Tony won't see me now.
I know he must be very disappointed, but I hope you can tell him that the Air Force is not satisfied with the technology he gave them; they want more...
My superior, General Johnson, once revealed that they want to team up with the Army to pressure Stark Industries...
Or perhaps they have a bigger conspiracy.
Rhodes said on the phone, and Schiller asked him, "Have you been excluded from the center of power in this circle?"
Why? Because you wavered?"
Rhodes was silent for a moment before saying, "No, General Johnson has never trusted me because I used to be General Anderlo's subordinate, and their relationship is very bad."
"So that's why he forced you to go, right?"
Schiller sighed and said, "What if you can't withstand the pressure there?"
Before Rhodes could speak, Schiller added, "Tony isn't seeing you now not because of anything related to the Air Force.
There are some internal problems at Stark Industries, and he needs to recover.
He hasn't left the house for days."
Rhodes's tone remained flat, just like him—always serious and seemingly rigid.
He said, "I think we all know that Stark Industries is not a monolithic entity.
Someone within them must be colluding with the Military, and that person must be high-ranking."
He continued, "The Military gets information about Stark Industries' technology too quickly and too detailed.
This is very abnormal.
Although I don't have more information for now, I don't want Tony to be betrayed."
"You want me to tell him this?
But perhaps you haven't considered that he already knows and has been delaying until now..."
"I know.
He's too soft-hearted; otherwise, he wouldn't have compromised with the Military because of me.
But this situation is too serious.
If he continues to be so indecisive, something big will definitely happen..."
Just as he was speaking, Schiller heard a commotion.
He turned his head and saw two shooting stars streaking across the window, followed by two dazzling streaks of light flashing across the sky.
A violent explosion echoed at the end of the sky, and the two lights intertwined, falling downwards.
Schiller looked out the window and said into the phone, "...Something big has already happened."
Schiller hung up the phone.
He immediately transformed into gray mist and passed through the streets of Manhattan, following the landing point of the two streaks of light to a dilapidated warehouse in New York's XC district.
This landing spot must have been chosen by Stark, because it was a rare abandoned urban area, and only by falling here would ordinary people not be harmed.
Schiller slowly materialized his form.
Before he could enter, his phone rang again.
Rhodes said urgently on the other end, "Send me a satellite location.
I'm coming over right now.
Tony might need my help!"
Schiller held the phone, flashed onto the warehouse roof, and looked down.
There, Iron Man, wearing a gold and red mech suit, was entangled with a giant robot.
That robot was not Iron Monger.
It was entirely black, with golden accents on some joints, larger than Iron Monger, but more ferocious.
Schiller said into the phone, "Things have changed; you'd better hurry over."
The battle below was fierce.
Iron Man wasn't unable to defeat the large robot, but during the fall just now, he had to guide the robot to an uninhabited area, so he didn't have time to adjust his angle when landing.
One side of his mech suit was already a bit stiff.
This wasn't like when he usually saved people by fighting street thugs.
Even with Jarvis's intelligent calculation system, Iron Man was still struggling.
It was clear that the robot seemed to have been prepared specifically to deal with him.
Iron Man flew into the air, then swooped down low, grabbing the robot's waist and slamming it into a wall.
After a violent crash, a large section of the roof collapsed, falling onto both of them.
Iron Man's situation worsened.
His entire shoulder armor was somewhat damaged, and one arm was almost completely unable to lift.
However, the large robot wasn't doing much better.
After being violently struck and then electrocuted, a large section of its cockpit was knocked off.
However, there was no driver inside; it seemed someone was remotely controlling it.
Upon discovering this, Iron Man came up with a way to deal with it.
He first pretended his mech suit was out of control, climbed out of the steel frame falling from the roof, and then feigned defeat, collapsing to the ground.
The large robot also struggled out of the steel frame.
Upon seeing Iron Man on the ground, it directly picked up a steel bar, intending to stab it into Iron Man's chest.
Just as it leaned its entire upper body forward to exert force, Iron Man on the ground suddenly burst up, kicking its knee, followed by an elbow strike to the robot's head.
The large robot's upper body design was too bulky.
Although very strong, its lower body was inevitably unstable.
It took a solid elbow strike from Iron Man, then swayed and fell to one side.
Just as Iron Man was about to repeat his trick, using electric shocks combined with impacts to defeat it, the large robot suddenly started smoking.
