A young girl is left alone after the death of her grandmother, hunting small animals and gathering weeds for sustenance in her small village in China. The village people are cruel to this wild young girl, sometimes throwing stones at her.

One day, a bright red flower, which the girl recognizes as the "flower of the farther shore" from her grandmother's tales, sprouts on her grandmother's grave. The girl cares for it, hoping that it will bloom into something beautiful enough that she can win the prize of a silver pin/golden brooch at the mid autumn festival.

Her plans are thwarted by a butcher boy who steals the flower: A boy who is respected by the village, who she cannot stand up against. In her grief, the no-one girl dissolves in the cold rain that night, and disappears into the earth, into nature, and becomes the everything girl.

Thereafter, the flowers of the farther shore grow in abundance in this village, every year. The butcher's son and the fan maker marry and move into the no-one girl's old house. Years later, their daughter goes through their things, and throws away the silver pin and golden brooch, now worthless.