Sun Wukong (Disney)

Sun Wukong is the main protagonist of Monkey King: Elements of Destiny.

Early Life
Sun Wukong is born from a magic stone that sits atop Mount Huaguo. This stone is no ordinary stone, however, because it receives the nurture of heaven (yang), which possesses a positive nature, and earth (yin), which possesses a negative nature, and thus is able to produce living beings (according to Taoist philosophies). The stone develops a magic womb, which bursts open one day to produce a stone egg about the size of a ball. When the wind blows on the egg, it turns into a stone monkey that can already crawl and walk. As his eyes move, two beams of golden light shoot toward the Heavenly Palace and startle Yuhuang the Jade Emperor. When he sees the light, he orders two of his officers to investigate. They report the stone monkey, and that the light is dying down as the monkey eats and drinks. The Jade Emperor believes him to be nothing special. On the mountain, the monkey befriends various animals and joins a group of other monkeys. After playing, the monkeys regularly bathe in a stream. One day, they decide to seek the source of the stream and climb the mountain to a waterfall. According to Gudai Yuan the monkey elder, legend says that whoever goes through the waterfall, finds the stream's source, and comes out again will become their king. The stone monkey volunteers and jumps into the waterfall. He finds a large iron bridge over rushing water, across which is a cave, filled with bamboo, trees, and beautiful flowers. Moss covered the walls. A stream flowed through the cave, and glowing light and mist filled the air. The monkey wanders in the cave and explore it, and he came across a huge and imposing moss-covered rock. When he touched the rock, it was suddenly bathed in brilliant light. The monkey saw golden writings which said "Greetings Sun Wukong, you shall rule Mount Huaguo and fight for justice throughout the world." Sun found a long table with bowls, cups, and plates. A fireplace sat against one wall. Deeper in the cave, Sun found bedrooms with cozy beds. He found the others who prepared a throne for him. He takes the throne and calls himself the Handsome Monkey King. However, when Gudai knows of immortality, the Monkey King decides to strive out of his island on a self made raft, in search of an Immortal to teach him knowledge and how to beat death. He comes ashore and wanders around. He takes some clothes that were left out to dry, and continues on foot. He asked some humans about an immortal. He continues on and into a forest. The Monkey King hears a Woodcutter singing an interesting song, and when questioning the Woodcutter about the origin he learns he was taught it by an Immortal who resides in the forest. The Monkey King comes to the entrance of a temple of which resides a magical taoist martial named Subhuti, who lets him in. Subhuti accepts the Monkey King as a student, teaching him all advanced taoist practices including the way of Immortality, telling Sun it was his destiny to know. Subhuti taught him the secrets of the five elements and the 72 Transformations. After intense training, Sun bid farewell to his master and returned to his home. As he returned to Mount Huaguo, Gudai informs Sun Shuilian Cave is taken over by a demon king named Hunshi. Sun defeats Hunshi and take back the cave. He decides to train the monkeys in the fighting arts. On hearing that Dragon Kings possess many treasures, and in search of a weapon, he travels to the oceans and finds the palace of a Dragon King. At the entrance, Sun asks for an introduction, the guards allowed him to see the Dragon King Ao Guang. Inside, he introduces himself and encourages the Dragon King to bestow him a weapon. Quickly realizing Sun is quite formidable, the Dragon King feigns willingness and hospitality, ordering his underlings to bring out weapon after weapon. Sun tests each weapon, but none are robust enough for the Monkey King who is unhappy at the situation. Sun then acquires the Golden-banded staff Ruyi Jingu Bang, the stabilizer of the Four Seas and a treasure of Ao Guang, the dragon-king of the Eastern Seas. Sun is the only creature strong enough to wield the staff-like weapon and there is an instant affinity between them. The Golden-banded staff can change its size, elongate, fly and attack opponents according to its master's will. It weighs 17,857 pounds. When not wielding the weapon, the Monkey King shrinks it down to the size of a sewing needle and stores it in his ear. In addition to taking the magical staff, the four Dragon Kings challenge Sun to see if he is worthy. After Sun defeats them, they give him Fengchizijinguan, Suozihuangjinjia, and Ousibuyunlu. Sun Wukong thanks the Dragon Kings and leaves happy. Upon his return to the mountain, he demonstrates the new weapon to his monkey tribe and draws the attention of other beastly powers, who seek to ally with him. Sun met Niu and became sworn brothers with him, and are good friends. Sun goes to Meido located in the Yokai Realm. He wipes his name out of the Book of Life and Death, a collection of books claimed to have every name of every mortal alive and the ability to manipulate lifespan, along with the names of all monkeys known to him. Sun got the title of "Great Sage Equal to Heaven", while Niu got the title of "Great Sage Who Pacifies Heaven".

