"You look sharp!" Shoichi praised, really awed by Tsuna and the others' attire. They were fitted into matching suits, even Ryuuichi. They were dressed in white dress shirt with a black suit over it. They had even wore black ties. Ryuuichi was fidgeting and adjusting his collar, feeling a tad bit uncomfortable and choked. As for the non-fighters, they wore maroon suits, adorned with dark brown ties.

"It's actually a little embarrassing." Tsuna sheepishly said. He wasn't used to wearing suits at all, and this would probably be the first time wearing it for all he can remember about his childhood. Though, he had a feeling that this wouldn't be the last time he would wear them.

"I had them specially made to order for this fight. The Vongola Mafia began as a vigilante group to protect people." Reborn began. "Each generation of the Vongola Family has donned this formal attire when risking their lives in battle to fulfill that duty" For some reason, Ryuuichi felt that that wasn't the case. The first generation of Vongola Family wore differently. Well, he might as well not know.

"The Vongola Family started off as a model organization. Though they may have dabbled in unspeakable acts later on." Tsuna sweated at that. "That's the problem!" 

"But.. But there isn't anything wrong about this fight! You are definitely doing the right thing!" Ryuuichi snickered. Shoichi was a little too fired up. The teen shook his head at that, smiling a little. Of course, he too felt excited. After all, they would finally, finally begun the battle.

"I-Irie-san" "Could you stop using my last name like I'm a stranger? I'm one of you guys now. Feel free to call me Shoichi" Tsuna hesitated, but ended up calling the man Shoichi-kun. Shoichi nodded, before turning serious again, something Ryuuichi found a bit weird. They sure do like from serious to relaxed and back to serious again. 

"As I said before, if the Vongola Rings, Mare Rings and the Seven Pacifiers which compose the Tri-Ni-Sette fall into Byakuran's hand, terrible things will happen. Defeating Byakuran-san will save the world!" 

It was hard for them to take, seeing that this battle would determine the fate of this world, which they hadn't expected it. Their priority were to get back to the past safely, until this whole mess spiral down on them. Reborn then told them not to worry about the world, much to Shoichi's chagrin. For now, they should focus on getting home.

All of them smiled, agreed on it. And then, each and one of them geared up. Ryuuichi had his gun hoisted around his shoulder, hid underneath his ed suit, and slung on his shoulder. As he decided to loosen his tie, he briefly the ring that was around his neck, under the white dress shirt. His other rings were wore on his fingers as his box weapons were chained by the gun holster.

They were all as ready as they will ever be. Tsuna turned towards the others, calling them whilst those said people replied with him either a nod or yes, or something along the line. Ryuuichi's name was the last to be called, which surprised the teen. He hadn't expected the brunette to remember him to be honest. He smiled and nodded, determination blazed in his eyes but for a different reason. Tsuna returned a smile too, before turning serious.

"Let's go"

----------------------------------------------------------

Upon the top of the steps of Namimori Shrine, they spotted a large float like thing, or something along the line. "This will be our base unit. I moved it out here this morning beforehand. Your bikes are stowed inside." Shoichi explained sheepishly. Ryuuichi walked up towards it and touched the fabric, inspecting the whole thing as the others talked. It was larger than he had expected. 

"Hahi! So this is what you were building this whole time" "Amazing" Even the girls were impressed by it. "Something about it doesn't feel right..." Gokudera grunted, to Shoichi's surprise. "It had better not be a piece of junk when we look inside." Suddenly, Ryuuichi had a mischievous idea and called out for the bomber while smirking.

"Hey Yato~ Let's have a bet~" The said teen blinked at the playful tone. It wasn't always Ryuuichi would offer a bet or challenge anyone. Not to mention that he would always win for weird reasons. Gokudera hesitated, but Ryuuichi's eyebrows were moving up and down, challenging him before he finally caved in. Right after he agreed, he immediately regretted because Ryuuichi's smirk grew wider. "I'd say that inside would be awesome as heck. If it's like what you had thought it would be, you win. And if it isn't, you lose. And, the loser would have to obey one the winner's wish."

The others, sweated when they could somewhat see the mischievous aura from the dark brown hair teen's back. 

"A-anyway, we stripped this unit of every function deemed unpractical" Shoichi interrupted, followed by Spanner. "Shoichi and I handpicked the newest machines to install inside." 

