Tony Stark Gets Shut Down

The next day, daylight squeezed through the gaps in the floor-to-ceiling windows, stabbing painfully at Tony's eyelids.

He woke up on the couch, his head feeling as though it had been shoved into an iron hoop that was steadily tightening, throbbing dully with every pulse.

The air was thick with the sour stench of alcohol, perfume, and vomit, churning his stomach. He shifted, cold metal scraping against his skin, and only then remembered that he was still trapped inside the powerless Mark 4 armor.

Like a sardine crammed into a can, unable to move.

Scenes from last night burrowed into his mind like shards of broken glass.

Rhodey's face, filled with disappointment.

Two metal suits brutally brawling inside his own home, smashing his beloved sports car.

And... Chu Hang's infuriatingly calm face.

"Truly... pathetic."

Those words had hit harder than Rhodey's fist, like a red-hot steel needle driven into his most vulnerable pride.

What enraged him most was not being beaten by Rhodey, nor even having the Mark 2 taken from him.

It was Chu Hang.

That guy had merely stood on the lawn, holding a glass of red wine like a spectator watching a show, casually waving his hand.

Then his armor and Rhodey's armor—two war machines representing the pinnacle of Earth's technology—had become two powerless heaps of scrap metal, plummeting stiffly from the sky.

What had that felt like?

He, Tony Stark—the brightest genius of this age, billionaire, playboy, superhero... had lost so completely before a "business partner" he had personally supported that he had nothing left.

Not only had Chu Hang effortlessly taken the Mark 2, he had also handed Tony's life's work to the military in the tone of someone bestowing charity, deciding the ownership of company assets.

That had not been a discussion. It had