207: Chapter 207 With a debt of 31 trillion, I made the whole world pay taxes to remember me.

The countdown hit 2.

The black mist between Su Qingyu's brows had solidified, and her eyes began to turn strange and cold—the 'Blackened Persona' implanted by the Screenwriting Team was overriding her true self.

"Qingyu!" Zhang Hao tried to rush over, but he was repelled by an invisible plot force field, smashing through three dining tables.

Countdown 1.

Lin Chen's fingers slid frantically across the shareholder panel. He typed into the search bar: "Emergency Plot Intervention," "Character Protection," "Forced Purification"...

Found it!

[Item: Character Fate Emergency Rewrite Protocol (Gold Edition)]

[Effect: Immediately interrupts any ongoing character script injection and grants permanent immunity to the same type of plot implantation]

[Price: 200 billion dimension points (First-time purchase includes a 3-second trial)]

[If the purchase is confirmed during the trial, it takes effect; if canceled, the plot injection will accelerate]

"Trial! Now!" Lin Chen roared.

[Trial activated]

[Remaining confirmation time: 3 seconds]

Time froze.

Everyone at the victory banquet—including the soon-to-be-blackened Su Qingyu—was perfectly still. Only Lin Chen could move.

He rushed to Su Qingyu and saw countless lines of code being frantically written into the mass of black mist between her brows:

[New Identity: Despairing Blackened Heroine]

[New Goal: Personally destroy everything belonging to Lin Chen, then defect to Arrogant Dragon]

[Key Plot: Slay Lin Chen tonight, become Arrogant Dragon's most loyal minion tomorrow...]

"Trial effect: Purification start," Lin Chen said to the void.

A beam of golden light surged from his palm, enveloping Su Qingyu.

The black mist began to scream—a literal, ear-piercing, inhuman shriek, as if countless voices were wailing: "No! This is an S-rank script! You can't...!"

The golden light crushed through it.

The black mist shattered inch by inch, turning into data dust.

Su Qingyu's eyelashes fluttered, and she slowly opened her eyes. Her gaze was clear, filled with confusion: "Lin Chen? I... I think I just had a terrible dream..."

[Trial countdown: 1 second]

Lin Chen clicked [Confirm Purchase] without hesitation.

[Payment successful: -200 billion dimension points]

[Su Qingyu's 'Blackened Script' has been permanently deleted; immunity implantation is now in effect]

Time resumed its flow.

"Boss!" Zhang Hao scrambled up from the floor. "What just happened? I thought I saw..."

"It's fine now." Lin Chen supported the still-weak Su Qingyu and turned to look at the shareholder panel.

His gaze was as cold as ice.

"Customer Service," he said. "What I want to buy out isn't 'a certain script'."

"Then you want..."

"I want to buy out the screenwriting rights for this world," Lin Chen said word by word. "From now on, for me and everyone I designate—our lives can only be written by ourselves."

Customer service was silent for three seconds.

"That would require the 'Ultimate Protocol for Autonomy of Fate'. The price..." It paused. "50 trillion dimension points."

Lin Chen's current debt: 9.8 trillion (Causality buyout) + 0.2 trillion (Purification just now) = 10 trillion.

Another 50 trillion?

"How much can I borrow?" Lin Chen asked.

[Recalculating...]

[Based on your buyout of partial causality, equity value has increased to 0.00000015%]

[Maximum loanable amount: approximately 21 trillion dimension points]

[Your current total debt has reached 47.6% of the limit; further borrowing will trigger a 'High-Risk Alert'...]

"Borrow it," Lin Chen interrupted. "Borrow all of it."

[Loan successful: +21 trillion dimension points]

[Total Debt: 31 trillion dimension points]

[Annual Interest Rate: 18.7%]

[If repayment cannot be made within one year, the existence rights of you and all associated characters will be forcibly reclaimed]

Lin Chen didn't look at the terms.

He went straight to the transaction page and found that sky-high item.

[Item: Ultimate Protocol for Autonomy of Fate (Custom Edition)]

[Scope: Lin Chen, Su Qingyu, Zhang Hao, Little Red Clothes, Lin Chen's Mother, and core executives of The Underworld Group (37 people in total)]

[Effects:]

1. Permanent departure from the platform's preset plot system

2. Immunity to all script implantations, fate corrections, and plot kills

3. Acquisition of 'Self-Narrative Rights' (Can actively write one's own life trajectory, provided it conforms to basic world-view logic)

4. Activation of the 'Fate Trading Market' (Can sell/buy causal connections with others)

[Custom Price: 49.8 trillion dimension points]

Lin Chen clicked purchase.