Tsuna looked around, searching for something- or rather, someone. Gokudera asked, to which the brunette replied that he was looking for Hibari and Yamamoto, both whom haven't arrive yet. 

"Hibari-san! Yamamoto!" Ryuuichi sweated at the attempt. He patted him on the shoulder and gave him a smile. "Don't worry. They will arrive." 'Though seriously, they sure like to be late and make grand entrances, especially Hibari...' He sighed at that. When Giannini and Reborn who had appeared as a hologram from Tsuna's headphone had said negative things, Basil immediately said the opposite.

"Besides, the Milliefiore aren't here yet either!" Suddenly, Spanner's laptop beeped loudly. There were something, Dying Will Flames to be exact, moving towards them in quite a high speed. And then, a large shadow was cast upon them. They all looked up to see dark clouds swirling above them. 

A ray of light were shot out of it and a face of Byakuran's appeared. "Hey there, fellas" "Ahhh!! What is that?!"

"You seems to be doing well, Tsunayoshi-kun" The said brunette gaped in shock. Who would have expected that Byakuran's face would appear, well, perhaps Ryuuichi. But that wasn't the point at the moment. The others, too, were surprised. Though, Ryohei was kind of idiotic at the moment as he thought that Byakuran was a giant.

Actually, the Sasagawa siblings were weird because Kyoko said that he looked like cotton candy. Ryuuichi gave her a crept out stare behind her back. 'What in the world-' Just how does that bloody thing in the sky looks like cotton candy. 'You know what? I give up'

It wasn't an illusion, not to mention that there were metallic reading. "It's a giant apparatus" Spanner deducted. Shoichi, after hearing that, immediately calmed them down. "That's like a blimp in a shape of a face. It's certainly possible with Milliefiore's technology" 

'Yeah but why a face?' Ryuuichi deadpanned in his thought. He pushed back the disgust that was building up in him for unknown reasons. 

"Oh? I said to bring everyone with you. Some people are missing." Byakuran mused. "Oh well. You'll be the ones who suffer at crunch time."

"Byakuran-san, you're the one who broke the rules! That apparatus is too big for a base unit in Choice!" Shoichi shouted but the said man weren't fazed. "You haven't gotten over your habit of jumping to conclusions, Sho-chan. This is a new method of transportation that was just completed. You've also seen it before. This machine will take you to the stage where Choice will happen. The Flame Ring Teleportation System."

Ryuuichi must say, if that thing would shook up everything like what it did to the Melone Base when teleporting, he would certainly be more than pleased to barf on the Marshmallow Freak. Though, unfortunately, it wouldn't. Ryuuichi pouted a little at that. It would be quite a scene if it happen. Then again, he didn't actually want to puke his guts out right before the battle so no thank you.

"But as you know, this device isn't easy to activate. It also serves the role of testing to see if you're qualified to participate in today's Choice. In another words, five million Fiamma Voltage. We need that much flame pressure to transport you to the stage for Choice."

Well, Ryuuichi would simply just lit up his ring. After all, the others would provide more than enough flames. "A ridiculous amount of flame pressure is still necessary to use this teleportation system. I'd say that it's reasonable to expect you to provide the flames yourselves. You could say it's a ticket for participate in Choice" 

'No, it isn't' Ryuuichi looked away when the face's eyes somewhat glanced towards him. The other's protested too. It was hard enough to blast two X Burner, and that they have to do it twenty times? That's too much, or so they've though. (Ryuuichi sweated. How the hell they come out with that metaphor was something even he wouldn't understand)

"Produce flame without any barrier and the device will pick them up." Byakuran ignored them. "Oh, I don't mean to scare you or anything, but if you fail, I'll be so disappointed that I'll have to take your town.. And do this to it" The eye that looked towards one of the mountains suddenly shot laser out of it and blasted the tip. 

"The Northern Namimori Mountain.." Ryohei gasped. They couldn't believed it as anger rose inside Tsuna. How could that damn white hair man do something like that? ('Well, he was just digging himself a grave after all' Ryuuichi nonchalantly, yet wickedly thought. He was slightly pissed at that too to be honest)

"Oh, sorry about that." The face e round. "My face slipped" Ryuuichi snarled at that disgusting sight and snapped out a short "I hope your face slipped down to the seventh level of hell, Marshmallow Freak" If Byakuran was annoyed by that, he surely didn't show it as he ignore the teen. 

