More of Kai’s Ex-Friend Group (and the horrors of late teen relationships)

Hi everyone!!! Last time on my designated Bewilthred Posting I talked about how I was fleshing out Kai’s old friend group prior to the WOP, and I have made a lot more changes since then!!! So let us delve into them and talk about them! This entry is basically a glorified brain dump (tbf that’s what all of these are but shhhh) so ignore any spelling errors or weird wording etc. Warnings below apply to the whole post.

⚠ CAUTION: ⚠ Ableism, Toxic Relationships, and Bullying. Stay safe out there!

So! Last time I talked about Lex and his relationship with Kai, but how about the others? Well I have conveniently drawn headshots of all of you to GAZE UPON!!!! How neat :3

In order, it’s Lex, Axel, Cali, Winona, and Kai. The little freaks!!! I shall talk about them one by one and what has changed for them in the last few weeks or so.

Lex

• Most of my changes for Lex thus far are mostly visual honestly, and also making him the designated leader/core connector between everyone. Without him, I feel like the friend group wouldn’t exist period LMFAO.


• Part of why I wanted to do that is, I feel it’s really common for people to get into friendships that are essentially just based on your relationship to another guy rather than actually liking the person, and I think that’s a dynamic that should be explored more…so I Am Exploring It’d


• Speaking of visual changes, I’m thinking about bringing back the purple!!! I think it gives nice contrast and ties him well with Winona but I’m still unsure about it honestly. I actually had the idea of pivoting Lex to a kemonomimi similar to Dyna who’s half anthro and half a more typically humanoid species, but I’m not sure about that. I’ve also pondered making him a snake bat hybrid but hmmm…lots to think about


• Most of his personality has remained the same though! I think the main change is I really want him to sort of toxically enforce a sort of “fucked up older guardian” reliance with Kai. I think that’d be very cool to write about….like what if you found your family but the found family WAS EVIL!!! AND BAD!!! Such concepts I’ve only really seen in Utena thus far and I MUST change that

Axel

• MY DEAREST AXEL! He is the type of specimen I want to squish until his eyes pop out and he dies. A lot of Axel’s traits I’ve conceptualized for him are actually eerily similar to Nova’s, so maybe I’ll do something interesting with that. I am planning to have the ex-friend group come back in one of Kai’s chapters since they go back to Armonia, so it’d possibly be interesting to see them slip into Omne’isms and maybe even side with them for a bit….just a thought though


• Speaking of actual Axel though, he’s a tiny sugar glider who is very sproadic, jumpy, impulsive, and violent. He shares the Kai horror of being treated more like a pet than a friend. He is admittedly much more intelligent and perceptive than people realize, but he’s got poor emotional regulation skills so people often ignore his actual feelings believing he’s “overreacting”. Which, ironically, leads to more overreacting.


• Out of all the gang, I think he actually likes Kai the most. Partly because Kai is probably the only person who takes his feelings seriously whatsoever. Especially at the start of the story though, Kai is not the best with dealing with his own emotions so he likely doesn’t give The Bestest Advice but I do think they have a limited, but still present understanding of each other to an extent.


• I do think a lot of that is, again, sadly overshadowed by Axel’s sort of “pet” role in the friend group. Axel does lean into the role because well, it’s part of why people like him, and also partly because I don’t think he realizes the extent it’s hurting him either. Parallels parallels…


• Fun fact I tried to make his little ahoge look like a bomb fuse, it’s cute!


• His relationship with Lex is similar to Kai’s in the sense that Lex views Axel like a little brother. But Lex will quickly shift his perception of that to an “annoying” one if Axel slights him too much.

Cali

• Previously the most fleshed out of them all, Cali actually remained mostly in tact from his original iteration, just with more flavor…


• My pitch is that I think Cali is basically going to be replaced by Kai, and served Kai’s role as “funny guy” before Lex met Kai. I don’t think Cali shows explicit resentment towards Kai, but he does acknowledge this is the case and the two mildly compete for the group’s affection.


• The main reason Cali is soon to be replaced is well, he is a complete and utter wimp. Through and through. If put at risk Cali will flee. They’re a coward, and that’s a fatal flaw to Lex who wants someone who will stick with him until the end (even if he might not end up doing the same). Lex sees that loyalty in Kai and thus keeps him for that.


• I think Cali is also much more under the hand cruel/often passively excuses any mean things directed at Kai in comparison to Winona, who is more explicitly mean. Winona (as I’ll get into in a sec) is the established Sarcastic role so she gets away with being a little more upfront, whilst Cali has to be more discreet with his venom. “It’s just a prank bro” No its not this is borderline torture! You suck!


• He also remains a water elementarian. Not much to say on that.

Winona

• MY BEAUTIFUL WINONA! She’s so messed up man. She’s the sort of “sarcastic” know it all, think like new velma scooby doo or something. Reserved, but also passive aggresive. She’s, unfortunately, extremely mean when she wants to be though.


• Winona is a half celestial half human and she struggles with this as she’s essentially two very different things smacked together. She sees a lot of herself in Kai for this struggle among others, but she shuts him out despite that.


• Most importantly though, she was Lex’s childhood best friend. They have been with each other through everything. Winona essentially holds deep sadness that their relationship has changed fundamentally, and deeply hates Kai because he’s well, replacing her too in a way.


• This is part of why Winona is especially cruel to Kai. While Kai tries very hard to get on her good side, Winona again shuts him out completely because she sees him as a threat to her friendship with Lex and frankly an insult to everything she is as a person. Winona believes that she is so much more intelligent and worthy because of the time she’s spent with Lex and the fact that she’s “not like them” (i.e, the rest of the friend group), and this is a very fucked up mentality admittedly but god if it isn’t interesting.


• She isn’t all cruel however, she obviously is extremely loyal and if you DO get on her good side, she will kill a man for you no questions. Weirdly, she’s alike to Nate and Mia in this way. You could psychoanalyze and say that’s part of why Kai wants so badly to gain her approval.

KAI!

• You all know him, this is mostly in relation to the others BUT!!!


• Kai is essentially the mashup of all the previous roles in one. He’s the loyal confidant. He’s the “funny guy”. He’s like a younger brother to Lex. Lex’s strongest relationship (besides Winona) is with Kai.


• I want to perhaps write an actual thing soon exploring the ableism that comes about in this whole friend group, because as I addressed in my last Bewilthred Post THERES SO MUCH TO COVER. but for now. I will say that its there and ooh the horrors. THE HORRORS!!!!

This post was extremely rambly, but maybe it’s good that way! You get to see my purest insanest thoughts. I hope to actually write more about these guys soon like in proper prose because I think that’d be fuuuun. AND ALSO A GOOD OUTLET CONSIDERING RECENT EVENTS COUGH COUGH but that’s another story for another day. For now though I hope you have a good day :3 maybe you should tell me if you read all this way who your fav is ooooh Splendid