Kainé is a companion and tritagonist of NieR, who ends up accompanying Nier after he helps her kill Hook. She is possessed by a Shade who dubs himself Tyrann, and as a result of her upbringing and Tyrann's occupation of her body, she has a disposition towards being cold and cruel - albeit the fact that more often than not she is shy and collected.
Story
- See also: Kainé's Dreams
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NieR RepliCant / NieR Gestalt
Kainé's Dreams
Originally born in the Aerie, Kainé is a coarse individual who suffers from being only half human. Her left arm and left leg, which she keeps under bandage-like coverings, are those of a Shade. This hybrid form has left her to live as an outcast, unwelcome in villages and befriended by few. As a response to the harassment she received in her childhood for being an hermaphrodite, she took a liking to clothes that emphasize feminine characteristics. She has grown accustomed to being alone, and her veneer of shyness is easily shattered by sudden outbursts and irrational displays of violent anger. Though she is secretly glad to have Nier's company, she has already learned to survive on her own due to her grandmother who she loved dearly, her skill with twin swords, and her ability to wield magic.
The only person that showed her kindness and protected her was her equally foul-mouthed grandmother Kali, with whom Kainé lived her childhood and inherited her attitude from. She held both love and respect for her grandmother who accepted her and treated her as a woman. One day when returning home she encountered the shade Hook, who was attacking Kali's house and had her pinned down, sadistically enjoying Kainé's despair. Kali died in the incident and Kainé was left mutilated. It was then that the Shade Tyrann fused with her, allowing her to live and causing Kainé's deep hatred of Shades.
When half of her body was taken over by the Tyrann, she became a Shade-possessed and gained humanly impossible battle power and the ability to hear the voices of the Shades, but despite this had convinced herself that they are all evil and deserve to die (Tyrann even mockingly asks her if she's going to sympathize with the Shade Gretel after hearing its vow to protect its fellow Shades). By becoming possessed, Kainé suffered even more persecution and lived only to exact her revenge even if it meant using the powers of a Shade.
The Witches' Banquet
The story is about a traveller who spreads words of equality in different cities. One day this traveller hears about Kaine’s story. The Aeries is a foggy place where sunlight could not even get through, and thus is constantly under the threat of Shades. The villagers live like cowardly bugs clinging along the cliffs. As the traveller spreads her of words of equality, the younger villagers said “we have someone in this village that is scarier than the Shades: a person possessed by a Shade.” The young man sarcastically says to the traveller, “You can treat this person just like any other? What a noble person you are!”
The traveller is used to people mocking her since she has been doing speeches everywhere. Whenever anyone questions here, she’ll carry a smile on her face, and feel that she has to forgive these sad people.
“I heard that if someone is possessed by a Shade, it would be like embracing death by your side. While I haven’t seen anyone who has been possessed, but I can’t stop crying when I think about the pain they have to go through. I just don’t understand why people would say they are scary,” the traveller says as the villagers look at her with their hollow eyes.
The traveller finds that the root of this village’s inequality stems from this “possessed person”, so she goes around and gathers more information to meet this Kaine. The villager says that Kaine is the only one who has been possessed by a Shade after the death of family member. It’s been said that she couldn’t stand the loneliness and had sex with a Shade. This resulted in her left body turning into something inhuman, and would kill both Shades and humans alike. She would eat the bodies afterwards, and she would be fooling around with men when she isn’t busy killing anyone. The traveller sympathizes with Kaine even more after hearing all these ridiculous rumours, and decides that she has to save her.
Kaine hires a villager to lead her to Kaine. When she notices that there are a bunch of flowers and colourful picture in her home, she is even more convinced that Kaine is just a normal person. “See, she likes pretty things too. She is a person just like any one of us!”
A shade appears all of a sudden and attacks the traveller and the villager. A person who is revealing her breasts and buttocks appeared just at the right moment and saved the two. That person fights the Shade head on, killing it while grinning from ear to ear, occasionally spewing out various profanities with joy. Her eyes shine with a bright red color, and her skin radiates a seductive aura.
