Ram-Power Great Immortal

The oil cauldron sat in the middle of the court, boiling hard, hissing with steam, throwing off heat that could be felt from a good ten paces away. Ram-Power Great Immortal stripped off his robe and leapt in. The ministers and officials all drew in a breath, expecting to see a charred corpse rise at once. But nothing happened. Instead, he looked as if he had stepped into a warm bath. He scrubbed his arms, washed his face, and even turned himself over in the rolling oil. The king stared. The court stared. This was chapter 46, after the Tiger-Power Great Immortal and the Deer-Power Great Immortal had already died, leaving Ram-Power alone. He knew he had no way out. Still, he was not afraid, because he had his cold dragon.

Cold-Dragon Body Protection

The three immortals each had a trick for preserving their lives: the Tiger-Power Immortal could let his severed head fly back; the Deer-Power Immortal could cut open his belly and replace his organs; Ram-Power's specialty was cold-dragon body protection, which made him unharmed in boiling oil.

A cold dragon is a small dragon creature that can release a fierce chill. Ram-Power somehow subdued one and placed it at the bottom of the oil cauldron. The dragon's cold breath could pull the temperature of the oil down almost to room temperature. From the outside, the pot still looked as if it were boiling hard, but inside it had become cold. When Ram-Power jumped in, what he felt was not scalding oil but a pool of cool liquid.

This was the most elegant of the immortals' tricks. The Tiger-Power Immortal's head-returning trick had a gap the enemy could exploit; the Deer-Power Immortal's organ-surgery trick exposed his insides to danger. Ram-Power's cold-dragon protection was passive defense. He did nothing at all. As long as the dragon was there, the oil could not hurt him. In theory, it was the safest contest of the three.

But passive defense has one fatal flaw: it depends entirely on the thing that protects you. If the cold dragon is gone, the man is just a man jumping into boiling oil.

Sun Wukong saw through it. When he noticed Ram-Power enjoying his bath so much, he knew there was a trick in the pot. He used a spell to call on the North Sea Dragon King, because a cold dragon belongs to the dragon clan's jurisdiction. At the dragon king's order, the cold dragon swam away from the cauldron.

The real heat came back in an instant.

Fried into Mutton

The moment the cold dragon was taken away, Ram-Power was still scrubbing himself in the oil. One second he was enjoying his hot spring. The next, boiling oil went straight through his skin.

He had no time to scream. The heat swallowed him all at once. Skin blackened, fat melted, muscle shrank. Huge bubbles rolled up in the cauldron, and the entire court saw a body convulsing in the oil, twisting and shrinking and curling up. A moment later, what floated to the surface was not a human shape but a yellow-fried ram.

"Fried into mutton." That is the phrase Wu Cheng'en uses. It is probably the coldest joke in the whole novel. A self-styled immortal ends as a dish. The Tiger-Power Immortal at least left a tiger corpse behind; the Deer-Power Immortal at least left an emptied body. Ram-Power did not even remain a complete corpse. He became fried mutton.

The joke works because it is so ordinary. Fried mutton is a common Chinese dish. Wu Cheng'en turns a demon's death into the steps of a home kitchen recipe. He does not reach for words like "miserable death" or "battered to pieces." He chooses something plain, almost domestic. That contrast is what makes the scene so disquieting: you know you are reading a monster's death, yet the image that comes to mind is frying meat in a kitchen.

The three immortals' deaths now stand complete. The Tiger-Power Immortal died absurdly, with his head stolen by a dog. The Deer-Power Immortal died brutally, with his organs taken by an eagle. Ram-Power died ironically, turned into food. Together the three deaths form a perfect progression from laughable to terrifying to tragic. Three animal spirits spent twenty years clawing their way into the center of worldly power, and in one night they were all forced back into their true forms.

Ram-Power's death has another layer of irony: he was the last one to die, and the one who least wanted to die. The Tiger-Power Immortal went in full of confidence; the Deer-Power Immortal at least had a brother's loyalty to drive him. Ram-Power was pushed forward after watching both sworn brothers die before him. He was not fearless, but he had no choice. If he stepped back, what would the king think? After two losses, if the third immortal simply gave up, then twenty years of state-preceptor status, the splendor of the Three Purities Temple, and Daoist rule in Chechi Kingdom would all vanish. He was a gambler being driven onto the oil cauldron by sunk cost.

Seen that way, Ram-Power's death is not just "a demon destroyed." It is the end of a gambler who could not leave the table.

Related Figures

• Tiger-Power Great Immortal - eldest of the three state preceptors, a tiger spirit, first to die, whose head was carried off by a dog in the beheading contest
• Deer-Power Great Immortal - second of the three, a white deer spirit, whose guts were carried off by an eagle in the disembowelment contest
• Sun Wukong - the main opponent, who asked the North Sea Dragon King to take away the cold dragon and thus stripped Ram-Power of his protection
• Tripitaka - the side representing Buddhism in the contest, who was also sent toward the oil cauldron and escaped only because Wukong helped him in secret
• North Sea Dragon King - the one who took the cold dragon away at Wukong's request, indirectly causing Ram-Power Great Immortal's death