personally through politics (like Saigō did). Watsuki feels that Ōkubo, who had been demonized during his time period, is an example of what a politician should be and needs more appreciation from the population. For his design, Watsuki wanted to use portrait photographs of Ōkubo, but could not find them. So he tried using a statue as a model, but believes that the final product does not look at all similar to the statue. In retrospect he believes that the character resembles President of the United States Abraham Lincoln, another historical figure that Watsuki has respect for. He is portrayed by Kazufumi Miyazawa in the live-action films. Himura Kenji is the son of Kamiya Kaoru and Himura Kenshin that appears in the last chapter of the manga as a young child. Although he bears an uncanny resemblance to Kenshin, he is more fond of his mother and less caring towards his father (he has a habit of pulling Kenshin's hair). He also appears in the follow-up chapter Yahiko's Sakabatō, where he is about four years old and is seen training with a shinai. Watsuki said that "stupid" was Kenji's personality model, and described him as equivalent to Arai Iori. The author said that Kenji exists solely to be the son of Kenshin and Kaoru, and even though the character was "cliché", he felt that Kenji had to appear. The author said that he is not "twisted enough" to place "negative elements in the ideal family." Kenji's character design is "a small Kenshin." Tsukioka Tsunan , born , is a popular nishiki-e painter. Like Sanosuke, he was a child soldier of the Sekihō Army. For the past ten years he has cursed the Meiji government and created a cache of grenades to blow up the department of internal affairs. He recruits Sanosuke and they embark on their terrorist attack, but are stopped by Kenshin. After Kenshin buries his bombs, Tsukioka stops painting and starts his own newspaper to report the government's wrongdoings. However, he still makes bombs solely as protection and gave several to Sanosuke just before he followed Kenshin to Kyoto. In the anime series, he becomes a valuable source of information for Kenshin and Sanosuke, serving as their intelligence source during the Feng Shui arc. Watsuki said that Tsunan originated from a fake advertisement within the series, labeled "Mysterious Artist Appears." When he decided to do the extra Sanosuke