Showdown: I Am Iron Man

The bald man thought Tony was trying to flee and threw back his head in laughter. "Ha~ ha~ ha~ ha~ ha~ ha~ Tony, you can't get away..."

As he spoke, thick black smoke billowed from his mech as it pursued Tony relentlessly from behind. The smoke trailed after it in a long plume, clearly visible beneath the city lights.

"Damn, that pollution is awful. Aren't you people going to do anything about it?" Apocalypse asked Coulson.

"Uh..." Coulson was speechless. Who had the mood to worry about pollution at a time like this? "That... isn't our responsibility."

Tony flew higher and higher. His power was nearly exhausted, but there was no turning back now. If he could not hold out until the bald man's clumsy mech froze over, he would be intercepted and killed in midair.

Thinking this, Tony glanced down at the ground. I wonder if Tang, that monster, can jump this high. Probably not. Otherwise, I'd just call him over to save me.

Without realizing it, Tony had begun to depend on Apocalypse. The feeling was subtle enough that even he had not noticed it himself.

But Apocalypse, down on the ground, received a system notification:

"Ding..."

"Iron Man's trust has increased. Luck Sharing: 60%."

Fortunately, things went their way. At an altitude of a thousand meters, the bald man's mech finally froze over. Just like Tony's earlier armor, it lost power and fell straight down.

It finally crashed near Stark Tower.

Tony had no time to celebrate. His armor had run out of power, so he could only activate the backup electricity and use intermittent reverse thrust to barely land safely on Stark Tower.

Unexpectedly, the moment he landed, the bald man's mech ambushed him from behind and grabbed him.

Taking advantage of his larger mech's superior power, the bald man attempted to crush Iron Man to death by force!

Tony hurriedly fired decoy flares. They had originally been designed to disrupt missile locks, but now he used them as flashbangs.

And they worked!

The dazzling red flares filled the sky. The bald man was blinded so badly he could not open his eyes, and his grip loosened, allowing Tony to escape.

In the original plot, Tony had lured the bald man to the top floor of Stark Tower and asked Pepper Potts to overload the massive Arc Reactor below, unleashing a beam of light into the sky that killed him.

But Pepper Potts had already been escorted away by Coulson, so events naturally would not unfold according to the original plot.

At this moment, Tony had not even considered that plan.

"Tang, my good friend, aren't you going to come help me out?"

Even while at a disadvantage, Tony could not conceal his playboy nature. Even asking for help, he had to do it differently.

Apocalypse smiled. "I have a plan. Lure him to the rooftop, and I'll overload the Arc Reactor. We'll use the energy from the overload to kill him. How does that sound?"

Tony was speechless. "You're so powerful, so why are you always thinking about wrecking my company's equipment? Arc Reactors aren't cheap either."

"By the way, you still haven't paid the delivery fee for rescuing you from the desert."

"Fine, fine, fine. Help me finish him, and you can settle it however you want."

Seeing the bald man lock onto him again, Tony could no longer remain calm and hurriedly called for help.

"Fine."

Watching the two steel monsters on the rooftop, Apocalypse bent his knees slightly, then shot into the air with a bang.

"Baldy, let that man go!"

Boom...

The bald man's mech was kicked flying by Apocalypse.

Seeing that a powerful enemy had arrived, the bald man was not worried. He laughed. "Ha~ ha~ ha~ ha~ Perfect. Try my new weapons."

As he spoke, eight weapon systems extended from the mech's shoulders, hands, waist, and legs—mini missiles, Gatling barrels, and laser cannons.

Whoosh... whoosh... whoosh... rat-a-tat-tat...

In an instant, countless attacks exploded against Apocalypse, forming an enormous fireball.

As the barrage continued, the fireball grew larger and larger.

Tony watched from the side with his heart in his throat. With firepower that fierce, even wearing armor, he would probably be shaken to death alive. Would Tang be all right?

Then the fireball moved.

Apocalypse endured the bombardment, his steps steady as he walked toward the bald man one step at a time, until he saw the man's expression of absolute terror.

"Is that it?"

He grabbed one mechanical arm in each hand. With a crack, he tore both arms off at the shoulders.

"Ah..."

The bald man screamed in agony. Torn away along with the mechanical arms were his actual arms.

Apocalypse remained unmoved. He pulled forward with both hands, stripping off the bald man's chest armor, then slapped once and sent the helmet flying.

For his own selfish gain, the bald man had sold weapons to violent extremists, causing who knew how many innocent civilian casualties. Even Tony's kidnapping had been arranged after he leaked the information in secret.

This punishment was already light.

"I'll leave the rest to you," Apocalypse said. "Later, you need to make me a suit of clothes. It has to look good, but it also needs to withstand bullets and missile blasts."

