Disclaimer: Katekyo Hitman Reborn! is owned by Akira Amano. The Gamer belongs to Sangyoung Seong and Sang-a.

…

Over the good three-quarters of the year Tsuna had been friends with Hibari, he had learned a lot about the older kid. He that Hibari had a fondness for jasmine tea, taken with honey, but drank green tea every day and loved hamburger steak. He preferred traditional clothing for leisure wear, and enjoyed small animals. He did not like being surrounded, large crowds, or people that broke rules.

So, it was perfectly understandable that Tsuna's brain froze when he saw Hibari being followed by a large group of what seemed to be delinquents without beating anyone up.

Granted, the delinquents were already pretty beat up, but still! It was Hibari! How could this be possible!?

Tsuna's danger meter tingled as Hibari spotted him and clearly changed his path to go straight to Tsuna. Honestly, Tsuna probably should have run. He blamed his shock.

Hibari smiled at Tsuna, a not very nice smile full of teeth. "This pack of herbivores," he said, waving a hand behind him, "is the new Namimori Middle Disciplinary Committee. They're joining the game."

Tsuna looked at the large group of sullen, glaring delinquents. His first impression that they were frankly terrifying. He looked at Hibari, ready to protest. Hibari gave him the look. Tsuna remembered that he actually knew Hibari, and Hibari could beat him up very, very easily. He sighed, picked up his phone and dialed Hana.

"Tsuna?" Hana asked as she picked up.

"Hibari has an army, and he wants them to join the game."

A pause.

"Vent session?" Hana asked in a long-suffering tone.

"Vent session. Can you get the others to the clearing? I'll do the party invites and explanations as we head over while you tell them what's going on."

Hana sighed but agreed and hung up. Tsuna took a second to pity himself, but his survival instincts were too well developed at this point to let that go on longer. So he sighed himself, and turned to Hibari.

"Please at least tell me you have a list of all their names," he asked.

Hibari smirked and handed him a list.

Tsuna rolled his eyes internally. "Invite Aikawa Kenta, Akagi Yasuharu…" he started.

He could practically taste the confusion and hostility in the air as he starting reading off the names for no apparent reason. Inwardly, he wailed about the sheer ridiculousness of the situation. Hibari! An army! This was the start of the end of the world, he just knew it.

"… and Wakata Haruya to the party." Tsuna looked up as he finished. He was rewarded with the sight of approximately 30 delinquents reacting simultaneously in shock to a small screen popping up in the middle of their vision.

For a moment, the only thing Tsuna could hear was beeping, a sound that was quickly silenced as Hibari made his displeasure known. Tsuna had to admit a small, vindictive part of him was very pleased that someone else had to deal with their world being upended for a change.

Then he saw how unnerved the older boys were and felt bad. It didn't stop the vindictive thrill though.

Tsuna sighed. Sometimes, he really wished he could enjoy shocking others without guilt. It would make his life so much easier to deal with.

"Alright!" Tsuna started as he clapped his hands to get the delinquents attention. "Welcome to the game."

As they walked to Tsuna's friend's training spot and Tsuna explained the game and all it entailed, he looked over the odd group he was somehow now responsible for. And wasn't that terrifying (Tsuna ignored the fact that he was not feeling nearly as upset as he should, and what he really felt was that this seemed somehow inevitable. It was not inevitable. It was Hibari. He was not turning into some kind of gang leader).

(Oh no, he was turning into some kind of gang leader. Why!? How!? He was only 10 years old!)

Most of the delinquents were around LV 6-8, with a few LV 5s and one LV 9, a Kusakabe Tetsuya. Tsuna firmly ignored that he was significantly higher LVed than all of them. The group were beat up, but not seriously injured, and while they seemed confused and vaguely hostile, they were following along willingly enough.

The explanation of what they had discovered so far took up the time it took to slowly wander down to the training grounds, and Tsuna was just getting to the Social tab when he was rammed into and slammed onto the ground.

