Chapter 146: The Mandarin

At the very moment a sense of danger surged into his heart, Gu Chongyan saw a dazzling laser beam shoot from a ring on Killmonger’s index finger. He sensed immense lethality from this beam.

"Protego!"

Without a second thought, Gu Chongyan pointed his finger, and surging magical power instantly condensed into an invisible barrier. With a sharp hiss, sparks showered through the void as the piercing laser and the invisible barrier ground against each other like saw blades meeting metal.

That ring seemed to be Killmonger’s trump card; seeing it fail to kill Gu Chongyan, Killmonger was taken aback. However, his reflexes were lightning-fast. The moment he missed, he forced his injured body through the window and shouted at the top of his lungs, "Alarm! S-class alarm!"

Gu Chongyan’s expression darkened; he hadn't expected even an easy target like Killmonger to be this troublesome.

"Come back here!"

With a grab of his hand, an invisible force descended upon Killmonger, acting like a spectral giant’s hand that dragged him backward. Just as Killmonger was being pulled back in a panic, a much more dangerous aura suddenly arrived. Gu Chongyan didn't hesitate, releasing Killmonger and vanishing from the spot instantly.

The moment he disappeared, a translucent, fluorescent white mist sprayed out from outside the house. Everything in the mist's path solidified instantly; walls and furniture were frozen solid as if the room had been plunged into the polar regions, turning into an ice cave in the blink of an eye. The white mist raged wildly, like a monster with its jaws wide open, striking the spot where he had just been standing and condensing into a massive block of ice two meters square.

"Hmm? A sorcerer?"

An aged voice echoed from outside. Gu Chongyan, having evaded the mist, hurriedly turned his gaze toward the source. In the sky, an emaciated old man in a dark green robe hovered with a sinister expression, his withered face looking like a skull unearthed from a grave. Across his entire body, the most striking features were his ten skeletal fingers, each adorned with a ring set with a different colored gemstone.

The Ten Rings? The Mandarin?

Seeing this, Gu Chongyan was stunned on the spot. He never expected to encounter the Mandarin here.

The Mandarin was born at the end of the Qing Dynasty. His mother was a prostitute and his father was Mongolian, leading him to claim descent from Genghis Khan. Shortly after he grew up, his mother died of a drug overdose. Raised by his uncle, he received martial arts training from a young age and, in his youth, built a family fortune that rivaled the wealth of nations.

The Mandarin was ambitious, obsessed with ascending the throne and ruling the world. Unfortunately, the tides of change were not something he could stop alone. The Qing Dynasty collapsed, and feudal relics like the Mandarin were swept into the dustbin of history. But he refused to give up. He practiced diligently and, in a valley of spirits in the northwest, discovered a crashed alien spacecraft, from which he unearthed ten rings imbued with magic.

Within the ship, he learned vast amounts of advanced science and arcane knowledge, using the rings to build his own army. Because of the rings, he achieved immortality and eternal youth, eventually founding the Ten Rings organization. Unlike the actor who played the Mandarin in *Iron Man 3*, the true Mandarin—as Iron Man’s arch-nemesis—possessed immense power, equal to or even stronger than any planetary-level superhero.

Like Madame Gao, the Mandarin practiced "Qi," but compared to Gao, who could only play around with Daredevil and Stick, the Mandarin had pushed his physical body to a degree comparable to the Hulk. Furthermore, he possessed ten rings with unique functions:

The White Light ring could emit various forms of energy across the electromagnetic spectrum.
Matter Rearranger could rearrange the atoms and molecules of matter, accelerating or slowing their movement to produce different effects.
Impact Beam could project various forms of energy, most commonly fast neutrons with massive concussive force.
Vortex could stir the air to form high-speed rotating cyclones.
Mind-Enhancer could amplify the wearer’s psychic energy.
Cutting Beam could emit energy beams that destroyed the bonds between all matter, molecules, and elements, requiring a 20-minute cooldown.
Ice Blast could emit freezing energy, reducing the target’s temperature to near absolute zero.
Black Light could create an area that absorbed all light, creating darkness.

With such an array of powers, the Mandarin was practically an all-powerful villain. The white mist that had threatened Gu Chongyan earlier was clearly the freezing energy from his Ice Blast ring.

The Mandarin’s appearance shocked Gu Chongyan; he never imagined that hunting Killmonger would lead to a run-in with the Mandarin. However, he quickly recalled that in the comics, the Mandarin and Killmonger had a connection, and after Killmonger’s death, the Mandarin had even tried to resurrect him using the Matter Rearranger ring.

At this moment, the Mandarin raised his left hand. On his middle finger, a zigzag-shaped green gemstone erupted with brilliant light. White electricity began to gather between his fingers, condensing in less than two seconds into a dazzling ball of electric light the size of a fist. The arcs struck the air with a "crackling" sound, resembling the chirping of hundreds of fledglings.

The Mandarin made a hollow grasping gesture with his left hand, and a spear made of lightning solidified. With a flick of his wrist, it shot forth like a falling meteor, tearing through the sky and轰ing toward Gu Chongyan.

Seeing this, Gu Chongyan took a deep breath, not daring to be negligent. The Mandarin’s strength was no less than his own, and as both his weapons were currently with Mr. Fantastic, he risked capsizing in the gutter if he weren't careful.

"Earth and Stone!"

He brought his hands to his chest, mimicking a Kamar-Taj magical seal, and rubbed them forcefully. Huge blocks of earth and rock surged from beneath the ground, flying upward like a meteor shower to meet the thunderbolt.

*Boom!*

The thunder exploded, the earth shattered, and the piercing spear of lightning was blocked by layers of incoming soil. Before Gu Chongyan could breathe a sigh of relief, the ring on the Mandarin’s left thumb flashed with white light.