[Payment successful: -49.8 trillion dimension points]

[Protocol taking effect...]

Across the entire victory banquet, thirty-seven golden pillars of light descended from the heavens.

Each pillar of light enveloped one person.

Su Qingyu, Zhang Hao, Little Red Clothes, Lin Chen's Mother (remotely connected via the reincarnation channel), the Finance Director, the Security Chief... for all those deeply bound to Lin Chen, the faint, flickering plot lines above their heads snapped at this moment.

In their place, a pale gold mark emerged on each person's forehead—a Mark of Autonomy of Fate, forged from Lin Chen's shareholder authority and a massive amount of dimension points.

"I feel... different." Zhang Hao looked at his hands. "Those 'voices from outside the wall', those 'suggestions', they're all gone. My head... it's so quiet now."

Little Red Clothes was even more direct; she floated into the air, her red garments dancing wildly: "Master! My 'Artifact Spirit Ending' causal line—it's broken! Completely broken! I can feel it now; what I want to become in the future is entirely up to me!"

Lin Chen's Mother's voice came through the reincarnation channel: "Son, I think I just saw... several 'possible futures' vanish. Now only one path remains, but that path is blank, waiting for me to walk it myself..."

Su Qingyu gripped Lin Chen's hand tightly, tears falling silently: "I saw them... I saw so many 'me's. In some I betrayed you, in some I died for you, in some I became another man's woman... but now, all those 'possibilities' have shattered."

She looked up, her gaze resolute: "From now on, I will only be Su Qingyu. Only your Su Qingyu."

Lin Chen pulled her into his arms.

But right in this tender moment—

[Warning! Warning! Warning!]

[Large-scale fate tampering detected!]

[Platform rule backlash mechanism activated!]

[Releasing 'Rule Virus: Existential Oblivion']

[Effect: Ordinary characters not covered by the protocol (approx. 98.3% of the world's population) will begin to forget the existence of 'Lin Chen' and his associates]

[Transmission method: Memory infection, spreading from peripheral characters to core characters]

[Estimated time to take full effect: 72 hours]

Zhang Hao was the first to notice the anomaly.

He snapped his head around to look at a nearby attendant—a veteran employee who had followed Lin Chen for three years.

At this moment, the attendant was scratching his head in confusion: "Eh? Why am I at this banquet? Who am I again... wait, who organized this banquet?"

He looked at Lin Chen, his gaze as stranger as if he were looking at a passerby.

"Boss!" Zhang Hao's face turned pale. "He's... forgetting you!"

What was even more terrifying was that this "oblivion" was spreading like a virus at a visible speed.

A second attendant, a third, a fourth...

The security guards began to whisper: "Who are we supposed to be protecting again?"

The guests looked blank: "What event did I come here for today?"

Among The Underworld Group's executives, those middle-level managers not on the 37-person list also began to experience memory blurring.

"I am... the Deputy Finance Director of the company? Then who is the Director?"

"What was our group's name again?"

Little Red Clothes screamed: "Master! The world is rejecting us! I can feel it—our 'sense of existence' is draining away from us!"

Su Qingyu grabbed Lin Chen's arm tightly: "You can't let them forget you... if you are forgotten by everyone, then in this world, won't you... 'cease to exist'?"

Lin Chen looked at the rapidly spreading memory collapse before him and suddenly smiled.

"Customer Service," he said. "I remember the 'Fate Trading Market' has a certain function."

"You mean..."

"Buying 'Presence'." Lin Chen pulled up the market interface. "I can sell the right to 'remember me' to those who are about to forget me."

"But they need to pay a price."

"The price is," Lin Chen said word by word, "the 'emotional output revenue rights' for 10% of their future lives."

"I want everyone who remembers me..."

"To become my Memory Shareholders."

[New Transaction Listed: Lin Chen's Existence Memory Subscription Service]

[Subscription Fee: 10% Emotional Revenue of Future Life]

[Effect: Permanently remember everything about Lin Chen and his associates]

[Push to the entire world (excluding those already protected by the protocol)?]

Lin Chen clicked [Yes].

The next second, a prompt sounded simultaneously in the minds of everyone in the world who was forgetting him—

[You are forgetting an important existence. Do you wish to pay an 'Emotional Tax' to retain this memory?]

[Yes/No]

[Selection time: 10 seconds]

[10, 9, 8...]