The delinquents screamed. "Oh -BEEP-, it's a giant -BEEP-ing spider," one of them cried.

"Kuro!" Tsuna wailed as Kuro did his happy dance on Tsuna's back. He glanced up at the delinquents. "Don't worry, he's friendly," he told them as he got up.

The group of boys gave him a round of terrified and disbelieving looks. Tsuna couldn't blame them. Kuro was nearly as big as he was at LV 10, and didn't seem to be slowing down anytime soon.

Tsuna stood up and took a deep breath. "Well, as you can see, this is Kuro, and he is my pet. He's kinda like Mite, and they were both adopted due to the game." Tsuna gave an uneasy look towards the training grounds were all the others and their pets were. He leaned forward. "Um, you might wanna get ready… cause, Kuro's kinda the smallest."

The utter disbelief and terror on the faces of the delinquents seemed to amuse Hibari. He hit the dirt with a tonfa and looked at his army.

"Get moving."

The group seemed to collectively gulp and looked like they were going to their doom. Still, they marched onwards. Tsuna pitied them but did not offer any condolences. That would probably only make things worse.

That was when Ryohei decided to welcome them by, as soon as he saw them, running up to them so fast he was practically a blur and yelling "EXTREME WELCOME!"

It was kinda funny to see the many hulking, scary delinquents jump and scream in unison, although Tsuna cringed preemptively at Hibari's dark look.

The prompt beat down of the boys took only a few seconds.

"Act appropriately," Hibari admonished before he walked to the edge again.

"A-ha," Tsuna started nervously. "You… probably shouldn't have startled them like that, Onii-san."

Ryohei rubbed the back of his head sheepishly. "Oops. I was Extremely excited to have new kouhai, so I Extremely wasn't thinking. Sorry."

"It's fine," Tsuna said. "You should apologize to them too though."

"You're Extremely right!" Ryohei smiled and turned to face the larger group. "Everyone, I'm Extremely sorry for scaring you!"

The delinquents nodded, somewhat dumbly. Smiling, Ryohei turned to Tsuna. "Hey Tsuna! Guess what Extremely happened?"

"What?"

Ryohei beamed at Tsuna.

"I Extremely got into the School Boxing Club! They said I could Extremely join their Extreme practices, so next year when I get to middle school I can get right in extremely immediately!"

Tsuna gasped. "Congratulations!"

Ryohei smile grew even bigger. "Extreme Thanks! It's gonna be Extreme!"

Hibari interrupted the moment. "Herbivores," he started.

Tsuna jumped. "Ah, sorry, lets continue on," he said. To Ryohei, he said, "We can celebrate later."

Ryohei nodded at Tsuna. Then they led the group into the clearing.

For once, everyone was there, even Takeshi. Takeshi was practicing strikes with his baseball bat, while Kyoko and Haru were doing another of their sparing matches. The spiders were doing some kind of race/mock fight that didn't seem to have any rules. Hana was standing in the middle, apparently waiting for them. She raised an eyebrow at the skittishness of the boys but didn't comment. As the others noticed what was going on, they stopped what they were doing and smiled at the newcomers, or, in terms of the spiders, clicked their manacles.

Tsuna turned to the group. "Welcome to our training ground. We meet up here to discuss things and, well, train. You've already met me, Onii-san, and Hibari, but that's Hana, Takeshi, Kyoko and Haru," he said, gesturing to the people as he mentioned them. "Kyoko, Haru, I was telling them about the Social tab when we came in, would you mind finishing that up while I talk to Hana?"

The two girls nodded happily and walked over. Tsuna envied their obliviousness.

He took a brisk breath and walked over to Hana.

"Hana, what do we do?" he said.

Hana bit her lip as she looked at the traumatized delinquents.

"Well, we'll need to split them up somehow, we can't all do a dungeon together," she started.

"Okay. Maybe we can do it by LV?"

