Kunitoki is a smith of the school, working in the Kikuchi district of Province at the very end of the period and into the . The published sources set the school's origin plainly: "the founder of the school was Kunimura", a man recorded as a grandson of Kuniyuki of Kyōto. From that Yamashiro descent the line takes its temperament, working broadly in the manner and noted for skill in . Around Kunimura a cluster of named smiths arose almost at once, Kunitoki, Kuniyoshi, Kunisuke, Kunitai and Kuninobu, and Kunitoki is counted among the first generation, traditionally given as Kunimura's son or younger brother. Two of his signed are Important Cultural Properties, one held at Kakegawa Shrine in Kōchi and one at the Wakayama -gū, and a third signed survives with its two-character , so his is one of the better-documented hands in a school whose members the judges otherwise find hard to tell apart.
His characteristic work is read on a slender or an of standard proportions, the surviving signed keeping a high -zori, a , and a thick chisel cut into the tang. The temper is the constant: a base, most often a , into which small and enter, with and , well laid, and on the signed a slight tendency toward . It is a quiet line by intention. The published commentary draws the school's hand as close to its Yamashiro parent but more reserved, observing that "compared with work the and are somewhat weaker" and that the commonly carries little activity and a subdued . Against that baseline one blade stands out, the signed transmitted in the Date family, which the judges single out because "within the the are frequently prominent" and the internal activity is comparatively rich.
The carries the school's signature as surely as the temper. Over a well-packed that tends to flow, at times mixing in ō-hada, lie fine and , and across the stands a whitish rather than the bright clove reflection of . This cooler, mistier reflection is the , the feature the school carries down from its -Yamashiro line, and it appears on his signed and his attributed work alike. Where the forging tightens into a closely knit with thick the result is, in the words of one entry, unmistakably well made. Over that the runs straight to a small round and returns shallowly, with faint on the calmer pieces.
His record divides cleanly by register. The signed work, the Date-family and the gold-inlaid , carries his personal touches, the frequent riding the , and on the a devotional carving program, set above a beside the . The other face is the attributed to him as a representative Enju hand, dignified in shape, deep in with thick , the subdued. On the gold-inlaid , inscribed in with his name and a futatsu-dō cutting test, the judges affirm the workmanship as a typical style of the late yet caution that "there are, on the contrary, no decisive points by which it should be determined as Kunitoki". The name itself continued through successive generations into the period, so the generation of a given blade is read from its make rather than its signature.
What sets the Kunitoki apart from his neighbours is exactly what the published sources name. He is held apart from the brighter, stronger Yamashiro hand of true by the cooler and the somewhat softer and the judges describe; his temper, they write, is the kind that "tends toward a subdued impression." Yet within his own school, where the smiths share a quiet and little individual character, his comparatively abundant and give him a recognizable place, and the published commentary calls one of his a "reminiscent of the school". He stands among the founding generation of a Kyūshū line that carried the Yamashiro manner south, a calm and well-forged hand at the head of the tradition.
For the collector he is a rare early name with a clear documentary trail. He has no National Treasures; his record runs instead through two Important Cultural Properties, a at Kakegawa Shrine and a at the Wakayama -gū, the prewar Jūyō Bijutsuhin, and a small number of blades, signed, gold-inlaid and . Several pieces carry and connoisseur provenance: a signed transmitted in the Date family, accompanied by a gold okukakeji mounting, and an with a Kōchū of Kyōhō 6 valuing it at 700 . His blades are now preserved in long-held collections and public institutions, the Sano Art Museum among them. Only three of his works fall in the and tiers, so a signed Kunitoki comes to light only seldom, and a privately held example is a notable thing for a collector to encounter, a document of how the manner took root in Kyūshū.