God's Imitator

Lu Bingjun lowered his head and thought for a moment, then said, ”Mm, you make a very good point.

”However, I think we should hold off on making any changes to the community fund rules for now.

”What the ’Negative Status’ actually is remains unclear, and changing the community fund rules could very likely trigger a series of complicated consequences that are difficult to predict.

”It would be better to wait until the ’Negative Status’ is fully understood before we discuss it in detail and make a decision.”

Ye Lin did not press the matter further, and no one else offered their opinion either.

Lu Bingjun stood up and said, ”Alright, let’s leave the discussion here for now!

”A new stage, a new beginning. With new members joining us, our community has grown stronger. We may face unknown challenges ahead, but I believe Community 2 will pull together and keep getting better!

”Tonight we’ll have a group dinner.

”Wen Wan.”

He looked toward a female player on his left with delicately applied makeup and wavy hair draped over her shoulders, saying, ”You’ll be in charge of arranging the dinner again this time.”...

With the long table meeting concluded, everyone went off to attend to their own matters.

Player No. 2, Yao Yuan, had not spoken during the meeting and had barely made an impression. His profession was an ordinary company employee, and even here in the New World, he still seemed to carry a faint, lingering air of someone who clocked in and out for a living.

He was the first to approach the two new players, Qin Cheng and Huang Shengjie, to help them familiarize themselves with the community’s layout and learn the relevant rules.

The other new player, Lu Qi, was taken under Ye Lin’s wing.

Wen Wan had introduced herself as working in e-commerce, and it was clear that within the community she had previously played a role similar to that of a ”housekeeper.” Dinner gatherings were generally organized by her.

She found fitness trainer Deng Xiao, the older Geng Yuxia, and administrative director Zhou Wanlin, and began making arrangements for the evening’s dinner, including deciding on a menu and purchasing the necessary supplies from the vending machines.

Since Community 2’s existing core members already had their roles divided, there was not much for Lin Sizhi and Shen Bowen, the two ”outsiders” from other communities, to get involved with.

Lin Sizhi asked Lu Bingjun for the printed copies of the community’s proposals up to that point and looked through the rules related to the community fund.

A short while later, Shen Bowen walked over from the direction of the reading area, carrying a few books.

She noticed Lin Sizhi reading the community’s proposals and sat down across from him, asking, ”Could I have a look once you’re done?”

Lin Sizhi nodded and handed over the sections he had already finished reading.

Shen Bowen read through them carefully from beginning to end as well.

Community 2 had only one type of community fund, called the ”Community Development Fund.”

It had two different methods of contribution.

The first was mandatory contribution, where every player was required to unconditionally contribute 30% of the visa time earned in games to the fund.

The second was voluntary contribution, where every player could choose to contribute any surplus visa time to the fund, with no limit on the amount.

Voluntary contributions to the community fund carried no explicit additional benefits, though the specific amount contributed by each player was recorded and ranked.

Contributed funds could not be freely withdrawn.

The only exception was that when a player encountered an ”emergency situation,” they could take out a single ”interest-free loan” of 30,000 minutes of visa time, to be repaid in full within one month.

In addition, the rules explicitly stated the following two provisions.

[1. When conflicts or disagreements arise among players within the community, everyone must take into account the ”ranking of community fund contributions by players” when determining the final compromise.]

[2. The community fund contributions made by the community leader (limited to one person) will be recorded as ”130%.” (This affects ranking only and does not change the actual amount.)]

Lin Sizhi went over to the vending machine and checked the specific amounts and rankings of all current players’ community fund contributions.

As the game cores, Lu Bingjun and Ye Lin were the two players who had contributed the most to the community fund.

Moreover, likely because of the rule stating the leader’s contributions were counted at 130%, the rankings clearly showed three distinct tiers in terms of amounts.

Lu Bingjun’s contributed amount was approximately 300,000 minutes, Ye Lin’s was approximately 200,000 minutes, and the other players’ contributions were mostly hovering around a few tens of thousands.

There were also a few players whose contributions were under 30,000 minutes, suggesting they had never made any voluntary contributions and had only the mandatory portion.

Lu Bingjun’s actual contributed amount should have been around 240,000 minutes, but because he was the community leader, a weighted calculation at 130% had been applied, resulting in the 300,000 figure shown in the rankings.

The community had a ”Death Exemption Ticket,” which still had about two weeks left before its cooldown would be complete. There was also a ”First Player Identity Card,” though the community rules contained no provision for ”rotating use,” suggesting it was simply handed directly to Lu Bingjun.

Currently, the rewards unlocked by the community fund in this community were at approximately the 600,000-minute tier. It had not yet reached 900,000 or higher, and so functions such as the ”Death Exemption Ticket and First Player Identity Card cooldown reduction,” ”Identity Card Fourth Privilege (earning 2,000 minutes of visa time per day),” and ”Discount Vouchers” had not been unlocked.

This placed it at roughly the same level of community development that Community 17 had reached after the ”Simple Q&A.”

Having finished reading through the rules, Shen Bowen said, looking thoughtful, ”When conflicts or disagreements arise among players within the community, they must take into account the ’ranking of community fund contributions’ to determine the final compromise?

”This rule seems a little...”

She could not immediately find the right words, and after thinking for a moment she said, ”At first glance, this seems to be formally dividing players into different tiers based on their contributions, establishing that those who contribute more are naturally entitled to greater say.

”But this rule isn’t actually enforceable. It can only be upheld through the players’ own voluntary compliance, relying on those who contributed less to willingly back down.

”But what if they don’t back down? Then this rule is nothing but empty words on paper.”

Lin Sizhi said, ”As long as a rule is clearly written down, even if it lacks strong operability or binding force, it will still carry some degree of constraint.

”Every community will explore the rules that best suit it, and these things were never meant to be set in stone.

”What tier did the community fund rewards reach in your previous community?”

Shen Bowen thought for a moment and said, ”Only the Death Exemption Ticket was unlocked.

”Most of the players in our community were very resistant to donating to the community fund, so there was no real sense of cooperation or community building. Everyone was more like neighbors living under the same roof.

”What about yours?”

Lin Sizhi answered honestly, ”We actually donated quite a lot.”

Shen Bowen asked, ”Did it exceed 600,000? Or 900,000?”

Lin Sizhi nodded and said, ”It exceeded that.”

Shen Bowen’s expression shifted to one of genuine surprise and she said, ”So your community still couldn’t hold its core members together? Or were you just unlucky and ended up outside the core group?”

Lin Sizhi smiled with a touch of resignation and said, ”Unexpected things have a way of happening.”

Shen Bowen did not ask any further. She simply looked over the current community’s proposal contents again and continued frowning in thought.