Showing off was a pleasurable thing, and successfully showing off made one feel positively exhilarated. These two progressively satisfying things combined should have been enough to make someone feel like they were floating in the clouds—even Hijikata should have been unable to resist... Yet reality was that Toshiro Hijikata, despite successfully showing off, felt utterly stifled. It was one thing for Tojo to think he was tempering himself with mayonnaise, but why did even the squad members so firmly believe it?
Was mayonnaise really that unpopular!? Damn it, was there no one in this world who understood him?
Did no one know how wonderful mayonnaise was? Still, calling it "Lord Ye's love of dragons" might have been going too far. Sogo Doma had indeed guessed that Hijikata said those things only to avoid embarrassing himself in front of others, but when Sogo was actually about to say it out loud, Toshiro Hijikata panicked. If Sogo exposed him now, it felt like certain social death lay ahead!
No, he wasn't doing it for himself. He was doing it for those squad members who admired him so much. If they found out that their vice commander hadn't been wolfing down mayonnaise to temper his spirit, wouldn't they collapse?
They definitely would... Why didn't that bastard Sogo know how to read the room? Could something like this be said outright?
Fortunately, the other party had only brought it up once. Ahem, if Hijikata's guess was correct, Sogo was giving him a warning—putting him in his place. Damn it, all he'd said was that Sogo should try to buy him off.
Was there really a need for that...
"Ah..." As Toshiro Hijikata thought, he said, "If I'd known earlier that Sogo did it to temper my spirit, I definitely would've cooperated..." Cooperated, his ass!