No matter how you look at it, this sudden incident, aside from being another soap opera for people to gossip about over tea and meals, added many more things worthy of attention.

Therefore, at the time, this incident was called—the “Haizhou No. 12 Incident”!

After a month had passed and the incident entered its aftermath, the wave of attention from Empire society finally subsided. This was clearly very much in line with the wishes of both the Empire military and the The Norman Family—no one wanted to be casually ridiculed or mocked by their own people or foreign media because of such a catastrophic piece of news.

The incident gradually died down over the course of a month, but for the military and the The Norman Family, that month was nothing short of a daily ordeal.

A month later, a black box extracted from the wreckage of a mech that crashed during the storm was placed on the desk of the incident investigation team at the Empire Cabinet Headquarters.

In the office hall sat several military officials, all over fifty. The gold stars on their epaulets and the dazzling array of medals on their chests exuded an imposing aura. Yet the most eye-catching person in the hall was not these awe-inspiring military elders, but a woman with a black mole at the corner of her mouth.

She wore a black suit, not a wrinkle in sight. Words like dignified and elegant seemed insufficient to describe the aura she radiated from within. If one had to compare, perhaps a mysterious flower from ancient Earth called violet could capture her enigmatic nobility.

She was the current Duchess of the Duke Norman, surname Clark. In the entire The Eagle Empire, probably fewer than a hundred people had ever met this Duchess. If you were to list these nearly one hundred people, you’d find that some of their names often appeared in the mainstream newspapers and magazines of the Empire, known to all. Of course, more than half of them were people whose names, identities, and occupations the public had no idea about.

But as traditional powers crumbled with humanity’s expansion into the universe, and the machinery of the state relatively declined, those who rose and seized social assets and power could, with a single thought or action, influence the lives of thousands at any moment.

They were called—“nobles.” But not in the traditional sense. Rather, in the hierarchy of all human society, they were the collective term for that small triangle at the top of the pyramid. In modern human society, they were the ones who held power.

The hall darkened, and the projector began playing information from the mech wreckage onto the screen. Everyone fell silent, for the scenes on display shocked all present.

In the recorded footage, the mining site looked like a steel behemoth dragging itself across the surface amid the raging storm, its ferocious “body” constantly unleashing a dense tide of metal, sweeping toward the formation of mechs.

It was a scene of death: a mech was instantly pierced through the cockpit by a flying girder as long as a basketball court, cut in half at the waist, the pilot reduced to a pile of fragments along with the machine.

Some mechs managed to pass through the metal rain, their bodies riddled with iron rods and steel stakes, struggling forward a few steps before collapsing in a shower of sparks, finally dragged into the wind—becoming just another wave in the storm.

Others fired their cannons at the metal rain, but were quickly dismembered by the overwhelming metallic onslaught.

It was as if an invisible grim reaper was lurking within the metal storm, harvesting these advanced Empire mechs, reaping the lives of these pilots—some young, some weathered.

The most unbearable sight was a mech, facing the oncoming metal frenzy, preparing to take cover in a pit ahead as if granted by heaven, when suddenly a crane arm, swept along by the storm, smashed it into the tempest, as if swallowed by a giant beast.

At this point, almost no one in the hall could bear to watch. Even though human society had developed to its current level, under such harsh natural conditions, no one dared to truly claim that “man can conquer nature.”

Yet those present had to keep their eyes open. The footage jumped again, gripping everyone’s heart, as the mech everyone was waiting for appeared in the recorder’s view.

It was a mech numbered 9. Unlike the others, whose numbers were black, this one’s number 9 was painted in red.

It stood out, and precisely because it stood out, everyone in the room felt as if they were clutching their hearts in their hands.

At this moment, the mech was running its rear thrusters at full power, struggling to stay close to the ground as it moved forward.

The massive air resistance and the superior thrust of its boosters allowed it to skim along the surface, avoiding the most disastrous zone of metallic chaos in midair.

But it was clear that this had exhausted all the mech’s strength—like a wealthy young lady, gingerly lifting the hem of her skirt as she walked along a muddy country road, perhaps frowning with effort to maintain her dignity and avoid soiling herself.