in Inui’s goodness perhaps act as her way of acknowledging Teiyo’s painful feelings while still meshing in her own biases and beliefs

I.e. she’s a parallel to Hiroya towards Inui and similarly reflects Hiroya’s characteristics of naivety and blind faith

I actually really like writing Hikari this way

I have to unfortunately err on the side of her feeling dismissive towards Teiyo’s feelings to keep in line with canon but I think injecting an implication that Hikari knew him as a kid and saw how much he once admired Inui shows her choice to believe-

I do think this means their separation is going to come with them both discovering things about the other they were blind to before

With Hiroya definitely going to learn more about Kyoko + her influence over Inui while Inui will perhaps struggle with treating Hiroya as an enemy vs. showing him care

Inui seemingly not understanding that Hiroya deeply admires him to the point of wanting to be at his side by telling Hiroya to forget about him and move on with life vs. Hiroya not understanding Inui is a deeply flawed person who wants other things in life is such fun storytelling I’m ngl

It honestly means both characters have so much room to grow as people in understanding each other and that the finale’s events were predictable because Inui and Hiroya fundamentally have separate goals and interests

It also highlights just how insincere Inui’s relationship with Hiroya is in that he’s not putting in the time or effort to see Hiroya for who he is but, rather, is interacting with Hiroya based on his own projections of what Hiroya’s like

I do think it’s intentional that Seseki feels like a father figure to Hiroya and that Inui, by virtue of being contrasted and compared to him, comes off as a second (well, first, actually) father figure to Hiroya

…almost like Seseki and Inui are foils who represent “good parenting“ vs. “Inui’s BS”

It’s an interesting contrast that Inui chooses to treat Hiroya specially while Seseki takes a more humble approach.

Even more interesting is that Inui’s approach is based on having barely interacted with Hiroya while Seseki got a whole year of bonding with him

Also makes me half-heartedly wonder Inui would have actually gone berserk if not for his apparent choice to choose comforting Hiroya over indulging in his grief

I hope canon touches on Inui’s POV of that incident bc his actions just don’t add up

by this conclusion,,, Hiroya's parents are either some nobody characters who died before he was even cognizant of them and therefore the story is justified in not caring...or future!Inui/Kyoko are his parents and that's why there's such a huge focus on Hiroya's bond with Inui in the overall plot :)

and then even more thoughtproof: Hiroya's memory of his parents might not exist. But he sure as hell should still remember he had parents and be wondering what happened to them/at least writing them off as killed in the tragedy even if he can't actually remember them dying there

this is why i keep circling back to the idea that it's Inui's/Kyoko's future selves who are Hiroya's parents (and re: Kyoko, it's specifically her resurrected future self).

esp because it just makes the most sense & explains why Inui feels like a estranged father when their relationship isn't that

and like,,,, if Kyoko wasn't ready to accept a future with him then / to the point six years later she never moved forward in their relationship,,, i sure as hell don't think she had a kid in between that chat and her death

also it's implied Kyoko and Inui never moved forward in their relationship because it almost feels certain Inui was asking (AT THE VERY LEAST) "Can we be more than lovers?" but Kyoko wasn't ready for that and shut him down...and six years later, she's still referred to as his "lover" not "wife"

YEAH SURE Inui is a scummy character but he's not THAT scummy.

Plus, seeing how softly he treats Hiroya, I find it hard to believe he would have just gone "gee I forgot my kid existed for six years w/out me (w/ amnesia!!) and never once thought to check in w/ him as he gets bullied and harrassed"

Hiroya while he researches how to bring Kyoko back to life and would have even openly said something like "I'm going to bring her back to us, so please don't stop me" instead of...canon

also if true, this meant Inui abandoned and forgot about his own kid for six years and-

The fact too the writing just,,, absolutely refuses to talk about Hiroya's parents (and in fact interestingly enough makes sure Hiroya never sees Inui as a parental figure to him despite Inui obviously acting as one) and introduced Kyoko as a character who WILL come back into the plot...yeah :)))

the third option is his guardian/family shoved money and an apartment on him and then pretty much abandoned him...but then again that implies they should have popped up once the public learnt Hiroya was a Numbers candidate to reap the benefits of his status in some way

I think Hiroya's parents are either: dead before he could even know to care about them OR he got separated from his parents really early (be it by time travel, dimension hopping, etc) and don't know they're still alive and probably looking for him

(I want the latter it's more interesting lol)