Mushi-Shi (2005–2006): Season 1, Episode 5 - The Traveling Swamp - full transcript
"The Traveling Swamp."
-
Hmm...
So when "Ah," the mushi
that eats silence,
becomes a parasite,
these horns sprout on its host?
Yes indeed, this is very rare...
And, what's that one?
A sake cup drawn by a young man
with a god-like left hand.
What?
His dislike for mushi-shi is well-known.
Come up with a better
story than that, Ginko.
Nah...
1 don't want to force you
to buy it, Dr. Adashino.
This item is too good for
the likes of an ordinary collector.
Well, let me have a close look...
I'd be willing to sell it to you...
if you'll help me.
On my way here, ll ran into something odd...
I want to capture it.
Something odd?
Yes... Have you heard of
what became of liquid mushi?
A "living swamp"...
As I was crossing the mountains,
I came across many swamps.
Another swamp...
But every time I went around one
and looked back from the mountainside,
the swamp would be completely gone.
Then, after I had crossed
the next mountain,
a new swamp would appear.
I wonder if the foxes and badgers
are playing tricks on me...
I saw you at the previous swamp, didn't 1?
Do you know a shortcut through
the mountains or something?
For a moment, I doubted my eyes...
Her hair was so eerily green.
It seemed dyed to its roots
by the waters of the swamp.
Um...
Is there something beyond
here in that direction?
Hmm?
Well then, can I ask you a question, too?
This is no ordinary swamp, is it?
This swamp is... traveling...
as it repeatedly comes up
and sinks down below the ground.
Like you, I think it's trying
to get beyond these mountains.
Oh? That's incredible. A living swamp?
Then are you moving together with it?
Why?
Anyway, if you go straight ahead,
you'll come to the sea.
My destination is the fishing village there.
Once you reach the sea, you won't
be able to travel with the swamp.
By the way, I'd like to study
the swamp water tomorrow morning.
Be my guest.
It's too dark right now.
Seems like a new type...
I thought you wouldn't believe me
when I said the swamp is traveling.
Oh, that? Because of my work,
I'm open to most phenomena.
Your work?
I'm a mushi-shi.
Mushi-induced phenomena are all strange.
Take the Suiko for example. Liquid mushi.
It's a clear and colorless liquid, but alive.
It prefers living in old water veins,
and sometimes stays in ponds and wells.
If one keeps drinking Suiko,
mistakenly thinking it's water,
he becomes unable to breathe
without constant contact with water,
and his body begins turning transparent.
If left alone, he turns
to liquid and flows away.
As for the mushi itself,
it is gone by that time.
There are things like that...
So maybe a traveling swamp could exist,
as well... You start to think like that.
What about you?
Didn't you think it was creepy?
-
I---
...never once thought it was frightening...
...Since when I saw it for the first time,
it was so powerful and solemn...
Powerful... How did it look?
It was swimming...
at the bottom of the raging river...
I was swallowed by the currents
and unable to make it to the surface.
Then...
I saw something huge and green...
...calmly rising from
the bottom of the current...
When ll came to, I was on the shores
of the swamp in a mountain valley.
This color...
Then I realized...
...the swamp was actually
the green thing that ll saw earlier.
By then, my hair had become this color.
I probably had died once...
But the swamp said, "You may live."
That's why this swamp is
the only place I feel I belong.
At least...
...wear this when you go.
Think of it as becoming
the bride of the water god.
All of us will look after your mother.
So don't worry.
Your name will become legend...
...as the honorable girl
who saved our village from the flood...
If one keeps drinking it,
his body becomes transparent...
...and eventually flows away.
So it's time to go?
It's going underground...
Hey, you're leaving so soon?
Make it wait a little!
Damn, I want to study it!
Thank you for teaching
me about many things.
I'm going to become
part of this swamp now...
Wait! Hey!
It's gone...
Damn! Why didn't I realize it earlier?
That was what became of the Suiko...
After the Suiko disappeared from the well,
it was traveling...
I'm going to become
part of this swamp now...
That fool! Does she realize
what that means?!
The swamp said, "You may live."
You...
...wanted to live, didn't you?
The swamp was...
heading for the sea, wasn't it?
A swamp heading toward the sea?
Know anything about that?
I've heard something like
that from an old fisherman.
He said that, at times, something "green,”
larger than a whale, comes down the river,
and once it reaches the sea, it dies
as if it disintegrated into the water.
He said he never saw it himself,
but he said it's as though it
were looking for a place to die...
