The white monkey barked once. At the stream, a group of mothers stepped up to the water's edge with babies clinging to their bodies like large brown clumps of thistledown. Behind the mothers, two young monkeys played roughly. Malao noted how their attacks and defensive maneuvers mirrored the movements he made during his training exercises. Like him, the monkeys’ arsenal included an unlimited combination of tumbles, jumps, dodges, sweeps, feints, and strikes.
The young monkeys were both about the same size, and they seemed equally matched. However, Malao knew that most monkey-style kung fu techniques had been developed with the assumption that your opponent would be bigger and stronger than you. These techniques helped him tremendously when fending off his larger, older brothers in both formal sparring matches and everyday roughhousing. To help him close the gap even further, Malao had trained extra hard. He had had to make up for what he lacked in size with quickness, accuracy, and stamina.
Monkey-style kung fu was very demanding, but Malao had pushed through all the pain—often pushing himself until he dropped. Literally. One of the most grueling exercises he performed was called Monkey Rope training. It was designed to develop strong back and shoulder muscles, which are critical for the swinging movements central to monkey-style kung fu. Malao would climb a thick rope hanging from the top of Cangzhen's tallest tree, using only his hands. He would then climb down again, still using only his hands. And then he'd climb back up. And then back down. Over and over until his hands bled.
To make matters worse, Grandmaster would sometimes stand on the ground at the end of the rope, watching. After Malao made ten or eleven trips up and down the rope, Grandmaster would begin to swing the rope wildly in an attempt to throw Malao off. Grandmaster was usually successful. Malao would fly through the air, frantically grabbing at tree branches as he tumbled back to earth. Fortunately for Malao, he always managed to grab hold of something with his aching hands before it was too late.
Still, Malao had always felt that Grandmaster would have somehow managed to catch him if he had ever plummeted to earth. As strange as it sounded, Malao knew part of him would miss Grandmaster always pushing his skills to their limits.
Downstream, the farthest group of monkeys began to chatter frantically. Their mood swing was contagious. The rest of the groups screeched and shrieked in succession before racing downstream to join the mayhem. With the white monkey in the lead, the group of enforcers below Malao's willow raced off, too.
In the distance, Malao heard a voice cry out, “MONKEYS! MAN THE CARTS!”
Malao scurried through the treetops to see what the commotion was all about. Long before he actually saw anything, he heard cries from both monkeys and men. When the scene finally came into view, Malao's heart sank. A massacre was unfolding.
The monkeys were swarming down from the trees onto large carts that rested on a wide trail. Thirty or forty men surrounded the carts in small groups. The men waited until a cart was completely covered with monkeys before drawing their weapons and lashing out. Quick and agile, most of the monkeys managed to escape the swinging swords and stabbing spears. However, some of the younger monkeys fell to the weapons.
To Malao's disbelief, monkeys continued to pour out of the trees, back onto the same carts. Malao assumed the monkeys were determined to get their hands on anything edible, regardless of the risk. Oddly, most of the carts didn't seem to contain food. When the monkeys lifted back the heavy blankets covering the carts, Malao saw gold. Huge piles of gold.
Malao shivered. He had seen enough death at Cangzhen to last a lifetime. He needed to stop the slaughter, but it would be no easy task. The men protecting the gold were extremely skilled with their weapons.
“Look what I got!” one man shouted as he hoisted a speared monkey high overhead. “Lunch! For all my friends!”
The men roared with laughter.
“Hey, I got one, too,” another man called out. “Seven or eight more and we'll have a feast!”
The group cheered.
“Watch the gold!” a third man shouted. “I just speared one trying to make off with some. Don't they realize that we're the bandits in this region? No one steals from us!”
“Here, here!” the group chanted, and Malao realized the bandits were enjoying this. It was a game to them. A cruel, deadly, horrible game. They didn't have to kill the monkeys. All they had to do was shoo them away. That's what the monks did if they were transporting items and encountered a monkey troop in the forest.
“STOP!” Malao yelled. He burst through the tree-tops and landed on top of one of the gold carts.
The bandits stared at Malao, surprised. The monkeys, however, continued to leap onto the carts.