NierKai

NierKai is the het ship between Nier and Kainé from the NieR fandom.

First Timeskip
Nier and Kainé meet after Nier visits the Aerie for the first time as a sixteen year old. On his way back to the overworld, he notices Kainé's house and goes over to investigate. It is unoccupied but he observes that the owner possesses a crown of Lunar Tears. At that moment, Kainé shows up and tells Nier to get away from her flowers, challenging him to a fight. After they fight for awhile, a giant Shade shows up and instead of fighting against each other, Nier and Kaine team up to drive the Shade away from Kainé's home. At the end of the battle, Kainé falls unconscious and is brought back to her bed by Nier. Upon waking, she tells Nier to leave her alone and that the Shade they just fought is her target alone.

When Nier visits the Aerie for the second time, he finds it under attack by the same giant Shade from his first visit. Running into Kainé on his way to the Aerie, the two of them once again team up to fight the giant Shade. This time, they kill it for good. At the end of the battle, Kainé is once again knocked unconscious and, observing Kainé's comatose state, Grimoire Weiss correctly guesses that Kainé intends to die like this. He further remarks that perhaps death is the best possible outcome for Kainé at this point, which Nier vehemently denies, saying, "That's not your decision! You don't get to decide who lives and who dies. She's a life! She has meaning and worth, and we're going to save her! Everyone has something to live for. Even Kainé." Existing in a limbo between life and death, Kainé is pulled back to life by Nier's voice, who tells her, "Don't give up! You're stronger than that! Don't you dare give up now!"

When she regains consciousness, Kainé states that she has nothing left to live for, after successfully taking revenge on the giant Shade who had killed her grandmother. Nier denies this, stating that they're friends now and that he needs her help in curing his little sister, Yonah, of her fatal illness, the Black Scrawl. Given a new reason to live, Kainé smiles and agrees to join him.

After locating all of the Sealed Verses together, Nier and his companions return to his village only to find it under attack by Shades. Wanting to protect Nier's village, Kainé asks Emil to petrify her with his eyes, in order to seal away a powerful Shade inside the basement of the library. Nier protests her request but, unable to do anything after being stabbed through the chest by the Shadowlord, he helplessly watches on as Kainé is turned to stone. The scene fades as Nier vows to restore Kainé back to life.

Second Timeskip
Five years later, Nier reunites with Emil and helps him fuse with his sister, Halua, in order to regain his normal eyesight. Endowed with new magical powers from the fusion, Emil uses them to unpetrify Kainé. After Kainé wakes up, Nier welcomes her back. Turning to Nier, who is now four years older than her (since she didn't age while petrified), Kainé remarks, "Wow. You grew up." He helps her off the ground and tells her how much time has passed, before giving her a Lunar Tear, stating that, "It's not as good as your grandmother's, but I tried." Kainé thanks him, reassuring him that the flower is lovely.

In the Shadowlord's castle, after Emil sacrifices himself so Nier, Kainé and Weiss can move forward to rescue Yonah, Nier has an emotional breakdown. Also saddened by Emil's apparent death, Kainé takes her anger out on Nier, kicking him in the stomach and punching him in the face before pushing him up against a wall. Nier takes her anger willingly, and it is at this moment that Kainé leans in to kiss Nier, before deciding better of it and backing away, telling Nier that they need to move forward.

Fanon
NierKai is one of the most popular ships in the NieR fandom, arguably only rivaled by 2B/9S from NieR Automata. Some fans were surprised when Nier kissed Kainé before killing her in ending C, due to the fact that their romance was downplayed during the earlier parts of the game. However, the downplaying of their romance was done intentionally by the writers for Replicant, who stated that they did not want to muddle the central focus of the game — the relationship between Nier and his younger sister. Despite this, many fans did pick up on hints throughout the game that Kainé had developed feelngs for Nier after the timeskip, and it was confirmed by Yoko Taro (the director of the game) that Kainé had fallen in love with Nier by the end.

NierKai is occassionally rivalled by the ship Nier/Emil. Some even prefer to ship Nier with Grimoire Weiss, especially those who played NieR Gestalt and feel that the age gap between Father Nier and Kainé is too large for romance to be viable. However, NierKai appears to be the most popular pairing in the fandom for Brother Nier, as well as for Kainé.

Fandom
FAN FICTION



PIXIV



Trivia

 * In Grimoire Nier, Yoko Taro stated that the choice between endings C and D was intended to be made based on the player's feelings towards Kainé, rather than Nier's feelings towards her. This implies that Nier's love for Kainé is contingent upon the player's choice. Yoko stated that he gave the players this choice because he didn't want to "shove romance down their throats."
 * However, both endings C and D are romantic in nature. Nier kisses Kainé in ending C. On the other hand, Yoko had stated that the player would pick ending D if they came to like Kainé after playing through the game twice. Because both final endings seem to imply that Nier harbored feelings for Kainé, many fans view the love between the two characters as mutual and requited.
 * The main storywriter for Replicant, Sawako Natori, stated that he had wanted to explore the romance between Nier and Kainé in a few more places while writing the scenario. However, Yoko had asked him to change these scenes, stating that they would take away from the main focus of the plot, which was Yonah's rescue.
 * In Jun Eishima's (writer of the Replicant light novels) interpretation, ending C is Father Nier's choice while ending D is Brother Nier's choice. Natori expanded on this, stating that, if Emil were the one to die rather than Kainé, then Brother Nier would still sacrifice himself to save Emil. This implies that, at least in Natori's interpretation, Nier's sacrifice in ending D is not necessarily romantic.
 * Yoko stated that the moment where Kainé beats Nier up in the Shadowlord's castle is the moment she realizes she loves him, and that it is the most romantic scene in the game.