Chapter 29: Whiplash
Lance Ryder ended the phone call and looked across the battlefield.
In the distance, Ivan Vanko was fighting fiercely against Tony Stark and Colonel James Rhodes. It was an incredible scene, and Lance would have loved to watch how it ended.
Unfortunately, the White House had just called.
They ordered him to return immediately to the Stark Expo and eliminate the remaining steel soldiers inside the exhibition grounds.
Ivan Vanko had deliberately left a large number of drones behind at the expo site.
Their purpose was simple—cause chaos.
By creating panic there, he could draw the attention of the military and any nearby heroes, allowing him to focus entirely on his personal showdown with Tony Stark.
Although Lance had already destroyed several drones earlier, many were still active.
Several civilians had already died.
Among the victims were reporters and even some government officials.
That was why the White House had issued an urgent request for assistance.
The National Guard had also been mobilized and was on the way.
But against machines like those steel soldiers, ordinary troops weren't enough.
Lance was required to intervene.
Strangely, the White House made no mention of S.H.I.E.L.D.
Whether they were unaware of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s involvement or intentionally ignoring it was unclear.
Lance glanced once more at Ivan Vanko.
Vanko's engineering abilities were impressive.
The steel armor he built for himself was clearly made from high-quality materials.
Somehow, he had managed to acquire enough specialized metal from Justin Hammer to construct it.
Even the powerful laser weapons used by Iron Man and War Machine couldn't easily penetrate Vanko's armor.
Unlike Stark's highly flexible combat style, Vanko preferred brutal close combat.
His weapon of choice—the electrified whip.
Against it, even Tony Stark looked somewhat overwhelmed.
Just before Lance left, Vanko had already entangled both Stark and Rhodes with his electric whips.
The battle was reaching its peak.
Because Lance stepped away quietly while answering the phone, neither Stark nor Rhodes noticed him.
He arrived unnoticed.
And he left the same way.
It was a shame.
Lance had actually wanted to watch how Stark ultimately killed Vanko.
Even though he already knew the outcome from the original timeline, seeing it firsthand would have been entertaining.
But the White House had other plans.
Within minutes, Lance arrived back at the Stark Expo.
By the time he entered the area, he had already changed into a U.S. Army major's uniform.
The exhibition grounds were still in chaos.
Steel soldiers continued rampaging through the area.
Not far away, a small boy wearing an Iron Man toy helmet stood alone.
His parents had clearly been separated from him during the chaos.
Because of the bright helmet on his head, one of the steel soldiers noticed him.
The machine walked toward the child.
Unaware of the danger, the boy raised a toy laser gun and aimed it at the robot.
The motion triggered the drone's threat detection system.
A weapon barrel unfolded from its back.
The targeting system locked directly onto the child.
Just as the weapon prepared to fire—
A man in a military uniform suddenly appeared between them.
It was Lance Ryder.
In the next instant, frost rapidly spread across the steel soldier's body.
Within seconds, the entire machine was sealed inside a massive block of ice.
Not just the outer shell—
Every internal system froze as well.
Lubricating oil.
Cooling fluid.
Hydraulic systems.
All frozen solid.
The extreme cold also caused electrical interference inside the machine.
As the drone attempted to reactivate its weapons, electrical currents surged wildly through its frozen circuitry.
Smoke began rising from the frozen machine.
Lance crouched down beside the boy.
"Your parents are over there," he said, pointing toward a frantic couple searching nearby."Go quickly."
The child stared at him for a moment before running toward his parents.
But just then—
A sharp beeping sound began echoing from the frozen steel soldier.
The self-destruct timer had activated.
Lance frowned.
Something was wrong.
According to the timeline, Pepper Potts should have been confronting Justin Hammer by now.
Meanwhile, Natasha Romanoff should have infiltrated Hammer Industries' headquarters.
Together, they were supposed to override Ivan Vanko's commands and stop the drones from detonating.
But clearly—
That hadn't happened.
If all these steel soldiers exploded at once, the casualties would be enormous.
