another student originally intended to be a starter. However, he failed to win in a league tournament, experienced frustration and felt he was "awful" despite his desire to succeed; he yearned to improve his kendo skills. As an "outlet" for Watsuki's kendo emotions, Yahiko "knows a pain that hero-types like Himura Kenshin and Sagara Sanosuke can never know". As Watsuki further developed the story, Yahiko becomes a comedic character. Watsuki wanted to draw Yahiko in a way that readers could envision him as being a "great" swordsman five to ten years later, eventually giving him a stronger characterization during the Kyoto arc which surprised his readers. During the last story arc from the manga, the story takes a darker tone than those from other shōnen series published by Shueisha. As the series was aimed at teenagers, Watsuki made Yahiko the main character during the time when Kenshin thought that Kamiya Kaoru was dead; his role was to serve as the identifying character for readers. However, the author found this hard to do, as the more time Kenshin was unwilling to continue to live, the worse Yahiko felt, leaving Watsuki a more negative feeling concerning the story. By the end of the series as Yahiko becomes a teenager, Watsuki had redesigned his appearance. He wanted Yahiko to impress manga readers so that he could be a protagonist for a possible series sequel. He said this goal influenced his design of Yahiko, with Kenshin's physical appearance as well as Sanosuke's personality. He added Sanosuke's kanji of to the back of his clothes, and was pleased that various readers recognized it. Although he suggested he was not going to make a sequel, he said the main characters would be Yahiko, Sanjō Tsubame and Tsukayama Yutarō. Watsuki thought about writing a story in which Yahiko and Tsubame would have a son, Myōjin Shinya, who would become a skilled swordsman. In the 20th volume from the Rurouni Kenshin kanzenban edition, Watsuki again redesigned Yahiko's appearance to show how he would appear at that time. His hair was not as spiky as it was originally, and he had new clothes. He wore a dark jacket, a white short-sleeved T-shirt and short trousers. He did not have socks under his sandals and he had bandages on his hands in order hold a swords. He had two swords—a shinai and a katana—with the latter tied on his back.