#i know there's stuff i left out in here but i'vve honestly forgotten whoopsies. most of this is extrapolated from discord stuff ( ._.)

[datastate]

gahhh there's so much that even i haven't been able to properly word for kai's ref sheet but. i do have the gist of how he regards his father... it's a lot though. and it changed a lot... always been complicated.

at his current age - on some level, i think kai... pities gashu. fear is present, naturally, bc kai knows the wrath that comes with asunaro's displeasure & gashu is essentially the boss’ right hand - but generally, he isn’t inclined either way. if he does feel any stronger feelings, they end up leaning toward anger. (if he does allow himself to linger on it enough (or there’s another factor intended) to invoke an intense emotional reaction)

(which is. well, this is unrelated, but it's really funny to compare this to ranger; whereas ranger had to make an effort to redirect his anger on gashu’s behalf (in a situation he deems unfair) from gashu toward himself, kai has to get himself accustomed to being angry toward his father.)

a lot of his youth, he felt terribly guilty. a lot of what gashu said (and did) stuck in his head. 'failure' as a literal trigger word, at this point. (specifically for the scene where he was trailing kai to make sure he got the job done, and then had to take out the target himself (and that's where kai got the scars on his shoulder in my hcs, the three bullet marks...); kai ended up being thrown into training for another year, and only afterward when he was sent out again was he able to conceal it better (bc he was older... and more accustomed to asunaro's system to take advantage of it for his own sake & the targets' sakes)) - kai was often angry with himself for disappointing his father. even now, though he takes a more objective stance when he lists it, it's these two things that stick : "my father was disappointed with me, and my standing in the organization was low." both are presumably still in relevance to his father.

gashu is assumed to be a greatly important figure within asunaro, who holds power and influence. he is able to bring in both emiri and michiru to the organization & relay the importance of the death game with them...

gashu was the only one in the entire organization that kai actually had a connection with. the entire reason that kai was brought into the organization in the first place was because of gashu's own selfishness - sure, his father values his family (it just so happens he values asunaro more...) & that's partly why he raised kai the way he did, to try to minimize the chance of kai being deemed useless, soon thereafter killed by asunaro. however, gashu and kai have much more of a. mentor and apprentice relationship, than father and child. whether he didn’t comprehend the whole situation, or craved validation, or felt a mix of fear/admiration for his father... before he was sent to actually kill, he showed a lot of potential. for this, gashu treated him with decency (or perhaps even curiosity, if we’re to contrast this with ranger’s behavior). kai knows this. but ever since he made that choice to go against what asunaro wanted, it meant he went against what gashu wanted for him. it meant he was signing his own death, and gashu couldn’t bear that.

and that sudden shift in how his father regarded him really, really hurt. even though kai felt he was doing the only reasonable thing, with the values he was raised to hold.

& because of that, for a long time, kai still considers himself loyal to asunaro (this begins to dissipate around the 16/17 age), but not the people who run the organization. there's still a period of time afterward where he will say he's loyal, aloud, but mostly because... well there's still the threat of death, and in a manner of speaking it is true, even if he's mostly taken these ideals for himself now. but whereas he can take asunaro's values (specifically when it comes to holding devotion in high regard) and realize what it means for the world as a whole, he then realizes the full extent of how much worse his father's mindset is -

gashu’s world is asunaro, at this point. it all leads back to the organization. that is why kai claims his father 'lost himself' or that the organization 'drove gashu mad' ... and why he sees death ('defeat' is a kinder term... and frankly inapplicable within the death game without punishment) as the only escape gashu has, at this point. gashu will not - or cannot! - return to the world he once knew... but that's a whole other issue.

( also relevant to mention here that kai probably only fully realized how much he was missing when he had that paternal dynamic with mister chidouin (& maybe mrs. chidouin? she does seem fond of him...) and it's only then that he really begins to. grieve that? not in a way that takes over his life, but i do think there would be a point where, once he finally accepts that he's been essentially cut off from asunaro and must cope with isolation as his punishment, he's immediately thrown into that unfortunate realization that his father never even had a chance to really love him, beyond the ideal that he wished for. and that from the start, being an assassin was something kai was never going to be able to accomplish unless he broke... & on a similar note, anger is still something that he doesn't enjoy feeling (because it's one of the emotions that kai cannot properly. moderate...) but it usually festers along with his grief for the life that he lost to asunaro's hand. to his own father, who he now realizes should've protected him. as much as he loves mister chidouin, knowing even broken trust won’t cut that, he would be prepared to kill him should he ever find out; not only for the group of participants - because sara's own father was going to hurt her, willingly throw her into the heart of asunaro. kai knows how much it affected himself, and there's a lot of. caution and weight, to even the more innocent gestures he does. because even though he's outside of asunaro, he just feels all he’s done will never leave him.

and... he’s never given that chance to alleviate it, because mister chidouin in-game was there to subtly enable that guilt & set a firm, '''reasonable''' line for how kai was to interact with normal society. including his daughter.)

ANYWAY... YES... my main point is that : kai doesn't place his life's value in gashu's hands anymore. his connection with gashu only lasts because gashu is still kai's higher-up, and through 'blood' (though that hardly counts for anything...) and it is because of this disconnect that kai can now see it from a more objective view. he recognizes gashu must've gone through his own shit to end up with such a twisted view of reality, but he wishes gashu understood that he brought a child with him into this. however, because there's nothing to really be done at this point, kai just ends up feeling very little toward his father. he doesn't feel as guilty as he once did, he's begun to forgive himself (even if he still fears himself & the harm he can do, though he has much more control of when/why he would even enact now... there'd still be those intrusive thoughts, with how familiar he was with the horrors), and redirect his resentment toward asunaro above all else... but for the most part he tries not to dig too deeply into the particulars until he absolutely must. even low-standing, he's still a part of asunaro and needs to use this to try to make sure they don't hurt anyone else that he now cares for. kai's just trying to move forward, even if the 'stains' on his conscience last.