Rules

Mukuro returns the next day, a plan in mind for how he's going to hide the other people he'll pick up during the infiltration. The Estraneo will die, but on top of that he'll take away their prized experiments. That way, no one else can step in and continue the torture.

Mukuro isn't oblivious, of course Estraneo isn't the only famiglia in human experimentation, but Mukuro has a personal hatred for them. He'll get to the others later.

For now, he needs to figure out all of the hidden bases necessary for a contingency plan because the Estraneo has allies and, worse-case scenario, they come after Mukuro and he has to keep running from them.

It would be… nice if Mukuro could find somewhere genuinely safe. Chrome is a brief escape, but as soon as his actual body is disturbed then he's wrenched away from her and stuck once again in hell.

Mukuro decides, halfway to Chrome's room, that when all is said and done, he'll look for a home. Somewhere he can go and no one will hurt him.

Kyouya pokes his head into the hallway and locks onto Mukuro. "Welcome home," the little boy says automatically in greeting before ducking away again.

Mukuro blinks, staring at the empty space where Kyouya used to be. "Okay," he murmurs quietly.

Chrome smiles fondly when Mukuro retreats into her, the boy stunned and partly frightened at the sudden rush of warmth in his chest. She walks into the living room and greets Kyouya back. "We're home."

.

Kyouya's adult is wary of the army Kyouya has accumulated, which is a perfectly logical reaction, but it also means that it takes several days until the adult is willing to even enter the house.

They settle on a compromise where there should only be enough children that Daemon can't be overwhelmed by 'demonic powers' if they attack. Kyouya lets the man have the delusion that he'd be able to escape without Kyouya's permission.

The first group Daemon is introduced to consists of Kyouya's nightlights; his first yellow, orange and purple. His green is off in school because the parents insist that learning how to spell is important.

.

Daemon looks up from the living room couch and sees the four children toddle into the room. He's not even surprised that the descendants have found each other –it only seems natural- but he does take a moment to stare at the little girl, slightly horrified. He then remembers that he has not actually fathered a child. He sighs in relief.

Daemon looks over the children who peer back in curiosity. Well, they clearly don't have rings so the first thing for him to do is to find them some conductors, so they can actually conjure flames, and then he can assess their power -

"This one is orange," Kyouya introduces and gestures at Tsuna.

The brunet obligingly lights up.

"How?" Daemon deadpans in annoyance. "No, wait, I mean why? Why do you do this to me? Do you even know – there are rules, tiny Alaude. Logical rules."

Kyouya just blinks at him. "Yes. My rules."

.

Kyouya doesn't mind the purple adult, even though the man keeps looking at the children in distress every so often. Mostly when they show him that Tsuna can fly and Tetsuya can power a lightbulb.

Daemon insists that flames can't reach past the skin unless they have a conductor -a ring of some sort- to control it. He says that Tsuna shouldn't be able to summon it to his hands, nor shape it into a vague bunny shape just to entertain Kyouya.

The purple throws his hands up in incredulous exasperation and claims that flames shouldn't even manifest visibly unless their power is off the charts strong. So really, it's near to impossible that every person Kyouya has found -especially civilian kids- have been able to not only trigger the summoning but also harness the flames at will.

To be fair, most of the children can only manage a dim glow on their skin. It's still incredible because most people who have class C or lower can't manifest their fire well or at all most of the time.

Daemon presumes that it's the power of ignorance.

After all, why would you give up when you are completely certain that what you're trying to achieve is reachable, if only you'll put enough effort into it. If you don't know there's a barrier in front of you, then of course you won't stop.

The mafia is built on that concept of pushing limits. Dying Will means you put everything into one action, one thought, and you don't stop until you have what you want – until you've thrown yourself at that barrier over and over again.

And you just hope and pray that it breaks before you do.

Daemon is looking forward to how these children will end up. Little terrors shifting to fully formed monsters, civilians worse than anything home grown by the mafia.

So Daemon steals a few different ring types and forges copies to gift to the children. He then takes it upon himself to teach them manipulation of the base flame, plus the special facets like disintegration and electricity.

He finds himself feeling… proud when the little kids charge a yakuza base a couple months later and send the adults running, most of the men and women on fire, and all of them screaming in terror.

...

Omake – Home

Tsuna twitches under Mukuro's intent stare and sighs, looking up from his paperwork. "What do you want?"

"Say it," Mukuro demands.

"I-" Tsuna sighs again, heavier this time. "I don't know what you want from me."

"I just got in," Mukuro explains. "Greet me."

Tsuna stares. "Uh, welcome home?"

Mukuro lights up in delight and smiles. "I'm home." He then disperses into thin air now that he has what he came for.

Tsuna runs a hand down his face. One of these days, he's going to build up the courage to ask for an explanation.