Reborn at Four, I Send a Magpie to Deliver a Letter to Dad

In her previous life, four-year-old Niannian was dumped in a poor mountain village by her stepmother. She died of illness without ever seeing her father. Reborn on the day she was sent away, she split half a flatbread with a magpie. “Xiaohua, would you deliver a message to my dad for me?”

Niannian can understand animals, but she can’t force them to do anything. She trades grains of rice for news, patiently teaching the magpie to recognize a photograph and her family’s home. Meanwhile, a little mouse sneaks into her stepmother’s house, chews holes in her new clothes, and runs off with her hair rollers, ruining the respectable image she has worked so hard to maintain.

Shen Weidong, back in the city, has never stopped searching for his daughter. One day, the magpie drops a red hair ribbon into his palm and leads him to the village entrance. Niannian cowers, afraid to acknowledge him, until the man drops to his knees. Then she throws herself into her father’s arms and says to her stepmother in a childish voice, “Goodbye, mean lady.”

But then her stepmother suddenly blocks the car. “Weidong, she isn’t your daughter at all!”