When after a lengthy chat the merfolk offered Nico a mask that would let her breathe water instead of air, and invited her to visit their realm, she took that rare opportunity immediately.
She had just arrived at those shores, and none of the land dwellers had told her yet that such a mask would grow to her face. nor that humans thus trapped under water, and made even more clumsy by cutting off their hands, were in the eyes of the merfolk amusing pets.