Ancient One's History
Yao was born in the 1430's, in the mystic city of Kamar-Taj, a village in the Himalayas area now known as Tibet. Originally, the youth was a peaceful farmer, like his fellow villagers. But he encountered an older villager named Kaluu. Kaluu shared with the youth his knowledge of magic, and they began exploring the secrets of sorcery together, even learning the secrets of immortality. Together they cast a spell that removed disease, poverty, and suffering from their village and granted its people immortality.
Yao wanted to continue to use his magic to help the village, but Kaluu wanted to build a vast empire, and organized the men of Kamar-Taj into an army by magically controlling their minds. Yao attempted to warn the village, but Kaluu used his magic to incapacitate the boy, paralyzing him and setting him on public display. Kaluu began his conquests, and the youth called upon mystical forces while in his paralytic state, ultimately banishing Kaluu to the dimension of Cyttorak. Kaluu's spell additionally revoked the immortality of Kamar-Taj, so Yao sought the Cup of Eternity and thus began aging at a greatly slowed rate.
Still a boy, Yao decided to seek out an order of ancient magic users known as the Ancient Ones in order to devote his entire life to their goal of combating evil sorcerers. The youth eventually became even more skilled than his colleagues, and grew in power so great that he was the first mortal of Earth to meet with Eternity, the sentient embodiment of the universe, who presented him with the Amulet of Agamotto and charged him to become the Earth dimension's "first" Sorcerer Supreme. The Ancient One remained in this capacity for countless years, outliving almost all other members of his order.
Finding a Replacement[/h�?�
During his wanderings, Yao discovered the temple of Cyttorak in Korea and fought Dormammu to a standstill (the first time this had been done). During their final fight in London he succeeded in banishing Dormammu and shielding the Earth against his evil influence. He finally settled himself in Tibet where he met Doctor Anthony Druid. Posing as the High Lama, the Ancient One tested his abilities to pass on his powers to a successor by granting powers to Dr. Druid.
Many years later, the Ancient One was sought by Baron Karl Mordo who desired to be his pupil. The Ancient One realized his need for a successor and agreed to tutor Mordo. Although he recognized Mordo's evil ambitions in his mind, he decided that he could do his best convert Mordo to the service of good, or at least keep him in check.[citation needed] Some time later, Dr. Stephen Vincent Strange, M.D., a gifted but arrogant and somewhat amoral surgeon, suffered injuries to his hands in an automobile accident, which inflicted injuries on their network of nerves that prevented him from holding surgical tools with the complete steadiness that surgery requires of its practitioners. After squandering a multimillion-dollar fortune in vain efforts to restore his hands's pre-injury steadiness, Strange sought the services of the Ancient One for his own purposes. But he soon found himself attempting to save the Ancient One from a plot that Mordo was attempting to execute. The Ancient One dismissed Mordo but explained that he had used this as a test for Strange, who agreed to stay as the Ancient One's new pupil. Strange trained with the Ancient One for many years before leaving to set up his own residence in New York, though he still relied on the Ancient One's guidance.
[h]Modern Age
By the modern age of heroes, Doctor Strange had become a well-known mystic operating from his Sanctum in Greenwich Village. He occasionally required the help of the Ancient One as of one his earliest recorded cases was in assisting a corrupt businessman who was plagued by recurring nightmares. Strange soon discovered that the man was being haunted by the being known as Nightmare, ruler of the Dimension of Dreams and entered this dimension to fix it. Nightmare attempted to trap him there, leaving his physical body undefended while the man, afraid that the secret of his crimes had been found out, would try to kill Strange. The Ancient One sensed Strange calling out for his aid from Nightmare's dimension, and using Strange's amulet, transfixed the would-be murderer, saving his student. This allowed Strange time to escape and confront the man.
Baron Mordo soon resurfaced and used his powers to try and eliminate the Ancient One. Baron Mordo controlled the Ancient One's assistant to poison the Ancient One, sensing his master in trouble, Strange battled Mordo in his ectoplasmic form, preventing Mordo from ending the Ancient One's life.
Some years after Strange had left Tibet, the Ancient One and Doctor Strange teamed up to combat the evil demon, Zom. In order to defeat Zom, the Ancient One made it appear as if Zom had killed him and seemed to transfer his magical ability into Strange. In actuality, the Ancient One activated the potential for further magical ability in Strange which had remained latent.
Cosmic Entity
Later still, the Ancient One was taken prisoner by the so-called Living Buddha and minor demons called the Shadowmen, all of which were serving the extradimensional demon Shuma-Gorath. The Ancient One was made to serve as a gateway for bringing the demon to Earth, but he retained enough power to make his own mind the only conduit through which Shuma-Gorath could travel. Knowing likewise that he had long outlived his own natural life expectancy, he prompted his disciple, Doctor Strange, to "kill" him by destroying the portion of his mind which constituted his ego, his sense of self, and thus to end his corporeal existence. This Doctor Strange did, even though he was racked by guilt over having had to do so; the death of Yao the Ancient One instantly freed his astral form and allowed him to will it to become one with the Universe, i.e. one with Eternity, which he immediately did. The Ancient One thus died in the Crypts of Kaa-U, in his native Tibet, where the bodies of all the deceased Sorcerers Supreme of the Earth continuum are interred, thereby preventing the rise of Shuma-Gorath. Once the Ancient One's spirit had unified with everything, he came to Doctor Strange, assuaging the doctor's guilt over having had to end his own master's life, and bestowing on his pupil the mantle of the realm's new Sorcerer Supreme.
Now a being that is almost cosmic in nature, the Ancient One is spending his time as a servant and messenger to Eternity, leaving behind his once-disciple as the Sorcerer Supreme of Earth.
Some time later, during a period when Doctor Strange had fallen from grace for using dark powers, the Ancient One's spirit appeared to Jericho Drumm and his spirit brother Daniel through the Eye of Agamotto, bestowing upon them the title and station of Sorcerer Supreme in place of Strange.[citation needed] When Strange used his powers to continue defending the universe despite it not being his duty anymore and proved that he would not to succumb to the dark magic he was using, the Ancient One appeared on the battlefield and gave Strange the Eye of Agamotto back, restoring his title of Sorcerer Supreme once more.
Years later, when the interdimensional army called the Empirikul invaded Earth and destroyed nearly all magic, Doctor Strange and his friends travelled around the world to recover the last small bits of magic that remained in artifacts. One of these artifacts was the Ancient One's corporeal skull, which Doctor Strange stole from the temple in Tibet and crushed up to make into a magical dust that he later used to blind the Empirkul's leader, the Imperator.
