The Bird That Sang Again
Miako swallowed a sigh as she stared down at her smartphone screen.
Her SNS timeline was completely covered in the #SingingBird hashtag.
Half the friends she followed were talking about the documentary, and the other half were gushing about how handsome that Korean appraiser was.
Again.
Miako muttered to herself.
It had been this way since middle school.
At some point, Korean idols, Korean dramas, Korean food, Korean cosmetics...
One by one, her friends had fallen into the Korean Wave.
Miako had never managed to follow them.
No, she hadn’t wanted to.
Honestly, she couldn’t understand what was so great about it.
Beep.
A LINE notification rang out.
Miako’s eyebrow twitched.
What’s so cool about him?
She looked at the photo Hina had posted.
Still, she had to admit it.
He is pretty good-looking.
Her finger moved to type a refusal, then stopped.
The word pizza wavered her for a moment.
And then, decisively.
Three stamps flew back at once.
All of them were cheering characters.
Haah.
Miako let out a long sigh.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
In Yui’s living room, Miako sat curled up in the far corner of the sofa.
Yui, Sakura, and Hina were already brimming with excitement, stationed in front of the huge TV.
“Hey, it’s finally out!”
Yui shouted, holding up the remote.
“Be quiet, it’s starting!” Sakura waved her hand.
With Nutflix’s familiar low rumble, the screen went dark.
Then, a bright note sounded like birdsong, a clear, crystalline melody made by machinery yet so pure and lovely it seemed a real bird had begun to sing.
A faded black-and-white photograph appeared on the screen, then gradually gathered color, and with it, life.
Then it drew them into a family photo of three smiling people.
The scene shifted to the streets of Vienna in the 1930s.
A family’s life flowed by quickly as time passed over them.
It was only a brief moment of happiness.
“March 12, 1938, Vienna, Austria.”
The narration began.
“That dawn, German troops crossed the border. In a single day, Austria was annexed by Nazi Germany. History calls this the Anschluss.”
“The Austrians in the streets greeted the German army with frenzied cheers. They believed Hitler would save the economy, which had been wrecked by the Great Depression.”
“Having been reduced to a powerless nation, they longed to regain the dignity of belonging once more to a mighty German people. That longing gave birth to those cheers. For people exhausted by famine and political chaos, entering the Nazi order looked like sweet salvation.”
“But for the Jews, it was the beginning of hell.”
Jewish shop windows shattered.
A Star of David smeared in paint across a wall.
Jews forced to their knees, made to endure humiliation.
“Property was confiscated, businesses were forced shut, bank accounts frozen, homes seized. They lost everything simply because they were Jewish.”
Miako’s hand stopped.
The slice of pizza froze halfway to her mouth.
“Josef Weiss. He was a master craftsman who had run a watch workshop in Vienna for three generations.”
A man appeared on screen.
An AI-restored color photo.
A man with brown hair, green eyes, and a gentle smile.
“His workshop was no exception.”
Nazi officers burst through the door.
Watches from the display cases crashed to the floor.
The precious tools the craftsman had spent a lifetime collecting were trampled underfoot.
“Filthy Jewish rats. Wealth squeezed from the blood of Germans, that’s what this is. From now on, it belongs to the German Reich!”
“November 9, 1938, Kristallnacht. The Night of Broken Glass.”
The screen showed a burning synagogue.
Shattered windows.
Looted shops.
Furniture scattered across the streets.
“After that night, the Jews understood. If they didn’t leave, they would die here.”
“But leaving was no easy thing either.”
A world map appeared.
Red X marks were stamped one by one over country names.
“The United States, Britain, France, Switzerland... Most countries refused Jewish refugees. Getting a visa was like plucking a star from the sky.”
The scene changed.
A dim room.
A single candle trembled on the table.
A young girl slept soundly in the bed in the corner.
Josef sat across from his wife.
Deep shadows lay across both their faces.
“I got the visa.”
Josef looked down at the papers on the table.
“It’s only one for America. It says the visa was issued only to me, as a watchmaker...”
In despair, Josef dragged his hands through his hair.
A heavy silence settled over the room.
“They say so many Jews applied that they don’t plan to issue any more. There’s no telling when a family visa might come through.”
“Honey. Then what about us...”
“I was going to go first, settle in, and bring you and Anna over.”
Josef lowered his head.
“But there’s no time. The Gestapo has started arresting Jewish men. They’re sending them to Dachau. We have to leave this week.”
