Kondo Dojo, central courtyard. Toshiro Hijikata was not an idiot. He often suspected that changing his image had been a mistake. In fact, that self-doubt had reached its peak over the past few weeks. It could not be helped—every time he went out recently, he drew countless stares, and those gazes carried contempt and disgust. That made Hijikata feel that people must have learned he was the Demon Vice-Chief, the leader of a violent organization. Otherwise, why would there be so much hostility in their eyes when they looked at him?
More importantly, he was not the only one people despised. Even Kondo Isao was looked at with disgust, even contempt, as though he were trash... Sigh. If he and Kondo Isao had not always felt that decapitation tactics were too underhanded, and if Lord Gui Long had not believed that the Doma Family needed an armed force it could openly display, leading the two sides to hit it off... then ordinary people would never have learned the Kondo Group's name.
After all, even the Doma Family needed a force that could intimidate those lurking in the shadows. Otherwise, it would end up like the Sanzenin Family, with someone constantly trying to kidnap them. So, even without the Kondo Group, there would have been some other group... Unlike the Sala Twin Trees, where people in the underworld only knew the name. And that was only because those ninjas were too obsessed with showing off, leaving words like, "Beneath the Sala Twin Trees..." behind after every operation.
If not for that, people outside probably would not even know what the Sala Twin Trees were! What Toshiro Hijikata wanted to complain about was, "Those ninjas are actually called the Oniwabanshu!" But since no living person had ever seen those ninjas—under the Doma