What’s Ancient One Up To? (An Extra Chapter for Alliance Leader Ye Shang Kong Ming 10/12)

Zhan Liu’s understanding of the Ancient One had actually come entirely from the comics and movies. But only after truly arriving in this world and dealing with the Ancient One did he realize that he actually didn’t understand her at all.

Whether in the comics or the movies, the Ancient One had never appeared many times. She had even appeared less often than Doctor Strange, which had led Zhan Liu to develop only a one-sided understanding of her.

The Ancient One’s labels were Sorcerer Supreme, powerful, mysterious, protector of Earth. If one went into more detail, one could also add such descriptions as: peeping tom on the river of time, one of Eternity’s lackeys among the five great deities, debtor to nearly every major figure in the magical world, and an actor who faked her death to shirk her debts…

But in reality, these were merely labels. What kind of person the Ancient One truly was—no one could really say for sure.

Before this, Zhan Liu had only known that the Ancient One was very powerful, a Heavenly Father Level expert, the upper limit of Single-Universe Level power, and one of the guarantees that kept the great powers of various dimensions from invading Earth.

He had always thought that the Ancient One was a transcendent figure who stood apart from worldly affairs and would not act casually unless Earth’s safety was threatened.

But in fact, when Earth exploded and the Ancient One did not appear, he knew that his judgment had been wrong.

After Magneto was rescued by the Ancient One when he was on the verge of death, Zhan Liu knew that his understanding of the Ancient One had been completely mistaken!

"That portal just now—was it opened by the Ancient One? The Sorcerer Supreme you mentioned?" Tony asked with a gloomy expression.

He had been on the verge of avenging his great hatred, only for the person responsible to be rescued by someone else. Anyone would have found that unbearable, let alone Tony, who was now a Magnetic Lunatic. He found the result even more impossible to accept.

Killing intent churned in his chest. His fury had nowhere to vent, and his eyes were practically red from holding it in.

If only he could find where the Sanctum was, he would have stormed over and slaughtered his way through.

But after only a moment, another spatial portal appeared in the void, and Magneto stepped out of it.

At the sight of him, Tony immediately lunged forward.

"Ultimate Limit Palm!"

"Go to hell, you filthy leftover!"

After fighting for more than a month, Tony had also learned bad habits from Zhan Liu, deliberately stabbing at the most painful spot in Magneto’s heart whenever he opened his mouth.

Zhan Liu coordinated with him perfectly, circling behind Magneto and kicking him hard in the back of the head.

Yet no one knew what miraculous medicine the Ancient One had given Magneto on the other side of the portal. His mind had actually returned to normal.

He separated his fists and punched toward their attacks. With a single strike, he heavily wounded both of them, sending them flying back a hundred li while vomiting blood.

But after knocking them back, Magneto did not continue pursuing them. Instead, he reached into his robes and pulled out a necklace-shaped magical artifact. The pendant beneath the necklace was a hollow sphere shaped like an eye, with an openwork design. It was none other than the Eye of Agamotto.

He opened it, took out the Time Stone, then clenched it in his hand and poured all the energy in his body into it.

Then a green light spread forward, covering the area where Earth had originally been.

Under the illumination of the green light, Earth, which had shattered into countless scraps and fragments, began converging toward the center. Then it slowly gathered and fused together, like a LEGO set being assembled, until Earth was pieced back together.

In fact, once he reached the Ninety-Seven Heavens, Magneto himself could also reverse the flow of time. But he had only just entered this realm and could not even control his own power, much less reverse the flow of time for the entire Earth.

But the Ancient One had lent the Time Stone to Magneto. With the power of the Time Stone, he could create a miracle that he would otherwise have been incapable of achieving.

Tony had originally flown back, intending to continue fighting. But upon seeing this scene, he could not help stopping. A terrifying thought surfaced in his mind.

Zhan Liu watched the scene of time reversing before him, frowning as he struggled to understand what the Ancient One was thinking.

The Ancient One possessed the Time Stone. If she wanted to reconstruct Earth, it would have been far too easy. There was absolutely no need to wait more than a month before showing herself. The longer she waited, the more power it would naturally take to reconstruct Earth.

What is the Ancient One up to?

The reversal of time replayed in reverse the moment when Earth’s magnetic field had become chaotic and collapsed as the planet shattered. This could deepen a magnetic-field expert’s understanding of Magnetic Field Rotation. After witnessing this once, Zhan Liu’s Complete State would certainly improve again.

But Magneto, who possessed the Time Stone and was presiding over the reversal of time and Earth’s reconstruction, would certainly improve his Complete State even more. He was already at the Ninety-Seven Heavens of Magnetic Field Rotation and had the advantage in power. Once Zhan Liu lost the advantage of his Complete State, the two of them would find it almost impossible to defeat him again.

Besides, if time were reversed and Pepper came back to life, Tony would definitely run off immediately, being the kind of man who valued beauty over friendship. How could he possibly continue fighting here?

And by himself, Zhan Liu would have no chance of defeating the super-evolved Magneto.

Given Magneto’s personality, he definitely would not let Zhan Liu go. The final battle was inevitable.

Zhan Liu took a deep breath and focused his attention on watching the planet being reconstructed. Every slight increase in his Complete State would give him a slightly better chance of surviving later.

Earth had been completely reconstructed. Then the collapsed skyscrapers rose again, and the people who had died came back to life.

Because the area covered by the Time Stone had not included the three of them, none of them were affected.

By the time Tony saw this scene, he could not hold back any longer. He immediately accelerated back to Earth and headed for New York.

Time continued flowing backward, and Colonel Stryker’s voice rang out in Zhan Liu’s mind.

"Hello? Hello? Can anyone hear me?"

Magneto suddenly stopped, withdrew the Time Stone, and placed it back inside the Eye of Agamotto. Then he casually tossed it away. A small spatial portal appeared in the void and caught the artifact, after which the portal closed again.

Magneto gave Zhan Liu a cold glance, then launched himself toward Earth.

Huh?

Zhan Liu froze. This reaction was wrong. It made absolutely no sense!

They had already prepared for a battle to the death, yet he had simply left?

That idiot Stryker was still rambling on.

"Mutants have always been a great scourge upon human society. But… ah!!!!!"

Stryker’s smug voice suddenly turned into a scream, making all the listeners shudder.

A moment later, Professor Charles’s gentle voice rang out in everyone’s minds.

"Sorry, friends. I am Professor X of the X-Men."

"All this time, Colonel Stryker has been using mutants for live human experimentation. Some time ago, he also captured Magneto and turned him into a weapon for killing. By controlling Magneto, he slaughtered cities and destroyed countries in order to make every nation and every human around the world hate mutants."

"Now he wants to use this killing weapon to wipe out the mutants in one fell swoop and become the hero who saves the world."

"But fortunately, his conspiracy was destroyed by the X-Men!"

"Humans and mutants will always be brothers. Please do not believe the provocations of ambitious people, and even less should you turn against mutants."

"Finally, let us observe a moment of silence for all the humans Stryker killed!"

After he finished speaking, the voice vanished from the minds of all humanity.

Zhan Liu ignored Professor X’s nonsense about redirecting everyone’s hatred. He took a deep breath, steeled himself, and prepared for battle.

Since Magneto had already eliminated the mutants as a potential liability, it was time to settle the grudges between the two sides.

Come on!

Magneto!

Either you die, or I live!