Taking care of dear mother's what
lol not him threatening the kid victim
(but it is best to keep a distance considering if all the other men are manipulated than tricking someone his age would prolly come automatically XD)
interesting to see arata's mom show up
I think it's a mixture of too. Probably her mother was popular, like Shinju. Courted by men that are either married or just trouble. Think of it like a cycle of abuse ala Shounen Abyss: Shinju's grandma keeps bringing random men, some of them target Shinju's mom. Either Shinju's mom thinks it is her fault, or her mom's; whichever one she knows she has to escape that place. Most cases, these kind of girls leave with the first guy that treats them kindly. She gets with a dude, has Shinju, and probably out of worry, overprotects Shinju in a twisted way.
If she was hungry while as a kid, she keeps feeding Shinju. If she was abused, she keeps Shinju "ugly" so they don't target her. If she was harassed at school, she doesn't take Shinju to school. If she was picked on her physique, she lets Shinju have ugly teeth, hair, etc, as a way to show she "doesn't care about that".
Arata's mom is right, she wanted to be seen as a good mother; but not by other people, just by Shinju. That's why Shinju loves her, and hates the guy that could possibly be her father.
Arata is so concentrated on the idea of Shinju being abused by her mom, that's why he cannot comprehend their relationship. From a social worker of course it looks obvious that Shinju was neglected, but from both Shinju's and her mother's point of view, they were happy.
Dude I’m so confused, so does Arata actually love this girl? Did the girl actually kill these guys? Is he still in his “I wanna help this girl” phase?
I think is a bit of both.
He sees in her all the abused or neglected kids he saves. He has pity for her, and he wants to be her saviour.
But at the same time, he is infatuated by her, in a way that foils the other men Shinju met.
He shows himself in ways he doesn't even realize to Shinju, but at the same time he doesn't think of Shinju as his proto "Mathilda" like the other guys did.
Is the same the author did on Yuureito, he makes the women seem like some mysterious femme fatale.