This eight-chapter volume is an original condensed retelling based on Wu Cheng'en's public-domain classic, not the complete original text or a line-by-line translation.

A White Bone Demon haunted White Tiger Ridge. Hearing that a taste of Tripitaka's flesh could grant immortality, she changed into a young woman carrying a basket of food. Wukong's fiery golden eyes saw the evil aura at once. He struck, but the demon escaped by shedding a false corpse.

Tripitaka saw only a murdered girl. Bajie, jealous of Wukong's place in their master's trust, accused the monkey of killing an innocent stranger. Wukong could not prove what his eyes alone had seen.

The demon returned as an old woman searching for her daughter, then as an old man looking for his wife and child. Each time Wukong exposed the disguise. On the third attack he destroyed the demon's true form. A skeleton lay on the road, the words “Lady White Bone” carved along its spine.

But Tripitaka's mortal sight had not witnessed the transformations. He remembered only three apparent deaths. He recited the Tightening Headband Spell and wrote a letter dismissing Wukong. With tears in his eyes, the monkey knelt. He plucked hairs from his body and turned them into copies of himself so he could bow to his master from every direction before returning to the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit.

Without Wukong, Tripitaka soon fell into the hands of the Yellow Robe Demon and was transformed into a tiger. Bajie and Wujing could not rescue him, so Bajie went to the mountain for help. Knowing exactly how to provoke his brother, the pig claimed that the demon had insulted the “Keeper of Heavenly Stables.” Wukong sprang up. “He may insult me,” he cried, “but he cannot harm my master!”

Wukong returned and discovered that the demon was Kui Wood Wolf, a celestial star official who had descended to reunite with a palace maiden. He summoned Heaven to reclaim the fugitive and restored Tripitaka.

At their reunion, neither master nor disciple made a grand apology. Tripitaka straightened Wukong's collar. Wukong took the White Dragon Horse's reins, and together they faced west again.

They were beginning to learn that seeing through a demon was easy compared with seeing through prejudice—and defeating an enemy was easier than preserving trust.