A Bottle of Pre-Qin Sword

The maid caressed the green rust on the bronze, and the swords of the princes cut through the morning mist. The earthworm-like words in the parchment record the covenants that were trampled by war horses. Finally, the princes sank the seal into the Wei River, watching the whirlpool swallow up the three hundred years' promise. When the new messenger crossed the boundary monument, he was carving on the tortoise shell with a broken iron sword: "The soothsayer said that tonight the crescent moon will fall into my wine bottle."