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He's standing out on the veranda, overlooking his men at their training when he hears a pair of soft, small footsteps padding along the wooden floor. Soon after, he feels a light tugging at his pant leg, and Shingen glances over to find a little girl looking expectantly up at him. She's got round chubby cheeks, big eyes that look just like her mother's, hair the very same colour as his, and his heart instantly softens at the sight of her.
"What is it, little one?" he asks, turning away from his retainers and crouching down to meet her closer to her height. Even with him crouched down and her standing, he seems to tower over her.
She holds her hand out to him, her little hand clutched into a fist, holding a red ribbon. He puts his hand out to take the ribbon and she lets go of it, still staring up at him.
"Hm? What's this for?" he asks, examining the ribbon.
"Hair," she explains.
When he doesn't catch on, she tries climb onto his leg. He picks her up, sits cross legged on the veranda, then settles her on his lap. She sits so properly, her back ramrod straight, waiting very patiently and looking the picture of a little lady, that Shingen can't help grinning.
"Papa, hair," she says again, peering up at him, pointing to the ribbon with one hand and grabbing a fistful of her hair with the other. His daughter's hair, which is usually nicely braided or done up, is loose about her, undone.
"Ah, I see."
Shingen pauses, staring thoughtfully down at his daughter, wondering how he's going to tackle this newest of challenges. He's never done her hair before. She's so very tiny, her hair so fine, and he's never been the most dextrous...
Still, having never been one to cower from a challenge, he decides to just give it a go.
It starts with one of the retainers noticing. The man stops what he's doing his attention caught elsewhere, and his sparring partner stops his sword mid-swing.
"Hey, pay attention!" he reprimands. "You let your focus go like that in a battle, you're gonna die!"
The retainer doesn't reply. Instead, he points his sword towards the veranda and his sparring partner falls silent too. Then, the other retainers start noticing, and one by one, they stop what they're doing to just... stare.
On the veranda sits their lord, cross legged, his tiny daughter on his lap, a red ribbon held in his mouth, focused so intently on trying to get his daughter's hair all held in one hand that he hasn't noticed all riotuous sounds of his retainers sparring have come to a halt.
"This is harder than it looks, isn't it," Shingen grumbles.
Each time he gathers up a stray lock of hair, another lock somehow manages to escape from his fingers, and on the rare occasion he does manage to get a hold of it all, he can't keep his hold long enough to get the ribbon tied up. At the same time, his daughter is so small and so fragile, he worries that if he held her hair any tighter, he'd hurt her.
All the time, she's sitting there contentedly, unaware of her father's toils, waiting patiently for what must seem like an infinite amount of time to a little girl in order to get her hair done.
"How does your mother do this every day?" Shingen asks no one in particular.
The girl babbles happily in reply.
Meanwhile, Lady Takeda, who had noticed the lack of noise in the courtyard and come to investigate, has paused what she'd been doing in favour of watching her husband trying valiantly to tie up their daughter's hair. The maids, who'd wondered what was taking the lady so long, had come to investigate and are also caught by the sight.
Shingen, still unaware that his entire clan has come to a standstill, is struck by a sudden inspiration.
"Here, hold this for me," he says, guiding his daughter's hand up to where he's got her hair gathered. "You got it?"
She nods once, beaming up at him.
"Good girl," he chuckles. Then as his daughter holds her hair in place, Shingen deftly wraps the ribbon around her little ponytail and ties it as best he can into a knot. "There."
His daughter lets go, and the ponytail miraculously stays.
For a moment, Shingen swells with pride at a job well done, then a cacophony of cheers erupts, startling him. He looks up to find his men, cheering like fools, all aglow with pride and laying on their compliments and encouragement. He's half-exasperated, half-touched that they're so enthusiastic over his small success.
His half-hearted chiding for them to get back to training dies in his throat when he realizes that his men aren't alone in their celebrations. Some ways down the veranda, the maids too, are celebrating their lord's triumph and in the midst of them, stands his wife, grinning widely at him and their daughter.
All thoughts of back-to-business are lost at the sight of her. He supposes it wouldn't do any harm to indulge in moments like these every once in a while.
"Not a bad job, right?" Shingen asks proudly.
"Excellent job, milord," she replies, still smiling.
"Mama!" their daughter squeals happily, climbing off Shingen's lap to toddle towards her mother, arms reaching out towards her.
Lady Takeda scoops her daughter up, and indulges the girl in her recollection of her time, giving enthusiatic replies, nodding and remarking at her mostly senseless babbling, the only understandable words of her story being 'papa' and 'hair'. The maids are cooing over the little girl too. The retainers are watching on, still grinning as they start getting back to their drills.
And in the midst of them all, is Shingen, surrounded by all the people he loves most, his heart so very full in the happy moment.