His wife, Maria, was already crying.
“Then what happens to Anna and me?”
“You have to go to Shanghai....”
Josef said.
“You don’t need a visa for Shanghai.”
“At the time, Shanghai was an international settlement and the only city in the world where entry did not require a visa.”
“For desperate Jews, Shanghai became the last land of hope. Between 1938 and 1941, around 20,000 Jews fled there.”
Then the scene began to shift again.
The train platform in Vienna.
The station was packed with refugees.
Women were crying out.
Children clung to their parents’ hands, terrified of losing them.
Elderly people dragged their bundles and wandered aimlessly through the crowd.
Josef took Maria’s hand.
They felt the warmth of each other’s touch at the same time they felt the tremor of fear.
“As soon as I’m settled in New York, I’ll prepare the papers. I’ll get you over to the U.S. somehow. No matter what it takes.”
With those words, Josef knelt before his young daughter.
“Anna.”
Anna looked up at her father.
She could read the situation from the atmosphere in the station.
Tears were gathering in her wide eyes.
“Why aren’t you coming with us, Dad?”
“Dad has to... take another ship.”
“Why? Why another ship?”
“Because Dad has to go first and prepare a home. I need to make a pretty room for you to come to, Anna.”
“...I don’t want that.”
Anna shook her head.
“I want to go together. With Dad.”
“Anna.”
Josef called her name in a firm voice.
Then he took a small box from his arms.
An exquisite mechanism glittering with gold and jewels.
Frere Rocha’s Singing Bird Box.
“Do you remember this?”
Anna’s eyes went wide.
“It’s the bird Grandpa had?”
“That’s right. Grandpa brought it from Switzerland. Your father inherited it when he was as young as you are now.”
Josef forced a smile.
Little Anna found that smile unsettling.
“Anna. Look at Dad’s eyes. Listen carefully. Dad is going to America first to get things ready. They only needed my skills. Your visa and Mom’s... were denied. You’ll have to take the ship to Shanghai with your mother.”
Josef wound the bird box’s spring.
Its clear note rang out through the noisy station.
“You mustn’t lose this, Anna. This is our promise.”
Anna gathered the bird box carefully in both hands and held it to her chest.
“Once Dad gets to America... there’s a huge building in New York. The Empire State Building.”
Josef spoke at Anna’s eye level.
“If Dad is late, come to New York. Make this bird sing where that big building can be seen.”
“And then?”
“Then Dad will hear the bird chirping and come looking for you, no matter what. Wherever you are, whatever I’m doing. If I hear that sound, I’ll run to you.”
The train gave a whistle to signal departure.
Maria looked at Josef with trembling eyes.
“Honey...”
Josef embraced his wife.
It was a brief but desperate hug.
“I love you. Stay healthy in Shanghai. I’ll find you somehow, no matter what it takes.”
“You too... take care of yourself.”
Josef looked at Anna and said, “Anna, this isn’t goodbye forever. We’re only being apart for a little while!”
Watching from beyond the monitor, Miako had long since set down her pizza and was wiping away tears with a tissue, completely absorbed.
She wasn’t the only one.
Everyone had abandoned their pizza and was crying too.
Then the screen shifted to the present.
From here on, it was Kim Si-woo’s point of view.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
The streets of Cat Street in Hong Kong.
Antique stalls crowded into a narrow alley, tourists and merchants tangled together in a noisy stream.
Amid them, a man was running at full speed.
He was clutching something in his hand as he shoved people aside and fled.
And behind him came the scream.
“Thief! Somebody help!”
The camera shook.
A scene caught by chance during the documentary shoot.
Then, in the split second the thief flashed past Si-woo’s side, his hand moved like lightning.
He caught the thief by the wrist.
Then hooked a foot behind him and slammed him to the ground in one motion.
Crash!
As the thief fell, one of the stalls toppled over with him.
Merchandise scattered everywhere.
“Whoa!”
Yui shouted.
“What was that? Was that really filmed like that, or is this an action movie?”
Sakura looked stunned too.
Miako didn’t answer.
She couldn’t tear her eyes from the screen.
After subduing the thief, Si-woo got to his feet.
He handed the thief over to the police.
He even apologized to the stall owner.
And then.
Si-woo’s gaze dropped to the floor.
Among the spilled goods was an object that had blackened with age, its shape hard to make out.
He picked it up.
After speaking with the stall owner through an interpreter, he bought the object for a surprisingly high price.
Miako tilted her head.
