Across the Pacific, it was the evening in the kitsune village of Inamura. A kitsune girl was tending her vegetable garden before the sun began to set. She glanced up for a second and saw a curious stranger strutting into Inamura. The stranger appeared to be an anthropomorphic monkey girl dressed in ornate (though rather archaic) Chinese garb. The yellow shirt and trousers almost made her look like an especially gaudy Buddhist monk, but the tigerskin skirt rather killed that effect. She wore a gold circlet on her head and had a fighting staff slung rather jauntily over her shoulders.
"Konnichiwa, honored visitor," the kitsune said to the grinning monkey girl. "I am Zakuro Kamakura. Who might you be?"
The monkey girl flashed a crooked smile and bowed deeply to Zakuro. "Sun Linghua at your service! I'm the best staff fighter on Flower and Fruit Mountain."
"Where?" asked Zakuro, playing with her tail as she tried to make sense of Linghua.
"It's in China," Linghua answered. "It's home to the Sun Clan, the greatest tribe of hóu yaoguai in the entire world!"
"Hóu yaoguai?" Zakuro asked, her ears twitching as she wracker her brain. "Oh, you mean saru-yōkai. We have some of those up in the mountains. I've heard that monkey yōkai are pretty common in India and China."
"We sure are," Linghua nodded. "Though the proper term in Chinese is yaoguai, not yōkai. We're called vanaras in India, but those western tribes that worship Hanuman aren't important." Linghua smirked. "All you need to know is the Sun Clan of Flower and Fruit Mountain. Our founder is the Great Sage Equal to Heaven, better known as Sun Wukong, whose surname we have all adopted for ourselves. You may know him as Son Goku. Not the anime one, though." Linghua laughed merrily.
"Goodness!" Linghua marveled. "You come from the clan of the fabled Monkey King?"
"That's why I wear these clothes," Linghua said, gesturing at her curious garments. "All of us Sun hóu yaoguai wear this getup in honor of our immortal founder. Not like you naked guys." Linghua's eyes roved over Zakuro's nude form, equal parts amused and aroused. "Sorry for looking. I just can't be the ascetic our holy founder was."
"It's no problem," Zakuro smiled. "Our ways must be a bit shocking for clothed yōkai... err... yaoguai. So, is Sun Wukong really immortal?"
"Multiple times over!" Linghua boasted. "He studied under a Taoist immortal, he wrote his name out of the books of the Underworld, he ate the Jade Emperor's Peaches of Immortality, he drank the Wine of Heaven, he swallowed Laozi's Pills of Immortality, and he was rewarded with buddhahood when he helped Tang Sanzang bring the Buddhist scriptures to China on their famous Journey to the West. The Great Sage Equal to Heaven is just as alive and well as he was in the Seventh Century!"
"And did he really trash Heaven before he redeemed himself?" Zakuro asked.
"Sure did!" Linghua smirked. "When he first became an immortal after learning Taoism and writing his name out of the Underworld books, the Jade Emperor offered him a position in the court of Heaven to keep him out of mischief. Too bad it was a shit job. They seriously made the great Sun Wukong the Protector of the Horses! A stable monkey! Literally the lowest rank in the court! Well, our great king stormed off and declared himself the Great Sage Equal to Heaven. The gods of Heaven naturally tried to beat him up for that, but Sun Wukong totally owned them. So they invited him back to Heaven and made him the warden of the orchards of the Peaches of Immortality. It was all going well until Sun Wukong got hungry and stole the peaches. Then he disguised himself as one of the gods and infiltrated a celestial feast. He drank all the wine and stole Laozi's Pills of Immortality! Heh, what a cool guy! Well, he realized that the Jade Emperor would be pissed and headed back to Flower and Fruit Mountain. The Jade Emperor WAS pissed and declared war on us. We almost won, but they brought in some super-god called Erlang who trapped Sun Wukong. They put him in a magic furnace that can melt immortals and tried to kill him, but they didn't count on the Great Sage being ULTRA-immortal. All that happened was the smoke gave his eyes the power to see through magical disguises and the heat put him in a bad mood. Like, a REALLY bad mood! He leaped out of the furnace and rampaged through Heaven, wrecking the Jade Emperor's palace. They had to call in the Buddha to discipline him! That's how big a badass he is! It took the BUDDHA HIMSELF to stop him once he really got going!"
"What a story!" Zakuro gasped.
"And he knows 72 transformations," Linghua added. "He can turn into 72 things! Me, I can only do one transformation. Like so." Linghua snapped her fingers and her simian features melted away. Her tail shrank into her body, her fur vanished, her feet reshaped, and her facial features rearranged into those of a gorgeous Chinese girl.
"Wow!" Zakuro smiled. "You do it so fluidly!"
"Thanks," Linghua chuckled as she returned to her monkey girl shape. "Anyway, could you give me directions to Kyodainayokai-beya?"
Zakuro pointed down a road. "Just go straight down that road until you see a welcome sign. We're just a few hours away. So you're becoming a sumo wrestler?"
"No way!" Linghua laughed. "I'm not gonna ruin my lovely monkey figure by becoming a fatty. Kyūri-sensei invited me for a special contest. He's gonna have a staff-fighting contest where his students will try to beat me at my own gain. I get a cash prize if I win. Any student who beats me gets a huge portion of his magic chankonabe. Well, I'd better get going. I need to grace that heya with my illustrious presence. Nice talking to ya, cutie!" With that, Sun Linghua merrily skipped off down the road to Kyūri's heya.