📚 Yuanshen Haikua — a Qing-dynasty endgame manual
This position is balanced to an uncanny degree: exactly eight pieces a side, both armies with both elephants, a chariot, a cannon, and near-equal pawns. Red moves first, but that privilege is not enough to tip the scale — the classical manual Uyên Thâm Hải Khoát (game 58) concludes: draw. No material paradox, no ready-made trap — just two equals, and the question of who first makes himself 'drunk'. Do not confuse this with the 'Eight Immortals Cross the Sea' elsewhere in the dictionary: the 'Eight Immortals of Wine' are eight real men of the Tang dynasty, eight famed poet-drinkers whom Du Fu immortalised in a single poem. Who those eight flesh-and-blood 'immortals' were is introduced in the anecdote below. On the board: with the armies in perfect equilibrium, can you spot any crack through which this draw could be broken?
Also 'Eight Immortals', but no sea-crossing: these eight 'immortals' crossed… a drinking bout
The dictionary holds two positions named "Eight Immortals", and they have nothing to do with each other. One is the eight deities crossing the Eastern Sea. This one — the "Eight Immortals of the Wine Cup" — is eight flesh-and-blood men of the Tang dynasty, immortalised by a poem of Du Fu. Around…
Stories around this position — storytelling, not part of the engine-verified content.
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