Jarvis began to sound frantic alarms.
Iron Man quickly retreated backward, but he was still a step too slow.
A violent explosion created a huge mushroom cloud in the warehouse.
The roar could be heard several blocks away.
It self-destructed.
Clearly, the designer of this large robot had a reason for making its upper body so large.
There was a large, powerful bomb inside.
When Schiller pulled Stark out of his mech suit, he was already covered in blood.
At least three of his ribs were broken, and his ankle and arm also seemed fractured.
Stark himself certainly had no superpowers.
While his brain was highly developed, his limbs were clearly far less capable.
Stark tried to lift his arm to wipe the blood from his eyes.
He saw it was Schiller and, letting out a sigh of relief, told him, "In my pocket... my phone... Jarvis will call another mech suit.
Go see if there's anyone around... The explosion was too big..."
Clearly, his head had also taken some impact.
Schiller flipped open his eyelids and checked; his eyes were severely bloodshot.
He took out a small bottle of medicine, poured out a tablet, and had Stark take it.
The high-concentration painkiller worked very well.
Soon, Stark said, "This guy was after me.
It has strong countermeasures against my mech suit and can even predict my movements.
I can't believe it..."
"Can't believe what? Can't believe the person who knows you best might have betrayed you?
If you have time for this, just build a few more mech suits, and you'll win with one punch each."
"I know I shouldn't hide in the lab and run away, but I just want to process this fact.
You can't expect me to be emotionless like a zombie."
Stark looked very negative now; his face was filled with despondency and disappointment.
Stark coughed heavily a few times, a trickle of blood running down the corner of his mouth.
Clearly, the impact just now had also affected his respiratory system.
A sense of euphoria from the high-concentration painkiller surged within him.
He seemed mesmerized and whispered:
"I knew his friends wouldn't be good people, just as rotten as him.
I originally thought..."
"No, or maybe he was right, Stark isn't worth trusting, he'll always disappoint people..."
Schiller laid Stark's head flat, felt his pulse, and found his heart rate was a bit low.
He wanted to take Stark away directly, but Stark, like a drunk person, stubbornly refused to leave.
It was clear that his will to live was not high at the moment.
So, Schiller could only sit cross-legged beside him, with the wreckage of the Iron Man suit nearby.
The large crater from the self-destruction of the big robot was smoking not far away, the entire warehouse was shattered, and the ground was covered in steel bars and concrete debris, like a doomsday ruin.
Schiller asked Stark, "Obadiah was actually more like your father than Howard, right?"
Stark didn't answer him, as if asleep.
After a while, he slowly said, "When I made my first robot, Uncle Obadiah was very happy.
He said I was a genius just like my father."
"I always heard my father's name from him.
He described him as a flawless person: intelligent, upright, steadfast... righteous..."
"In my old memories, every time he mentioned the name Howard, it was always with only praise and nostalgia."
"But later, I started to dislike hearing that name more and more, so he stopped mentioning it..."
Stark's voice was hoarse; he was almost speaking breathlessly.
He said:
"I saw a photo of them, placed on his desk.
In it, they were both very young, full of vigor..."
"Perhaps like you and Rhodes," Schiller said.
"No, that's not the same, completely different."
"I'm not like Howard at all, not at all.
Rhodes won't be like Obadiah either.
Rhodes and I, we are complete opposites.
And we will never be their replicas, absolutely not..."
After that, Stark fell silent.
The effects of the painkiller quickly made him fall into a deep sleep.
When Rhodes arrived and saw Stark's severe injuries, he violently punched the remains of the mech suit.
Schiller told him, "Right now, I think his mental state is a bigger problem than his physical injuries."
"Aren't you a psychologist?
Can't you counsel him?"
"I am a psychologist, but not God.
Clearly, he's hit a dead end.
He feels that everything he's suffering now is retribution: his retribution, his father's retribution, Stark Industries' retribution."
"He wants to give all this away?"
"That's for him to answer.
He once said that for his family, he would never retreat, but now it seems he really wants to give all of this up himself."
Rhodes looked back at Stark lying on the ground and said, "If there's one price he has to pay, perhaps it's for his exceptionally intelligent brain, for that sensitive heart."
"He said you two are complete opposites," Schiller said.
"He has an iron suit, but what about you?"
"Do you have a sufficiently steadfast heart?"
Rhodes turned back around and looked at the scrapped mech suit in front of him, saying nothing.