Anyway, we should hurry...
Judging by the fact that the fishermen
aren't making a ruckus,
it hasn't reached the sea, yet.
Here it is!
"Underground Water Veins"
Here it is!
"Underground Water Veins" This is a map of
the underground water veins in this area.
"Underground Water Veins"
It's a rare item.
It's a rare item.
It was apparently based
on dowsing rod vibrations.
I hope it's reliable.
When test wells were dug,
the probability was fifty-fifty.
The locations of the swamps
I saw match this water vein.
So Suiko does move along
the underground water veins...
But it forks here.
Can't predict which way
it's going like this...
Hey Ginko,
I have this map, too.
It's a map of where the rivers may
have been tens of thousands of years ago.
Although the nearby river has its estuary
in the same place as those times,
it's interesting to see that it ran
in quite different places back then.
Look, you...
I don't have time to hear you
boasting about your collecti...
Let me see that.
They match... What's it mean?
These water veins were once a river.
When a river becomes no longer
a river and gets buried underground,
it often remains as a layer of stones.
Rainwater seeps toward that layer...
When a location where a river
used to be is buried underground,
it becomes a river for subterranean water.
Maybe that swamp remembers
this old river and is following it...
After deciding where to die?
It's like salmon, or sweetfish.
Anyhow, it should eventually
come to this estuary.
If it reaches the sea,
there's nothing we can do.
Adashino!
Could you gather some people?
We're putting up a net near the estuary.
Okay! That's it! Pull!
Right!
We appreciate so many of you turning out.
You sure it was okay?
No problem. We fishermen have
all the time on our hands right now.
There're so few fish these days,
you'd think the sea was dead.
And this is a request from you,
Dr. Adashino, so...
Being a doctor comes
with perks, doesn't it?
No, it's my wonderful personality.
But, Ginko,
you don't know if the girl can
still be caught by this net, right?
Right, but it's our only hope.
Why do you want to save her so much?
I suppose you probably have
a guilty conscience, but...
If the girl said she wanted
desperately to live, I'd understand.
But she wanted to become
part of the swamp, right?
That might be her happiness...
Sometimes that's the way
it is in this world,
though it sounds cruel...
About that green sake cup...
Huh?
It originally belonged to
that young man's grandmother.
Because she was no longer
either mushi or human,
her only way to appear
before the young man
was to restore that sake cup
given to her by mushi.
Although by doing so, she could
never return to being human again...
I made her mushi because
that was what she wanted.
But I'm not sure if that was for the best.
Becoming mushi is different
from a normal death.
Mushi exist between
the living and the dead.
They are "living," like people,
and inanimate, like objects.
They're dead, yet alive.
Don't you think that's an unimaginable hell
compared to "a moment of death"?
The heart that makes one human
is erased little by little.
That was where she was headed...
But when I saw her that final time,
she was wearing her
finest kimono with care.
There aren't many situations
mote cruel than that, right?
Nothing's coming...
I just heard something...
It's here!
Wh-what the...
Slow it down! Don't lose the net!
Don't stab it! There's a woman inside!
What?!
Hang in there!
I-it slipped past...
Il saw a person... in a red kimono...
Were we... too late?
Hey! What's up with
this huge school of fish?!
Same here!
What the hell is this?!
Ginko, they found the girl. She's alive!
But...
they said she looked like gelatin...
Doctor!
How's the girl?
Looks like the seawater
washed out that green stuff...
Well, she's like dough now, I guess...
The fish are gathering to feed
on the carcass of that green stuff.
The ocean is black with fish!
Let me take a look at her.
That girl brought a wonderful thing.
Hey!
Can you hear me?
When we reached the sea,
I could tell... the swamp... was dying.
I was so... so terrified
of dissolving into the swamp...
But... I was so sad
about the swamp dying...
It lived for tens of thousands of years,
if not more.
You accompanied it on its final journey.
You were fortunate to have met it.
Yes.
Hi there, lo.
Dr. Adashino...
Oh, looks like another large catch today.
Yes, fish are coming from far away, too.
They grow this big by feeding
on the swamp's carcass.
Your hair's jet black now.
Yes, sol can't breathe
underwater anymore,
but that's okay.
I want to live independently here
by the sea where the swamp died.
Swamps again...
One, two, three, four...
The reason it surfaced
as it was moving forward...
...was to leave behind
its offspring, I guess...
Swamps are born and
eventually become stagnant...
When the world nurtured
in their bosom comes to an end,
they put on their own feet...
and begin to move...
