Young scholar Pu Songling encounters danger while traveling and is forced to spend the night at Lanruo Temple. There, he is captured by a toad and a turtle and taken to the bottom of a mysterious ancient well. The two spirits compete in storytelling and force Pu Songling to judge the quality of his stories... Ultimately, forced into a corner, Pu Songling tells his own extraordinary tale. 　　The film is structured in chapters, with a main plot, "Stories from the Well," and five adaptations of classic Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio: "The Taoist of Laoshan," "Princess Lotus," "Nie Xiaoqian," "Painted Skin," and "The Lady of Duke Lu," totaling six chapters.