Analysis:
The assert failed because the execution code for
partial matching is designed with the assumption that
NULLs on the left side are detected as early as possible,
and a NULL result is returned before any lookups are
performed at all.

However, in the case of an Item_cache object on the left
side, null was not detected properly, because detection
was done via Item::is_null(), which is not implemented at
all for Item_cache, and resolved to the default Item::is_null()
which always returns FALSE.

Solution:
Use the property Item::null_value instead of is_null(), which
is properly updated for Item_cache objects as well.