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

The heavy, pure copper gate of the national treasury was broken by the combined force of Tian Ce's broken sword and Li Shimin's brute strength.

With a dull thud, it slid to the sides.

The sight inside the door made even the seasoned eunuch Wang De, who was used to seeing all sorts of things, gasp in astonishment.

There is no vulgar piling up of gold and silver jewelry.

That was a high-purity industrial gold brick converted from a full five billion in real-economy dividends.

Each piece was cut as neatly as a block of tofu.

Under the cold emergency lights of the national treasury, it reflected a dazzling golden light.

Li Shimin did not touch those gold bricks.

He strode to the front of a holographic bounty terminal at the Jinshan headquarters.

He slammed the broken Tian Ce sword heavily onto the control panel.

The bloodstains from the knife smeared onto the metal panel.

"Connect to the nationwide public channel!"

Li Shimin roared at the top of his lungs.

"Activate the world's highest bounty for physics!"

The indicator lights on the control panel lit up.

The old emperor's face was stained with blood and dust, and contorted with anxiety.

It was instantly projected onto every working screen across the entire Tang Dynasty.

"Citizens of the Great Tang! Listen up!"

Li Shimin's voice was not processed by any audio editing equipment.

His voice was slightly hoarse, and even a little cracked.

"The tree is about to collapse! The breakwater won't hold for long!"

"I don't care if you're workers in state-owned factories or repairmen in the black market."

"As long as you have heavy mechs and mining vehicles."

"Bring them all out! They'll be used as jacks at the bottom of the Tower of Babel!"

He pointed to the glittering mountain of gold behind him.

"Do you see these gold bricks?"

"Bring out my entire private treasury!"

"Whoever tries to lift the tower, and a mech is destroyed, I will compensate them with ten times its weight in industrial gold!"

"Give me the life-threatening stuff! Give me the money stuff too!"

Under the reward, there must be a brave man.

Moreover, it's risking one's life for a fortune that a family could never spend in ten generations.

After a brief silence.

A series of mechanical roars erupted throughout the area surrounding Chang'an City, even drowning out the sound of the wave shield cracking.

Rumble!

At a sand quarry on the banks of the Wei River.

Dozens of heavy-duty bucket excavators that were originally used to dredge river sand.

They didn't even wash the mud off the tracks.

With red eyes, the driver floored the accelerator, and the car sped toward the tilted wooden base, billowing black smoke.

The underground workshops in the West Market.

Old Wai, along with several apprentices, pushed open the tattered roller shutter door, which had been smashed in half by the Great Snow Dragon Riders.

They brought out a giant, cobbled-together modified crane whose exterior hadn't even been painted.

"Damn it, if I do this once, I'll eat roujiamo (Chinese hamburger) every day from now on!"

Old Wai, with a pipe in his mouth, frantically pulled on the control lever with both hands.

Even the reserve camp of the Great Snow Dragon Cavalry stationed outside the city.

Those heavily armored mechs that didn't have time to enter the city and be wiped out.

They were also led by officers at all levels.

They defied the military rule against leaving the camp without permission and charged towards the dark, shadowy figure that blotted out the sky.

In less than the time it takes for an incense stick to burn.

Countless heavy-duty engineering mechs, mining behemoths, and military armor.

They flocked to the wasteland outside Chang'an from all directions.

Like a swarm of black ants, they gathered beneath the vast, boundless shadow of the Jianmu tree.

"Form ranks! Raise the support frame!"

Xu Xiao piloted the command mech, standing at the very front.

His voice echoed hoarsely on the public channel.

Tens of thousands of mechs of all sizes.

Directly below the leaning Jianmu tree, they were stacked one on top of another.

The smaller mechs served as stepping stones, while the heavy behemoths stood on their shoulders.

One layer after another.

They used steel and flesh to build a 100-meter-high wall of robots on the wasteland.

The giant mining crane at the very top extended its thickest hydraulic support rod.

It held firmly against a broken carbon nanotube load-bearing beam on the outside of the building.

boom!

Above, the giant blue ion hand finally gave way.

After a loud, ear-piercing crash of shattering glass.

The giant hand shattered with a deafening roar, turning into a sky full of blue sparks and disappearing without a trace.

The physical weight of 30,000 tons.

Without the buffer of the wave shield.

With terrifying acceleration, it slammed heavily into the wall of robots.

"Ugh—!"

From the cab of the giant crane at the very top, came Lao Wai's heart-wrenching screams.

The pressure, exceeding the design limit by ten times, was applied instantly.

The crane's thick titanium alloy hydraulic rod was bent into a terrifying arc.

The internal hydraulic oil could not withstand the high pressure.

With a bang.

The valve burst.

Scalding hot, dark brown engine oil sprayed out like a high-pressure water gun, splashing all over the surrounding mechs.

"withstand!"

Li Shimin somehow ended up on the city wall.

The old emperor stood in the howling cold wind, leaning against the battlements.

His eyes were bloodshot as he watched the horrific scene outside the city.

"No refunds! We'll compensate ten times the gold for each mech! If we refund, Chang'an will be gone!"

Old Wai gritted his teeth, his face covered in scalding hot engine oil that had splattered into the cockpit.

Large blisters formed from the burn.

He pushed the control lever hard with both hands, his thumbs even bleeding.

"Damn it... I've never seen so much gold in my life..."

The lightweight mechs at the bottom, which serve as stepping stones.

The outer casing began to deform severely.

The driver was suffering immense pain from the crushing of his bones inside, and blood was flowing from his nose.

The mechanical joints kept making creaking and cracking sounds.

The human wall is sinking.

The tower's tilt angle continues to slowly but irreversibly decrease.

"Fifteen degrees...twenty degrees..."

On the city wall, Wang De looked at the numbers on the measuring instrument and closed his eyes in despair.

"Your Majesty, let's go, we can't hold on any longer."

Li Shimin did not move.

He gripped the battlements tightly, his fingernails splitting.

This is the harsh reality.

No amount of gold can buy miracles that defy the laws of physics.

Those mechs forming a human wall were like mantises trying to stop a wheel in front of 30,000 tons of heavy metal.

Engine oil mixed with blood dripped down the tracks onto the barren soil.

Just as the mechs were about to be completely crushed into iron discs by this enormous gravity.

The desperate moment when Chang'an City was about to be cut in two.

hum-

A low, tremor-like shockwave that seemed to distort the very air.

Descending without warning from the stratosphere at extremely high altitudes.

The shockwave was completely silent.

But at the very moment it descended.

Lao Wai suddenly felt a lightness in his hands as he pushed the control lever.

The terrifying gravity that pressed down on him made him feel like he was going to vomit his internal organs.

Disappeared.