"Those Who Inhale the Dew."
-
Hmm...
So when "Ah," the mushi
that eats silence,
becomes a parasite,
these horns sprout on its host?
Yes indeed, this is very rare...
And, what's that one?
A sake cup drawn by a young man
with a god-like left hand.
What?
His dislike for mushi-shi is well-known.
Come up with a better
story than that, Ginko.
Nah...
1 don't want to force you
to buy it, Dr. Adashino.
This item is too good for
the likes of an ordinary collector.
Well, let me have a close look...
I'd be willing to sell it to you...
if you'll help me.
On my way here, ll ran into something odd...
I want to capture it.
Something odd?
Yes... Have you heard of
what became of liquid mushi?
A "living swamp"...
As I was crossing the mountains,
I came across many swamps.
Another swamp...
But every time I went around one
and looked back from the mountainside,
the swamp would be completely gone.
Then, after I had crossed
the next mountain,
a new swamp would appear.
I wonder if the foxes and badgers
are playing tricks on me...
I saw you at the previous swamp, didn't 1?
Do you know a shortcut through
the mountains or something?
For a moment, I doubted my eyes...
Her hair was so eerily green.
It seemed dyed to its roots
by the waters of the swamp.
Um...
Is there something beyond
here in that direction?
Hmm?
Well then, can I ask you a question, too?
This is no ordinary swamp, is it?
This swamp is... traveling...
as it repeatedly comes up
and sinks down below the ground.
Like you, I think it's trying
to get beyond these mountains.
Oh? That's incredible. A living swamp?
Then are you moving together with it?
Why?
Anyway, if you go straight ahead,
you'll come to the sea.
My destination is the fishing village there.
Once you reach the sea, you won't
be able to travel with the swamp.
By the way, I'd like to study
the swamp water tomorrow morning.
Be my guest.
It's too dark right now.
Seems like a new type...
I thought you wouldn't believe me
when I said the swamp is traveling.
Oh, that? Because of my work,
I'm open to most phenomena.
Your work?
I'm a mushi-shi.
Mushi-induced phenomena are all strange.
Take the Suiko for example. Liquid mushi.
It's a clear and colorless liquid, but alive.
It prefers living in old water veins,
and sometimes stays in ponds and wells.
If one keeps drinking Suiko,
mistakenly thinking it's water,
he becomes unable to breathe
without constant contact with water,
and his body begins turning transparent.
If left alone, he turns
to liquid and flows away.
As for the mushi itself,
it is gone by that time.
There are things like that...
So maybe a traveling swamp could exist,
as well... You start to think like that.
What about you?
Didn't you think it was creepy?
-
I---
...never once thought it was frightening...
...Since when I saw it for the first time,
it was so powerful and solemn...
Powerful... How did it look?
It was swimming...
at the bottom of the raging river...
I was swallowed by the currents
and unable to make it to the surface.
Then...
I saw something huge and green...
...calmly rising from
the bottom of the current...
When ll came to, I was on the shores
of the swamp in a mountain valley.
This color...
Then I realized...
...the swamp was actually
the green thing that ll saw earlier.
By then, my hair had become this color.
I probably had died once...
But the swamp said, "You may live."
That's why this swamp is
the only place I feel I belong.
At least...
...wear this when you go.
Think of it as becoming
the bride of the water god.
All of us will look after your mother.
So don't worry.
Your name will become legend...
...as the honorable girl
who saved our village from the flood...
If one keeps drinking it,
his body becomes transparent...
...and eventually flows away.
So it's time to go?
It's going underground...
Hey, you're leaving so soon?
Make it wait a little!
Damn, I want to study it!
Thank you for teaching
me about many things.
I'm going to become
part of this swamp now...
Wait! Hey!
It's gone...
Damn! Why didn't I realize it earlier?
That was what became of the Suiko...
After the Suiko disappeared from the well,
it was traveling...
I'm going to become
part of this swamp now...
That fool! Does she realize
what that means?!
The swamp said, "You may live."
You...
...wanted to live, didn't you?
The swamp was...
heading for the sea, wasn't it?
A swamp heading toward the sea?
Know anything about that?
I've heard something like
that from an old fisherman.
He said that, at times, something "green,”
larger than a whale, comes down the river,
and once it reaches the sea, it dies
as if it disintegrated into the water.
He said he never saw it himself,
but he said it's as though it
were looking for a place to die...
Anyway, we should hurry...
