I Am...

Fanny and Tony finally found the frozen Iron Monger after digging through the deep snow. Fanny unconsciously thought about a certain frozen Avengers elsewhere.

However, unlike that certain frozen Avenger, Obadiah didn't have the super serum injected into his body. There's no way he could survive being frozen like this.

It took them a while, but they finally got the Iron Monger armor out of the ice. They opened the helmet of the armor and found Obadiah within it, a 'Sumire Karaage Roll' stuffed in his mouth. Tony was speechless.

"Well, at least his last supper was a good meal," Tony said awkwardly before putting the mask back and bringing the Iron Monger back to his villa with Fanny's help.

Fanny felt a surge of complicated emotion when he saw Obadiah's dead face. This was the first person he killed. And Obadiah didn't even know his killer's identity.

"He probably died with regrets," Fanny thought, but he did not care too much about it. The Marvel universe had many fantastical and magical abilities, but Obadiah knew absolutely none of them. He was really dead.

Tony removed the miniaturized ark reactor from the Iron Monger armor and put it aside. He then asked Fanny, "A secret agent was looking for you last night. Are you going to contact him?"

"SHIELD?!" Fanny raised his eyebrows.

"That's a nice and easy-to-remember name." Tony nodded. "Yeah, it was Strategic… Homeland, something. The agent went by… Phil Carson?!"

"Phil Coulson, right?" Fanny rolled his eyes at Tony. "What did he say?"

Fanny's intervention had taken away SHIELD's chance to make proper contact with Tony. He was curious about how the future would develop.

"He asked about what happened yesterday!"

"What did you tell him?"

Seeing Tony's expression, Fanny guessed that Tony must have said something.

"You know, military stuff..." Tony shrugged and switched to a serious tone, "What about you? Are you going to continue like this?"

"?" Fanny had a question mark on his face. "What do you mean continue like this?"

"Since you and your mage friends want to protect the world, why don't you use a proper channel?"

"Cough..."

Fanny almost spat out the tea in his mouth. Was he asking him to debut together as superheroes?!

He glared at Tony, "You are used to the life of a rich and talented person, with dangers lurking everywhere and the world watching your every move."

"But I am just an ordinary little mage. Even standing on the school podium makes me tremble. Moreover, our responsibilities are different. Ordinary people must not discover things like a dimensional invasion. Publicizing these threats would only create panic and confusion."

"Also, besides Miss Potts, you're on your own. I have a lot of relatives, my Master, and the senior mages. If I recklessly make enemies, they would have a massive target on their backs."

"So, stop messing around. The world needs heroes, but that person does not have to be me!"

Of course, Fanny knew that he was spouting nonsense. His main reason was his insufficient strength. If he had the strength to push through all dangers and solve all problems, he would not care about hiding his identity.

Tony said nothing. Yinsen's dying words echoed in his mind. Just like Fanny, his life didn't belong to just himself. And he had made too many mistakes he needed to atone for.

"Alright, that's all then. I have to go!" Fanny stretched his waist lazily, preparing to leave Tony with his own thought, but then he paused. "About that organization called SHIELD, it should be fine if you keep in contact with them. They would be useful for you in the future."

His intervention had prevented Tony's contact with SHIELD. Fanny was somewhat worried about what would happen if Nick Fury failed to recruit Tony to the Avengers initiative. He wanted the superheroes to keep protecting the Earth while he gained the strength to deal with his own problems.

Their current relationship was advantageous for Fanny, and he still wants to rely on Tony's Iron Man armors to gain experience in the future. So this token of spoiler should be fine—if anything, he was returning the plot to the right track.

"My future?!" Tony returned to his senses, a little confused by Fanny's sentence. He frowned, "Are they going to steal my technology as well?"

"Uh..."

Fanny stopped in his tracks. This was a mistake that might change the future beyond recognition. If he didn't explain it properly, Iron Man might be fighting against SHIELD and Hydra.

"That's not it. Remember your poisoning? They have some clue about it."

Fanny ended up spoiling more future plots.

Tony then recalled his largest unsolved problem. But he didn't feel much sense of urgency. For one, he still had a lot of possible solutions to explore. Besides, he had Fanny as insurance. He could take it easy.

"Anyway, you can keep in touch with them, but don't trust them too much," Fanny carefully hinted that SHIELD had been infiltrated to its core by Hydra. Even their directors were all from Hydra, so it was pretty serious.

Therefore, Fanny did not want Tony to trust SHIELD too much. That would just strengthen Hydra.

"Children don't need to worry too much about adults," Tony couldn't hold his retort at Fanny's sagely reminder. Most people ignored Fanny's age when talking to him, but that quirk didn't work on Tony for some reason.

After giving Tony a universal hand gesture, Fanny opened the portal and returned home. Iron Man had been born, and future dangers await.

Pepper called Tony not long after Fanny left, stressed out by the queries from Coulson and the reporters.

"Well, let's hold a press conference. I'll be there in a minute," Tony replied clearly to her grievances.

Tony hung up his phone and looked at the bullet-riddled Mark II armor and the Iron Monger armor next. He sighed, changed into new clothes, and headed to the press conference after greeting the bodyguard outside the door.

Coulson rushed to hand a piece of paper to Tony when they arrived at the press conference. He said, "You were on your yacht. There will be proof that you signed off from the port and sworn statements from 50 guests."

Tony smirked at the manuscript. "Wouldn't it be better if we say it was only me and Pepper on the ship?"

"We can't fake that!" Coulson played along with a joke and then said, "Just read the script."

"Why didn't you mention Obadiah?" After glancing at the manuscript, Tony found that there was no information about Obadiah.

"We arranged for him to go on a vacation." Coulson smiled. "Small aircraft have such a poor safety record."

"But will they believe you? This kind of... weak explanation?! And bodyguards?!" Tony frowned and continued to read the manuscript.

"Trust me, this is not our first rodeo. Just read the script," Coulson said confidently. "There will be no problem."

A few minutes later….

"I am Iron Man!"