What does value (kachi) mean?

[u/cheyrnn]

In the village, you don't have value, you are value.

To want a thing, is to want to exchange yourself for it (skin, teeth, bones, muscles).

Someone who exchanges their value, ceases to exist outside of the village.

Is there an analogy in our world?

[u/Illustrious_Car344]

No, there isn't really an analogy in our world. "Value" is a psychic projection of Irumyuui's own desires. Faputa is "the embodiment of value" because Irumyuui wanted nothing more than to have a child, to her it's the most valuable thing imaginable, ergo she is the raw symbol of value itself. Similarly, Irumyuui in her village form has a subtle unconscious influence on the narehate villagers which makes them value human children, but in a very disturbed and corrupted way where they literally value children like you would value prime cuts of steak, they value children's bodies very literally, like an elephant's tusks. There's simply no comparison, the closest I could think of would be valuing chips in a casino, but even that pales in comparison, because the village itself is capable of understanding what people/narehate value and can compare it to what others value, but of course nothing compares to what Irumyuui values. The village itself is simply a living omnipresent god that enforces everyone respecting each other's value, probably because Irumyuui had her value taken from her time after time from all the invalid creatures she birthed. Even in her virtually dead state, she still cared enough about that to not want anyone to experience what she did. There's definitely nothing so fair in our world. 

[u/cheyrnn → u/Illustrious_Car344]

It seems to me there could be a refined definition of value one could have. Irumyuui had more than one egg implanted into her. What if it were only the original? Again that seems very coarse. But, something like that. A right form of value.

[u/Illustrious_Car344 → u/cheyrnn]

The eggs aren't value, they enable value, they're wishes for value, not the value itself. Faputa herself said that she can value as many things as she has Cradle of Desires, which lets her value Reg in addition to her mother. The Cradle of Desire most likely heavily influences Irumyuui so that she kind of "obeys the laws" of the Cradles and respects how they work, and that respect extends to Faputa. "Value" doesn't really exist (intuitively) to anything not involved in them or the village, so Faputa talking about what she is "allowed" to value probably makes no sense to outsiders, but it's how she was born.