"Hmm. Might be better to see if they're long-range, mid-range, or short-range fighters?"

Upon seeing Tsuna's blank look, she explained. "It refers to how far away a fighter can hurt someone in combat. I'm long-range because my bow can shoot from far away, Kyoko, Haru and maybe Takeshi are mid-range, because their weapons extend their reach, and Ryohei is short range because his range is how far he can punch."

Tsuna nodded. That made sense. Hana was so smart. And sane. The sanity was nice.

Then he frowned. "I'm not sure if any of them have weapons," he said. "Would that actually do anything?"

"Maybe not. Hmmm. How many of them are there?"

"About 30."

"Right, and we have how many….?" She started counting her fingers.

Tsuna looked over to where the group was. Takeshi had drifted over and was now gesturing happily as he helped the girls explain. Ryohei was doing that thing where he was talking loudly at Hibari and somehow not getting beat up.

Beside him, Hana made a small sound of triumph. "We can split it into six groups of around five and have each group be headed by one of us. Well, if Kyoko and Haru team up together."

Tsuna glanced at her. "Do you really think we'd make good heads of the group?"

Hana bit her lip again as she looked at the insane boxer, the even worse warlord-in-training, the two girls that thought they were in a shounen anime, and the laughing clown with a sword.

"Well, we should be able to keep the worst of it from permanently injuring any of them. Hopefully."

"I do still have the Frankentoast."

"You kept it? And it's still good?"

"Ah, I had to throw the first one out, but I kept making them because I really, really want to make sure everyone is okay. And if someone is stupid enough to get hurt that badly, I will make them eat the Frankentoast."

Hana gave Tsuna a look he didn't feel like trying to interpret. "Well, hopefully it doesn't come to that," she said.

…it was probably going to come to that. Tsuna sighed. Then he raised his head and clapped.

Everyone looked over at him. "Once you're done with explanations, come over here to be sorted," he requested. Everyone nodded.

Hibari and Ryohei wandered over. "What do you extremely mean, sorted?" Ryohei asked. Hibari also gave a look that meant he wanted to hear the answer.

"Well, since there is so many new people, we're going to split up into groups led by one of us, so that each group has someone that knows what they are doing. Then we're going to each do a dungeon separately," Tsuna said.

"Sounds Extremely good," said Ryohei.

"No," said Hibari.

Tsuna, Hana, and Ryohei blinked at him.

"We're doing a raid," Hibari announced.

Tsuna choked. Hibari wanted to do one of those insane dungeon-things where you needed more than twenty members just to get in!?

"Hiee?! H-Hibari! We can't do a raid! We have new people that have no idea what they are doing!" Tsuna squeaked.

"Hnn." Hibari gave Tsuna another look. "We're doing a raid," he repeated.

"But!-" Hibari raised a tonfa. Tsuna shut up, whimpering. He put his head in his hands. Then he looked up at Hibari, accusingly.

"You gathered up an army just so you could do raids, didn't you," Tsuna said.

Hibari looked away. "No," he said.

Tsuna moaned and put his head in hands again. "You totally did," he said in despair.

Hibari bopped Tsuna on the head with a tonfa. When Tsuna looked up at him, Hibari scowled. "You are no longer allowed to cry," he told Tsuna.

Tsuna blinked at Hibari. "Eh?" What did that have to do with anything?

Beside him, Ryohei whispered to Hana, in a voice about as loud as a normal person's talking voice, "I extremely don't get it."

Hana facepalmed and muttered under her breath, "Overprotective idiots."

The group waited a few moments as Takeshi, Haru and Kyoko finished their explanation and the larger group headed over. Tsuna noted that the delinquents seemed only slightly uncomfortable now, instead of clearly traumatized. Good.

Hana nudged Tsuna. "You're up," she said.

"Wai-What?" Tsuna asked.

Hana looked down at him. "You're the leader, you tell them what we're doing."

"No. No way am I the leader."