Looking down at his tattered clothes, he found them far too undignified. He could not exactly end every fight dressed like a beggar.

Tony gave a bitter smile. "Even my Iron Man armor might not withstand that. Where am I supposed to find materials that strong?"

Apocalypse patted Tony's shoulder. "You're a genius. You'll find a way."

By then, police sirens were blaring outside as countless United States police officers arrived.

Colonel Rhodes could handle the military, but he could not control the police.

Apocalypse had no interest in dealing with the aftermath.

With Tony's connections, it was easily handled.

The next day, they held a press conference.

The battle the previous night had affected far too large an area. It had started near the Stark Industries building, moved onto the highway, then into the sky. Countless people had been injured, and nobody knew how many vehicles had been destroyed. They had to give the public an explanation.

Colonel Rhodes reluctantly lied for Tony and announced to the dozens of reporters below, "Yesterday, the simulated combat systems of two prototype robots from Stark Industries malfunctioned, causing them to go berserk. Fortunately, one of Tony's private bodyguards rescued him in time and stopped the accident. Stark's vice president, Baldy... ahem... Obadiah Stane, unfortunately died in this incident..."

When it was Tony's turn to make a statement, he impatiently read a few lines from the script Coulson had given him.

A beautiful female reporter suddenly interrupted from below. "Mr. Tony, do you think we'll believe that bullshit? There are rumors that a superhero called Iron Man stopped President Stane when he went insane, and that Iron Man is you?!"

Tony smiled awkwardly. "Don't be ridiculous. What kind of superhero am I... I'm not cut out to be a superhero..."

"Really?" The beautiful reporter looked provocative, an amused smile playing at the corners of her mouth.

This reporter had once had a one-night stand with Tony. When she woke up at Tony's home, Pepper Potts had been the one to bring her clean clothes and arrange a car for her departure.

They both understood the rules of the adult world. The woman did not cling to him, and the man did not dwell on her.

Still, there was a trace of affection between them.

Provoked like that by his beautiful one-night lover, Tony's playboy instincts could no longer be restrained. In a moment of impulse, he said, "That's right! I am Iron Man!"

The crowd below immediately erupted!

Thus, the superhero who would open the Marvel Universe, save countless lives in the future, and battle supervillains—Iron Man—was officially born!

At the same time, it meant that the supervillains were coming!

Apocalypse casually skimmed through a few of the explosive reports about Iron Man.

Sure enough, personality determined behavior. Tony had still revealed his identity. It fit his attention-loving playboy side perfectly.

Apocalypse had not deliberately concealed his own existence. Nick Fury had done all that for him.

From the battle among the three giants on the streets of New York to the battle at Stark Industries, no information about any of it could be found online.

That saved Apocalypse quite a bit of trouble.

The lower his profile, the more time he would have to grow stronger.

From the moment he obtained three times the Hulk's strength until now, Apocalypse's combat techniques had improved greatly. However, his fundamental strength had not changed substantially.

This forcibly obtained power apparently could not be cultivated to become stronger. It was fundamentally different from the Hulk, who grew stronger the angrier he became.

In the comic world, the Hulk could evolve into the Worldbreaker Hulk. But without other opportunities, Apocalypse's strength would remain permanently fixed at three times the Hulk's strength.

That was far from enough to face the various super bosses of the future.

But Apocalypse had no solution for now and could only practice combat techniques every day.

After Iron Man announced that he was Iron Man, he received endless attention, but he also attracted trouble.

The most immediate trouble came from Stark Industries' longtime rival—Hammer Industries. They began accusing Iron Man of endangering national security and tried to force him to hand over the technology behind the Iron Man armor.

Iron Man Tony accepted an invitation to debate before Congress. As unruly as ever, his brilliant arguments earned wave after wave of applause. The CEO of Hammer Industries and that fat pig of a politician were furious, but there was nothing they could do to Iron Man.

They were facing a wealthy, powerful super genius. Their financial influence and authority had never been a match for Iron Man's.

They had hoped to use the public attention generated by the news incident to force Iron Man to surrender the technology behind the Iron Man armor. Instead, they ended up empty-handed, as no one at the scene stood on their side.

In the end, Iron Man concluded the entire debate with a pretentious declaration: "I have successfully privatized world peace!"

"Clap clap clap clap clap..."

Amid the applause, Iron Man departed with flair.

Yet every move he made was being watched by a burly man far away in Siberia.

The burly man wore a white tank top and had a toothpick in his mouth. He stared viciously at Iron Man on the television. The table before him was covered with blueprints—the designs for Iron Man's Miniature Arc Reactor.