I tried to look for information on them, but I can't find anything. Are they just strong pieces of armor or do they grant him special abilities?
1 Answer
- The cloud walking boots allow him to fly (although Wukong doesn't strictly need them to fly, having cultivated formidable powers of his own, and being able to cover 108,000 li in a single leap;)
Likewise with the golden chainmail—Wukong's body subsequently becomes fairly invulnerable during his time in Laozi's eight-way trigram Crucible—but it never hurts to have some extra padding.
I can't recall if the phoenix feather cap granted any special powers, but, in any event, it was subsequently replaced by the gold circlet that Xuanzang used to control him.
The unabridged Journey to the West is filled with detailed descriptions of the magical powers of objects, so it is likely more detail can be found in the text. (When I get a chance to dig it out, I will re-read the passages and amend my answer:)
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1almost forgot his shoes... :). i read the original novel in Classical Chinese, really interested to know who did the best eng translation. his boots: 脚蹬藕丝步云履 - cloud walking boots made of lotus silk (very fragile thread could be obtained by tearing apart the lotus root, amazing how this nano stuff could stand thumping as shoes :D– Mishu 米殊Jul 18, 2017 at 15:12