The title 'Daocong Lide Shih' literally means 'the poem from the sword forest.' This story occurred in the Southern Song Dynasty when there were no laws protecting the rights of those organizing private associations. So the association called Bachihmen run by the returning solders from the war against the Northern Jin Dynasty and the Mongolian troops was inspected by the government. The head of this association was named Gong Siahuai, and his girl friend was a singing girl called Yan Siaohua.

      One day Gong was arrested by a group of four constables whom he thought were his friends. The group was given the mission to catch Gong because the evil and highest ranking official Shih Miyuan, accused Gong of betraying his country. Shih Miyuan planned to use this trumped up anti-government charge both to control the association Bachihmen and to arrest martial arts masters and mistresses who tried to rescue Gong. At the same time the Northern Jin Dynasty also sent a forceful martial arts master, Cyu Ji, to assassinate the people who came to help Gong.

      In order to help Gong, Gong's girl friend married an official, so she would have the opportunity to persuade the government to release Gong. Furthermore, she worked with the wugong master, Ye Hong. Ye Hong was once defeated by Gong Siahuai in a wugong contest, but he respected Gong as a hero so he decided to rescue Gong. Ye Hong's friend, Wang Syukong, who also lost to Gong in a wugong contest, had the same impression of Gong, thus he participated in the rescue team organized by the Elder Sister Song of the Bachihmen association. This rescue team decided to break in the 'big' jail where Gong was locked up.

      Nevertheless there were spies in both Yan Siaohua's and Elder Sister Song's sides. So they did not succeed; Yan and Ye Hong were poisoned, and they almost died; Song and her followers from the Bachihmen were ambushed and suffered terribly. Ye found out that one of his friends was the spy, Cyu Ji, so Ye killed him.

      This story does not have a clear ending. Instead, it mentions two possibilities passed among the hero's and heroine's contemporaries: one is that Gong was released by the emperor, and the other is that Gong died in jail one day before the emperor's amnesty arrived.

Many poetic sentences are used in this book, and the dialogue is elegant. Spies make this story more suspenseful and thrilling. The author analyzes the characters' mentalities in detail and expresses his own philosophic beliefs at the same time.