Iron Man had been born, the rest was not for Eric to worry about, his aim was never Iron Man, but the Ten Rings gang who kidnapped him, or rather, the master behind the Ten Rings gang, Mandarin.
No one knows exactly what Mandarin's name was, his real name has long been forgotten in the annals of history, but he was known by many aliases, Zhang Tong, Chu, Gene Kahn, Manchu...
He was of mixed Chinese and English descent, He has been training martial arts since he was young and possesses notable martial arts training. By chance, he found a crashed alien ship in the middle of the Valley of Spirits and killed a badly wounded and dying alien in the ship, snatched ten magic rings from him and also learned a lot of advanced technology and magic knowledge in the ship.
With this knowledge and the powerful Ten Rings, he built his own army and founded the Ten Rings Gang, calling himself "Mandarin" from then on.
Ninety percent of his strength came from his ten magical rings, and that was Eric's goal.
A group of Ten Rings members armed with guns were no different from a nest of ants in front of Eric, and they were all down in a minute.
These men were just unconscious, they were the first grindstone since Iron Man was born, well, maybe not even a grindstone, just a sandbag for him to vent his emotions on. But they still had to exist, if Iron Man found them all dead when he came looking for them, he might just find out about Eric, and that wasn't what he wanted.
"Tell me, where is your master?"
Leaving a group of minions lying dead, Eric took control of three guys who looked like leaders back in the cave, they were all very distinctive, one bearded, one bald, and one with a scar on his face.
"&%*$#%! @*..." was what the bearded man said.
"&...! #...~@$..." This is what the bald man said.
"+--+=~? ,'''-" this is what Scarface said.
"Oh, so that's what happened!" Eric looked dumbfounded, then his face sank and he slapped each of the three men on the head, "Can't you fucking speak English?!"
Then the three men went into another flurry of bird language, Eric distinguished them carefully and found that they spoke at least seven or eight languages, but none of which he understood.
There's no fucking way to communicate!
The language didn't work! Erik didn't think he'd lose out on language at the last minute! He was so angry that he punched around the cave, punching hundreds of holes in the walls, scaring the three men so much that they nearly pissed themselves.
After venting, Eric remembered that he had seemingly teleported Yinsen, a language genius and a regular visitor to the cave, who must have known what these guys were talking about.
Eric hurriedly teleported to his teleportation destination to find the him hadn't actually run away and was sitting on the ground waiting for him.
"Oh? Why aren't you running?"
"Mr. Eric, I guess you must have needed me somewhere if you rescued me, and since this place is quite safe anyway, I'll wait for you here in case you can't find me when the time comes." Yinsen face was straightforward, even though it was the first time he had seen such a magical ability as teleportation, he did not panic in the slightest.
Erik was impressed by his performance. Originally, he had only saved him by hand and had intended to teleport him to a safe place and leave it at that, as he was not too talented.
But now it seems that he is not as bad as he thought, at least this guts is more than most people, so let's give him a hand!
"You're good! Are you interested in coming to work at Skye Industries?" Eric wasn't the least bit surprised that he was recognized, with the growth of Skye Industries, he was not much less well known, than Stark.
"That ..." Yinsen looked hesitant and finally shook his head, "I'm sorry Mr. Eric, but Mr. Stark already promised me a job. "
Eric nodded a little regretfully in understanding, "Okay, first do me a favor then I'll give you a ride home, and you know what to do right?"
"Understood, I'm a very tight lipped guy." Ethan gave a very steady looking smile that one couldn't help but trust.
Eric nodded and without further ado, teleported back to the cave with him.
"They're a mixed bag of languages, Arabic, Urdu, Dari, Pashto, Mongolian, Fars, and Russian ..."
With Yinsen as his translator, Eric was able to communicate with the three leaders much more smoothly.
Soon, Eric found a clue from the trio's mere words.
Their base was indeed affiliated with the Ten Rings, but they hadn't seen the legendary Mandarin either.
According to Mandarin's organisational structure, they were only the lowest-level recruits, specialising in fighting and killing, living a precarious life every day, and were not qualified to meet the legendary omnipotent deity Mandarin.
The man responsible for giving them orders was one of his servants.
With the news, Eric graciously lets the trio go and brainwashes everyone at the base, telling them to wait for Iron Man to arrive!
Erik took Yinsen to the Servant and with a lot of talking, he finally found out where Mandarin really was.
"Yinsen, what happens next is out of your hands, thank you for your help, I'll take you home." Eric shook hands with Yinsen and said goodbye, teleporting him to his homeland.
Sending him away, Erik took a long breath and adjusted himself to prepare for the great battle to come.
Mandarin powers, excluding his notable martial arts attainments, came almost entirely from the ten rings on his hands.
These ten rings have given him ten powerful superpowers, which is the equivalent of combining the powers of ten mutants into one person, very strong and very difficult to deal with.
Eric's target was clear: those ten rings.
Anyone who came to fight Mandarin was almost always there to fight him to drop the rings, and he knows knew this very well; he was always ready to live and die with the rings, and as soon as he was about to die, he would destroy them and make the comers work for nothing.
So, fighting Mandarin is not the hard part, the real hard part is how to grab the ring.
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