"Yes you EXTREMELY are baby bro," said Ryohei.

Hibari just blinked at Tsuna.

Tsuna looked Hana.

"No way am I taking control of this crazy group," she said. "You're it."

Tsuna wordlessly gestured at the group walking over. Hana rolled her eyes. "Just pretend you are in a classroom, and you're the teacher," she said.

"It will be EXTREMELY like when you were explaining as you were walking here!" added Ryohei.

Tsuna gave in.

When the group was assembled before him, Tsuna began. "First of all, everyone here has been in fights before, correct?"

The heads in front of him nodded.

"Good. Who knows how to use weapons, pipes, baseball bats, things like that? Raise your hands."

About half of the people raised their hands.

"Keep your hands up if you have your weapon of choice with you."

About half the weapons people lowered their hands. Tsuna briefly thought about sending these kids (and why did he think of them as kids, these people were older than him for goodness sake) to go back for their weapons, but then he realized that firstly, they might not have their own weapons, and secondly Hibari might get mad at them if they took too much time, which Tsuna did not want to do to them.

"Alright, is their anybody here who isn't comfortable fighting without a weapon and doesn't have one."

Nobody spoke up. Excellent.

"Great. We're going to be splitting up into groups of five, based on skill level and weapon use, each led by someone with experience. Those with a high level and use weapons, with Hibari. Those with a high level and use fists, with Ryohei. Those with long range weapons or with the lowest levels, with Hana. The rest of you spread yourself out among us. Also, Kyoko and Haru count as one team. Also, everyone grab some snacks to eat! Those heal you and I want everyone to be ready for this!"

It took about five minutes for the people to figure themselves out. It probably would have taken longer, but Hibari started glowering and thus people sorted themselves out quickly.

Tsuna swept a gaze over his team. They were normal-looking delinquents, although they seemed a bit nervous. That nervousness felt like it was directed more at what was happening and the people around them than Tsuna, so Tsuna guessed that they picked him because they wanted someone familiar.

…he could deal with that. Just pretend these were younger kids that were looking to him as a guide in an unfamiliar thing. Not yankees under his orders about to go into combat. Just kids.

"Alright. So Hibari wants to do a raid, which we've never done before. I'm guessing it just means a lot of enemies, or maybe harder enemies than dungeons normally have. Food will heal you as I just mentioned, and I have a lot of it, so if you need healing, just let me know. Don't worry about acting tough, I'm not expecting anything special out of you, alright?"

Tsuna was happy to see shoulders untense slightly as his group gave cautious nods. One of the boys, an Akagi Yasuharu, put on a cocky attitude and said, "Don't worry about it shrimp, we got this."

Tsuna ignored that the boy basically just did what Tsuna had just said not to, as the knocking of the boy's knees was fairly clear about his real feelings. Also, the elbow Akagi got from the boy next to him said that he did that a lot. It was better than cringing in terror anyway.

Why did it feel like Tsuna was trying to convince himself he was normal again?

Anyways, as Tsuna led the older students towards battle—totally normal, don't think about it—he sped up to walk alongside Hana.

"So, any ideas for what we're going to do when fighting?" he asked her.

Hana sighed. "Unfortunately," she said, "seeing as how we've never done something like this before, I'm somewhat uncertain what exactly is going to happen. A lot depends on the environment. However, one of the reasons I had us split up into groups based off of ranges was so that we could order people that way. Like, we have the violent short-range monkeys in front, the mid-range monkeys behind them and then us and the long-range monkeys in back directing the battle and acting as support. However, considering that we've never practiced this before or even really talked about it, it's probably going to turn into a big brawl, and the best we as the leaders can do is make sure we have all the members of our group accounted for."

Tsuna gulped and resisted the urge to shriek. Why hiimmm? What did he do to deserve thiisss?

Tsuna gestured wordlessly. Next to him, Hana snorted. "I feel you," she said.

And then they were at the raid dungeon.

…

The entrance to this one was an outcropping of rocks on the other side of the park. Tsuna was uncertain how to get in, but when they reached the entrance, a large boulder rolled away to reveal a tunnel.

"Er…," Tsuna said as he peered into inky depths. "Did anyone bring a flashlight?"

The silence he was greeted with served well enough as an answer.

"Right," Hana said, sounding like she'd very much like this day to be over. "Tsuna, we're gonna need to use your Molotovs."

Tsuna sighed and handed out a Molotov to each leader. Hibari immediately handed his to the guy next to him, the single level nine with the title "Defeated Delinquent Leader". Tsuna very carefully did not think about what that title meant.

And then they started heading into the dark, dark tunnel of the dungeon. Unlike previous dungeons, this one seemed bigger than just a house. Tsuna hoped it wouldn't be as big as the Frozen Hills had been.

After a few minutes of walking the group found another, smaller, tunnel connecting to the first tunnel.

"Hey, should we extremely split up and check out this tunnel?" Ryohei asked.

"No," said Hana and Tsuna simultaneously. They glanced at each other. Then Hana said, "We should map those out on a later run, but right now we have no way of not getting lost."

"Also," Tsuna added, "I would feel better if I can make sure everyone is safe, at least until I know we know what we're doing."

Hibari scoffed but didn't disagree, so it was settled.

They continued on for a few minutes, passing several more entrances. Then— "Hey, I think I see something," one of the boys said.

And indeed, Tsuna could see tiny pinpricks in the darkness ahead. Several pairs, actually.

Hibari strode forward, bloodlust wrapped around him like a cloak. His move prompted several boys to move forward. And for their unknown enemy to attack.

Hana squinted as Hibari raised his tonfas. "Are those… goblins? Dressed in samurai armor?"

"I think so?" said Tsuna. He didn't know Japanese armor well enough to say. The title of the monster was "Goblin Scout" though.

"Aren't goblins a Western monster? Everything else we've fought has been Japanese!"

Tsuna shrugged. "Maybe that's why they were wearing Japanese armor?" And indeed, the correct word was were, as Hibari had already dispatched them. Tsuna was way to used to watching Hibari beat up monsters.

Hana gave a wordless snarl and then threw her hands up in the air at the randomness of everything. Tsuna reached over and patted her on the back. Then he raised his voice and asked, "What loot did we get?"

One of the boys nearest Hibari, who had watched in horrified awe at the savage beat down, started and then peered at the ground hesitantly.

"A-ah, there's… money? And… I think a tooth of some kind?"

Tsuna nodded and strode forward. Using [Observe], he noted that it was, in fact, a Goblin Tooth, and it was a crafting material. For what he wasn't sure.

"Give the cash to Hana, and I'll take this. We divvy the money up at the end, along with any other pieces of loot we get," he told the kid, who jumped to it.

It was profoundly wrong that that a boy at least three years older than him acted like he had just been given orders from a superior.

Suddenly Tsuna's vision tinted orange.

"Incoming!" he barked as he threw a Molotov. A Molotov that revealed a lot more goblins than the few that had just been dispatched.

And then they were upon them.

One came at Tsuna large mouth gaping wide. He punched it in the nose hard enough to send it stumbling into the one behind it, who shoved it out of the way. That one was dispatched with a kick, which let Tsuna step forward and put all his weight into another punch. Absently, Tsuna noted that his [Hand-to-Hand Mastery], a skill he had gained a few months ago, was now at level 14. He was deep into a battle calm now; one he had gained over the months since his life became a game.

That calm was broken by a familiar scream. Hana.

"They're at our back too!" she yelled.

Tsuna sucked in a breath. The tunnels, that had been what they were for.

Behind him, he could hear the delinquents start to panic. A cold pit settled in his stomach.

"We need to go," he said.

Next to him Hibari uttered "No. We will fight," as he smashed a goblin into a wall with a single hit.

