Koekai
Koekai (胡慧海, "Barbarian/Foreigner" + "Wisdom" + "Ocean"), or Ko (胡), is one of the four uncanny simians.
He has gone by many names and titles:
- Shakukou (石猴, "Stone Monkey"): Initial identity among the monkets.
- Bikou-Ou (美猴王, "Handsome Monkey King"): Self-given title after becoming the monarch of the monkeys.
- Koekai (胡慧海, "Barbarian/Foreigner"+"Wisdom"+"Ocean"): Name given by his teacher, Shubodai.
- Hitsupaon (弼馬温, "Keeper of Horses"): Job title as head of the stables.
- Seitentaisei (斉天大聖, "Great Sage Equal to Heaven"): Job title as guardian of the immortal peaches. Originally a self-given title.
Physical Description
Special abilities
Mental characteristics
Personal history
Birth from a Stone
After learning his dimension was doomed to be destroyed, the original Monkey King, Son Goku, traveled to Nino Hogoku, where he knew the Getsuhon Archipelago would be recreated. Atop Daikakazan, he created a stone egg from which his successor would be born. Centuries later, after absorbing enough magic from the universe, the stone egg hatched, and a monkey-like creature emerged. Its eyes released golden beams of light that allegedly.Becoming the Monkey King
Descending from the mountain top, the creature became known as Shakukou, or Stone Monkey, amongst the other beasts living there.Cultivation
He studied cultivation under Shubodai, who gave him the name Koekai. Under his master's tutelage, Koekai learned the Art of 72 Transformations to help survive the three calamities.
by Mr. Mirai
Comments
Author's Notes
While most of the names are just the Japanese pronunciation of the Monkey King's aliases from the original story, for obvious reasons, I didn't want to use the name Son Goku. Thus, I came up with the name Koekai (胡慧海). In the Journey to the West, the Monkey King's teacher considers the surname 胡 (hu, "foreigner/barbarian") or 孫 (sun, "grandchild/descendent"), which is taken by removing the animal radical (犭) from either or the original two characters the word 猢猻 (husun, "macaque"). I wanted to use the character 胡 (hu [Chinese] / ko [Japanese]) to better distinguish my character from the original. In Japanese, it also pronounced similar to the character used for monkey in his other names, 猴 (kou). As for his given name, the Monkey King's teacher puts specific characters in his student's name based off the generation they're in:
- 廣 (guang [Chinese] / ko [Japanese], "wide")
- 大 (da / dai, "great")
- 智 (zhi / chi, "wide")
- 慧 (hui / e, "intelligence/wisdom")
- 真 (zhen / shin, "true")
- 如 (ru / nyo, "conforming/likeness")
- 性 (xing / sei, "nature")
- 海 (hai / kai, "sea/ocean")
- 穎 (ying / ei, "sharp")
- 悟 (wu / go, "wake-to")
- 圓 (yuan / en, "complete/circle")
- 覺 (jue / kaku, "awakening")
Since Wukong is part of the tenth generation, his name starts with the 悟 (wu / go) character. I wanted a name with the 慧 (e) character since intelligence is one of the defining characteristics of the Monkey King—in fact, his species is literally "intelligent stone monkey." The character refers to prajñā ("wisdom"), which features insight into a list of things, including suññatā ("emptiness"), which is the meaning of the 悟 (wu) character from his original name. I also like the ominousness of the number four, and the character is used for the fourth generation. The name Wukong was also borrowed from a Buddhist monk of the same name in real life (see also: The Origin of Sun Wukong (Journey to the West Research)). So I searched a list of Japanese Buddhist monks for names that included the 慧 (e) characters and found 慧海 (ekai, "Ocean of Wisdom") (see also: Kawaguchi Ekai (wiki)). Altogether, the characters in the name 胡慧海 (koekai) can either be read as "a wise foreigner from across the ocean" or "a foreigner with an ocean of wisdom."