Chapter 18 - Tragedy in Revenge

Tragedy in Revenge is Saiyuki's eighteenth chapter.

Summary
The Sanzo-ikkou are sleeping in Jeep while Hakkai dreams. In the dream, he sees himself, as Cho Gonou, with Kanan. She tells him how much she loves his beautiful hands, and he thinks how he would have done anything, become anything, for her. He tells her to come with him, that he'll protect her, but suddenly she is a corpse crawling with centipedes and she tells him that she can't go with him because his hands are covered in blood. He stands shocked, holding his bloody hands in front of himself.

The nightmare wakes Hakkai up and as he thinks about the dream, Sanzo asks him if anything is wrong. Hakkai responds that he has insomnia and goes to take a walk. Gojyo cracks one eye open and watches him walk off into the trees. As Hakkai walks, he thinks about how the scars of his past have started aching again ever since they met the fortune teller Chin Yisou. He suspects Chin Yisou holds a grudge against him from the past, but he wonders why he is going after him in a seemingly roundabout way. He holds his hands in front of his face, thinking how even after taking so many lives, he was unable to save his one and only love, and how his hands will never be clean of sin. Gojyo suddenly comes up behind him, startling him, and comments that Hakkai's lifeline is short. Gojyo says that his own lifeline is long, so that must make him a cockroach, and Hakkai makes a joke about Gojyo's reproductive drive also matching that of a cockroach. Hakkai then asks if he woke Gojyo up, but Gojyo replies that he just wanted to see Hakkai with a frown on his face. After a pause, Hakkai asks Gojyo why he saved him three years ago. He says if Gojyo had left him to die, that may have been fate he deserved. Gojyo answers that if Hakkai is going to ask like this, then he won't answer. Hakkai laughs. As they begin to joke with each other, a strange puppet doll shuffles out of the woods towards them.

As the doll greets them, it addresses Hakkai as "Cho Gonou the murderer". In its hands it holds a mahjong tile inscribed with the character for 'grudge'. The doll goes on to remind Hakkai that wherever he goes he will never find peace because he is a sinner. Hakkai, realizing that Chin Yisou is behind this, says with a dark expression of anger that if Chin Yisou has business with him that he should come out and talk to him himself. The doll responds that Cho Gonou is now showing his true face. Gojyo kicks the doll over and says that he has had enough.

As Gojyo and Hakkai begin to head back to Jeep, the doll opens its mouth and shoots something straight into Gojyo's chest. As the doll laughs, Gojyo collapses. As Sanzo and Goku join them, asking what happened, Gojyo screams in agony, saying that something is crawling inside his veins. The doll says that it has planted a seed inside Gojyo, right next to his heart, which will suck his blood and take root in his veins. As the doll laughs gleefully about how much fun this is, Sanzo shoots it in the head, shattering its head into pieces.

Sanzo thinks to himself that he knows what is going on. He orders Goku to hold Gojyo still and aims his gun at Gojyo's chest. He shouts out to Chin Yisou, asking if he is happy now that he gets what he wants. As Hakkai protests, Sanzo assures him that he will not miss the seed. He tells Hakkai to close the wound as soon as he shoots, and that if Gojyo dies, it's his own fault for having a weak heart. Gojyo responds that there's no way he is going to die. Sanzo shoots. Gojyo coughs up blood, and then goes still. Hakkai rushes to his side and heals the wound, reporting that Gojyo is unconscious but stable.

Hakkai says this is all his fault because he is the one Chin Yisou wants. Sanzo yells as him to get it together, not to play into Chin Yisou's hands by falling apart. Hakkai goes faint and falls unconscious. Sanzo sends Goku off the get water. Left alone with Hakkai and Gojyo both unconscious, Sanzo punches a tree in angry frustration. He thinks to himself that everything is going as Chin Yisou planned, that he is sure Chin Yisou wanted him to have to shoot Gojyo right in front of Hakkai. He realizes that Chin Yisou wants to break Hakkai, not kill him.

Meanwhile, Goku returns to Jeep in search of a water canteen. Behind him, Chin Yisou sits on a tree branch, watching.