God's Imitator

Obviously, this was another trap, neither too big nor too small.

In the spectators’ room, there were three different speakers simultaneously. One was next to the ’inner field players’ screen, one next to the ’outer field players’ screen, and one on the wall far from both screens.

The information conveyed by these three speakers was different.

If sound came from the speaker on the spectator room’s wall, then only spectators would know that information.

If sound came from the speaker next to the ’outer field players’ screen, it meant both outer field players and spectators would know.

The speaker next to the ’inner field players’ screen was approximately equivalent to notifying everyone.

When introducing rules to the three types of players earlier, the speakers had been constantly switching. This was some kind of hint, but most spectators very likely hadn’t paid attention.

Moreover, if following the situation in ’King’s Judgment,’ when spectators bet on players, the bet-on players wouldn’t be notified.

Obviously, this was some kind of path dependence. The rules of ’Lifting Game’ weren’t like that.

When spectators bet on inner field players, it wouldn’t be broadcast in the inner field players’ room, but it would notify outer field players.And this would naturally form a certain ’the nail that sticks out gets hammered down’ trend, making those players who hadn’t received bets yet more inclined to unite and antagonize the bet-on players.

If Yang Yuting immediately bet on Fu Chen and Shen Xing now, the worst-case scenario might be directly causing the remaining three un-bet-on players to unite.

Indirectly forcing Fu Chen, Zhou Guifen, and Wu Xiaomei into a strong binding together.

But Yang Yuting felt this wasn’t a good choice. Although Wu Xiaomei and Chen Ran, this mother-daughter pair, had the best start, Yang Yuting instinctively felt that gaining an early advantage in such a game might not necessarily be a good thing.

Therefore, she still chose to wait temporarily and not destroy the outer field players’ cooperation strategy due to spectators’ rash actions.

As for whether Zhou Guifen and Fu Yujun could achieve cooperation, Yang Yuting actually wasn’t too worried. Even if she didn’t bet, the two would be natural allies.

...

Fu Chen had already finished reading the notice boards of the five types of equipment and noted down the specific functions written on them.

[Modification Shop: Gives the car pen a certain probability of automatically passing curves. The more modifications, the higher the difficulty of curves that can be passed.]

[Repair Shop: Reduces the probability of the car pen losing control. The more repairs, the lower the probability of the car pen losing control.]

[Car Rental: Rents out the car pen to earn funds for ’outer field players.’ The more rentals, the more funds earned.]

[Gas Station: Reduces car pen weight. The more refueling, the more weight reduction.]

[TV Station: Each use can choose to advertise for the other four types of equipment. The equipment with the most ads will receive an additional discount.]

Currently, these five types of equipment all had corresponding uses, and certain equipment could be used in combination.

According to the notice board information, the first use of this equipment had a consistent price of 1,000 points of funds, with subsequent use prices continuously increasing.

But which one to choose would be more worthwhile was still very difficult to conclude definitively.

Moreover, considering this was an elimination-type game, player files inevitably existed in the game, and the player file situations would very likely also affect game strategies.

Therefore, all inner field players including Fu Chen temporarily didn’t rashly use funds to modify car pens. Everyone still decided to first complete the first round of the game to see the situation, then make decisions afterward.

[The first round of the game begins.]

[Now please make your choices, players. Complete ’exclusive punishment’ first, or complete ’track in the picture’ first.]

[When the number of seated people for any challenge item reaches 4, that challenge item will open first.]

The large central hexagonal platform was for completing ’exclusive punishment,’ requiring everyone’s cooperation. The gameplay was somewhat similar to the ’spirit of the pen’ game.

The six sets of individual tables and chairs were for completing ’track in the picture,’ which could be completed independently.

Fu Chen hurriedly said, ”Hello everyone, I’m Fu Chen from Community 17. If you’ve dealt with our community in previous games, you should know we’re a community that tends toward cooperation.

”Should we briefly discuss game strategies first?”

But his proposal still didn’t get much response. Four players had already seated themselves at their respective tables and chairs.

Among them, Chen Ran, Jiao Hai, and Peng Xinyuan completely ignored what Fu Chen said and seated themselves at the fastest speed, while Liu Jie hesitated slightly, but perhaps considering that 3 versus 3 had no meaning anyway, she also chose to sit.

Only Shen Xing hesitated slightly, but seeing this situation, could only choose to sit.

[Will open ’track in the picture’ challenge first. Please take your seats and complete the challenge as soon as possible, players.]

Fu Chen had no other option and could only sit in his own position, picking up the car pen according to the diagram’s requirements.

Obviously, in such an environment, players who spoke up first, even if expressing goodwill, might not necessarily be accepted and might instead be suspected of having ulterior motives.

Moreover, these players’ approach also made sense.

’Track in the picture’ would be safer. Even if they failed, it wouldn’t have too much impact for now. The vast majority of players didn’t want to face the cruel ’exclusive punishment’ right at the start.

Although everyone’s arms were in an exhausted state and resting a bit might be better, what if ’exclusive punishment’ also wasted stamina or even caused injury?

Therefore, most players still prioritized choosing ’track in the picture,’ preparing to first experience this game’s specific difficulty and test the car pen’s performance.

Fu Chen also didn’t get discouraged. The game still had many rounds, they could take it slowly.

The game rules for ’track in the picture’ were very simple. Just grip the upper end of the car pen, keep arms in a front raise posture, ensure the pen tip didn’t touch the paper and the pen tip’s projection always stayed within the track.

But seemingly simple rules weren’t quite like that when actually tried.

First, the car pen was heavy, and the front raise was a quite strenuous posture. Not only would it magnify the lever effect, but the main force-generating muscle groups were in the anterior deltoid of the shoulder. Other muscles were very difficult to compensate with.

The anterior and medial deltoid muscles, without fitness habits, were very difficult to precisely train.

Moreover, the previous preparation phase had already exhausted all these inner field players. Such a short time couldn’t recover at all.

Second, the track on this map was very narrow, giving players a very low margin for error.

Although everyone knew to keep the ’pen tip’s projection’ within the track, the car pen wasn’t like a laser pointer with a small red dot for marking. There were no prompts at all, they could only estimate visually themselves.

The closer the pen tip was to the paper surface, the more accurately they could estimate visually and the less likely to go out of bounds. But this way, the pen tip was also more likely to touch the paper, causing game failure.

But conversely, the farther the pen tip from the paper surface, although it wouldn’t touch the paper, it was also more likely to produce errors, causing the projection to go out of bounds. Moreover, the higher the car pen was held, the more strenuous it was.

Soon, Fu Chen heard a relatively sharp ”beep—” accompanied by some male player’s somewhat broken cursing.

”Damn!”

When entering the second half of the map, Fu Chen clearly felt his shoulder somewhat exhausted. His entire arm began involuntarily trembling. The pen tip slightly tilted and had already gone out of bounds.

”Beep—”

His table also produced such a sound effect, representing that this attempt had failed.

Soon, as if it were contagious, other players also failed one after another.

Even Chen Ran, who got the ’sports car’ item, only persisted slightly longer and ultimately also didn’t succeed on the first try.

However, compared to others, her situation was obviously relatively optimistic.

Somewhat unexpectedly, although Jiao Hai got the third-ranked SUV, he was the first to fail. It wasn’t clear whether it was because he wasn’t good at this game and lacked patience, or because ’loss of control’ occurred.

Each round of the game could fail three times total. After the first failure, everyone had a pretty good idea. They didn’t continue trying but each came to different equipment, beginning to consider modifying and upgrading their car pens.