What on earth was that?
After that, Si-woo’s solo interview continued for several minutes.
“...Someone had deliberately hidden its traces. Even so, I never imagined anything remarkable would come out of it.”
The screen shifted to Sotheby’s conservation science lab.
The mysterious object found under the stall.
Under the hands of preservation experts, the identity of the box began to emerge little by little.
As the internal wax was melted away, the gold-plated surface gleamed brilliantly under the lights.
Everyone recognized it.
It was the bird box Josef had handed to Anna at the train station in the beginning.
While watching TV, Miako suddenly shouted, “It’s the bird box!”
But no one heard her because they were all too focused.
The mechanism was wound again.
Then the bird inside the box began to move.
It flapped its wings, opened its beak, and started to sing.
Even after eighty years, the sound rang out with perfect clarity.
And when the bird’s song came to an end...
before the echo could even fade, the screen went dark.
The documentary was over.
Everyone stared blankly at the screen, wordless.
The cold pizza sat on the floor.
Miako, Yui, Sakura, and Hina sat still until the ending song finished, a plaintive string melody drifting through the room.
Even after that was gone...
“Wait, that’s it...?”
“No way!”
“Don’t worry. I heard the next episode is coming out next week too.”
“How are we supposed to wait until next week... sob...”
While everyone else sniffled, Miako scratched the side of her head and spoke carefully.
“Should we watch together again next week?”
Everyone nodded with solemn faces.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Episode 1 of the documentary was released.
That night, the talk around Singing Bird exploded.
Tesola CEO Elon Musk shared the Singing Bird poster on X with the post, “Nutflix finally did something right.”
The post surpassed 200 million views in just twelve hours.
Episode 1 of the documentary had landed like a stone dropped into still water.
Nutflix took the global No. 1 spot.
In 190 countries around the world, it was shattering viewing records.
For a documentary, it was an unprecedented event in history.
And in the middle of it all, Si-woo’s smartphone never had a chance to rest.
The vibrations wouldn’t stop.
Countless calls.
All kinds of interview requests.
Not only Korean media, but CNN, BBC, NHK.
Foreign outlets were lining up too.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
In the reception room of Eterna Gallery, Si-woo sat on the sofa and looked down at his second phone.
Shin A-young set a coffee cup down beside him and said, “How does it feel to become famous in an instant? Or should I say a global celebrity?”
Si-woo shook his head, looking faintly dazed.
“Honestly, I still don’t really know.”
“Have you checked Instagram?”
Shin A-young lifted her smartphone and showed him.
There was Si-woo’s account.
The follower count was displayed.
2,847,329
“Two million?”
“When I checked a few hours ago, it was 2.5 million. Now it’s almost at 3 million.”
Even Shin A-young seemed at a loss, shaking her head.
She looked back down at her phone.
Even in that moment, the followers were climbing steeply.
Then the phone rang.
The name on the screen:
General Manager Yang Dong-seok.
Si-woo answered on his second phone.
“Yes. General Manager Yang Dong-seok.”
“Hahaha! Appraiser Kim Si-woo! Congratulations!”
Yang Dong-seok’s voice was brimming with excitement.
“Congratulations? I didn’t really do anything. If anything, you’re the one who should be congratulated, General Manager Yang.”
“Heh-heh-heh! So modest. Without Appraiser Kim Si-woo, we wouldn’t have been able to film a scene like that in the first place. As promised with Nutflix, the contract will be honored. But even I was honestly surprised.”
“At what, exactly?”
“You’re breaking Nutflix’s records, aren’t you? Even if the count is only for one day of views, the buzz is only going to get bigger from here. Headquarters is already making a racket, telling us to put even more effort into editing the next episode. Hahaha. Well, that was a little much of me.”
“No. It’s really because the editing was so good.”
Si-woo spoke sincerely.
“While watching it, it felt like footage shot long ago had come back to life. And the reenactment actors were excellent too.”
“You flatter me too much. Still, the material was so good to begin with. A bird singing again after more than eighty years... what could be more dramatic than that? Ah, and I know you must be busy, so I shouldn’t keep you on the phone. Get some rest.”
Yang Dong-seok hurried through the rest of his words and hung up.
At the other end, Shin A-young was talking on her own phone.
Before long, she ended the call and turned back with a bright smile.
“The Munch Museum just contacted us. They said they’ll accept Si-woo’s conditions. Representatives from the Norwegian government are coming in person to sign the contract.”