A little boy, Biki enters a warehouse which has two doors. He has come to see Sui, a little girl who is sitting alone in the darkness while being blindfolded. Biki changes the bandage on Sui's eyes and asks about her condition. Sui suddenly talks about knowing the cause of her illness and reveals that Mushis have been living in her eyes for a long time...Sui is actually the youngest daughter of the village chief's family who contracted this strange disease 6 months ago. Her eyes would hurt whenever they were in contact with light. Despite seeing many optometrists, none could cure her of this illness. As such, she was sent to live in the warehouse of Biki's family since it could block light from entering the interior with its two doors. This gesture might have been for Sui's interests but to Biki, he felt that it felt like she was abandoned by her family.
After changing the bandage, Sui explains to Biki that behind the eyelids are another set of eyelids. Beyond the second pair of eyelids, that is somewhere light from the outside will not reach and the Mushis are living there. Sui offers to teach Biki how to close the second pair of eyelids and tells him to close his eyes. Despite doing so, Biki can see strands of moving light which leads Sui to comment that he is still looking at his eyelids thus he cannot feel total darkness. Biki is unable to follow Sui's instructions and feels that she is talking about an impossible thing.
Biki then accompanies Sui to play some games within the darkness where he comments that although he cannot see anything immediately after entering the warehouse, his eyes would get used to the darkness where he can subsequently make out faint outlines of objects. Sui states that this is possible because there is a river of light underground and this can only be seen if you can close your second eyelids. The river is actually made up of small Mushis which can be seen at close range. However, when Sui wants to take a closer look, she sees a man i.e. Ginko warning her to stay away from the river. Although she has never seen Ginko before, he would always appear on the other side of the river and tell her the same thing repeatedly. That is why she looks at the river from a distance. As Biki leaves the warehouse, he starts to get worried about Sui since he does not believe what she has said.
When Biki reaches home, his mother reminds him not to spend too much time with Sui as her disease might be contagious. However, Biki does not think much of this since he had burnt the old bandages and disinfected the dishes properly. He realises that Sui's family dumped her into their care due to this reason and they have no choice but to take up the responsibility of caring for Sui. Biki's mother knows that he just wants to keep Sui company but she's still fearful about anything happening to her son.
One night, Biki is reading when he suddenly experiences a sharp pain in his eyes and blows out the oil lamp hurriedly. This scares Biki as he senses something wrong with himself. The next day, Biki's mother finds him sprawled on the floor while shielding his eyes from the sunlight...
Biki's mother takes up the task of delivering meals to Sui and reveals that Biki has been infected with the illness too. This stuns Sui as Biki's mother chides herself for sympathising with Sui which has in turn caused the current state of affairs.
Biki's mother returns home and finds Ginko sitting beside Biki. Ginko introduces himself as an expert in this area and explains that he had given some medicine to Biki. He should recover soon since his illness is in the early stage and keeping him in the darkness will cause the condition to worsen. In addition, he explains that this is something which the Mushishis can cure instead of the optometrists.
Biki wakes up from a nightmare of Sui crying while apologising for infecting him and sees Ginko by his side. Ginko sees that Biki has recovered and explains that Sui is suffering from this illness as Manako no Yami Mushi (Darkness of the eyes Mushi) have infested her eyes. As this illness spreads in the darkness and Biki spent too much time with Sui, that was why he was infected. Biki wonders why Ginko knows about Sui where the latter explains that he would always see her when he closes his second eyelid. However, Sui mentioned before that the man she saw at the river of light has one eye, Biki thinks that Ginko is not the person whom Sui is referring to. Ginko says that he will begin Sui's treatment when the sun sets.
At night, Ginko finds that Sui's eye sockets are hollow and realises that she has entered the river of light. Thus, he brings Sui outdoors so that he can do something about her dead eyes since she has closed her second eyelids for too long. Ginko instructs Sui to open her eyes slowly with her second eyelids closed so that the Mushis can be scared out by the moonlight. Biki is horrified to see Sui's hollow eye sockets and the next minute, slimy Mushis are flowing out from there. As the volume of the Mushis increase tremendously, Ginko sees a purple slimy snake-like Mushi and grabs hold of it while telling Sui to close her eyes. This leads the Mushi to rush back into Sui's eye sockets. Ginko kills the purple Mushi and proceeds to treat Sui's eyes.
As Sui's eyes have been eaten away, Ginko digs into his left eye for the artificial eyeball which scares Biki. Ginko tells Biki not to be overly alarmed and proceeds to inject a greenish liquid made up from the purple Mushi into the eyeball. He then puts it into Sui's eye socket which should help her to see again. Biki asks Ginko about the river of light they were seeing but the latter does not elaborate further.
It's said that people forgot how to close their second eyelids after they gained light. However, that would have been better for them since many humans lost their eyes after closing their second eyelids for too long. Thousands of lives that flow beneath our feet, the source of life...
Actually, Biki did see the river of light for a brief moment when Ginko put the eyeball into Sui's eye socket. And that led to her recovery which means that she doesn't have to stay in the warehouse anymore. Meanwhile, Ginko continues to embark on his journey with a new eyeball in his left eye socket...
The main difference between this episode and the first episode's Mushis is the purpose of their existence. In the debut episode, Renzu was a half-baked Mushi who didn't set out to be a Mushi in the first place and she meant absolutely no harm to her grandson. However, the Mushis in this episode were not the kind sort as they gobbled up people's eyes. That goes to show that even in the Mushi world, there is a segregation of good vs evil just like what is applicable to humans. And if there are the evil types, I doubt humans and Mushis can co-exist peacefully.
An alarming revelation was that Ginko's left eye is an artificial eyeball. I hope the series will explore the reason behind this and why he goes around on finding people who are related to Mushis in one way or another. What exactly is he trying to achieve? At first, I was bewildered why he had to cover one of his eyes with his fringe. Now, I think it might have been due to the artificial eye so he is hiding it on purpose. Ginko is such a mysterious character that I think an in-depth feature into his background will be very interesting.
About the concept of the second eyelids, I found it very intriguing and the fact that it uses a real life example to increase the impact will make it more memorable to the viewer. Just like what is mentioned, even if you close your eyelids, there is actually nothing to block your eyes from staring at the closed eyelids thus the flickers and movements of light can be observed. No doubt this might have been a purely biological concept, using it here gives this simple theory an added mystique touch.
I can't explain this but whenever I watch Mushishi, it gives me a strong sense of peacefulness. Maybe it's the scenery and pace of the anime plus the mysteries unfolded in each episode so far. Or it could have been due to the music used. Somehow, I just feel relaxed while watching this. Some series hold your attention so closely that your emotions go with how the characters are feeling, some make you laugh like mad, some make you feel sad etc. In Mushishi's case, it may feel bland during the viewing but on afterthought when I think of the episode, it provides much room for thought and has a lingering sense of tranquility. However, the same cannot be said when I saw those Mushis emerging from the eye sockets. That was gross and it didn't go down well with me.
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