Kaito Takamiya

Kaito Takamiya (鹰宫海斗) is a young hunter and a teacher in training at Cross Academy. He is first introduced in the light novels and does not appear in the manga until 53rd Night.

Character concept
Kaito was created for the second story in the light novel, Vampire Knight: Ice Blue's Sin by Ayuna Fujisaki. Matsuri Hino liked the character so much, that when she needed to create another hunter, she asked Ayuna Fujisaki if she could use Kaito.

Personality
Kaito is a gruff young man. He is implied to be rather unethical and somewhat ruthless. He has no love of vampires, but he seems to tolerate certain ones, especially Zero and even refers to Yuki as a lion cub.

Kaito was a bit of a bully as a teen, giving both Ichiru and Zero a hard time. He seems less so as an adult, although possibly inclined to stirring the pot and seeing what happens. In one such instance he helped Yori Wakaba sneak into a vampire party, because if any of the vampires tried anything it would have given the hunters reason to take action. It’s not entirely clear whether he actually wanted this to happen, but he implied he was also testing Zero's tolerance to any threat from the vampires. Despite this, he appears to be fairly genuinely interested in Zero’s welfare for the most part.

Background
According to Kaien, Zero and Kaito both share Yagari's attitude because they trained under him. He is a ruthless vampire hunter, hates purebloods and vampires, and is wary of other people. His elder brother was bitten by a Pureblood and on his first mission with Yagari, he insisted on killing his brother himself. His family never cared much for him, so Kaito ran away from home to live with his teacher. He always thought his brother was murdered since he never came back from his mission. He actually cared very much for him, but he always covered that up, since he thought compassion was a weakness. When he and Zero went on their first mission to kill a Level E, it turned out that his brother was actually bitten by a Pureblood all this time, so Kaito had to kill his own brother. He'd rather wanted to kill his brother by himself then letting someone else do it, but it had deeply affected him. Kaito trained under Yagari with Ichiru and Zero after his former teacher was wounded, this is prior to Yagari losing his eye. During that time, Kaito picked on Ichiru for his physical weakness and Zero for his softness. Later, Zero and Kaito become more friendly.

Plot summary
Kaito was invited to the academy by Kaien at the insistence of Yagari under the guise of being a student teacher, however it is really because they are relying on his competence as a skilled hunter to assist the updated Hunters Association's organization. Kaito makes his own plans, he invites Yori to sneak into the party revealing to Zero that he intends to use her as bait to stir up the vampires, however he intended to protect her. Kaito later admits that he also was testing Zero. He also told Zero that if any of the vampires shows signs to harm Yori, Zero can go and kill that vampire.

Kaito reveals his purpose is to watch over Zero, to look for any failing that might render him as unsuitable for becoming president of the hunters association. He then finds a gun under Zero's pillow and questions its use, when Zero states he uses it as insurance after Yuki's departure, Kaito tells him that he is now Zero's insurance.

Kaito accompanies Zero to Dahlia Academy and notes after Zero's encounter with Sara that Zero looks too much like a vampire who lost its prey. He then forces Zero to take three days off and to visit his family's grave knowing that Zero would not have visited it since Ichiru was buried, he also reminds Zero to take the time to remind himself of the difference between being vampire and being a human, assuring Zero that some part of him must remain human.

Kaito berates Zero for returning early from his leave, but eagerly participates in the questioning of Hanabusa Aido. He continues to attend Cross Academy and participate in their security.

Zero Kiryu
Kaito has a decent working relationship with Zero. He seems to make jokes where he is either attempting to get a rise from Zero or he forgets that Zero is a vampire.

Ichiru Kiryu
In Vampire Knight Novella "Season of Transcience", Kaito seems to dislike Ichiru because he gets in their way because he is ill and sickly.

Powers
Like all hunters, Kaito would have slight accelerated healing over humans and the ability to sense vampires.