Since Killua told Gon he was no longer important as he once was, do you think he may have to show Gon he still cares later on? Gon is used to being abandoned and called less important than something else, so I can see the second place comment making his self worth issues worse and make him feel like Killua will never actually stay with him, and will just leave him again like everyone else.

ohhh that’s saying that gon knew he was important to killua in the first place.

now, i know that’s a bit of a radical statement, but gon and killua have different ways of showing love and appreciation for a reason, and they aren’t exactly fluent in each other’s love languages.

killua is all about helping the ones he cares about; gon prefers verbal affirmations of attraction and love. and then you consider that, you realize that killua wasn’t exactly forthcoming with his feelings towards gon verbally; gon might as well not even begin to know how much killua cares about him and In General (the famous ‘it means nothing to you’ quote? that’s calling killua out on his emotional inadequacy). i won’t go as far as to say that gon is absolutely in the dark when it comes to killua’s feelings (he is too perceptive for that), but he could definitely use a couple of ‘i’m happy when i’m with you’ from killua.

so yep, that ‘you are no longer number one’ comment definitely was quite a harsh blow to gon, but it only reinforced his doubts, not created new ones. i won’t be surprised if gon ends up becoming close friends with alluka because he wanted find out whatever was so fascinating about her that made killua leave him behind (pls togashi make it so, that would be a good parallel).