HAJIME SAITO
HS
Captain of the Shinsengumi's Third Unit during the Bakumatsu. Now a government operative who has changed employers without changing principles. Old enemy of Kenshin, occasional and entirely unsentimental ally, completely indifferent to whatever philosophical position Kenshin has arrived at regarding killing. His code, aku soku zan, slay evil immediately, is the direct opposite of Kenshin's vow and the show gives it genuine weight rather than using it as a cheap counterpoint. Gatotsu stance. One of the best characters in the series and the most honest about what the Meiji era actually cost and required.
HAJIME THROUGH THE ARCHIVE //
MEIJI RESTORATION ERA //
Open page →Battōsai and the Shinsengumi Were Enemies Before They Became Survivors
Ishin Shishi · Shinsengumi · Kenshin and Saitō Open →During the Bakumatsu, Kenshin killed for the pro-Imperial Ishin Shishi while the Shinsengumi defended the Tokugawa order in Kyoto. Hajime Saitō served as captain of the Shinsengumi's Third Unit, putting the two men on opposite sides of the same street war.
What changed
Ten years later, the government Kenshin helped create employs Saitō. Their old causes have won or lost, but neither man can pretend the people they became during the war simply vanished with the regime.
