During the development of the series' pilot chapter, Rurouni, Meiji Swordsman Romantic Story, Watsuki and his editor argued over Kenshin's speech patterns, settling for a "slangy" one. For the final version of the first Romantic Story, Watsuki adjusted the dialogue; in his view, he made Kenshin sound "more as I prefer him now". Nevertheless, Kenshin was concerned about how Kenshin's manner abruptly changed when facing his opponent. Watsuki added Kenshin's trademark as a placeholder to be an expression of the English speech disfluency "huh". Watsuki notes that he was surprised at how well it caught on, and how much he ended up having Kenshin use the sound during the series. Watsuki also planned to make Kenshin more 30 years old; his editor commented that it was strange that the main character of a manga for teenagers to be of such an age, so he instead made him 28 years old.
