Deposed? I couldn't be happier! I wouldn't even be a dog to the crown prince.

Far away in Hawaii, Li Chengqian was already dressed in his combat uniform. He stood in front of the giant quantum terminal, his ten fingers moving like afterimages on the holographic keyboard.

The tight-fitting long-distance tactical uniform, with its deep matte charcoal black finish, outlined his tall and upright young figure.

The miniature fusion core on its chest emitted a faint blue glow, casting flickering light on and off in the cabin filled with the salty, humid tropical sea breeze.

The languid look that had always been on his face was completely washed away in that microsecond by a cold waterfall of code.

The Creator's ruthless nature finally resurfaced in the depths of those clear eyes.

"Your Highness, seventeen more reports of anomalies have arrived from Chang'an. The secondary computing power across the entire territory has begun to reverse!"

Wu Zetian's virtual holographic projection stood anxiously on one side of the control panel, her phoenix eyes filled with sternness.

Her beautiful hands gripped the data tablet so tightly that her knuckles turned white from the excessive force.

"Those old-established families hiding in the mud are using illegal gateways to forcibly use the central nervous systems of hundreds of thousands of displaced people as fuel for their machines."

The ancestral base of Tian Shu has detected a high-intensity physical overload. If it's not suppressed soon, the underlying logic protocol will be completely torn apart!

"A rat is still a rat. Give them a few lines of basic code and they think they can sit in a box and be the god of the world."

The smile on Li Chengqian's lips was devoid of any warmth, so cold that even the air conditioning system in the control room emitted a dry, faint whistle.

The development of forced patches, under the afterimages of his ten fingers, was like golden electric snakes wandering in the void.

They are densely packed together on the quantum light screen.

There are no fancy or complicated architectures; all that's there is is a brutal crackdown on illegal underlying protocols.

Faced with this hallucinogenic disaster that threatens the very foundation of the nation, Li Chengqian directly activated the highest level of system privileges and wrote an "Anti-Addiction System 2.0" with a forced physical blocking function.

This is a secret, ancestral-level technological portal that he secretly left behind when building the base of the Celestial Pivot.

He used to think that dealing with ordinary people in the Tang Dynasty didn't require such inhumane technological shackles.

But now, since those greedy old tyrants like to use human lives as human shields, he will use the most hardcore algorithm to smash the greed of those old bones to pieces.

"Your Highness, the bandwidth blocking for this Anti-Addiction 2.0 is too wide. It's clearly going to be a massive network-wide filter."

The young director of the Academy of Sciences, who was in charge of monitoring the satellite link, swallowed hard, his voice trembling with extreme shock.

He stared at the constantly generated black grid code, his eyelids twitching uncontrollably.

"There are currently millions of people connected to the civilian internet in the entire Tang Dynasty. Once this code is implemented, all the entertainment modules will become blank slates."

"The purpose of creating this new universe is to let them work hard in reality, not to let them hide in their cubicles and indulge in digital opium."

Li Chengqian did not turn around, his fingertips heavily drawing a deep red ripple on the light screen, representing absolute annihilation.

This new mandatory patch not only limits all online time on civilian networks.

More importantly, it can act like a sharp scalpel, forcibly severing the deep neural connections established by those illegal devices.

No matter which abandoned mine you hide in, no matter what kind of high-voltage current you use to forcibly bind your brain, as long as the iron curtain against addiction falls.

The ancestral code will forcibly and physically strip away all false consciousness without the official anti-counterfeiting seal of the Tang Dynasty within one ten-thousandth of a millisecond.

The tension in the countdown reached a suffocating extreme in those milliseconds as the countdown jumped to the final five minutes.

"Satellite orbit correction complete; thirteen transoceanic optical cables have been integrated into the highest legal entity settlement network!"

Wu Zetian pressed the final confirmation button. Her exquisite face lost some of the shrewdness of a financial queen and gained a solemnity as she faced the new era.

"Your Highness, the broadcast towers throughout the territory are ready. Once you press Enter, this network will truly change the world."

Li Chengqian took a deep breath, slowly withdrew his hands from the control panel, and took one last look at the purplish-red computing power star sea that represented the aristocratic family's black market.

The patch's full network coverage, in that one minute, boldly unfolded in the skies above the city that never sleeps, displaying an unstoppable technological dominance.

"Buzz—!"

An invisible digital ripple, centered on Hawaii, extends across the entire Tang Dynasty via the satellite network, accurately identifying and locking onto all illegal deep-sea diving equipment.

