HELP! Free Tier ARM (São Paulo) – VNIC completely dead, cannot ping gateway 10.0.0.1 even after stop/start (No internet connection on machine)

Upgraded my Always Free ARM instance from 22.04 → 24.04 a while ago.
Suddenly the wired network icon shows “?” and there is ZERO connectivity:

• enp0s6 is UP

• I can connect to RDP or SSH.

• has correct private IP and default route

• 100 % packet loss to gateway 10.0.0.1 and internet

• VNIC metrics show 0 packets in/out

• already did: reboot, stop/start instance, flush routes, dhclient → nothing works

• even tried to delete the whole VCN (accidentally closed the window mid-deletion, not sure if it finished) and created a brand new VCN → still the same dead VNIC

Oracle support chat blocks me because it’s pure Always Free account.Anyone had this exact thing recently and actually got it fixed without terminating the instance?
Need the VNIC reset from backend or any working workaround. Thanks in advance to whoever can help, I’m completely stuck.

(Instance is Ampere A1, São Paulo region, Ubuntu 24.04 upgraded from 22.04).