"Lord Shinomiya, and Sir Hijikata, I wholeheartedly agree with your words. As they say, when the lord is humiliated, his retainers must die..." After muttering to himself for quite some time, Tojo, who had been standing behind Gan'an Shinomiya, suddenly dropped to one knee. "Sir Hijikata has insulted my master several times. Lord Shinomiya, please give the order and allow me to spar with Sir Hijikata..."
"Hm?" Toshiro Hijikata was briefly stunned, then immediately felt ashamed of his own arrogance. Perhaps the past few years without any opponents besides Sougo and Katsura Kotaro had made him somewhat conceited, causing him to underestimate the people of the world. Had he observed more carefully earlier, it would not have been difficult to see that this Tojo fellow possessed considerable strength—whether it was his stance and angles that allowed him to strike at any moment, or the calluses on his hands, all of it plainly showed that he had undergone harsh training. For someone like that, the killing intent Hijikata had released earlier was more like a provocation than a warning.
This... Hijikata felt a headache coming on again. He had clearly only wanted to warn the man. Wait, was it too late to explain now?
A spar sounded troublesome enough. After all, Lord Keiryu had already spoken, so Hijikata would probably have plenty of dealings with them in the future—if he won, the other side would most likely refuse to accept it and might curse him behind his back. Not that he was afraid of being cursed; he did not even care if people cursed him to his face, let alone in secret.
But what if he ruined Lord Keiryu's plans? Losing was no good either—wouldn't that make him the one getting slapped in the face?
As that bastard Sougo put it: