Seven Years Ago

At the grand age of five, Tsuna wanted to be a robot. At the time it seemed like not only the coolest thing to be, but it also would work as a good solution for his lack of balance and bully problem. Robots didn't trip on nothing but air. They had sensors and super vision to prevent such accidents from happening. No one would bully a robot either. They were too tough and strong to bully! And if Tsuna painted his robot parts with pretty colors, then he'd be the most awesome kid in school. It was a flawless plan.

Tsuna's love for robots may or may not have come from Voltron and the limited amount of Gundam Seed his mother let him see. While those heroes weren't robots themselves, they controlled robots and were cool. So if just driving a robot is cool, then being a robot would be cooler.

His love of robots lasted for most of the year, until one late August. There was a field trip to Tokyo. Tsuna wasn't sure if he liked the capital, to be honest. It was loud, busy, and he was constantly scared of getting separated from the group.

They visited the National Museum on the last day of the trip. It was there that his love for robots died a swift and merciless death. Because while robots are cool, the exhibits at the museums were pretty cool themselves.

There was one exhibit on the ancient Nara. There were around thirty items in total. The largest piece was a small statue that was made out of wood and painted with gold leafing. It was of the standing eleven-headed Kannon Bosatsu. The statue came from Sakurai in Nara, from Mt. Miwa in one of the Shinto shrines that were built there.

"This may seem strange to you now, to think of a Buddist statue in a Shinto shrine. During the first Meji period, the government made the decree that Buddism and Shintoism were to be separate from each other. Before then, in the Nara period, it was common practice to build Buddist temples within the grounds of Shinto Shrines." Tsuna looked up at the statue in awe as the audio tour guide reported the history directly into his ear.

As the female voice continued with the tour, the teacher led the group away from the statue. Tsuna lingered, eyes drawn to a small photo that was framed next to the plaque. It showed a group of people surrounding a pile of items, including the statue, in a cave. They were all smiling widely for the camera, and at the center of the group was a foreign man.

Harry Packard and his adventuring troupe upon the discovery of the hidden shrine within Mt. Miwa.

Tsuna read the plaque slowly, mumbling the words under his breath. When he finished and understood just what it meant, he blinked in surprise. So the statues and art decos weren't just moved from the shrine to the museum, but were found in a hidden shrine? By a normal person, instead of an archaeologist?

Tsuna was floored by that discovery. Anybody could stumble upon these artifacts and get them featured in a museum? That was pretty cool, Tsuna could admit. He left the statue, intent on returning with his group, with that thought bouncing in his head.

Of course, this is when he realized that he had lost the group. The Audio tour wasn't even talking about the Nara collection anymore. Tsuna quickly tried to rewind the recording on the tape, hoping that the virtual tour would lead him back to the group.

Tsuna fumbled in his panic and accidentally hit the fast-forward button. By the time he realized it, the recording was near the end of the recording. Tsuna quickly hit pause and tried to rewind again.

But the button wouldn't work.

"What?" Tsuna cried out in a whine. The button wasn't budging an inch downward. He couldn't rewind the tape. When they had handed out the audio guides, Tsuna was the last one to get his. As a result of that, he was forced to grab the one that looked the most beat up and worn out. The man at the counter had warned him to be careful with the recording.

But now Tsuna had messed up and lost any chance of trying to catch up with his group. His only option was to listen to the audio tour and wait at the exhibit it was talking about. That way the group would meet up with him.

It would mean having to stay in a single exhibit for a long time while he waited, but Tsuna would prefer that than be lost in the museum. With the plan in mind, Tsuna pressed the play button and listened carefully.

" -was from the Yayoi period. The ornate decor on the amulet indicates just how creative and industrial Japan's way of life was in that period. The amulet was a gift to the Chinese monarchy of the time, placed within a convoy that passed through the lands of Japan from the then country of Yamadai. This country is better known as Yamatai, the lost civilization of Queen Himiko, priestess and monarch of the country. The city is said to have been related to the Yamato providence of the modern-day Nara providence. Possibly the city had been located there, but as of today, there has been no evidence to support this claim. The location of Yamatai is one of Japan's greatest historical mysteries."

Tsuna dodged around the legs of the adults and college students crowding the exhibits. As the audio guide spoke he kept an eye out for the Yayoi exhibit. The audio finished the tour with a promotion for an upcoming exhibit on the Lost City of Yamatai.

Luckily the exhibit wasn't too far away and was near the entrance to the museum. Tsuna dashed over to the entrance of the exhibit. On his way, a banner caught his eye. He had seen it earlier when arriving but was so nervous about the trip that he didn't pay it any mind.

Now with his time to spare waiting for the group, Tsuna took a closer look. It looked like they were setting up a new exhibit. Today was its opening day, and people were lined up to visit it. There was a poster board set up to introduce it by the door. On it was a picture of an older man of foreign descent. He was a speaker that was there to promote and open the exhibit with a lecture on Yamatai.

Tsuna glanced back at the Yayoi exhibit nervously. Without the audio tour explaining the artifacts and giving additional information on their history, Tsuna wasn't sure if he'd be as interested in the exhibit. He didn't know the importance of a broken vase made from ancient times.

And it was going to be a long time before the group got to the exhibit. It was a four-hour tour, and they were only at the first exhibit when Tsuna got separated. The Yamatai exhibit was right next to the Yayoi one, and it even had a speaker to explain everything!

Masuri-sensei would be upset that Tsuna got separated but maybe if Tsuna proved that he did learn something she wouldn't be as mad. That was why they were at the museum after all.

It was with this logic that Tsuna wandered away from the Yayoi exhibit and walked into the Yamatai Hall.

Present Day

"Get out of the way Dame-Tsuna!" This was the only warning given before Tsuna found himself shoved to the ground. His bag and umbrella fell out of his hands onto the schoolyard. The umbrella was immediately picked up by the wind and blown away into the distance. His bag had been partially open from his previous search for his Chemistry homework. Had he known that he was going to drop the bag, Tsuna never would have bothered. Now all his papers and books were scattered onto the wet grass.

Tsuna himself had landed face-first into a mud puddle. As he got up, he could feel the dirt and grime on his hands and face. A mournful look down revealed that his white blazer had not been spared either.

The person who pushed Tsuna looked to be Mochida judging from the poor hairstyle choice that Tsuna could make out. With him was his group of friends from the Kendo club. Behind Tsuna, he could hear the tell-tale sounds of screams of pain and terror. Hibari's work, no doubt.

When Hana pushed for the school to make the rule of "Propositioning the female class of the school is not prohibited", Mochida had been the victim to Hibari's tender mercies on more than one occasion. Tsuna was half convinced that Hana had a whistle made specifically for Hibari to hear when she deemed Mochida's actions to be breaking the rule.

The rule made it so that the guys of the school could no longer ask a girl out while on the school's grounds. Girls could still confess to the boys, of course. Hana had said she wanted to put the clause in for both the male and females, but she didn't to avoid a full-on riot from the 'fan clubs' that held a large percentage of the female students.

A fair portion of the guys was disheartened at the new rule but didn't refute it. Others were more hard-headed and ignored it. Or they tried to. Hibari was very efficient at knowing when a rule was broken, and he delivered his punishment brutally.

On the bright side, Kyoko was a lot happier nowadays.

Tsuna carefully righted himself and uselessly brushed off the grass and loose dirt that clung to his clothes. Hopefully, Hibari would be so intent on hunting down Mochida that he'd ignore Tsuna's uniform. Unlikely, but Tsuna was trying to think more positively these days.

Another sharp wind blasted through from the north, pelting Tsuna's back with large droplets of water. Tsuna immediately darted forward to get his things. The last thing he needed was for his homework to get blown away. There was no way that his teachers would believe him if he tried to explain what happened. They didn't when Tsuna tried to tell them that Nori and Makuda had thrown his bag into the river last year. All of his textbooks and homework had been inside, and nearly nothing had survived the ordeal.

"Tsuna-kun!" Tsuna jumped in surprise at the shout. At the gates were Kyoko and Hana. They were both dressed in coats over their uniforms and their umbrellas were grasped tightly. Kyoko hurried over to him, a concerned expression on her face. Behind her was Hana with a more amused and sardonic eyebrow raise.

Hana didn't do concern. She was too mature for that. She settled for sass and logic, nothing more and nothing less. Tsuna knew for a fact that she was going to rule the world one day. Or maybe just Japan. It depended on how much effort she wanted to exert.

"What happened?" Hana asked while Kyoko jumped to catch a paper that almost got swept away. "Did you try to take a mud bath?" She carefully bent down to keep her umbrella blocking the wind and gingerly picked up a math book with two fingers.

"The walkway wasn't big enough for both me and Mochida." Tsuna sighed. "He pushed me while trying to run away from that." Tsuna pointed his thumb at the sounds of pained groans from over the wall. Hana nodded with a pained grimace.

"That checks out, he was trying to ask Kyoko out again." Hana rolled her eyes with a shake of the head. "The monkey is too stupid to know when to quit." Tsuna thanked her as she dropped the math book into the bag. Tsuna winced as he thought about his pencils and the inside of the fabric. It didn't matter in the end, since the bag had gotten so muddy and wet already, but it did mean that today was going to be unpleasant.

"He shouldn't have done that." Kyoko said with a frown. In her hands was a collection of loose papers. Most of them were Tsuna's homework. The most dirty-looking was his chemistry homework, unfortunately. Nezu was going to murder Tsuna.

"It's," Tsuna verbally paused as he took the papers. Kyoko was staring at him intently. As if she was daring Tsuna to say that it was fine. The rain did nothing to hide the sharp glint in her honey eyes.

"Not a good way to start my day." He finished lamely. From beside him, Hana shot him a smirk that he firmly ignored. He'd like to see her deny Kyoko when she was pulling out those eyes. "But it's not like this is the worst thing to happen to me." He pointed out.

Kyoko was not impressed with his logic. "Not getting thrown down three flights of stairs is not what you put as the bar of 'acceptable'." She lectured.

"It is a pretty low bar." Hana agreed with a nod. Tsuna sent her a glare at the lack of help. She merely gave him an unrepentant smile. Kyoko gestured to Hana with a 'see she agrees' motion. Tsuna sighed and reached for the last book on the ground.

It was a small black leather-bound journal. Luckily only the spine got hit with most of the mud, and it narrowly avoided landing in a puddle of water. He quickly checked the inside pages to confirm that nothing was badly damaged. Luckily, the pages were intact. The loose-leaf additions were still inside, printed-out maps were safely tucked into the pages, and none of the drawings were tainted. A miracle by all rights, given Tsuna's luck. He held the journal to Hana.

"Can you hang on to this until I get into a spare uniform?" He asked. "I don't want to put it in the bag and my pants are too muddy and wet." Hana nodded, taking the journal and slipping it into her bag for safekeeping. Tsuna trusted that she would make sure nothing happened to it. Then he looked back to Kyoko.

"And it's not like Mochida is going to have a good morning either." He reminded her. Kyoko frowned in confusion. Tsuna only smiled, and turned around to point at the stalking form of one Hibari Kyouya. Behind him was his second hand Kusakabe Tetsuya. Kusakabe was dutifully at least three feet away with his umbrella held high and his other hand busy texting on his phone.

Hibari had gone without an umbrella. The boy feared nothing, not even God, and so he likely wasn't worried about getting a cold. A pair of tonfa were held in the older boy's hands and Tsuna could see a faint sight of blood being washed off them from the rain. Tsuna winced in sympathy. Someone lost a tooth.

As Hibari walked by, he paused. Dark eyes narrowed at the small trio that was watching him. Then he changed his path and strode towards them. Tsuna swallowed the lump that formed in his throat and tried to ignore the nerves in his stomach. No matter what, Hibari would always be the scariest thing on earth for Tsuna.

"Herbivores," Hibari growled. Tsuna honestly wasn't sure if it was a greeting or a threat. Possibly both, knowing Hibari. "a pack of sheep ran from their punishment. Where did they go?" Straight to the point, and highlighted with the threat of more punishment if they refused to answer by the lifting of his tonfa.

Tsuna prayed that Hibari never followed in his father's footsteps and became a police chief. If this was how he interrogated people now, it would be terrifying in the future when he was legally given a gun. Though to be honest Tsuna couldn't imagine Hibari with a gun. It was more likely that he'd stick with his tonfa.

"They were gone by the time Kyoko and I got onto the grounds." Hana drolled without flinching. She was one of the few who didn't immediately fear Hibari. She respected him, which for Hana was more impressive. She didn't respect anyone, especially guys.

Hibari immediately set his full attention on Tsuna. His mouth ticked into a frown at the state of Tsuna's dress. Seeing this, Tsuna was quick to talk.

"Mochida and his friends pushed me off the walkway and ran towards the gyms." Tsuna pointed in the direction. "I think they're heading for the kendo club." They might have thought being in one of the buildings would save them from Hibari's wrath. If there was one thing Hibari hated more than rule-breaking, it was the destruction of school property.

Unless he was the one doing the destroying. That was one fact that Mochida seemed to have forgotten.

Hibari was silent for a moment before relaxing his stance. Tsuna let out a breath of relief. That breath was quickly choked off when he received a sharp kick to the gut. Kyoko and Hana both jumped back with yelps of surprise. Tsuna was knocked back into a new puddle of water and mud. He wheezed out a pained groan as he felt the cold water and mud coat his back and hair. That was going to take forever to wash out.

Without offering an explanation Hibari turned away and began his new trek towards the kendo club. Of course, Tsuna knew why he was kicked. It was for his uniform and its disrepair. And for crowding possibly, though Hibari never minded groups of three as much as the larger groups.

"I'll have a spare uniform sent to your club room," Kusakabe announced promptly, thumb flying across his phone. "The second-floor restrooms should be clear soon as well." Kusakabe glanced up from his phone and nodded to the group. "Sawada, Sasagawa-chan, Kurokawa. Have a good day." Kusakabe then quickly made his way to his boss.

"That's nice of him." Kyoko murmured while Tsuna pulled himself into a standing position. She then looked to Tsuna sympathetically and held up her umbrella in a wordless offer. As nice as it would be to share an umbrella with Kyoko, Tsuna shook his head in denial.

"I'm already soaked," He explained wryly. "And I don't want to ruin your uniform and summon Hibari back." Because he would find out. There was a fifty-fifty chance that he would punish Tsuna or Kyoko for the infraction. Though if he went for Kyoko, her brother would immediately offer himself up in sacrifice instead and the two would duel it out on the roof all morning long.

With the weather as it is, Tsuna doubted that Hibari would want to fight the boxer. That would mean Tsuna would be the target. Getting bit to death was an event that he tried to limit to only happening once per day.

The trio then made their way inside the school. In the sky, the dark clouds parted for a brief second to reveal the sun in its shining glory. Tsuna basked in its warmth for a second and inhaled deeply. The scent of the rainy air was nice to take in. The forecast predicted that the rain would stop in the mid-afternoon. As much trouble as it gave him, Tsuna would miss it.

"Yamamoto-kun!" All thoughts were thrown to the side as Tsuna was nearly bowled once more. This time by a group of girls stampeding out of the school doors and towards a small group of boys. At the center of the boys was Yamamoto Takeshi, the baseball star and resident boy idol for their class.

"Monkeys." Hana spat. It was debatable if she meant the girls or the group of boys.

Tsuna stepped out of the way of the girls clumsily. One girl that was at the back of the group bumped into him. This caused her to get some mud on her forearms. Luckily it missed her uniform, so Tsuna wouldn't get bitten to death again.

The girl shoved Tsuna back with a glare. "Watch where you're going, dork!" She snapped. The girl didn't stay long to shout at Tsuna. Instead, she turned and ran to catch up with the group while trying to brush off the mud.

Tsuna similarly didn't dwell on the moment and followed his friends into the school. Dork was one of the, not kinder, but lesser insults he's been given over the years. Tsuna has been called nearly everything under the sun, just short of actual curses.

Though there was that one memorable time Kyoko convinced him and Hana to visit Kokuyo for a cafe that sold premium cakes. Kokuyo was a nice town, larger than Namimori, but Tsuna had gotten separated and stumbled on a gang of thugs. Their vocabulary was verbose and plentiful for sure. Tsuna was lucky that he found the police station while running away.

The usual names that Tsuna was saddled with were more benign in nature. Hurtful, but not crass. Dame-Tsuna was the most popular. It was his nickname from elementary that clung to his person with a terrible tenacity. Mostly from his bullies refusing to call him anything else. They've used it so much that an embarrassing amount of people honestly think it's his name. Hana has a special glare for those people.

Crazy was often used. Dreamer or Henshu-Tsuna was also a normal term used by those that visited the club room. They would come in to see what it was about, possibly as a dare or just in curiosity about what Tsuna could be interested in. They would stay there for a maximum of one day before leaving, muttering one of those insults under their breaths.

Other popular monikers were nerd, dork, geek, lame - the usual terms used for those that were unpopular. Dasai-Tsuna was the normal go-to for that description. Once he was called Hentai-Tsuna by Mochida. The combined glares from both Kyoko and Hana persuaded him to never use it again. Annoying was used mostly by the student council and teaching staff. Nezu once actually called him Uzai-Tsuna in class. The other students laughed it up, of course. Tsuna, for his part, just answered the question on the blackboard with grim patience.

No matter what Kyoko and Hana think, they cannot ask Hibari to bite Nezu to death. Nor can they try to get the teacher fired. Tsuna didn't need a vast amount of friends or popularity. He just needed to get through his schooling. Nezu couldn't actually sabotage Tsuna's chances of getting into his hopeful university so the name-calling can be ignored.

It was that singular thought that pushed Tsuna through school most days. Tsuna could deal with anything the teachers or students threw at him. It was all just one more step on his path to achieving his dream. One more day, one more year, one more step until he could finally leave Namimori behind.

Compared to that, it was all worth it.

"We're going ahead to the club room." Hana called out as she and Kyoko left their shoe lockers. Tsuna nodded and waved them off. He waited until they left before opening his locker. As he suspected, there was a flyer crammed inside.

It was from the student council. He didn't bother reading it. It would just be the same as all the others. Warning him that they were well past the deadline to get enough members for the club. The only reason it hasn't been disbanded yet was that Tsuna's father donated to the school yearly. Tsuna didn't know the amount, but it was enough to make the principal hesitant to shut down the club.

Tsuna barely remembers his dad. He thought the man was dead for most of his life. The only reason he knew the guy was alive was because of donations. Tsuna didn't have a high opinion of the man that left his mother to essentially become a single parent. Still, Tsuna could admit that he owed the man.

Despite the favor his father bought them, it wouldn't last forever. The principal was not a very strong-willed man. Everyone knew that the student council really did all the business of the school and that Hibari unofficially ruled Namimori like a dictator. It wouldn't take long before the council convinced the principal to officially permit the disbandment of the club.

Tsuna crumpled the paper and shoved it into his bag. He pulled out his shoes and shook out the tacks that had been placed there. It was routine by now. Tsuna didn't know who put them there or why. It didn't really matter in the end.

It was just another cog in the wheel that was Tsuna's daily life. Honestly, at this point, Tsuna almost wished his bullies were more creative. No one outright tried to beat him up anymore. Not since he started hanging out with Kyoko and Hana. Tsuna would eat his lunches with the girls now, so the normal time slot for his beatdowns was now impossible. No one was dumb enough to start a fight in a classroom.

Tsuna slipped his slippers on, sans socks. He hoped that part of the uniform that Kusakabe sent had another pair. He really didn't want to be in wet socks all day.

When finished at his locker, Tsuna quickly made his way to the second floor. As Kusakabe had said, the restrooms were empty still. It was early in the morning and only those in clubs were here at this time. This was a boon for Tsuna.

The first thing he did was look under his shirt. There was a large bruise already forming on his lower abdomen. It didn't look pretty. Tsuna dropped the shirt bottom and steeled himself before looking in the mirror.

He looked like a drowned cat. Tsuna's hair was naturally fluffy and poofed around his head in a wild manner that was impossible to style. On good days it looked like a 'majestic lion's mane'. Those were Kyoko's words. On bad days it was a 'dead bush'. Hana's words, obviously.

Today his hair was finally obeying gravity but in the worst way. It hung all around him and dripped heavily with both water and caked mud. The dirt and water made his hair darker, giving it a more inky look. Tsuna could audition for the drama club's The Ring musical and would be given the starring role on the spot.

Tsuna turned on the faucet and did his best to quickly wash out the dirt and mud from his hair. The showers in the gyms would be better at cleaning his hair out. Tsuna didn't really want to go to the gyms right now. Not when Hibari was biting people to death. Also, it would eat into his time before school officially started. Tsuna wanted to get to his club as quickly as possible.

So a quick hodgepodge cleaning in a bathroom sink was what he was left with. He didn't spend as much time as he should have, but Tsuna was anxious to get out of his dirty uniform. Tsuna used the hand air dryers to dry his hair. The end result was slightly cleaner but poofed out in a comical fashion. Hopefully one of the girls could help him tame it into something more befitting the school hours.

Tsuna quickly gave his face and arms the same treatment. He washed off the dirt and mud until there was only the freshly scrubbed skin left. It was the best he could do without a shower. Hopefully, it was enough for his teachers and, more importantly, Hibari's standards.

When satisfied with his results, Tsuna left the restroom. The second floor had more traffic than before. It mostly consisted of club members, DC members, and teachers. A glance at a clock on the wall revealed that it took about twenty minutes to get freshened up. More than he would have liked, but it was the least amount of time he could spare.

Tsuna then began the trek to the club room. The student council was the one to assign club rooms. Last year they were able to get away with a smaller but usable room on the first floor. It was next to the sewing club and you could hear the machines running through the wall no matter what time of day it was. It was almost creepy.

This year the council was not as kind. They had been beyond fed up with Tsuna's nepotism shield and the principal's cowardice. If it wasn't the only reason that Tsuna got to keep the club running, he would have told the principal that the money would likely keep coming no matter what. Tsuna's father didn't know about the club, so it wouldn't matter.

But while Tsuna wasn't the bravest of people, he was willing to use anything he could to his advantage. So until he could find a solution he'd rely on the principal's greed and fear.

In retribution for the lack of action from the principal, the council fought back in a similar way. They assigned them the worst possible location for their club room. It was on the first floor, but it was only accessed by a hard-to-see passage on the third floor.

You had to first climb all the flights of stairs for the third floor. Then you go to the roof access point - which was in the furthest corner from the stairs that brought you to the third floor. After that, you climb the first flights of stairs towards the roof. There's on the small landing, nestled next to the final set of stairs that led to the roof, was a door.

It was made of dark wood that looked to be older than the building itself. The dark wood made it hard to see in the shadow of the staircase. The lock was broken in a way that made it automatically lock itself at all times, so they all had to make copies of the original skeleton key. The door was also within complete eyesight of the roof access door.

So if two people were entering or exiting the roof and the nearly hidden door, they could see each other. This happened often to Tsuna. Hibari liked to nap and relax on the roof while Tsuna pushed the limits of how long he could stay in the club while still obeying the rules.

On the times he pushed too far, Hibari was in the perfect position to pounce. Literally.

The door led to a long staircase that winded down the school floors. It was the only relic from the past before the school was built. Namimori middle school was built in the framework of an old hospital. Before the hospital, it was a large mansion from a rich noble with ties to the then Daimyo.

None of it was confirmed of course. The only thing that was certain was that when they were building the school, they couldn't take out the weird staircase. It was too close to a lot of the load-bearing walls. Tearing it down would have cost more than what the mayor was willing to pay.

Its very existence was cool and Tsuna was impressed at the effort that must have been spent by the student council to find it. Kyoko was fond of the novel experience of having their club in a secret passageway. Ordinarily, Tsuna would agree wholeheartedly. However, given the size of the room at the end of the journey made him more inclined to agree with Hana. She had spent a good time trying to find a way to force the council to give them a better room. All attempts failed.

The room was barely larger than that of a broom closet. Tsuna had no idea why such an intricate path led only to something as small as a cubical. It was annoying and grated on his nerves. Something in his gut told him that it didn't add up.

It was a smaller mystery to solve. Tsuna didn't have access to the original blueprints of the building and all information gathered on its history was unconfirmed or shaky at best. Tsuna liked to poke at the evidence they had been able to gather every now and then when he was needing a break from the larger research projects.

As he got closer to the final destination, Tsuna could hear the sounds of shouting voices. Two girls, both sharp and cutting. Tsuna picked up his pace, taking the last few flights of stairs two at a time. The sight he was greeted with wasn't good. Hana and Kinamoto Mayumi were on the landing in front of the club room.

They were facing off against each other in a loud shouting match. They must have stepped out because the room was too small for the argument. It was barely big enough for the trio, and getting into a fight would be near impossible.

And judging by their stances, Hana and Kinamoto were seconds away from throwing punches.

"YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE A CLUB NAME!" Kinamoto bellowed. "Not having enough members is one infraction but this basically just makes your club's existence null and void." Hana scoffed at the statement.

"Not having a name is hardly against the rules." She sneered. "There's nothing that says having a name is required." Then she smirked darkly and tilted her head back in a smug manner. "But on the other hand, to disband a club it is required that you get the principal's written permission and approval." Her silent, good luck with that, was heard clearly.

Kinamoto glared at Hana from over the top of her glasses. The older student was on the student council. She was in charge of keeping the clubs organized. Every club outing, purchase, and promotion marketing had to go through Kinamoto. She hated Tsuna and his friends with a burning fashion.

She was a tall third year with dark hair that was pulled back in low twin tails that trailed down her shoulders. Kinamoto wore the winter uniform all year long and wore green framed glasses that could glint in the light to intimidate her enemies. Or most of them anyway. Hana was special in that regard. If she didn't fear Hibari, then she definitely wasn't scared of Kinamoto.

Kinamoto took a deep breath to calm herself before continuing. She glanced up and caught sight of Tsuna. She transferred her glare onto him as he stood beside Hana. Tsuna did fear Kinamoto, but it was a fear that was born from his natural fear of authority.

His teachers couldn't hurt Tsuna too much as long as his grades stayed up. That made them less authorities and more annoying necessities. Kinamoto had real power, however. She could and would find a way to disband the one thing that Tsuna enjoyed at school.

Another fear was that if his club was gone, would Tsuna still have Hana and Kyoko as friends? He didn't want to find out.

"You can't hide behind Principal Tanaka anymore." She declared coldly. "He's agreed to an ultimatum. You have a month. If you don't get the required number of members by then, the club will be disbanded. And for all the trouble you gave me, it will be a permanent ban ." The sweet tone she gave those last words would rot teeth.

Even though ice gripped Tsuna's heart, he stayed calm. Hana would hate it if he cried in front of Kinamoto again. So instead Tsuna nodded his head in understanding and smiled.

"That's fine. We'll meet your requirements. But if we don't make the deadline and you disband us, you'll have to be the one to tell Hibari." He gave her an apologetic smile. Kinamoto frowned. She looked between Tsuna and the smiling Hana in suspicion.

"Why would Hibari be involved?" She asked. Hana chuckled without humor and pulled up a folded piece of paper in her pocket. She held it out in invitation to Kinamoto. The older girl hesitated but snatched the paper after a beat.

When she finished reading the contents, her face paled. "How?" She asked in a gaunt voice. "Hibari's never joined a club before."

"We asked nicely." Tsuna answered. "He doesn't attend many of the club meetings but we don't mind that much." Kinamoto looked up from the papers and shoved them back at Tsuna, hitting his chest. She either didn't care or notice the mud on his person.

"It's not required by me to inform members of a club's disbandment. It's the duty of the club leader. Which is you, Sawada." Her voice was shaky now. She knew the words to be true but she was doubting herself. She's dealt with Tsuna and Hana's loophole hopping to know there was a catch.

"I guess." Tsuna shrugged. "But I'll tell him that Kinamoto Mayumi-senpai was the one to push for the disbandment. And that the principal was the one to approve it." If possible, Kinamoto got paler. She began to step backward as if trying to ward them away.

Hana's smirk got wider. "Hibari's strong but he's as much as a monkey as the rest of the boys in the school." She explained cooly. "So he won't understand when we tell him that there won't be any more club meetings. He'll ask questions and we'll be forced to name names." She showed not an inch of remorse for the fates of Kinamoto and the principal.

"Monsters." Kinamoto breathed. "You're monsters." Tsuna winced at the statement, but Hana looked nonpulsed.

"If we need to be." She agreed. Kinamoto took this moment to flee. She dashed up the stairs, keys gripped in her shaking hands. Distantly Tsuna could hear the jingling of Kinamoto struggling to find the key to the upstairs door.

"How long do we have until she realizes that Hibari would sooner bite us all to death for our 'infraction' than be angry about the disbandment?" Tsuna was under no illusions. If Hibari cared to pay attention to the club politics he would have destroyed them long before it got to this point. Luckily for Tsuna, Hibari left any club-related matters to the council.

"A month or two," Hana replied. She eyed the stairs with a calculating expression. "We'll have until the new year if principal Tanaka hears about Hibari's involvement." Tsuna agreed to that. The principal feared Hibari above all things. It was a healthy fear to have. Tsuna was empathetic to it.

"Kinamoto won't tell him." Tsuna warned. "She's smarter than that." Things would have been a lot easier if Kinamoto would fall for something that simple. Hana rolled her eyes. She didn't look too worried.

"Get me your mother's cooked salmon and hamburger steak recipes and I'll be able to get the word to the principal." She walked to the club room and paused at the doorway. Hana looked back and gave Tsuna a serious glare.

"After that, we'll run out of time and favors. If we don't get three more members the club will be disbanded. Nothing will stop it." He took her warning to heart and nodded. They needed to find people who would join.

Last year they coasted by the random students that joined on a whim or dare. The multitude of them was enough to legally say that they had the members. Each roster they gave the council had different names on them, but it worked.

But now people were worn off of the novelty of curiously watching Tsuna's interests. They came, they saw, and they realized that Tsuna was not joking, and they left. By now there weren't many people they could convince to join.

Not unless they poached from other clubs. Hana suggested this method several times. Tsuna had been hesitant to go through with it. For one, if they were in another club most of their time was held up by that club. The council would no doubt search them for non-members who never showed to meetings and were just placeholder names on the roster.

He also didn't want to pull someone away from their club. It felt wrong in a way. The other club had them first, and it might cause tension that Tsuna honestly could not afford between the clubs.

Another factor that Tsuna had clung to was an, admittedly, old-fashioned one. Tsuna wanted people in the club that honestly wanted to be there. People who would have fun and enjoy it. People that didn't call him crazy or a hopeless dreamer.

Tsuna might have to change that way of thinking if he wanted to keep his club alive. The realization was a hard pill to swallow. It made him want to hide away and cry in a corner. Everything in him recoiled at the very thought.

But Tsuna has been dealing with a deck stacked against him from the start. So if he can weather Mochida, Nezu, and Kinamoto - Tsuna can ignore his own instincts. If it meant he could keep this; the club, and his friends, then it was worth it.

Just one more problem, one more step towards his destiny.

It was his mantra to repeat anytime he was faced with a situation he didn't like. It's helped him a lot in the years. Everything was smaller when compared to the bigger picture. Tsuna made it his job and mission to always see the bigger picture.

"Thank you for all your help, Hana-chan. I wouldn't have made it this far without you." He confessed. Hana gave him a bland smile and rolled her eyes.

"Of course you wouldn't. Kinamoto would have squashed you within the first year." She remarked factually. Tsuna winced at the harsh truth but accepted it to be true. Hana had made it a personal mission to force Tsuna to have more of a backbone. She was baffled at the idea of Tsuna being scared of the student council.

To be fair most of the people on the council were scary. Hana just refused to feel fear in the face of adversity. She was like Hibari in that way. When faced with something scary, she saw it as more of a challenge than anything else. Tsuna was envious of her.

"Wait out there. I'll toss out the spare uniform for you." Having him change on the landing would be easier. The room was cramped with everything they shoved in there and it wasn't like anybody came down the stairs anyway.

Tsuna didn't have to wait long before Hana handed him the clothes. He thanked her and shut the club door and quickly got changed. The fresh clothes were amazing to wear after getting out of the soggy ones from before. The DC was even kind enough to give him fresh socks - Kusakabe's forethought or not, Tsuna didn't know. He didn't care either. It felt like dipping his feet into heaven when slipping the socks on.

"I'm telling you it has to be in the mountains of the Nara prefecture!" The best words to describe the club room was 'a disaster'. There was one round coffee table that was scratched and nearly broken. The table was completely covered by books and papers. There was a very small area cleared of most of the papers. In that spot was a communal laptop that was donated by Tsuna's mom as a celebration gift when Hana and Kyoko officially joined the club.

Behind the computer, still within the small clearing, was a power strip. That power strip was connected to another power strip that connected to another strip that connected to the electric socket by the door. It was the only electrical socket in the room. Hence the conga line of power strips.

At the center of the table was a coffee maker that plugged into the same strip as the computer. There were also multiple phone and tablet chargers plugged in, waiting for their appropriate appliances to be charged. There was also a printer, copier, and fax machine shoved into one corner. All plugged in via power strips of course.

The west wall was lined with file cabinets and boxes. Most of it was from before they got the room. Tsuna was reluctant to get rid of them merely for the fact that with as much they print off and collect paper documents they might need the cabinets. Under the table, next to the communal laptop was a smaller file cabinet. That one held the files that had information that had to be referenced on the fly.

The wall next to the door was filled with funny motivational posters and pencil drawings courtesy of Kyoko. She said it livened the room up. A lot of the images were of chibi versions of Tsuna and Hana at work in the room. Some showed the chibi trio at a cake shop or some other location. One memorable picture showed the image of a chibi Hibari napping on the school roof.

The north wall was covered by a giant world map. On that map were smaller maps of more detailed locations. Most of them concentrated on Japan and South Korea. Colored string was pinned to the map with the odd photo or printed paper to mark a significant piece of evidence.

Another couple of words that could be used to describe the room would be 'fire hazard'. Especially since it was a room with no windows and the only escape being a permanently locked door at the top of three flights of stairs. And they broke the smoke detector when it went off at the steam of the coffee.

The girls were standing in front of the map. Kyoko must have already brewed the coffee. Tsuna could smell it in the air, and she had her Eevee novelty mug in hand. Kyoko had bought them all their own mugs to use. Hana's was the largest and was in the shape of a smiling masked ninja. Tsuna's was only a little smaller than Hana's. It was a mug that was made into the depiction of Totoro from the Studio Ghibli film. Kyoko swore there was no hidden meaning behind the mugs. Tsuna was unsure of the claim.

The last one to leave the room was delegated to cleaning the mugs and coffee maker. That made it Tsuna's regular chore. He was usually the last one to leave the club. He didn't mind it, but it did make it harder to dodge Hibari when he got testy at Tsuna's habit of toeing the line of when to leave.

As Tsuna approached the hooks on the wall that they drilled in to hang the mugs, he paused. There was a fourth hook in the wall. Right next to his. Hanging from it was a new mug. It was white and had a small yellow bird on it with a heart above its head.

"Kyoko, did you get Hibari a coffee mug?" Tsuna asked incredulously. This halted whatever debate she was having with Hana. She gave Tsuna a bright smile and nodded.

"Isn't it cute?" She asked. "I found it yesterday and thought it fit Hibari-senpai well!" This only baffled Tsuna more.

"We only got him to sign up yesterday. After school!" It had been a very daring affair too. Tsuna pulled the short straw and had to be the one to approach Hibari on the roof. Hana heard a rumor that Hibari liked hamburger steak and Tsuna's mother was a top-tier cook.

The plan had been simple. Tell Hibari that every Friday the club had hamburger steak to eat during club meetings. Tsuna would then offer an extra bento he asked his mother to make that had the meal prepared.

Hibari gave Tsuna a good thrashing for the audacity of approaching him. But he also tried the food and agreed to sign up, provided he was allowed to skip any and all meetings he wanted to. Tsuna agreed to the terms quickly before retreating back to Kyoko and Hana who had watched from the doorway that led back into the school.

Which gave them the leverage needed to keep Kinamoto at bay. But it didn't explain why Kyoko got Hibari a mug. Hibari didn't seem like a coffee person to Tsuna. But they didn't have a tea brewer and even if Tsuna wanted to try and get one, there wasn't enough room.

Tsuna's mind short-circuited at the thought of Hibari seeing the club room. He would kill them for the number of safety hazards there were. Tsuna prayed that Hibari didn't feel a need to ever actually join them on Fridays.

"That's why it's so good I found the mug so quickly!" Kyoko countered cheerfully. Tsuna gave her a wobbly smile and decided to let the matter drop. It wasn't like Hibari was going to ever join a meeting and see the mug anyway.

"What were you guys arguing about anyway?" Tsuna asked while filling up his own mug. Hana scoffed from her place by the map. Her tablet was already in hand and Tsuna would see that she was scrolling through a historical article on the myths and legends of Shintoism.

"Kyoko is calling for a trip to Nara again." Hana explained with a glare at Kyoko's smiling form. "Ignoring how Nara is the last place to look, there is no way we have the funds for a trip to the Nara prefecture. Even if we did have the money, Kinamoto would never approve the trip until we get more members in the club."

"Nara is not the last place to look!" Kyoko argued with a pout. She didn't refute the fact about Kinamoto, though. "America is the last place to look!" Hana opened her mouth on reflex to argue back but paused. Then she sighed and gave Kyoko an exasperated look.

"America wasn't even on the list of options." She pointed out. "We're looking for Takamagahara, not the lost Roanoke colony." The comment threw Kyoko off her groove.

"What's that?" While Hana began to educate Kyoko on the subject, Tsuna sat by the laptop. The chair they brought in was one of the old ones from before the school changed class equipment and furniture. The old chairs were so uncomfortable that there had been a school-wide petition and fundraiser to get better seats.

Every time he sat in the chair, Tsuna was reminded just why so many students were ready to protest to get rid of them. They tried to mitigate the pain of the hard plastic and pointed metal flakes by attaching pillows to the back and seat of the chair. It helped a little bit, but didn't stop the back pain from kicking in.

As he turned on the computer, Tsuna reached down and opened the file cabinet by his feet. He rummaged around in it for a minute before pulling out a large folder that was only kept shut by a series of rubber bands.

"Hana, can you toss me my journal please?" Hana reached into her bag and threw the book at Tsuna without pausing in her lecture on American history. Why she knew so much about it was a mystery.

Tsuna failed to catch the flying object with his hands. Instead, it smacked into his face and gave his nose a good smarting. The girls thankfully didn't notice the clumsy action. Rubbing his nose, Tsuna opened the journal.

Takamagahara wasn't the only historical mystery they researched, but it was the biggest case. It was Tsuna's passion project. Takamagahara was the mythological city of the gods, where Amaterasu ruled. It was also named the birthplace of the gods.

The land was supposed to be made in the same image as Japan's most fertile lands. With sweeping rivers, rice fields, and an endlessly bountiful harvest from farmlands. There was also a city where the gods dwelled, made of jade and stone and filled with the riches of the gods. A singular bridge that was called the Ama-no-ukihashi connected Takamagahara to the mortal realm.

While Tsuna was unsure of the jade and riches, he was sure that the city existed. Most think that the city is just a myth that was made by the upper class to make them seem divine and holy to the common people in ancient times. Tsuna would have been inclined to think so as well if it wasn't for one Kanji Ishiwara.

Kanji was a major general in Japan's military during World War II. He was a terrible man that did a lot of horrendous deeds to rise in the ranks and get what he wanted. Tsuna wasn't interested in his veteran days, however. Kanji was a self-named philosopher and proposed a new theory for Takamagahara. He suspected that the city wasn't in Japan at all but instead was located somewhere outside. He often pushed for the idea of it being in Gangwong, South Korea.

He made the claim while retired in Yamagata. Supposedly he stayed there until the end of the war when he was called to trial as a witness. Supposedly, because there were reports that Kanji left Yamagata during that time.

Tsuna had convinced his mom to have a summer vacation in Yamagata two years ago. While there, Tsuna tracked down where his family currently resided and posed as a student doing a summer report on the war.

It wasn't really a lie. Tsuna did his report on Kanji Ishiwara that summer. He just made sure to leave out any talk of Takamagahara.

Kanji's granddaughter was really kind and helpful to Tsuna's cause. After answering the questions needed for the report, she told Tsuna all about the stories her father would tell her about Kanji. Two, in particular, caught his interest.

Kanji was such a firm believer of Takamagahara that his son knew most of Kanji's stories by heart. He would tell anyone who would listen about his thoughts and theories on the city and where he suspected it was located. Most of it was the same diatribe of what he told other scholars and wrote about.

But Kanji passed down to his son, and he to his daughter, a small statue. Kanji had proudly claimed that it was proof of the city's existence. The granddaughter showed Tsuna the statue with a fond shake of her head. The woman had assumed that it was a normal knick-knack her grandfather bought or found in his travels as a major general.

It was small and easily held in the palm of the hand. The statue depicted a bronze Izanagi. She was standing elegantly with her eyes closed and her hand cupped into a form that made it look like she was going to sculpt something.

Tsuna recognized it to be something much older than what the granddaughter had thought. Tsuna couldn't accurately date the sculpture of course, but if pressed he would have guessed it to be from the late Heian period.

The next thing that caught his interest was the granddaughter's somber retelling of Kanji's last years of life. He suffered from dementia and was forgetting things at a rapid pace. He would ramble to his family members nonsensically.

"Father said that Grandfather was a mess. He wouldn't remember faces or names and kept reliving moments of his past at random on a day-by-day basis. There was a small bit of clarity, in the last few days, of when he spoke about a dream he kept having. He would describe it in the greatest detail. Of a grand city in the sky that was old but beautiful and had fertile farmlands that stretched out as far as the eye could see. He would say that the dream was a memory and that he wanted to go back there. Father thought it was his vision of what Takamagahara would look like."

It was sad, but it also implied something more. That Kanji had seen Takamagahara for himself. His memory was being mistaken as dementia-fueled dreams. Between that and the statue, Tsuna would bet his soul that Kanji had been to the city.

Tsuna had left with the knowledge and picture of the statue. It gave him the affirmation he needed to keep searching for the city. In the interview, he asked if Kanji had traveled anywhere during or after the war.

"Father did mention that Grandfather was gone for almost all of his time after retirement. He only came back shortly before the trial with the UN. After that Grandfather stayed home and died four years later."

So Kanji did travel. Presumably, it was in search of Takamagahara. Sadly she didn't know where her grandfather traveled to. Her father had passed away just a few years ago so Tsuna couldn't ask the man if he knew.

It was frustrating to be on the brink of a trail to follow only to be blocked. Tsuna likely would have stayed at that dead-end if it wasn't for Kyoko. While Hana was an expert at dodging Kinamoto and narrowing down research, Kyoko was the queen of finding obscure information.

She had managed to track down one of Kanji's closest friends who did know an approximate guide of where Kanji had traveled. The friend even confirmed that Kanji had gone in search of Takamagahara. Interestingly enough, South Korea was not one of Kanji's destinations.

So if Kanji had preached about Takamagahara being in South Korea, then why did he not visit it when searching for the city? Tsuna was convinced that Kanji had found the city. For whatever reason, he decided to hide the knowledge and throw out red herrings of where it was. Whatever Kanji found there, he didn't want anyone else to find it.

It made Tsuna want to find Takamagahara even more.

"Hey Tsuna," Hana broke off from her tirade and pointed at Tsuna's bag that he left in the hall. He didn't want to bring it in the room with it still dripping wet. "Before you get into a research frenzy again, go redo your homework. I don't want to listen to the teachers whine about your bad luck again." Tsuna sighed but relented. Hana was right. Even if he really wanted to check on a lead of where Kanji might have gone when he visited Hokkaido.

"Yeah, I probably should." Tsuna agreed. He rose from the chair and headed for the door. "Kyoko, can you check on what I started on the laptop? Hokkaido was Kanji's last stop and I'm trying to figure out where he might have gone." Kyoko gave him a thumbs up and headed for the table.

"Sure thing! But I'm telling you, the city is in Nara." She giggled when Hana let out a groan of frustration. Tsuna chuckled and dipped out of the room with a clean sheet of papers in hand. Sadly he couldn't redo all of the homework. His chemistry, English, and math were worksheets that were handed out in class.

His math could be redeemed if he redid the problems on a separate paper. History was a simple manner of reprinting his essay from the computer. He kept all his typed work in a file in his email, so it would be easy to find and reprint.

Now he just had to hope that Nezu wouldn't berate him too long in class.