Tsuna snarled. "I am not risking innocent people to satisfy your bloodlust!" he said, punching the goblin in front of him and then kicking off to turn back.

"Retreat!" he barked as he shoved his way through the panicked masses towards the back, where Hana and several other delinquents, the weakest ones, struggled against the goblins.

Like a current, where he passed people followed. Tsuna only vaguely noted it however, far more concerned with clearing a way out.

He passed Hana with a lunge to plant his fist in the face of the biggest, meanest looking goblin. Then it was back to battle. Punch that goblin. Kick that goblin in the knee and uppercut when it stumbles. Three combo that goblin kick the next one break the nose everything is orange punch punch kick throw kick kick punch set on fire— "I can see light!" someone yells and suddenly there are a lot less goblins, and someone's beside him hit that goblin and then the air is getting lighter and Tsuna can see. There's grass, and people behind him stumbling out, but there's more in the cave and Tsuna needs to get them out. "Here!" he yells as he pulls people out of that dark mouth, people gasping and collapsing onto the ground. They pour from the cave like water from a faucet.

"Is everyone here!?" Tsuna yells, as the people who leave trickle to a stop. Someone starts counting. Hana. Tsuna notes Ryohei, the girls, Takashi, and Hibari among the crowd. The injured crowd. Tsuna swallows.

"Get the first aid kits and the food out!" he yelled as he started to do just that, going to a boy with burned pants clutching a bleeding wrist.

"Hey, are you alright?" Tsuna says in a quieter voice to the boy, a Saito Issei.

"Uh, y-yeah," says the boy. "One of them just…" He made a claw with his hand and scratched at the air.

"Alright," Tsuna said in his best calming voice. "We're going to need to clean that out."

Behind him Hibari scoffed and muttered, "herbivores," and Tsuna

Was

Just

Done.

"What is wrong with you?!" he snarled as he surged to his feet and turned to face Hibari.

Hibari blinked.

"People are hurt because of your actions and all you can do is call them herbivores?! None of us wanted this! I didn't want this! I wanted to break them into it slowly, let them level up first but nooo, let's go do a raid, a fight none of us know anything about, with a group of complete new people just because you wanted a fight!" Tsuna was screaming at this point. Hibari's face had gone totally blank.

"We weren't ready! We weren't ready and now people are hurt! Now people are bleeding and all you can do is scoff and I just…" Tsuna took a ragged breath and waved his arms uselessly. "We aren't like you. We can't fight like you, and we don't love fighting like you. I was okay before because everyone knew what they were getting into. We knew we were going to be fighting monsters and most of us wanted to. You just… you just dumped a group of people, normal people, into a dangerous fight just to satisfy your bloodlust. I… You can't do that."

Tsuna realized he was crying. He rubbed his eyes. "Just… just go home. Get healed up and go home."

Tsuna turned back to Issei. Around him, people began to move again. "Sorry about that," he said to Issei. "Now, let's get you healed up."

Tsuna didn't notice when Hibari left.

…

Later that night, when Tsuna was in bed, his phone buzzed. It had been buzzing throughout dinner, but he hadn't felt like picking up. He probably should though.

Tsuna sighed and flipped open the phone.

He had messages from all his friends, all of them variants on "Are you okay?". Well almost all his friends. Hibari hadn't sent him anything.

Tsuna sighed again and decided to just answer everyone in a group chat.

"im ok" he typed.

"Tsuna! Thank goodness. I was worried," Hana typed back immediately. Tsuna winced, realizing she must have been glued to her phone waiting for his response.

"Same! i ws XTREMELY worried bby bro!" Ryohei added.

"Haru too (_)"

"I'm glad you're okay ~Kyoko"

"Haha, me too!" sent Takeshi. Tsuna felt his chest warm. He was so lucky to have these friends.

"thx guys" he typed back.

