Nanashi (Japanese for "Nameless") is the main antagonist of the first half of the 2018 remake of the anime Gegege no Kitarou. He is a yokai created from the lingering hatred of a human-yokai child which was killed while still being inside its mother. Living on for centuries without a name and knowing only hatred, he seeks to obliterate both humanity and yokai, but is eventually stopped by Kitaro and Mana Inuyama.
Biography[]
Nanashi´s parents were a human woman and a yokai man. Because this kind of relationship was forbidden by both human and yokai laws, they were hunted down and ultimately executed by an alliance of their respective families. Nanashi was still unborn at this point. As his parents were impaled ontop of a mountain, Nanashi rose from the puddle of their dripped blood. Festering on the hatred of humans and yokai, he lived on for hundreds of years, waiting to get his chance to exterminate both humans and yokai. He closely watched the descendants of his mother´s bloodline over the ages, and finally deemed Mana Inuyama a suitable vessel to fill with hatred and merge with himself to carry out his plan.
Nanashi first appears in the very beginning of the anime, right after Kitaro defeats the Nobiagari. Sneaking up on him on a high building, he aims and shoots an arrow bearing his pentagram symbol into the Kitaro, which renders him unconscious.
Soon after, Nanashi is seen at night in the middle of a stadium, using a paper slip with his symbol to summon a yokai, which later turns out to be Tantanbo.
After Tantanbo and his yokai allies have been defeated, Nanashi watches Kitaro´and his friends wondering about the source of the recent spike in yokai attacks.
Much later, Nanashi releases the seal that trapped the 808 Tanuki, who then take control of Japan. When Kitaro and friends defeat them and their gigantic yokai beast, Nanashi gathers the malice and hatred emanating from the enslaved humans and transfers it into Mana, forming a unique seal within her. He then watches her resuming her normal life while having a cryptic and brutal vision of a woman hunted down by two men.
Mana encounters Nanashi and while he phases through her, she experiences the same strange vision. Kitaro and the gang investigate the disappearance of school kids and discover that a group of previously defeated but through some means revived yokai has lured them into their "ghost school" to eventually eat them. After their defeat they admit Nanashi revived them, dropping his name for the first time. Nanashi then appears before Kitaro and threatens him in a cryptic speech.
A while later, Nanashi orchestrates the spread of a smartphone app, which asks the user to curse somebody, leading to actual harm for that person. Eventually, the people are forced into suicide by that app. Kitaro and his friends defeat the Kubire-Oni, the Yokai operating through the app, but Nanashi managed to collect enough malevolent energy to form a second seal within the unaware Mana.
When a young witch named Agnes steals an important magical ring from her fellow Western Yokai, Nanashi helps her escape to Japan, stating where she goes is his desire. Subsequently, the leader of the Western Yokai, Backbeard, and his whole army follow Agnes and start to invade Japan, much to the delight of Nanashi. Agnés encounters Kitaro and his friends and enlists their help to search for the Ring of Arcana. During many clashes between Kitaro´s faction and the Western Yokai it is eventually revealed that Backbeard wants to use the ring to turn all humans in Japan into yokai, which is named the Brigadoon Project. Nanashi muses about the sad fate of Agnes, who is the one supposed to actually cast the Brigadoon spell. He gets his hands on the ring, and leads Mana to put it on and react to the magic energy in it. When Backbeard forces Agnés to cast the spell, Nanashi starts collecting the wailing energy from the transforming humans. Eventually, Backbeard is defeated and everything returns to normal, but Nanashi uses the collected malice to activate yet another seal in Mana.
Appearance[]
For the most part of his arc, Nanashi has a humanoid figure, which is almost completely covered by a black cloak. He also wears a hat matching the cloak. From his body only his hands, which are white with long nails, are visible, while his face is hidden behind a pale mask which resembles the face of a mustached man. The most prominent feature are his brightly glowing purple eyes. He is also surrounded by some kind of dark aura, which resembles the evil energy he gathers at various points over the course of the series.
After he absorbs Mana and the five seals he created within her, he transforms into a giant yokai resembling an infant. His true form is a tiny purple yokai which is featureless aside from his glowing eyes.
Personality[]
During most of the arc, Nanashi´s personality is shrouded in mystery. This is mostly because he has a very unique and enigmatic style of speech, talking almost exclusively in cryptic metaphors. He also does not interact much with any character, only briefly issuing an obscure warning to Kitaro. Other than that, he is mostly talking to himself. What can be gathered from his often morbid and vengeful chose of words is his deep hatred towards humans and also yokai in general.
In stark contrast to this very wordy speech pattern he actually has a childlike personality which hates every human and yokai since he never got to know any love. In his true form he does not talk at all, but displays his emotions through sounds of anger, sulking and fear.