230: Until the building collapsed

The alarm would ring through the sky for a full ten minutes to signify farewell and reverence for all the heroic spirits.

It was precisely these ten minutes that gave the Marines on the field a certain amount of reaction time.

Under Lagrange's command to "drop everything and run for your lives" and the alarm echoing overhead, all the Marines rushed to the landing pods closest to them.

The mechanism on them that allowed for "takeoff and landing from a planetary surface and repeated use" had been mocked as "useless" by the Military Alliance soldiers hundreds of times, only to play a role in an unexpected way.

Except for a small number of drop pods that failed to control their angle when falling and damaged their power systems, the vast majority of people found an escape route and took off one after another with about a minute remaining.

Except for Lagrange and his guards.

Lagrange really wanted to curse right now—

The protective powered armor he was wearing was incredibly heavy, and even with the overload boost, his running speed was only slightly faster than an average person's.

Furthermore, taking it off required the cooperation of two people, disassembling it piece by piece for a long time.

As a result, by the time only three minutes remained until the explosion, these guys had barely managed to climb into their landing pod.

Before the door was even tightly shut, Lagrange hurriedly activated the landing pod's propulsion system.

The four engines instantly delivered an incredibly powerful thrust, slamming the completely unprepared Lagrange onto the floor; he only managed to stand up with support once the graviton interference facility began operating—

Thank God, it was running normally.

Three minutes was enough time for him to fly out of the nuclear bomb's blast radius—especially since it was a primitive underground nuclear bomb intended for structural demolition.

The joy of surviving the disaster began to fade, and an incomparable rage immediately flooded Lagrange's brain like a tide.

Someone within the Military Alliance wanted to blow up the Tower of Mourners!!!

That tower was the symbol of the Imperial Garrison Legion's reorganization into the Military Alliance, the spiritual home for all the soldiers of the Military Alliance, and a hall that only the dead could step into!

And at this moment... (Surface perspective)

"BOOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

An earth-shattering explosion rang out, and an unparalleled super earthquake began from beneath the base of the Tower of Mourners.

The ground undulated like waves, then cracked and collapsed; all the shorter buildings simply crumbled down.

At the center of the explosion—the bottom of the tower—countless dust particles, swept up by high-temperature gases and shockwaves, burst out like a massive blowout.

Of course, the high tower did not collapse immediately; it only shook and twisted incessantly, making ear-piercing noises.

The nuclear bomb had undoubtedly severed the tower's base and twisted its main structure.

It still stood firm in the air simply because it was too high—so high that even the atmosphere seemed to want to hold it up; only by slicing through the firmament could it fall completely.

But the heroic spirits engraved on the steel could not, in the end, hold up the steel that was slowly heading toward collapse, just as a few outstanding individuals could not save the current wretched state of humanity.

After standing firm for more than ten minutes, the tower finally began to tilt slowly in one direction—

It was not a space elevator, after all; gravity still governed this massive wonder.

Thus, first the entire tower, after reaching a certain tipping point, developed cracks a third of the way up from the base, then two-thirds... the entire tower disintegrated in mid-air, breaking into section after section, falling to the ground in segments.

It wasn't until the pointed tip of the tower hit the ground, kicking up a cloud of dust, that Lagrange re-boarded his flagship.

As soon as he walked back onto the Bridge, everyone felt his uncontrollable aura of rage.

Coincidentally, the recording of the Tower of Mourners' collapse began playing on the central console—

"Attention everyone!!! Broadcast on all frequencies immediately! To the entire star sector!!!"

"The Military Alliance Traitor, Randall, has conspired with aliens! He has blown up the Tower of Mourners!!!"

"To all Legions siding with the old factions of the Military Alliance!!! We are now in a fight to the death!!!"

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