"Yeah! Besides, we need to plan how to beat this new dungeon! \(^_^)/"

Tsuna's good mood instantly disappeared.

"mayb we shouldn't," he typed.

"Hahi?"

Tsuna frowned.

"mayb we should stop doin dungeons. ppl got really hurt this time, and i dont like seeing u guys in dangr"

"Hahi?! (0_0) But we're like superheroes!"

"Yes, we're the Battle Sisters of Justice! ~Kyoko"

"WE'RE NOT SUPERHEROS! WE ARENT ANYTHING OF JUSTICE. we're just kids. we get hurt. lets stop."

"I agree with Tsuna," Hana typed. "I know you two feel like this is some kind of cartoon but it's not. We were incredibly lucky today. Yes, you know first aid, and yes, we had food, but could that heal a broken bone? What if we ran out of food? People could have died back there.

"We should stop."

There was a pause in the chat.

"i xtremely don't knw," typed Ryohei. "i xtremely like fighting with u guys, bt i also xtremely worry too. its very unextreme."

Both Kyoko and Haru started typing but stopped without sending anything.

Then Takeshi started typing.

"I know I'm one of the last people to join," he started. "So I don't know what it was like before. But I really enjoy my time with you guys. I enjoy going out together and killing monsters. Yes I get hurt, but so do I when I play baseball, and even if I get hurt more it hurts less surrounded by such warm friends. I'd be sad if I couldn't meet up with you guys like that. And besides, you guys helped me, before, with the baseball team. Even if we get hurt, I think it's worth it to help people like that."

"YES. I XTREMELY FEEL THE SAME"

"Hahi! Haru has met such wonderful people through this!"

"Yes! It makes me happy to help people too! ~Kyoko"

"Ugh, I guess" said Hana. "It's not like I can stop you monkeys."

Tsuna covered his face. He could remember what it was like before the game came into his life, when every day was cold and friendless. He didn't want to go back to that time. But still… Tsuna sighed.

"promse me u'll b more careful"

"Promise!"

"Pinky swear!"

"Haha totally"

"I XTREMELY PROMISE!"

"Like I wasn't careful already monkey."

Despite himself, Tsuna smiled.

"fine. lets meet tmw at the clearing"

"Yayy!"

"\(^_^)/ \(^_^)/ \(^_^)/"

"Haha yeah!"

"XTRME!"

"I'll put together some observations. See you tomorrow."

Tsuna smiled.

"see u"

…

The next day as soon as school was let out Tsuna was racing towards the clearing. He didn't know why he needed to get there as quickly as he could, but his steps felt lighter than they had in a long time.

Haru waved excitedly as he ran into the clearing, followed closely by Kyoko and then Takeshi, who didn't even look winded.

Hana strolled in last. "Sorry for being late," she said. "I had to grab some chalk. I figured visuals would make it easier to go over what happened."

Tsuna grimaced. "Yeah, but do we really need too?" he asked.

"Do we really EXTREMELY need to do what!?" Ryohei yelled as he ran into the clearing.

"Go over what happened yesterday. It's not like we can do the raid again anytime soon, we need at least twenty people," Tsuna clarified.

"I'm not so sure about that," said Hana as she pointed over his shoulder.

Tsuna turned around to see the group of delinquents he met yesterday, walking up. Most were smiling sheepishly, while others were trying (and failing) to seem coolly disinterested.

"W-what? You guys…" he started, uncertain how to finish his sentence.

"Hey, we're not nuts like Hibari-sama is, but we like a good fight," said one of them. " 'sides, its not right to rely on a little shrimp like you for protection."

Tsuna frowned. "You could get hurt you know," he said quietly.

"Yeah," said another delinquent, "but like, we could get hurt just livin' and I don' know bout you guys, but I'd rather get hurt by a goblin that get scratched by a cat or sum'thin. It's cooler."

"O-oh." For some reason, Tsuna felt like smiling. "Okay, then."