A plate that showed a series of zero FV appeared. "Now, start pushing out flames quick. There's only a little time left before noon, the scheduled time. Time will be up when the light from my face disappears" The light started fading, but Tsuna hesitated. They were still lack of two important members after all. 

As the light started fading, two teens jumped out from the trees, leaving a trail of purple and blue flame. "What are you people doing?" "Yo, sorry to keep you waiting"

In just the nick of time, Tsuna and the others lit up their rings and opened their Vongola Boxes while Ryuuichi simply lit up his Cloud ring. A blinding light shot up towards the face, blowing off the dark cloud and revealed the machine. Byakuran was surprised at that amount of Flames produced, before his face disappeared. The readings showed eleven million Fiamma Voltage. Ryuuichi raised an eyebrows at that. 'Shouldn't it be ten million?'

Tsuna and his Guardians stood side by side with their respective box weapon, or rather, partners. The dark brown hair teen smirked. 

'Byakuran, you're dead~'

-----------------------------------------------------------

Right after Tsuna had chosen a card as told by Byakuran, they were immediately teleported to a place with tall skyscrapers, yet there wasn't anyone at all. He had chosen the lightning card, which decided their element for the battlefield. 

"Welcome to the Choice arena" A certain white hair man greeted them. As the dust dispersed, they could finally see their surrounding, which surprised the heck out of most of them, except Ryuuichi. The teen looked around while rubbing the back of his neck. 'My neck hurts...' The buildings were much taller than he had expected. Imagine if he were to stand on one of the buildings. He quickly shook that out of his head and suppressed a shiver. It wasn't as though he was fear of heights, but the thought of looking down from one had him shuddering.

And the feel of falling wasn't really a good thing. Not like he had experienced it in real life.

He turned towards the man and his guardians, all standing behind him. He indifferently stared at them, which had Kikyo raising an eyebrow. Kikyo had never seen someone like Ryuuichi who would simply just stare at them without fear, nor with any emotions at all. Other than amusement, that is. 

Their eyes met for a moment and Ryuuichi's dark brown orbs glinted in amusement before he broke it off to look at Byakuran, who was talking to Tsuna and the others. The man was explaining things to them, to which Tsuna and the others doubted. They didn't know that they were at a place where there's no one other than them so fighting in this place was a bad idea. Though, Byakuran simply smiled and enlightened them.

'A bunch of rowdy s....' Ryuuichi sighed inwardly, pointedly towards Bluebell and Zakuro. Well, it wasn't as if he could say anything about it. The others are as rowdy as cats on rebellious state. Especially a certain few of them. He tugged Hibari's sleeve lightly, bringing his attention to him. He gave him a pointed look and shook his head lightly, muttering a 'wait'.

"Thank you Ryuuichi-kun~" The said teen grumbled out that he didn't did it for him. Byakuran took out a gyroroulette with orange flame burning on top of it. "This is Choice. We have to prepare for the next Choice. I'll make it easier for everyone to see" He walked forward, nearer to them, bringing the gyroroulette too. Then, it suddenly shone and two monitor with symbols on it appeared, one with Milliefiore's crest while the other with Vongola's. "What's with the list of symbols?" 

"These represent our individual elements?" 

"Place the hand with your ring on the side with gears, Tsunayoshi-kun" Byakuran called out, holding out his right hand where his Sky Mare Ring adorned on his middle finger, and placed it onto the other side of the gyroroulette. The said brunette hesitated at first, but walked forward towards it and placed his on the other side. "Spin the gear right when I say Choice" 

"Huh? H-hold-" "Choice" Byakuran ignored it and simply turned the gears, to which Tsuna didn't managed to do it. Slowly, numbers from the top to the bottom appeared. "And it's decided" The numbers appeared beside their respective symbols on the monitor. One on the sky, one on rain, one on storm and two on the box, which is the null with flame on it on Vongola's side. On Milliefiore's, one on sun, two on mist and one on cloud, with the same flame on the sun. 

"The gyroroulette determined the number of combatants from each element on the battlefield." Byakuran explained after Shoichi's realization on it.Gokudera had then asked, more like demanded to know about the null element, which meant that they would have to choose two participants without rings. Suddenly, they all heard a gasp from the girls and turned towards them. Daisy was greeting them and had gave them a wilted flower. If Kikyo hadn't pulled him back, Ryuuichi was sure that he would have shot him. Well, it wasn't as if that dude would die anyway, so who cares.

