Yep! Your eyes are not deceiving you.  According to unilad, researchers from the Kurashiki University of Science and the Arts have revealed they will be taking a mummified 'mermaid' for CT scans to get to the bottom of its mysterious form and legend which has even been alleged to be connected to the coronavirus pandemic.  The mummy may also have religious significance according to the creator of the project, Hiroshi Kinoshita, of the Okayama Folklore Society.  'Japanese mermaids have a legend of immortality. It is said that if you eat the flesh of a mermaid, you will never die', he said. 'There is a legend in many parts of Japan that a woman accidentally ate the flesh of a mermaid and lived for 800 years. This ‘Yao-Bikuni’ legend is also preserved near the temple where the mermaid mummy was found. I heard that some people, believing in the legend, used to eat the scales of mermaid mummies.'

Kinoshita also explained how there is a legend surrounding mermaids that can 'predict[...] an infectious disease,' and that this may have foreshadowed the coronavirus pandemic.  While a letter which came with the mummy suggests it was 'caught in a fish-catching net in the sea off Kocki Prefecture,' Kinoshita is skeptical.  The letter states: 'The fishermen who caught it did not know it was a mermaid but took it to Osaka and sold it as unusual fish. My ancestors bought it and kept it as a family treasure.'  The mummy currently resides in the Enjuin temple in the city of Asakuchi, where it is locked up in a fireproof safe, having previously been displayed in a glass case. Read more on this mummified mermaid by clicking here.