The delinquents smiled too, then stiffened. The group split in two to allow Hibari to stalk forward. Unlike his normal stalk, however, this time he seemed a bit more hunched, like a bristled cat. He was also carrying a basket that looked like it had muffins and pastries in it.

Hibari stopped in front of Tsuna and tossed the basket to the ground between them.

"Ah, I'm sorry, but, like what?" Tsuna asked.

Hibari seemed to hunch over more.

"Its like the first time, herbivore," he said. "But you brought the basket."

When he brought the basket? But the only time he had brought Hibari a basket was… oh. The day after Hibari had gotten injured, as an apology.

Tsuna covered his face and resisted the inappropriate urge to giggle. "Hibari, you're supposed to give get-well-soon baskets to the people that got injured," he said, then lifted his hand and smiled at Hibari. "But fine, apology accepted. Now then, Hana was just about to go over what happened yesterday."

Hibari straightened up, looking pleased with himself. Behind him, the delinquents cheered.

Tsuna beamed at them all. Then he froze. Before him was a orange box that proclaimed, "Congratulations! Through leadership and charisma, you have gathered together a Family! What would you like to name your new Family?"

…

A/N: And our babies start to grow up.

In a nutshell, Hibari starts out a force of nature and trips over the fact he's mortal, the Disciplinary Committee are terrified, confused, and in awe, and Tsuna realizes he can't ignore reality forever.

Well, this ended up a bit more nightmarish than I expected. I originally planned to have Tsuna martyr himself and "die", revealing that people will revive under the game system while also traumatizing his friends into being even more protective, but that seemed a bit much to put a group of elementary and middle school students through. Also, the potential implications would add waaay too much darkness to this story. This though… perhaps I shouldn't have watched Goblin Slayer. Don't worry, the story will not get any closer to that show. It's going to get a lot lighter soon, after Tsuna and co get used to raid battles. A lot of the nightmare was just due to the fact they had been used to a small group in small dungeons, and raids are very different. Also, I needed to traumatize them with their first true loss for character development reasons.

I know that thirty seems like a lot, but considering that according "Hidden Bullet: Extreme Memories" it's canon that the school has at least 100 people willing to get into a fight against Hibari at once, and in the anime at least the committee is big enough to patrol the school. I'm assuming that the school was big and had a large delinquent population, and the thirty is the cream of the crop.

I also just realized I never explained how parties worked clearly. Simply, Tsuna's life is a game for him constantly, but for others, it is a game only if they party with Tsuna, and they can't be in the same party if they are too far apart. So each time they want to train or do dungeons, Tsuna has to invite them to a party, and he has to be there. It's why Hibari kept going back at first. The family/guild system completely erases that, so people in the guild are like Tsuna: their life is constantly a game. The family/guild system is somewhat nerfed, however, by the fact Tsuna has to like and be liked by the people he invites, or, in other words he has to be friends with a person to invite them to the family/guild (special rules for trying to infiltrate the family, but I won't get into that here). So Vongola won't be gaining what is essentially a superpower tool right off the bat, and the storyline isn't too messed up. Hopefully. He's also the only one right now that can add people.

Also, about the limit for people in the guild: One reason its so high is that it represents a massive change for Tsuna and his friends, and I didn't think they'd be ready beforehand. The other reason is that this world revolves around flames and the mafia, so I added seven required spots for the leader and his guardians, and then seven spots for underlings, to make a small street gang, pretty much the smallest an actual criminal group can be (that I know of).

Lastly, I have no idea when I'm going to update again. As the year long hiatus might have clued you in, I'm bad at setting a schedule and sitting down to write. I do have a solid plan for next chapter, as well as a few odds and ends to wrap up before Reborn shows up, but I have no idea when I'll actually, you know, write it. Anyways, thanks for having patience, I wish I could say I'll write more often but I know myself too well to promise something like that. It'll come when it comes. At the very least, I can say I don't plan on abandoning this story any time soon.