God's Imitator

Another match had ended.

He Xiaojun returned to his own lounge, using the brief time between matches to rethink the current situation.

In the previous game, he had accepted Huang Ming’s invitation and obtained a large amount of Wealth Vouchers from Huang Ming.

This also caused his personal Wealth Vouchers to grow rapidly.

But He Xiaojun’s heart was still uneasy.

”According to the game mechanics, there’s an upper limit to the Wealth Vouchers that can be transferred in each match, basically around 11 million. So, if in subsequent matches I keep matching with Huang Ming and ensure maximum returns every match, it should be enough to be selected for a certain Exit Area in the end.

”But this kind of strategy, other communities have definitely also thought of it. They’ll all do this too.

”If that’s the case, everyone’s expected returns in the latter half will be about the same. Wouldn’t rankings then be decided by the Wealth Vouchers from the first half?

”In that case, I wouldn’t have any advantage...

”No, not necessarily, because Core Communities can’t mindlessly adopt this strategy. They can only adopt it with limitations.”Because this kind of strategy is equivalent to sacrificing one player. If Huang Ming transfers all his Wealth Vouchers to me, he himself will have no returns and will most likely bottom out in the end.

”Peripheral Communities only need to protect one person in the game. The others can still return to their original community, so even if returns are a bit lower, it’s acceptable.

”But Core Communities most likely can’t do this.

”If two Core Community players adopt this strategy to transfer Wealth Vouchers to each other, it will cause one person’s wealth value to bottom out. After entering their own community’s Exit Area, they’ll be squeezed out by other high-return Peripheral Community players and won’t be able to return to their original community.

”So, for Core Communities, they can only adopt this strategy to a limited extent to distribute Wealth Vouchers. Strong players still need to find ways to expand returns from external players.

”It could be randomly matching with strong players from other communities to snatch returns, or cooperating with other Peripheral Communities, persuading those Peripheral Community players to give returns...

”This game doesn’t display each person’s or each community’s specific Wealth Voucher values. All players can only roughly guess, so this invisibly increases pressure. They don’t know at all how many Wealth Vouchers are safe, and can only try to fight for every single one.”

While thinking, He Xiaojun checked the display screen information beside his three doors.

According to his agreement with Huang Ming, the two matched once every other round.

After completing the match in the previous game, they temporarily wouldn’t match this game. Instead, they would each seek out people who might be players from the same community and send invitations.

When inviting, they defaulted to choosing the ’Thief’ identity.

This way, if they could encounter players from the same community, that would naturally be best. They could share strategies. If they didn’t encounter players from the same community, the two would directly adopt the ’Thief’s’ first strategy, take the Wealth Vouchers from the wooden boxes and leave.

This way, compared to Huang Ming directly transferring returns to He Xiaojun, they would lose a bit, but at least wouldn’t be completely isolated from external games and could still obtain some information.

After considering, He Xiaojun sent an invitation to ’↑The High Priestess.’

He wasn’t certain whether the other party was actually a player from the same community. He just felt they might match up with players from the same community, so he could only try.

However, the other party quickly agreed.

”Hm? I guessed right? This is Dr. Shen?”

In He Xiaojun’s Community 14, there was a female doctor. This was considered a special identity in the Gallery.

And among the tarot cards, ’The High Priestess’ was relatively the closest to the medical profession.

The double screening of gender and occupation greatly increased the probability of success.

...

The match began.

He Xiaojun entered the room and saw ’↑The High Priestess’ sitting upright at the table without any extra movements.

He also sat down calmly on the ’Thief’ side and proposed, ”Block the sound in the room?”

Theoretically speaking, after entering the latter half, there should be very few players choosing the spectator identity, because participating as ’Thief’ in each round of the game could guarantee obtaining Wealth Vouchers from at least 10 wooden boxes, while being a ’Spectator’ had no returns.

It was equivalent to a pure loss.

But each community adopted different strategies. Perhaps some communities would take turns arranging for players to be spectators to collect intelligence. This possibility also existed, so to be safe, it was more secure to block the sound.

’↑The High Priestess’ nodded in agreement.

[Spectators can no longer hear the sound from the current room.]

He Xiaojun first asked, ”If you had to choose your lucky wooden box, which would you choose?

”This might determine which specific strategy I’ll adopt.”

On the notice board, ’↑The High Priestess’ still used the Number Bomb strategy. This was also normal. Relatively weak players would be more inclined toward conservative strategies.

This also matched He Xiaojun’s perception of Dr. Shen’s strength.

’↑The High Priestess’ carefully scrutinized He Xiaojun for a while, seemingly considering something. Then she extended both hands, pointing at two different wooden boxes.

One was wooden box number 5, ’The Hierophant.’ The other was wooden box number 14, ’Temperance.’

He Xiaojun was stunned for a moment.

”Why point at two wooden boxes?”

If the other party directly pointed at wooden box number 14, then He Xiaojun could directly confirm the other party was a player from the same community.

But pointing like this, was it Community 5 or Community 14?

However, He Xiaojun quickly also roughly guessed the other party’s possible intention.

”Dr. Shen also isn’t clear about my identity. If I’m a player from another community coming to trick information out of her, directly pointing at wooden box number 14 would be very dangerous.

”So she points at two. I should be the one to further confirm.

”Mm, this is also a reasonable reaction.

”Anyway, our community has a secret code. As long as the code matches, then there’s no problem.”

He Xiaojun asked, ”What do you think of the difficulty of this game?”

’↑The High Priestess’ answered, ”Very simple. No matter what situation, I’ll say it’s very simple.”

He Xiaojun breathed a sigh of relief. ”Excellent!”

’↑The High Priestess’ also looked like she breathed a sigh of relief. ”Finally found a player from the same community.

”I’m completely confused right now. I don’t know what to do at all.”

They couldn’t mention names or communities, so He Xiaojun could only use other ways to share the strategy.

”’The Moon’ in the same camp as you is number 7.

”Our current strategy is this: try as much as possible to ensure one person enters an Exit Area...”

He Xiaojun simply shared the strategy previously agreed upon with Huang Ming. This strategy wasn’t complex and shouldn’t have any major loopholes either.

After bringing Dr. Shen in, subsequent matches would be simple.

Huang Ming and Dr. Shen could take turns matching with He Xiaojun, ensuring He Xiaojun always obtained maximum returns, and when taking turns off, these two players could continue matching with other players, searching for players from the same community while stably obtaining returns from 10 wooden boxes as ’Thief.’

After ’↑The High Priestess’ finished listening to He Xiaojun’s account, she fell into silence.

”This strategy sounds okay, but... doesn’t it seem to have hidden dangers?

”If Core Communities don’t want to accept you, is it really appropriate to force your way in?”