This woman…. Is she the poor “possessed person”? The traveller forgets about the kind of situation she is in, and is just blankly staring at the person who is completely different from what she is expecting to be. As the dead Shade turn into smoke, she can finally hear the voice of the villager. “That’s the scary monster! She is killing Shades when she is a Shade herself! And she is even proud of killing her own kind! She might even kill people! You should run away now!” the villager says as he begins running. “Wait, weren’t you just saved by her? She killed the Shade because she was trying to save you! Stop this discrimination, you should know that she is actually a good person.”
But the villager looks at her with those hollow eyes and says “Don’t you get it? That thing isn’t human. Come on “Master”, this isn’t discrimination, this is classification.” And then he just runs away for good.
The traveller decided to approach Kaine. She ripped off her scarf to help wrap up the injury on Kaine’s thigh. She forcefully goes into Kaine’s home, and started spewing out all those principles of equality. However, Kaine falls asleep listening to her speech.
The traveller wakes up in the middle of the night as Kaine is gone from her bed, with traces of blood extending outside the door. The traveller thinks that Kaine must hiding outside because she wants to endure the pain of the wound alone. She darts out of the door and hears some painful moaning in the bushes. The traveller goes to Kaine and asks, “are you okay? I’ll help patch you up……” The fog clears up, and she sees Kaine’s entire body.
The left side of Kaine’s left body is unbelievably black, with pulsating and jittering pulps of meat, as though it is an entirely different organism. The traveller keeps on repeating to herself “everyone is equal”, and smiles at Kaine. The traveller looks down because Kaine has been staring down the whole time. Then she sees Kaine hold something with her demonic left arm, and she was absolutely horrified when she notices what that thing is.
Kaine is holding……. that swelled up and stiff male organ. The traveller saw the blood vessels on the object shaking. Kaine isn’t just possessed by Shades, she is also a hermaphrodite. “I can’t control myself… in the night after I killed Shades…”
This is the first time that Kaine has talked to the traveller. Kaine narrows her eyes and opens up her lips, then she looks at the traveller has she rapidly moves her left hand. Her breathing becomes much more rapid, and her eyes lost focus as she looks up into the sky.
“Stop!”
The traveller doesn’t dare to look at the finishing moment and backs off.
“Don’t come here! You… horrible Shade!”
The traveller escaped as she hears Kaine’s out of control screaming, it sounds like sobbing and laughter at the same time.
It’s scary, it’s scary, it’s scary, it’s disgusting, it’s frightening. It’s despicable, it’s despicable, it’s despicable, it’s disgusting, it’s frightening. Incomprehensible, I don’t want to be there, it’s disgusting, it’s horrifying.
All kinds of hideous emotions that she has never felt before rushes out of the traveller. She cries to exhaustion and throws up everything in her stomach. This night that she spent with Kaine, this worthless night. I hate her for making me like this. I hate her, I’m scared of her I’m disgusted by her. Oh no, don’t be mistaken, this isn’t discrimination, this is just classification. She isn’t even human, she is just a monster with an unimaginable body! Of course she isn’t one of us. It is a person’s right to want to run away from a monster and wish for its death right? Isn’t that correct? I’m right, right? I’m a noble person right? Am I wrong? No I must be correct right?
NieR
- "Weiss, you dumbass! Start making sense, you rotten book, or you're going to be sorry! Maybe I'll rip your pages out, one-by-one! Or maybe I'll put you in the goddamn furnace! How can someone with a big, smart brain get hypnotized like a little bitch? Huh? Oh, Shadowlord! I love you, Shadowlord! Come over here and give Weiss a big sloppy kiss, Shadowlord! Now pull your head out of your goddamn ass and START FUCKING HELPING US!"
NieR
Nier, Kainé and Weiss reach the Shadowlord's chamber and, after defeating Grimoire Noir, they discover that the Shadowlord is the original "Nier" as seen in the game's prologue, who was the primary test subject for the Gestalt Project, and driven by an identical desire to protect his sister/daughter. Having taken Yonah, he has given the original human Yonah her Replicant body, but this Yonah realizes that she cannot keep it, as she hears the Replicant Yonah calling for her brother/father. She vacates the body, and Nier and the Shadowlord do battle. During the fight, Weiss loses all his strength and disappears, leaving Nier to fight the Shadowlord alone. After defeating him, Nier and Yonah are reunited. However without their souls, the Replicants are doomed to extinction.
Ending A: Call Her Back
- "I got my own shit to take care of."
