Four characters, one story
Chengyu Story Puzzle
A farmer waiting by a tree stump. A man cutting his own foot to fit the shoe. Every chengyu is a story squeezed into four characters — put them back in the right order before the clock runs out. 392 idioms from Beginner to Expert, three lives — and the 51 with a story unlock it, each with its own idiom page.
- Read the meaning — that is your clue. Beginner also gives you the pinyin in order, Intermediate the first syllable; Advanced and Expert give you nothing but the meaning.
- Build the idiom — tap a character to drop it into the next slot, tap a filled slot to take it back. Drag works too on a desktop.
- Watch for decoys — Intermediate adds one extra character to the tray, Advanced two, Expert three taken from idioms just as hard. They are never part of the answer.
- Three lives. The first wrong arrangement on an idiom is free — the slots flash green for every character already in place — after that each one costs a life, and so does letting the clock run out.
- Rounds of ten. Every round the clock gets shorter; every two rounds harder idioms join. Four right in a row raises your combo, up to ×5.
- Stuck? H or the hint button locks one character into its correct position. It is free, but that idiom loses its time bonus — and Expert has no hints.
These are some of the idioms in the game with a documented origin — solve one and its story unlocks. The rest of the bank reveals its meaning when you solve it.
Beginner — the fables everyone knows
| Chengyu | Pinyin | Literally | It means |
|---|---|---|---|
| 守株待兔 | shǒu zhū dài tù | guard the stump, wait for the rabbit | trusting to luck instead of working |
| 画蛇添足 | huà shé tiān zú | draw a snake and add feet | ruining it by overdoing it |
| 亡羊补牢 | wáng yáng bǔ láo | mend the pen after the sheep are lost | it is not too late to fix things |
| 掩耳盗铃 | yǎn ěr dào líng | cover your ears while stealing a bell | fooling nobody but yourself |
| 井底之蛙 | jǐng dǐ zhī wā | a frog at the bottom of a well | someone with a narrow view |
| 塞翁失马 | sài wēng shī mǎ | the old man of the frontier loses his horse | a setback may be a blessing |
| 自相矛盾 | zì xiāng máo dùn | your own spear against your own shield | contradicting yourself |
Intermediate — history, mostly from the Records of the Grand Historian
| Chengyu | Pinyin | Literally | It means |
|---|---|---|---|
| 指鹿为马 | zhǐ lù wéi mǎ | point at a deer and call it a horse | insisting on a lie to see who objects |
| 四面楚歌 | sì miàn chǔ gē | songs of Chu on all four sides | surrounded, with no ally left |
| 破釜沉舟 | pò fǔ chén zhōu | smash the pots, sink the boats | committing with no way back |
| 负荆请罪 | fù jīng qǐng zuì | carry the thorn rod and ask to be punished | a full and humble apology |
| 三顾茅庐 | sān gù máo lú | three visits to the thatched hut | courting talent with real persistence |
| 纸上谈兵 | zhǐ shàng tán bīng | discuss warfare on paper | theory from someone who has never done it |
| 唇亡齿寒 | chún wáng chǐ hán | lips gone, teeth cold | two parties whose fates are bound together |
Advanced — sharper, and less often taught
| Chengyu | Pinyin | Literally | It means |
|---|---|---|---|
| 螳螂捕蝉 | táng láng bǔ chán | the mantis stalks the cicada | chasing a gain, blind to the danger behind |
| 惊弓之鸟 | jīng gōng zhī niǎo | a bird startled by the bowstring | too badly frightened to recover |
| 曲突徙薪 | qū tū xǐ xīn | bend the chimney, move the firewood | preventing the disaster nobody thanks you for |
| 图穷匕见 | tú qióng bǐ xiàn | the map runs out and the dagger appears | the moment the real intention shows |
| 请君入瓮 | qǐng jūn rù wèng | please, sir, step into the jar | catching someone with their own method |
| 洛阳纸贵 | luò yáng zhǐ guì | paper grew expensive in Luoyang | a work everyone must have a copy of |
Order is the grammar
A chengyu is compressed classical Chinese. 唇亡齿寒 is lips gone, teeth cold — a chain of cause and effect that means nothing shuffled. Producing the order proves you parsed it.
The story is the mnemonic
Nobody remembers "trust to luck instead of working". Everybody remembers the farmer who sat by a stump until his field went to weeds. That is why the story is the reward here, not the footnote.
They are everywhere
Chengyu are not archaic decoration — they run through news copy, speeches and ordinary conversation. Four characters used well is the single fastest way to sound like you have read something.