thank you!!!! :D i'm having a lot of fun getting to ramble abt him so i'm glad people keep giving me the opportunity to >:3

time to get into the MEAT though. i actually think arthur Is aware of cain's yandereisms, but he's...well. he doesn't approve of them, but he also doesn't understand where they're coming from, and so all of his attempts to steer cain away from them end up reinforcing them instead. and that's noooo good for either of them in the long OR short run

this one involves a little bit of actively cutting apart some scenes so you'll have to bear with me. the first is ms2 17.7, or when owen first tries to talk to arthur abt the stuff that cain's doing in western country. this is where we get arthur's legendary "If he does not wish for me to see him like that, then I will not. All I can do is trust in Cain and wait for him." line where he uh, sure does directly say that he's not going to look at cain's negative aspects. more on this scene in a little bit but i want to also draw a line between arthur saying this and how elsewhere he repeatedly says cain is Perfect, and especially how in the arthur+faust magazine interview he says that cain is already a wonderful person even without arthur himself being there.

...buuuut back to ms2 17.7 for now! shortly after arthur says that if cain doesn't want him to look at him he simply won't then is when owen mentions that cain is doing All This Stuff in arthur's name, which is also the point at which arthur goes woah, no, you're right we do actually need to stop this. which is something i honestly find outrageously frustrating like if you object to something being done in your name surely you'd object to it being done in general? i don't understand why arthur's fine with it in one case but not the other, especially when he knows it means cain's going against his own heart either way. NOT the point rn though so let's move to the next point which is that arthur says that this isn't the first time cain has done Stuff Like This Ostensibly For Arthur before, a line that does not get dwelled on but is one i DESPERATELY want elaboration on

so yeah, this is a pattern for cain, and it's something arthur is aware of and objects to, but only when it's pointed at him. if it's not, arthur is content to avert his gaze and continue to say that cain is perfect and without reproach which absolutely drives me up the freaking wall and is easily my least favorite part of the relationship they have with each other. seeing people talk up the "devotion" they have for each other when they only choose to look at each other's most superficial positive characteristics and have their entire relationship hinging on being able to maintain that image of each other (cain also does this! he also says that he can't handle the idea of an arthur that isn't his savior!) and that's not devotion, that's not even genuine love. and because neither of them make that effort to see deeper into one another, arthur doesn't know how to actually get cain to be a little healthier in how he expresses himself, which is how we got ms2 21.7, wherein arthur's attempt to tell cain that he doesn't have to try so hard to be important to him does literally nothing but reinforce all of the twisted up, unhealthy circular logic that cain is operating on. whoops!

so ultimately what i want, i guess, is for cain to do something that completely screws himself over. i want his personal status quo to change in a huge, massive way because he screwed up and took things too far and has to face consequences now. neither arthur nor owen are going to accept his yandereisms with open arms (not like i would................i would accept them................) and i really, really want him to try to pull something and for it to blow up in his face. i genuinely don't see him getting to be like. genuinely, actually happy until his life gets irrevocably ruined in this specific way, and that's ultimately what i want for cain more than anything