Mermaid Forest

The Last Face (Part I) (1x8)

: 29, 2003

Yuta and Mana meet Nanao, a 10-year-old boy carrying a cinerary box. Nanao was kidnapped by an unknown man with the help of his grandmother, but he escaped. Yuta and Mana take Nanao home, where Nanao's grandmother shows Yuta and Mana a photograph of Nanao's mother, who is not the woman Nanao calls Mother. Alone, Nanao's mother opens the cinerary box, revealing the skin of a scarred woman's face. The next day Mana and Nanao see Nanao's mother enter the cellar, but later the woman from the photo emerges with a bandage on one side of her face. In the cellar, Mana discovers surgical instruments and the skin from the face of Nanao's mother. Meanwhile Yuta has been following the kidnapper. When the woman with the bandage meets the kidnapper, Yuta overhears her call him Nanao and him call her Mother. The bandage slips from her face, revealing a scar. The older Nanao explains to Yuta that, 25 years ago, his mother ate mermaid flesh. Then eight years ago, his mother, who hadn't aged in 25 years, kidnapped his son.