Judging by the fact that the fishermen
aren't making a ruckus,
it hasn't reached the sea, yet.
Here it is!
"Underground Water Veins"
Here it is!
"Underground Water Veins" This is a map of
the underground water veins in this area.
"Underground Water Veins"
It's a rare item.
It's a rare item.
It was apparently based
on dowsing rod vibrations.
I hope it's reliable.
When test wells were dug,
the probability was fifty-fifty.
The locations of the swamps
I saw match this water vein.
So Suiko does move along
the underground water veins...
But it forks here.
Can't predict which way
it's going like this...
Hey Ginko,
I have this map, too.
It's a map of where the rivers may
have been tens of thousands of years ago.
Although the nearby river has its estuary
in the same place as those times,
it's interesting to see that it ran
in quite different places back then.
Look, you...
I don't have time to hear you
boasting about your collecti...
Let me see that.
They match... What's it mean?
These water veins were once a river.
When a river becomes no longer
a river and gets buried underground,
it often remains as a layer of stones.
Rainwater seeps toward that layer...
When a location where a river
used to be is buried underground,
it becomes a river for subterranean water.
Maybe that swamp remembers
this old river and is following it...
After deciding where to die?
It's like salmon, or sweetfish.
Anyhow, it should eventually
come to this estuary.
If it reaches the sea,
there's nothing we can do.
Adashino!
Could you gather some people?
We're putting up a net near the estuary.
Okay! That's it! Pull!
Right!
We appreciate so many of you turning out.
You sure it was okay?
No problem. We fishermen have
all the time on our hands right now.
There're so few fish these days,
you'd think the sea was dead.
And this is a request from you,
Dr. Adashino, so...
Being a doctor comes
with perks, doesn't it?
No, it's my wonderful personality.
But, Ginko,
you don't know if the girl can
still be caught by this net, right?
Right, but it's our only hope.
Why do you want to save her so much?
I suppose you probably have
a guilty conscience, but...
If the girl said she wanted
desperately to live, I'd understand.
But she wanted to become
part of the swamp, right?
That might be her happiness...
Sometimes that's the way
it is in this world,
though it sounds cruel...
About that green sake cup...
Huh?
It originally belonged to
that young man's grandmother.
Because she was no longer
either mushi or human,
her only way to appear
before the young man
was to restore that sake cup
given to her by mushi.
Although by doing so, she could
never return to being human again...
I made her mushi because
that was what she wanted.
But I'm not sure if that was for the best.
Becoming mushi is different
from a normal death.
Mushi exist between
the living and the dead.
They are "living," like people,
and inanimate, like objects.
They're dead, yet alive.
Don't you think that's an unimaginable hell
compared to "a moment of death"?
The heart that makes one human
is erased little by little.
That was where she was headed...
But when I saw her that final time,
she was wearing her
finest kimono with care.
There aren't many situations
mote cruel than that, right?
Nothing's coming...
I just heard something...
It's here!
Wh-what the...
Slow it down! Don't lose the net!
Don't stab it! There's a woman inside!
What?!
Hang in there!
I-it slipped past...
Il saw a person... in a red kimono...
Were we... too late?
Hey! What's up with
this huge school of fish?!
Same here!
What the hell is this?!
Ginko, they found the girl. She's alive!
But...
they said she looked like gelatin...
Doctor!
How's the girl?
Looks like the seawater
washed out that green stuff...
Well, she's like dough now, I guess...
The fish are gathering to feed
on the carcass of that green stuff.
The ocean is black with fish!
Let me take a look at her.
That girl brought a wonderful thing.
Hey!
Can you hear me?
When we reached the sea,
I could tell... the swamp... was dying.
I was so... so terrified
of dissolving into the swamp...
But... I was so sad
about the swamp dying...
It lived for tens of thousands of years,
if not more.
You accompanied it on its final journey.
You were fortunate to have met it.
Yes.
Hi there, lo.
Dr. Adashino...
Oh, looks like another large catch today.
Yes, fish are coming from far away, too.
They grow this big by feeding
on the swamp's carcass.
Your hair's jet black now.
Yes, sol can't breathe
underwater anymore,
but that's okay.
I want to live independently here
by the sea where the swamp died.
Swamps again...
One, two, three, four...
The reason it surfaced
as it was moving forward...
...was to leave behind
its offspring, I guess...
Swamps are born and
eventually become stagnant...
When the world nurtured
in their bosom comes to an end,
they put on their own feet...
and begin to move...
"Those Who Inhale the Dew."