. And then, they heard it. A low, constant roar that grew louder with every step. They rounded a final, rocky outcrop and stopped, their chaotic chatter fading into a collective, awestruck silence.
Before them, a magnificent waterfall cascaded down the cliff face, a roaring curtain of white water thundering into a deep, misty pool below.
"We've found it!" one monkey shrieked, and the tribe erupted in celebration, hooting and beating their chests.
But another, more cautious monkey peered into the churning mist at the base of the falls. "It looks dangerous down there."
"Dangerous?" stone monkey scoffed, his voice dripping with contempt. "A bit of water? I could walk through that piss-stream with my eyes closed."
The black-furred monkey, ever the instigator, stepped forward with a sneer. "Big words from a rock-headed loudmouth. If it's so easy, why don't you prove it?"
The other monkeys, sensing a challenge, joined in, jeering and goading him. "Yeah, prove it!" "Afraid you'll get your fur wet, stone-boy?"
Stone monkey's eye twitched. He crossed his arms. "And what's in it for me if I do?"
The monkeys went silent, scratching their heads and looking at each other. "I'll give you my youngest child!" one offered. stone monkey recoiled in disgust. "What in all the hells would I do with your snot-nosed brat? Use him as a rock to skip?"
"You can have my share of the peaches for a week!" another shouted. "I can pick my own damn fruit, you witless chimp!"
A third, particularly dim-witted monkey stepped forward with a hopeful look. "You can have my..." He paused, thinking hard. "...my ass?" stone monkey stared at him, his face a mask of profound disbelief. "And what use is your hairy ass to me? A second pillow? I think not!"
It was the white monkey who finally spoke, his voice cutting through the foolishness. "You will be our king."
The other monkeys blinked, then began to nod in agreement. "Yes! Our king!" An old, grizzled elder of the tribe stepped forward, his gaze steady. "That will do," he declared, his voice a gravelly rasp. "Our tribe has long needed a leader, one to protect us. If you are brave enough to pass through that veil of water and return unharmed, we will all bow to you as our king."
The stone monkey looked at the roaring waterfall, then at the expectant faces of the tribe. A slow, magnificent, and utterly arrogant grin spread across his face.
"Kekekekeke! Alright then!" he roared, puffing out his chest. "But from now on, you will not call me 'king.' You will address me by my proper title!"
He paused for dramatic effect.
"The Handsome Monkey King! Kekekekeke!"
And with a final, unhinged laugh, he turned and leaped headfirst into the thundering curtain of water.
…
Time flowed like the river outside their cave, and the monkey tribe thrived. Under the rule of their Handsome Monkey King, the Water Curtain Cave was more than a home; it was a paradise. A fortress of laughter, feasting, and blissful, unapologetic chaos. Handsome Monkey King, their king, had grown into his role with a wild, possessive joy. This was his mountain, his tribe, his kingdom.
One cool evening, as the setting sun painted the sky in hues of orange and purple, Monkey King lounged on his stone throne, lazily picking his teeth with a sharpened bit of bamboo. He watched his subjects, a satisfied, if slightly bored, look on his face.
But then, he saw it. A small, somber gathering in a quiet corner of the great cavern. An old, grey-furred monkey lay on a bed of soft leaves, his breath a shallow, rattling thing. Others groomed him gently, their usual boisterous energy replaced by a heavy, unfamiliar silence.
Monkey King's brow furrowed. He had never seen such a thing. He hopped down from his throne and strode over to Hanuman, who was observing the scene with a sad, knowing look in his intelligent eyes.
"Oi, Hanuman, you walking scrolls of gloom," Monkey King said, his voice a low growl. "What ails that grey-furred fossil over there? He looks like he's trying to shit out a boulder."
Hanuman turned to his king, his expression grave. "He is old, my king. His time is ending." He paused, letting the words settle. "He is dying."
Monkey King stared, his usual manic grin absent. "Dying? What in the seven hells is that supposed to mean? Did he eat one of your poison fruits?"
"No, my king," Hanuman said softly. "It is the way of all things. We are born, we live, we grow old, and then... we cease to be."
The words hit Monkey King with the force of a physical blow. He, who had been born from eternal stone, who had never known a moment of weakness, had never once considered an end.
"Cease?" Monkey King's voice was a choked whisper. "You mean... stop? Like a rock? Like a dead tree? That's it?" His voice rose with each question, a frantic, desperate edge creeping in. "No more fruit? No more brawling? No more laughing at the gods' expense?"
Hanuman looked at his king with a deep, sorrowful pity. "It is the path for all of us. Even you, my king."
"BULL'S SHIT!"
The roar exploded from Monkey King's chest, a raw, terrified sound that shook the very foundations of the cave. He kicked his stone throne, sending it skidding across the floor. "I WAS BORN FROM A BLOODY STONE! I STARED INTO THE HEAVENS AND MADE THE GODS BLINK! YOU THINK I'M JUST GOING TO... END?! LIKE SOME WORM-EATEN PIECE OF FRUIT?!"
He was a being of pure, untamed life. The concept of not-life, of an end to his glorious, chaotic existence, was not just a fear; it was an insult. An intolerable, cosmic injustice.
Without another word, he stormed out of the cave, leaving his tribe in stunned silence. He burst through the shimmering curtain of the waterfall and stood on the cliff's edge, the cool night air doing nothing to quell the fire of terror and rage in his soul.
He couldn't stay here. He couldn't just wait for this... this dying to claim him.
With a final, defiant roar that echoed across the silent mountain, he made his decision. He scrambled down to the beach and began to work, not with the skill of a craftsman, but with the desperate fury of a cornered animal. He tore down bamboo stalks with his bare hands, stripped vines with his teeth, and lashed together a crude, clumsy raft.
He would not accept this fate. He would find a way to defy it.
"I'll find some dusty old Immortal hiding on a mountain," he snarled to the uncaring moon, his voice a raw promise. "And I'll beat the secret of not-dying out of his wrinkled arse! Death can come for the rest of you fools, but it won't have me!"
And as the first light of dawn broke over the horizon, the Handsome Monkey King pushed his makeshift raft into the vast, unknown ocean, leaving his home, his tribe, and his mortality behind.