Ryuuichi hadn't like Daisy at all, personally felt that the dude was creepy. And a bit psycho. He gripped his bow slightly tighter in annoyance. He really really wanted to stab him to death.

Of course, the others were shaken as well. 

Byakuran simply ignored it and went on. "Well then. Let's announce the participating members then. Oh, this is the one time you can discuss before making your choice." He said in a sickening playful tone. Shoichi then stepped forward. "Byakuran-san, since I don't have a ring, I can be considered a 'null element', right?" Ryuuichi could briefly see some sparks as the two men locked eyes. 

"Well, I'll make a special exception" 

"In that case, Tsunayoshi-kun, our lineup is settled. The participating Vongola members will be as follow; Sky will be Tsunayoshi-kun, Storm will be Gokudera-kun, Rain will be Yamamoto-kun. Null element will be represented by Spanner and me" The bomber protested about Shoichi making decisions, but backed down when Reborn agreed with the man's decision. Ryohei, on the other hand, was too fired up and wanted to participate, which of course he couldn't. 

When Shoichi reasoned with them, they finally fully stopped their protests, other than Hibari. The prefect actually was about to force his way into participating, which had stopped when two voices was heard. "Hold on, Kyouya" "Hibari, wait." Dino and Ryuuichi spoke in unison, which had the younger turned towards him as dark brown orbs met similar hue ones. Ryuuichi made an amused sound behind his throat.

"Man, you're so hopeless" Hibari was annoyed that he was stopped by not one, but two people whom he could actually stand. Not really for the older one but something along the line. The man had actually sneaked in during the warp and how he stayed unnoticed was beyond them. Well, Reborn probably knew it since the beginning. 

"I'm your tutor. Of course I'd come. Use your head. If Tsuna and the others beat the Milliefiore (Ryuuichi could actually felt something from the said Famiglia at that, and sweated) you'll be free to fight with whomever you want." For once, the prefect actually it up and willed himself to wait, but of course, not without irritation. 

The others sweated on how Cavallone's Boss managed to persuade the teen, other than Ryuuichi. The latter simply sighed and shook his head at that. Well, at least things had settled and the lineup for Vongola was decided.

As for Milliefiore, Kikyo, Daisy, Torikabuto and one of his followers, Saru whom had appeared out of nowhere were the participants. As for the rule, Byakuran had decided on the Target Rule, which meant that if one of the the targeted one of each group was defeated, the whole group would lose. For Vongola, Shoichi was the target while Milliefiore's was Daisy. Sun Flames bursted out from both targets chests. 

The amount that flown out was too much for Shoichi and had him collapsed onto his knees, feeling his energy draining slowly. 

"That's the target marker. The target lights a fire on his chest so he can discerned from the other player. And it's proof that the target hasn't been defeated and is still alive." (Ryuuichi wondered if Daisy was actually alive to be honest. That creep practically looked like a zombie.)

Shoichi tried futilely to pry the damn target off his chest as it couldn't be taken off until the battle is over. And, the duration til the flames flared from their chest ends was the time limit for the battle. With that amount, the targets would no doubt collapse in no time. 

Shoichi slowly gathered himself again, and agreed with it. With that, their surrounding turned dark as something were shot up to the sky, glowing. "As I've said before, the prizes of this grand game of Choice are.. All the Mare Rings, all the Vongola Rings, all the Arcobaleno pacifiers and.." Ryuuichi frowned. 'Didn't the prize end there' To his, and the others, utter surprise, Byakuran raised his hand and pointed at him, their eyes widen.

"... Shiroki Ryuuichi" 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N= RIGHT! Cliff hanger! I think..? Why do I felt that the things I wrote gets more and more boring....?

The battle would actually start on the next chapter. I might update a tad bit slower because of stress...? Well, stuffs. Not to mention I think I have low blood pressure, or anemia for all I know... ANYWAYS

Ryuuichi was feeling quite playful the moment he had offered a bet with Gokudera, that and the wish. Well, it'll be mentioned somewhere in the coming chapters. 

And yeah, the one more million of Fiamma Voltage was Ryuuichi.... Did I over did with that..? 

Nope. Ryuuichi wasn't afraid of the real Funeral Wreaths. If anything, Reborn was much more scarier. That, and he practically didn't like Daisy at all. [I, too, personally]

This arc, the Choice Arc, would probably end in about one or two chapters more... Yeah. 

Yep. Hibari is rebellious, in a way. 

[I apologize for any spellings, grammars, etc.etc. mistakes]