Ending B: Lingering Memories
Ending B starts the same as Ending A. After Replicant Nier defeats Gestalt Nier, the scene then changes to Gestalt Nier scrunched up, weeping to himself - alone in a white void - as he regrets all the hardships he put Yonah through. A flashback occurs, with Yonah and himself alone in the grocery store. He tells her that he isn't hungry, while Yonah tries to force him to eat something. The scene reverts back and images of enemies that Replicant Nier killed gaze at him while he cries to himself. Gestalt Yonah, in her young form comes to greet him and thanks him for always being there with her, and shares the cookie with her brother/father.
Ending C: Thank You
- "Please... Before it comes to that... I want you to kill me."
Ending D: Something Very Special
- "It's like I just found something special. Something very special."
The Lost World
In "Ending E", told in Grimoire Nier, after the Shadowlord disappeared, a program to reset the entire Replicant system begins its execution in the Forest of Myth, and Kainé goes to destroy it. The forgotten Nier is reunited with Kainé, as a young boy/man, reconstructed with the “memories” that the tree had of his first visit to the Forest of Myth.Other Appearances
SINoALICE
Nier Replicant's SINoALICE collaboration has Kainé available as a potential character through the collaboration gacha. Her swords can be unlocked through a payment of 300 crystals. Her job story has her cursing the world and her existence.
During the collaboration event, she is given a passing mention when Emil remembers the truth. Unlike Nier, who turned into a Shade, Kainé is mentioned to have only "passed away." The ending afterword implies that her swords' emergence in the Library (SINoALICE's setting) contributed to the recreation of Emil's memories. Clicking on the "Follow" option for the Emil Copies NPC after the final battle in Normal difficulty has him mention the white flowers she liked.
When player characters attack with Kainé's Swords in battle, they are given an animation that is so far unique to that weapon.
See also
Gallery
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Trivia
- Kainé is the only character out of the group who doesn't directly kill any main antagonists or bosses, as Nier kills every boss except Popola and Grimoire Noir, Emil helps Nier kill Wendy, and Weiss kills Grimoire Noir.
- Kainé is implied to have romantic feelings for Nier. She is also very close to Emil, treating him in a sisterly fashion. In contrast, she and Weiss rarely get along and often argue.
- Kainé is good at tongue twisters. A few times through and she starts adding curse words to them though.
- According to director Yoko, in Grimoire Nier, Kainé's gestalt was not originally a hermaphrodite. She was a normal female with a fiancé, but her replicant was born as a hermaphrodite due to an error in the long-running replicant system.
- According to this Get News interview with Yoko, female members of the development team demanded a "male heroine." Yoko taking their request to the extremes led to the initial idea of Kainé's hermaphroditism. During the second part of the interview, it was the graphic stabbing scenes and blood that led to the game's Mature rating, not Kainé. Later, he shared that he thought her biology would be a huge reveal for players to discover and was surprised when it was included in the earliest advertisements for the game.
- Instead of Ending C and D being a decision for “Nier and Kainé”, it was more a choice for “the player and Kainé”. Director Yoko explained, "If you like Kainé after playing through the game twice, then sacrifice yourself and save her, if you don’t then you don’t have to save her." However, in an interview, novelist Jun Eishima expressed her opinion that Ending C would have been Father Nier's choice, while Ending D would be Brother Nier's choice, stating that, "A father is responsible to his own daughter, so he couldn’t just give up his existence. He feels that it’s his duty to protect Yonah and raise her, so he’d kill Kainé and live on. On the other hand, a brother and sister both coexist with and depend on each other, so maybe he’d choose to disappear and be relieved from his burden."[1]
- Though originally rumored to be a character exclusive to the Japan-only Nier Replicant, the third trailer for NIER showcased an audio-only monologue of Kainé berating Nier's book companion, Grimoire Weiss.
- Kainé makes an appearance in the arcade-based fantasy collectible card game Lord of Vermilion Re:2.
- Kaine is mentioned in NieR Automata, along with Nier and Yonah, while Emil appears.
- According to this 4Gamer interview, Kainé's inclusion in the SINoALICE scenario was considered but prevented due to budgetary reasons. PokeLabo could only afford enough for two voice actors.
References
- ↑ Grimoire Nier. Published by Square Enix in 2010. Available online.