Battle against Heaven
Everyone send a massive amounts of complaints to the Jade Emperor about Sun and Niu. Yuhuang heard about this, and to stop Sun and Niu from becoming too dangerous, he invites Sun and Niu to Heaven. Sun and Niu believe they are receiving an honorable place as one of the gods as they are told they will be made 'Protector of the Horses' (a fancy term the Heavens coined for stable-boys) the lowest job in Heaven. When they discover the importance of status in Heaven, and how they have been given the lowest position, Niu sets the Cloud Horses free from the stable, then they sneak out. Later, the duo go to see the preparations for the Royal Banquet, tries some of the fine foods and then consumes some of the royal wine while all the important god and goddesses are on their way to the Royal Banquet. They reach high levels the authorities of Heaven leave unguarded, for they can only be accessed by high level immortals with the very highest levels of pure spirituality, something that they never associated the Monkey King with. On realizing he's at Dou Shuai Palace at the top of the 33 layers, Sun steals and consumes Laozi's pills of longevity, Xi Wangmu's Peaches of immortality, takes the remainder of the Jade Emperor's royal wine, then escapes back with Niu to his kingdom in preparation for the battle. Yuhuang becomes enraged and orders his forces to mobilize Sun and Niu. They fought 100,000 warriors, the 28 Mansions, the Four Heavenly Kings, Nezha, Juling Shen, and Erlang Shen. Eventually, through the teamwork of Taoist and Buddhist forces, including the efforts from some of the greatest deities, and then finally by the Bodhisattva of mercy, Guanyin, Sun and Niu are captured. After several failed attempts at execution, Sun Wukong is locked into Laozi's eight-way trigram Crucible to be distilled into an elixir (so that Laozi could regain his pills of longevity) by samadhi fires. After 49 days, however, when the cauldron is opened, the Monkey King jumps out, having survived by hiding in a corner marked by the wind trigram in which there was no fire. Additionally the heat from the samadhi fires reinforces the Monkey King's bodily frame, making him stronger than ever before, and impervious to damage. The heat also gives him a new ability; the Monkey King is now able to recognize evil with huǒyǎn-jīnjīng (火眼金睛) (lit. "golden-gaze fiery-eyes"). Sun Wukong proceeds to destroy the crucible as Niu breaks free. The duo make their way to Heaven's main chamber to confront the Jade Emperor and his senior advisers. With no options left, Yuhuang decide to surrender his battle and never bother them again, which Sun and Niu left Heaven triumphantly.

Meeting Buddha
One day, they are summoned by Buddha. Buddha begins telling him about the numeration he made. He and Buddha made a bet about the comparison how powerful they are. He leaps and flies to the end of the world. Seeing nothing there but five pillars, the Monkey King believes that he has reached the ends of universe. To prove his trail, he marks a pillar with a phrase declaring himself the Great Sage Equal to Heaven (and in some versions, urinates on a pillar ). He then leaps back and returns to Buddha's palm to claim his victory in winning the bet. Sun Wukong is then very surprised to then find that the five "pillars" he found are merely fingers of the Buddha's hand, finding it impossible to believe. Buddha tells the duo they will await for the path of Buddhahood.

Ascending to Buddhahood
500 years later, Tang, a monk, who traveled to India and took the duo as his students. He even accepts Zhu, Sha and Yulong as his students. He taught the quartet about Buddhism. However, Niu wanted to destroy Buddhism and attacked many innocent people. Sun confronted his fallen friend in a fierce battle that shook the earth until finally, he defeated him. In a fit of anger, Tang banishes Niu for assaulting China. But Niu swore revenge and reclaim what's rightfully his. Following Niu's exile, Sun was given Buddhahood.