“It’s actually pretty simple.”
Old Steve took the staff, testing its weight in his hands before tapping the end against Barton’s chest.
Barton: “…”
I just woke up!
Seeing Barton roll his eyes and pass out on the ground, old Steve grinned.
“Success.”
Xia Luo rubbed his forehead. “I want to know how to use the staff to hypnotize people.”
“Well, I can’t help you there.”
Old Steve shrugged. “That’s the only thing I know how to do.”
“Fine, you head to Stark Tower and wait for Loki to show up. I’ll go and break up a fight.”
As he spoke, Xia Luo removed the Mind Stone from the staff, encasing it in nanotech and keeping it with him.
“Break up a fight?” Old Steve looked puzzled.
“Yeah, break up a fight. If I’m not wrong, Tony and the version of you in this world are about to duel.”
“What?”
Old Steve looked incredulous. “That’s impossible! Tony and I have always been on good terms; we wouldn’t fight.”
Xia Luo rolled his eyes. “You once beat the crap out of Tony.”
“Who said that? That’s slander, absolute slander!”
“You said it.”
Not long after, in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of New York.
“Stuck in traffic, Ice Cube?” Tony taunted from the rooftop.
Young Steve gripped his shield tightly, ready to unleash all his pent-up frustration.
“Stark, I’m going to give you a good thrashing.”
Tony seemed unconcerned—until he looked over Steve’s shoulder.
He saw a dark shape darting rapidly through the forest, covering the distance in mere seconds.
Tony’s brow furrowed. “We agreed—no backup.”
Young Steve was equally confused. “I didn’t call for backup.”
Before he could turn around, a voice spoke from behind him. “On your left.”
As the red-and-blue figure emerged from the shadows, Tony’s face lit up with surprise.
“Oh, it’s you, Spider-Man.” He smiled.
Young Steve glanced back at Xia Luo, then turned to Tony. “You called for backup. You’re a puppy.”
“No, he came on his own.”
Tony stepped up to Xia Luo. “Great to see you. Ever since we last met, I suspected you might be from…”
“The multiverse. A parallel timeline.”
Xia Luo cut him off and surveyed the darkness around them. “You two go ahead and fight. Don’t mind me.”
Tony: “…”
“You’re not here to help me?”
“I’m actually here to break up the fight.”
“Well, you don’t look like it.”
“I’ll step in and break it up later.”
With that, Xia Luo fired a web and swung up to the rooftop.
“What are you waiting for? You can start now.” He urged them.
Young Steve scowled. “You called in a referee.”
“Thanks for the reminder—the ref’s one of us.”
Tony ended the banter with a grin, raising his hand and firing a continuous repulsor blast.
Bang!
In an instant, young Steve quickly raised his shield to block the surprise pulse attack.
“We haven’t even started!!” he shouted.
“Oh, we have.”
Tony’s smirk widened, and his Mark suit soared into the air, shooting repulsor blasts across the ground.
Boom!!
In the middle of the explosion, young Steve dodged nimbly, occasionally reflecting the pulse blasts with his shield, gradually drawing Tony into the abandoned warehouse.
He needed to use the terrain to keep Tony grounded if he wanted a chance to teach him a lesson.
He wondered who would show up next.
Aside from Venom Parker, there weren’t many who could take down both Tony and Steve in a two-versus-one scenario.
Of course, someone could still strike at the critical moment when they were both exhausted.
But as a ring of dark red light materialized before his eyes, Xia Luo knew he was wrong.
An eerie aura engulfed the space, his spider-sense flaring wildly, and Xia Luo retreated back into the battleground.
“Hold up.”
With the two combatants locked in, Xia Luo raised his hand to deflect a pulse blast while catching the incoming shield with the other.
Whoosh~
The wind roared as Xia Luo managed to stop the fight.
“What the…?”
Both Steve and Tony were stunned by the scene.
“How is that possible!” Young Steve doubted he had used his full strength.
But Tony, coming to his senses, laughed. “It’s not impossible. Two years ago, he did something even crazier. Yes, the black version of him.”
Xia Luo tossed the shield back to Steve, then turned toward the rooftop.
From the dark red sparks of a portal, a figure clad in a sorcerer’s robe slowly emerged.
“That’s…” Xia Luo’s expression tightened.
Tony had also sensed the intense and terrifying presence, his face serious.
“Who is he?”
“The Sorcerer Supreme, Stephen Strange.”
“A sorcerer?”
Young Steve was taken aback. “We have sorcerers now? I’m definitely outdated.”
“Don’t worry, this is my first time seeing one too,” Tony tried to reassure him.
Xia Luo shot them a quick glance. These two had no idea how serious this situation was.
As Strange descended, the oppressive chill in the air grew even more unsettling.
“He’s giving me an evil sorcerer vibe,” Tony muttered, covertly instructing JARVIS to analyze the eerie energy surrounding them.
Xia Luo took a deep breath. “You guessed right. He is… a dark sorcerer.”
He never expected it to be the dark version of Strange. This was bad news.
“What?” Steve was shocked.
Tony, noticing Steve’s reaction, asked, “You know what a dark sorcerer is?”
Steve shook his head. “No, but it doesn’t sound good.”
“Are you done chatting?”
The next moment, Dark Stephen interrupted them.
He wore a mocking grin as he looked at the three of them, a shadow moving unnervingly across his brow. He looked gaunt but far more sinister.
“Didn’t expect three of you—perfect.”
With those words, Dark Stephen’s expression twisted, and he made a quick gesture with his hands. A dark magic array suddenly erupted beneath them.
“What’s that?!”
Before Tony and Steve could react, Xia Luo had already leaped from its center.
“You can’t escape.”
Dark Stephen sneered, snapping his fingers. From the magic array, hideous dark hands burst forth, latching onto Tony and Steve, transforming into writhing black serpents that quickly filled the warehouse.
Hahahaha~
Mmmrr~
In an instant, the warehouse echoed with demonic whispers, mingling with chilling screams. The dark hands had taken over half the space.
Seeing the hands rushing toward him, Xia Luo felt a cold shiver down his spine, his scalp tingling.
Did his first encounter with a sorcerer really have to be this intense?
Heart racing, he tugged at his web lines.
Thwip Thwip Thwip~
The spectral hands were instantly shredded by the web trap, but before he could breathe a sigh of relief, dark energy surged again, and the severed hands began to reform.
“This… damn phobia.”
Xia Luo slammed his elbow into the wall, bursting through it, only to be engulfed by even deeper darkness outside.
“Little spider, you won’t escape.”
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