Kai
From Dragon Ball Wiki, the ''Dragon Ball'' encyclopedia
Directory: Characters → Deities A Kai (界王 Kaio, literally, King of the Worlds) is an upper-level god of Dragon Ball universe. (界 is "world" and 王 is "king").
Contents |
[edit] Overview
In the Dragon Ball universe, there are five Kais for each galaxy. Four of them are given the job of controlling a particular quadrant of the galaxy each, and overseeing the local deities (Guardians) on each planet of their part of the galaxy. They are called the North Kai (this position is held by King Kai in the local Earth galaxy), the West Kai, the South Kai, and the East Kai. The fifth one is a Grand Kai who oversees them all and rules over the entire galaxy.
Above the Kais there are Supreme Kais who each rule over a quadrant of the entire universe, with a Grand Supreme Kai overseeing them and who rules over the entire universe.
The Kais live in the Other World. It should be noted that they are among the few living residents in Other World. They are considered immortal, in the sense that they refer to residents of the living world as "mortals," but can still die of unnatural causes (as King Kai does, when he is inadvertently killed by the self-destructing Cell), however since they are already in Other World it doesn't really affect them in the long run (however, King Kai did receive tons of laughter and bullying from his fellow Kais for being dead). The Kais are also known to have a love for fancy cars and each Kai owns one.
During the events in the series, Kais prove not to be strong enough to oppose the villains directly, though they seem to influence the process by giving wise advice or providing training. King Kai has amazingly powerful telepathy skills, being able to transfer his thoughts to the whole planets or even galaxies, and he also teaches Goku highly useful techniques such as the Spirit Bomb and the Kaio-ken attack.
In the Dragon Ball Z: Bojack Unbound movie, King Kai explains that in the past, he and the other three Kais (South, East and West) took it upon themselves to stop the evil galactic thug Bojack. To do so, they combined their power and imprisoned Bojack and his followers in a planet (a star in the dub) at the far end of the galaxy. Bojack and his henchmen were later set free when King Kai's planet was destroyed and King Kai was killed by the self-destructing Cell; this caused the seal which bound Bojack to break.
[edit] Origins
The Kai originally come from Planet Kaishin ("World-Core"). The planet is basically a larger version of the planets that the four Kai's call home (such as King Kai's Planet). On the planet are gigantic trees, the Kaiju (World-Tree), and the Kai are all born from the fruit of this tree, as Shin-jin (Core-People). The population of this planet is roughly about 80 or so. The Shin-jin are genderless, and their average life expectancy is said to be 75,000 years. They live leisurely lives, studying various things at a school-like castle. But whenever one of the Kai on the Kai Planets passes away, they draw lots among themselves to choose who will take that Kai's place and become the new Kai. The Supreme Kais, however, are chosen only from among Shin-jin born from a special golden fruit that is particularly rare. Occasionally there are delinquent Shin-jin with evil hearts, whom become Makaioshin ("Demon Realm Kings"). [1]
