Elfen Lied

Elfen Lied – Story:

Elfen Lied is about the story of Lucy, a humanoid test-subject known as Lucy. The Diclonius, is a mutated homosapien. It is said to be selected by God and will eventually become the destruction of mankind. They possess two horns on their heads and have a “sixth sense” along with telekinetic abilities. Due to these dangerous powers, they have been captured and isolated in laboratories. Lucy, a young and psychotic Diclonius, manages to break free. She brutally murders most of the guards in the laboratory where she is being held.But she was shot in the head as she makes her escape. She survives, falling off a cliff into the ocean and manages to drift along to a beach. There two teenagers, Kouta and Yuka, discover her. Having lost her memories, she was named after the only thing that she can now say, “Nyuu,” and the two allow her to stay at Kouta’s home. However, it appears that the psychotic side of Lucy is not dead just yet…

Elfen Lied – Characters:

Lucy, is a Diclonius girl around eighteen. Lucy has developed strong emotions of hatred and vengeance towards human beings. The main reason is how she was treated by the majority of them as a child. They made fun of her horns and gave her insulting nicknames such as “Freak.”

Nyu, is Lucy’s split personality that developed after a bullet ricocheted off the metallic helmet encasing her head. Nyu has a childlike personality and infantile knowledge of the world. She forgets even that she is a Diclonius and how to use or manifest her powers, leaving her the powerless to humans.

Kohta, is around nineteen and enters the story when his cousin’s family allows him to move in to their closed-down restaurant in exchange for maintaining it while he goes to a local university. Kohta has repressed traumatic memories of his father’s and sister’s deaths during his childhood.

Yuka, is Kohta’s cousin. She is around nineteen and last saw Kohta when they were ten. During the summer when Kohta’s family visited last time Kohta’s father and sister were murdered. When Kohta moves to Kamakura to attend the same university as her, she moves in with him at the Kaeda House Inn. She has had a crush on Kohta since childhood, and secretly hopes that they will finally be together.

Elfen Lied – Episode List:

Episode
Elfen Lied - 01 - A Chance Encounter A diclonius named “Lucy” escapes from an experimental laboratory off the coast of Kamakura, which is being used as a facility to hold diclonius and use them for experiments.After killing many guards, she is shot in the head and falls into the sea; her brain damage causes her to form an innocent, somewhat infantile split personality, “Nyu”. Later, she is found by Kohta and Yuka, two cousins who are reunited after eight years to study at university, and is taken back home with them. After she breaks Kohta’s seashell, his keepsake from his younger sister Kanae who died “of an illness” eight years earlier, she runs away because Kohta gets angry with her. She does not remember anything that she has done in her entire life.
Elfen Lied - 02 - Annihilation The offshore facility, headed by the scientist Kurama, sends a special task force, headed by the ruthless, cold-hearted assassin Bando, to hunt down Lucy at a beach in Kamakura. However, they only encounter her in her innocent "Nyu" state. She is hit over the head by Bando. Bando then tells his partner to finish Nyu off, but the hit reverts Nyu back to Lucy, who kills Bando's partner, and goes after Bando. Lucy uses a firearm to shoot and injure Bando. In the end, Bando has been dismembered and blinded. Lucy reverts to Nyu before she is able to kill Bando. It is seen here that Lucy and Nyu switch between each other depending on the events surrounding them. After being injured by Bando, Kohta is put in the hospital, but is not severely injured, and is released hours later while Yuka goes looking for Lucy. He encounters her back at the house and forgives her.
Elfen Lied - 03 - Deep Feelings Yuka, who has been in love with Kohta since childhood, caught him in several awkward situations with Nyu (such as changing her clothes for her after the last episode because her other clothes are wet), causing her to become increasingly jealous of Kohta's concern for Nyu. Mayu, a 13 year old girl and her dog Wanta, who witnessed the incidents in episode 2, return an umbrella left by Kohta on the beach to him, where she is interrogated about the events. Meanwhile, Nana, codenamed "No. 7", another diclonius, is released from her confinement in order to track down Lucy and bring her back to the facility.
Elfen Lied - 04 - Attack Nana, using the telepathic powers of diclonii to find Lucy, fights her in a local cemetery, and Mayu encounters them in the middle of the battle. Before long, Nana has all her limbs ripped off, nearly dead. Kurama is ordered by his boss, Kakuzawa, to put Nana down, however Kurama does not kill her. Yuka discovers that Mayu is homeless and invites her to stay with them.
Elfen Lied - 05 - Receipt Mayu's past and why she ran away from home are revealed. Mayu's mother remarried, and her new stepfather repeatedly molested her. When her mother refused to offer her any help, she ran away from home, where she encountered a stray dog, whom she named "Wanta". As Kohta and Yuka enter university and take Nyu with them, Professor Kakuzawa, the son of Kurama's boss (and, by coincidence, the university lecturer) discovers Nyu and she is taken from Kohta and Yuka. Kakuzawa is revealed to be partly diclonius, and intends to breed with Lucy. However she simply kills him, claiming that he is worthless in the evolution towards a diclonius-populated world. Kohta finds out it is also Mayu's 14th birthday, and invites her to stay permanently with them, where she finally feels that she has a family who cares for her.
Elfen Lied - 06 - Innermost Feelings Bando escapes from the hospital, still trying to find Lucy to satisfy his grudge against her. Professor Kakuzawa Yū's decapitated body is found by his assistant and Kohta. While searching for Lucy, Kohta and Yuka develop a fondness for each other as displayed through a kiss. Finally, Lucy is found by Kohta and Yuka and taken back home.
Elfen Lied - 07 - Confrontation Nana is released with brand-new artificial limbs and enough money to last her for a while on her own. Kurama, his second-in-command Shirakawa, and his assistant are all reprimanded by Kakuzawa for letting her escape and letting Kohta enter the facility to find Lucy. Meanwhile Nana, not knowing of anything outside the facility, does not know what to do with the money and begins to burn some. Soon, she is found by Mayu at the cemetery where she was almost killed by Lucy and they become friends with each other. Nana is then brought back to Kohta's home. Discovering that Lucy (actually Nyu) is in the home, Nana attacks her.
Elfen Lied - 08 - The Beginning As a result of living her entire life inside the facility, Nana is found to be naive and sensitive about the events surrounding her. Mayu discovers the real Lucy behind Nyu as Nana tells her of their diclonius powers. As Lucy is recovering from being hit in the face by Nana, she goes through a flashback of her childhood, where she was raised in an orphanage all her life where her peers constantly bullied her. Feeling lonely and ignored, she begins to develop her hatred for humans. When her peers discover that she has made friends with a stray dog, (discovered when a girl pretended to be Lucy's friend) they force her to watch as they beat it to death with a vase, and in her despair, Lucy activates her vectors and commits her first murders against her schoolmates.
Elfen Lied - 09 - Reminiscence Lucy's past links with Kohta are uncovered - after her dog was killed, she began to show contempt for humans, until Kohta briefly befriended her. Kohta plays the series' opening theme "Lilium" in a music box which he bought in Kamakura. They go to the zoo and later play in the water, where she thanks Kohta for the most fun she'd ever had in her life. Her hope in being re-acquainted with humans is briefly regained. However, when she discovers Kohta's cousin (Yuka), who he claimed to be a boy, is actually a girl, she loses hope and begins her future murderous path.
Elfen Lied - 10 - Infant Kurama's past is explained in this episode. He was a good friend of Professor Kazukawa, who invited Kurama to work with him and his father on the diclonius project after leaving university. He reluctantly agrees, however, as he is performing research, he is infected with the diclonius virus via transmission through their vectors, and as a result, his daughter Mariko is born a diclonius. He decides to kill her, however as his wife dies from complications after giving birth, begging him to spare her, Kurama chooses to let her live under Kazukawa's condition that bombs must be planted inside her to kill her in case she turns aggressive. Meanwhile, as both Lucy and Nana are now part of Kohta's household, the facility decides to send "the most powerful" diclonius, known only as "No. 35".
Elfen Lied - 11 - Complication Mariko is revealed to be the true identity of No. 35. Under supervision from staff at the facility, she is released as a last effort to retrieve Lucy. Nana senses Mariko's presence and her desire to kill her through their ability to locate each other. Mariko and Nana meet on a bridge on the shore and they battle. Kurama, who supposedly "had to leave", has joined Bando to kill Lucy on his own beyond the knowledge of Shirakawa and the staff.
Elfen Lied - 12 - Quagmire The past which Kohta had tried to forget eight years ago comes back to him as he remembers that Lucy took revenge on Kohta's lie about the gender of his cousin by killing Kohta's father and his sister Kanae. As Shirakawa dispatches Mariko to kill Lucy, Bando is paid by Kurama to kill her as well. Mariko is about to kill Nana (as well as Kohta and Lucy), until Nana uses her vectors to deactivate Mariko's and falls off the bridge, as Mariko's vectors fail and she is taken away. Shirakawa discovers Lucy's Nyu personality and identifies her as the target diclonius, only to be killed along with the security forces enlisted to guard against Mariko.
Elfen Lied - 13 - No Return Mariko regains the ability to use her vectors and stages one final meeting with Lucy. They meet, and Lucy goes into a state of shock after losing one of her horns. Kurama, accompanied by Nana whom he rescued after she fell off the bridge where she battled Mariko, encounters their fight. Here, Mariko realizes that Kurama is her father and meets him for the first time, beginning to cry after finally encountering her father, who appears to have abandoned her for Nana. Kurama exchanges final words of reassurance to Mariko just before the final bomb inside her is detonated, killing them both. The Director of the facility that had been holding Lucy, Nana and Mariko reveals that he is a diclonius. Lucy, who makes it out of the fight alive, reveals her remorse and emotion for Kohta and they kiss before she leaves to encounter the security team. However, Lucy's ultimate fate is unknown except that her other horn is broken, although it is possible that she died as the shots of the guns continue, even after her horn is broken. The "family" of Kaede house, including Nana, settles down. As they are about to eat, Wanta barks at someone at the door. When Kohta goes to check, the music box playing "Lilium" stops and he sees a figure standing at the front door. He then hears the grandfather clock, which Lucy had repeatedly attempted to repair, ticking again.