I'm the Sneaky One

When Tony woke again, Leon had already carried him, along with the Mark 1 Armor, out of the cave. Yinsen, who had been hiding inside a missile casing, had also been dragged out by Leon's carpet search.

After Leon gave him a long and earnest explanation, Yinsen finally believed that Leon was Tony's younger brother.

When he saw the devastation at the Ten Rings base, Yinsen had no choice but to believe it. It was simply too brutal.

Most of the Ten Rings members had not even left behind bone fragments. Their bodies had been completely obliterated, and they had died horribly.

Not long after.

Tony, whom Leon had knocked unconscious, finally woke up.

"Hiss... My jaw!"

The Mark 1 helmet opened, and Tony grimaced in pain.

"Tony, are you all right?"

Yinsen came over and asked with concern.

"Heh, at least I'm still alive." Tony gave a bitter smile, then suddenly remembered something. "Where's that bastard pretending to be my brother Leon? I'm going to blast him with a cannon!"

"Who are you going to blast?"

Leon had returned after washing his face.

The morning sunlight shone on his mature, handsome face, where elegance and wicked charm coexisted. It left people dazed—how could there be such a handsome bastard in the world?

"Leon, perfect timing. There was some guy pretending to be you just now... Wait, Leon? Why are you here?!"

Tony cried out.

He stared blankly at Leon, who had appeared before him.

"Because the bastard pretending to be me that you mentioned was me, my foolish big brother~"

Leon said with a helpless, mischievous grin.

"But you... How did you suddenly become so strong? And what's with that outfit? Are you doing cosplay?"

"Wait, you didn't inject yourself with Super Soldier Serum, did you? That has to be it!"

"But that's not right. Super Soldier Serum shouldn't have effects this powerful, and nine out of ten people who take it become lunatics, while the last one is half-crazy..."

Tony's mind raced as he tried to deduce the source of Leon's extraordinary strength from the intelligence he knew. But how could he know it was all because of the system?

"All right, all right. I'll explain it to you slowly later. It's a long story."

"Then make it short."

Tony had no intention of letting Leon brush him off so easily.

What if the power Leon had gained came with some uncontrollable risk, like how "Super Soldier Serum amplifies a person's inner desires"?

Tony could not accept that. They had to eliminate any hidden danger as soon as possible.

This was his only little brother!

There was no helping it.

Leon could only briefly recount how he had been hit by a truck and nearly died before gaining superpowers, omitting the existence of the system.

But everything he told Tony was true.

So Tony could not find any fault in Leon's story.

"Leon, can you fly now?"

Tony asked curiously.

"No."

"You think I'm Superman or something?"

Leon laughed and punched Tony lightly in the chest. Tony gave a crooked smile. "That's great, then. Let your big brother show you what it means to be a flying man."

With that said.

Like a child who had never grown up, Tony eagerly began showing off the Mark 1 Armor's flight capabilities in front of Leon.

He pressed the switch on his left arm plate to ignite it manually, then shot into the sky with a trail of rather environmentally unfriendly gray-white exhaust streaming from the soles of his feet.

"Woohoo~ Takeoff!"

"Leon, did you see that? Armor capable of carrying someone through the air—mine is the only one of its kind in the world!" Tony shouted excitedly, grinning from ear to ear.

However.

He had not flown very high.

The cobbled-together jet device on the Mark 1 Armor came apart directly in midair. Amid a panicked scream, Tony began free-falling.

"Ahhhhhh!!!!"

Leon helplessly covered his forehead. "You just had to show off and fly. Now you've crashed, haven't you?"

"What do we do, Leon?" Yinsen instinctively looked at Leon and said worriedly, "If Tony falls like this, he'll definitely get hurt!"

"What else can we do? Catch him, of course."

Leon answered. He had to spoil his own brother, after all.

He fixed his eyes on where Tony would land, bent down, and leaped over ten meters into the air. After catching Tony in the armor, he used himself as a cushion and crashed to the ground with him.

Bang!!!

Even with Leon acting as a buffer, the tremendous force of impact with the ground still shattered the crudely made Mark 1 into pieces.

Leon pushed Tony, who had suffered only a few scrapes, off himself. Rising to his feet, he mocked him, "You flew great. Don't fly again next time."

"Uh, this was just an accident."

Tony's mouth twitched awkwardly, but he stubbornly said, "Once we get back, I'll definitely make an improved version. It'll look so cool you'll regret it, so don't come asking me for one."

"Hmph~ As if I care."

Leon curled his lip. "Maybe by then, I'll be able to fly on my own."

This was how the two brothers usually got along.

Neither would yield verbally, but both were softer than the other at heart.

"Um..."

Yinsen weakly raised a hand and asked, "How are we supposed to leave this place?"

"All the Ten Rings armored vehicles are wrecked. Most of them have melted into scrap iron."

At that.

Tony immediately turned to look at Leon. Leon did not disappoint him; he tapped his Bluetooth earpiece with one finger and commanded with immense Haki:

"JARVIS, bring the Jet Glider over!"

"Certainly, Master Leon."

The Jet Glider parked five kilometers away received the order and arrived beside the three of them in just fifteen seconds.

"Jet Glider?"

"You actually brought that thing out here? You really don't value your life!"

Tony exclaimed, then suddenly realized that Leon's physical condition was no longer what it once had been, making it easier to understand.

But—

"The Jet Glider's cockpit can only fit two people at most..."

"Easy."

Leon shrugged. "Squeeze together, and there'll always be room."

"Sir, I am very glad that you are safe and sound."

JARVIS's voice came from the Jet Glider's onboard system.

"Oh, JARVIS, I'm so moved to hear your voice again!"

Tony expressed his deep longing for JARVIS with slight exaggeration. Every day without JARVIS by his side had been torture.

After that.

The three of them began stacking themselves like a sandwich.

Tony sat in front, Leon in the middle, and Yinsen in the back. Their seating arrangement was happily settled just like that.

"Leon, your pistol is poking me!"

"Pistol?"

"Fuck you!"

"Let's go home."

Amid Leon and Tony's bickering, the Jet Glider slowly drove away from the Ten Rings base, which had become nothing but ruins.

Half an hour later.

Movement came from beneath a pile of rubble somewhere here.

Soon.

A bald man covered in burns crawled out.

Looking closely.

He was actually the leader of this Ten Rings base.

He was not dead yet.

When Leon fired the Chest Cannon, the bald man had immediately found a shelter made from piled rocks and hidden in a trench dug beneath it.

Although he had later been buried beneath the rocks, that had allowed him to escape disaster. His skin was badly burned and he was reeking of radiation, but at least he was still alive for now.

He looked in the direction Leon and the others had left, his face turning savage as he snarled, "Stark, just you wait!"

"Wait for what? Let's do it now!"

"!!!"

Leon, who had returned, appeared behind the bald man like a ghost. He plunged both hands into the man's chest, then brutally tore him in half from the middle.

This guy had scavenged the parts to create Iron Monger, so Leon had kept a close eye on him from beginning to end. He had noticed him hiding from the start.

"I thought you were better at hiding. You made me lose Tony all the cover girls for the next year."

Still unsatisfied, Leon kicked the corpse twice, then set it on fire and thoroughly destroyed the evidence. Only then did he contentedly rejoin Tony and Yinsen, who were waiting for him not far away.