At that moment, the thirteen high-orbit quantum satellites spanning the Pacific Ocean simultaneously corrected their infrared sensors, sending out beams of pale white secondary directional pulses.

Like raindrops, they relentlessly pounded into every dark, murky swamp in Chang'an.

Young Master Wang, who was opening champagne around a glowing box in an abandoned tunnel, suddenly stared blankly at the holographic display screen in front of him.

All the numbers representing computing power gains were eerily frozen in a cold gray state within a microsecond.

"What's going on? Why is the server lagging? Give me a boost of voltage!"

Young Master Wang roared with bloodshot eyes, slamming his hand on the physical transformer next to him, causing the pointer on it to vibrate wildly.

No matter how frantically his hackers smashed keyboards, the only thing popping up in the Tian Shu backend was a series of super-anti-counterfeiting characters with the Dongfanghong flowing light.

Your device has not passed the Datang Anti-Addiction 2.0 security protocol certification. The system will forcibly disconnect your neural connections physically after 30,000 milliseconds.

This technological strangulation, which surpassed the understanding of aristocratic families, triggered an unprecedented hysteria within the entire underground dark web of the Tang Dynasty.

"Delist! Quickly transfer your computing power to the public internet and withdraw your profits!"

"I can't withdraw any funds! Li Chengqian has completely blocked all withdrawal channels on the civilian network segment!"

The patriarchs' withered fingers dug blood from the keyboard, but they were powerless to stop the brutal sweep of the ghastly white anti-addiction iron curtain.

The last bit of leverage they had accumulated in the black market was as fragile as ice shards under the scorching sun in the face of this technological shackle imposed by the Creator himself.

Inside the Daming Palace.

Li Shimin was pressing the holographic push button, which symbolized supreme power, with all his might, watching the red dot in the center of the hall suddenly slow down, representing the number of mutants.

The old man finally slumped back into the dragon throne, letting out a long sigh of relief. Cold sweat dripped from his forehead onto the cold dragon robe.

"Well... well, what an anti-addiction system. This rebellious son's methods are still a step ahead of my elite black-armored cavalry."

"Your Majesty is wise, and His Highness the Crown Prince's divine skill has truly turned the tide!" Fang Xuanling hurriedly bowed beside him, the look of horror on his face only beginning to fade at this moment.

As long as the four million people at the bottom of society don't turn into idiots in an instant, the foundation of the Tang Dynasty in reality will remain the imposing Mount Tai that no one can move.

Changsun Wuji, clutching the empty golden goblet, moved back to his seat with lingering fear.

This ability to quell global unrest in a second using algorithms made these seasoned cunning schemers, who had spent their lives playing power games, experience for the first time what utter despair from a technological standpoint truly meant.

The wind and snow outside the window gradually subsided.

The cyber-psychotic patients on Suzaku Avenue who were frantically tearing apart mechs.

As the dark purple electric current inside the helmet instantly extinguished, they collapsed onto the ancient bluestone pavement like puddles of mud.

Their chests were still heaving violently, but the eerie purplish-red tinge in their eyes finally began to slowly fade away under the forced formatting of the Datang Anti-Addiction 2.0 system.

Realistic reason regained control of their cerebral cortex, and the emptiness and pain brought about by the extreme loss of their senses caused them to emit unconscious, hoarse cries of sorrow on the street.

"Sister...is it dawn yet? I just...I think I bought the whole West Market..." The poor scholar, now awake, looked at his broken right forearm, tears and snot streaming down his face from the pain, and struggled awkwardly in the mud.

The surrounding people looked at the mess on the ground, and then at their neighbors who were slowly returning to their mortal forms. For a moment, apart from heavy breathing, the only thing left in the hall was the fervent worship of the Eastern Palace Heavenly Pivot symbol that was floating above the city that never sleeps and was radiating golden holy light.

The rich buy wings, while the poor seek dignity in them.

But now, the iron gate of anti-addiction measures tells everyone who, in this cyber age, is the ultimate deity controlling the final switch.

Inside the main control room in Hawaii, the dense mechanical beeping gradually subsided, leaving only the faint sound of coolant circulating in the pipes.

Li Chengqian reached over and pulled the dark sunglasses next to the recliner, then expertly put them back on his nose.

Li Chengqian pressed the Enter key and coldly stared at the countdown on the big screen: "Ten o'clock tonight, the power will be cut off on time. I want to see how many demons and monsters will be forced out when this cyber opium is cut off."