A thought suddenly crossed Lance's mind.
The next second—
He shot into the sky.
Many people on the ground saw it happen.
News cameras and military satellites quickly captured the moment.
Within seconds, Lance rose hundreds of meters above the expo grounds.
From that height, he could see the entire area clearly.
Lance pulled out his oak wand.
Decades earlier, when it was first created, the wand had been a reddish-brown color.
But after spending nearly sixty years in Jotunheim, it had gradually changed.
Now it looked pale brown—almost white.
Whether the change came from Jotunheim's influence or from Lance's mastery of ice magic, even he wasn't sure.
But the wand had long since become the most important tool in his possession.
The moment the wand appeared, Lance's expression grew serious.
A massive magic circle expanded around him.
Within seconds, it spread outward to a diameter of more than ten meters.
Then—
A strange resonance echoed through the air.
From the glowing circle, enormous walls of ice burst outward.
One after another, they shot downward toward the ground.
Each ice wall landed beside a steel soldier.
In seconds, every remaining drone was surrounded by towering frozen barriers.
The ice walls isolated them from the nearby civilians.
The moment Lance finished casting—
BOOM!
Explosions erupted across the expo grounds.
More than a dozen enormous fireballs shot into the sky.
Half of the exhibition area was swallowed by flames.
Those watching from a distance finally understood what Lance had done.
Before the explosions began, he had already trapped every steel soldier inside ice barriers.
The walls protected civilians from the blasts.
Because the tops of the barriers were open, most of the explosive force shot upward into the sky.
The surrounding buildings, however, were not so fortunate.
As the explosions ended, smoke filled the air.
The ice walls began cracking under the pressure.
Soon they shattered and collapsed.
Panic briefly spread again among the crowd.
But at that moment—
Vehicles from the National Guard rushed into the expo grounds.
Soldiers quickly began securing the area and guiding civilians to safety.
At last, the chaos started to come under control.
By then, Lance Ryder had already vanished from the sky.
He reappeared quietly on the rooftop of a nearby residential building.
From there, he watched as half of the expo complex burned.
A faint smile appeared on his face.
Now the architectural clues connected to Howard Stark's new element design had been completely destroyed.
Even Tony Stark would have difficulty reconstructing the original inspiration.
After ending another brief call with the White House, Lance quietly left the area.
Before returning home, he had one more place to visit—
The battlefield in Central Park.
He suspected the fight there had already ended.
If the steel soldiers here had all detonated, Ivan Vanko's armor probably hadn't survived either.
Sure enough, when Lance arrived, the battlefield was in ruins.
Metal fragments were scattered everywhere.
Trees were charred and still burning.
The air smelled strongly of gunpowder.
Among the wreckage were small pieces of scorched flesh.
The remains of Ivan Vanko.
Most of his body had been vaporized in the explosion.
Lance studied the battlefield for a moment.
Then he began gathering the scattered fragments of Vanko's armor.
He was very interested in that technology.
With enough pieces, he might be able to build a new armored suit.
It wouldn't be as advanced as Iron Man's armor.
But it could easily surpass Vanko's.
What Lance lacked most right now was materials.
Gold-titanium alloys and other high-strength metals were extremely difficult to acquire.
Even purchasing them legally would leave a clear record.
Anyone investigating those purchases could eventually trace them back to him.
And that was the last thing Lance wanted.
But collecting battlefield scrap—
That left no record.
However, the armor wasn't for Lance himself.
As a mage, standing on the front lines was rarely the best strategy.
A powerful warrior fighting at his side would be far more effective.
The ideal combat formation for a mage was simple:
A strong guardian in front.
A mage behind them with enough space to cast powerful spells.
Lance didn't currently have such a companion.
But he intended to change that.
While searching the battlefield, Lance also found something else.
Two damaged electric whips.
The same weapons Ivan Vanko had used to bind both Tony Stark and Colonel Rhodes.
Lance picked them up and examined them with interest.
These might prove even more valuable than the armor fragments.
End of Chapter 29
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