God's Imitator

Sixth round. Zheng Chunhua met with Qin Cheng again.

”How are things on the patient side?” Zheng Chunhua asked.

Qin Cheng answered honestly, ”There’s one Infected player, but fortunately the other patients have been fairly cautious, so he hasn’t been able to spread it further.

”He’s already obtained medication, so the patients in Zone D should all be safe for now.

”How about your end?”

Zheng Chunhua said, ”I’ve managed to get three more bottles of Type M: two sealed, one opened.

”I can say with reasonable confidence that the price for Type M is around 1,400, and the other three types are indeed considerably cheaper.

”And as for Chen Guangming, he has no intention of selling me any Type M.”

Zheng Chunhua gave a brief account of his meetings with Chen Guangming and Bai Zhilan over the past two rounds.

”All things considered, it’s manageable. If Bai Zhilan brings more Type M next round, I’ll buy it all even if it costs a little more.”As long as there’s no large-scale spread of infection in Zone D, we should have enough.

”After all, each bottle holds five tablets, and three is enough to cure one Infected player.”

But Qin Cheng’s brow furrowed, and he fell into thought.

”Something isn’t right.

”Something is off.

”Uncle Zheng, the sample bottle Bai Zhilan gave you, can I have a look at it?”

Zheng Chunhua, not quite sure what he was getting at, handed over the opened bottle of Type M.

Qin Cheng tipped out one of the white tablets and held it in his palm for a close look.

Then he took out another tablet and examined it carefully as well.

”C18N04. These are all Type O tablets.

”Bai Zhilan was probing you.

”She may not be a cooperative player after all.”

Qin Cheng put the white tablets back into the bottle with a slight air of resignation.

Zheng Chunhua was taken aback, ”How can that be?”

He quickly took the bottle back and held the tablets up to examine them carefully. Sure enough, every tablet bore the formula C18N04, which meant they were not Type M at all, but Type O.

There was only one explanation: Bai Zhilan had deliberately swapped them out.

Zheng Chunhua said quickly, ”But I only bought that bottle at a very low price. I didn’t hold the tablets up and examine them closely.

”That shouldn’t have given anything away, should it?”

Qin Cheng shook his head and said, ”Actually, the fact that you were willing to buy the bottle at all has already said something.

”If you had absolutely no way of identifying the tablets, then when she offered you that already-opened bottle, the most logical response would have been to simply refuse.

”If you accepted, there are only two explanations.

”First, you cannot distinguish the tablets, but you are someone who trusts other players very easily.

”Second, you have a way of identifying the tablets.

”The second option is clearly more plausible. Bai Zhilan has almost certainly concluded that you have the ability to tell these tablets apart, and she has confirmed that you know their real-world counterparts, meaning you know their effects and side effects.”

Zheng Chunhua was stunned. When he had taken that bottle from Bai Zhilan, he had not thought about any of this.

He had simply assumed that as long as he did not deliberately hold the tablets up to the light and inspect the inscribed letters, he would not be giving anything away. But looking at it now, that reasoning had been far too simplistic.

”If she isn’t cooperating in good faith, does that mean she won’t sell me any Type M either?

”What should I do? Should I pretend I don’t know anything, or...”

Zheng Chunhua was increasingly uncertain.

Qin Cheng bowed his head in thought for a moment and said, ”I can’t think of a good solution right now.

”All you can do is keep up the act of not knowing, and try to get her to sell you a little more. But she may not take the bait.

”If we assume the worst, all we can do is hold on as long as possible.

”That means making the best use of the Type M we already have to save every patient we can.

”At that point it comes down to who runs out of resources first, us or the Sales players.

”After all, Chen Guangming saying he has fully opened up Zone C, and Bai Zhilan saying the Zone A Reviewer is buying large quantities of Type M, are both things that may not be true.”

Seventh round. Zheng Chunhua met with Bai Zhilan again.

”Hello, uncle!”

Bai Zhilan sat down across from him, looking just as cheerful and bright as before, radiating an air of warmth and friendliness.

But if she were genuinely the person she appeared to be, she could not possibly have deliberately swapped out the tablets to probe him.

Even so, following Qin Cheng’s advice, Zheng Chunhua did not confront her directly. He kept up the act of knowing nothing and asked, ”Did you bring the Type M?”

Bai Zhilan nodded, but did not take any bottles from her pocket.

”I did.

”But uncle, I can only sell it to you at 2,000 Medical Points per bottle.”

Zheng Chunhua’s expression hardened immediately. He looked at Bai Zhilan and said, ”You never had any intention of selling to me, did you?

”You’d do well to understand that as the Reviewer, I can meet with both Sales players. If you won’t sell, someone else will.

”You can’t honestly think you have me at your mercy?”

Bai Zhilan smiled, though compared to the sweet and guileless smile she had shown before, this one carried a great deal more behind it.

”Of course not, uncle. You shouldn’t be able to get any medication from the other Sales player either.

”At this point, why don’t we both speak plainly?

”About this game.”

Zheng Chunhua leaned back slightly as well and said, ”Go ahead.”

In truth, somewhere in the back of his mind, he had always known that the image Bai Zhilan had been projecting was almost impossible to encounter in this world, because a player like that would have been done in long ago in earlier games.

Even with new players joining at the start of the Second Stage, such players were unlikely to have ended up as ’Sales’ in a game like this.

And yet, in some corner of his heart, Zheng Chunhua had held onto a faint hope. If Bai Zhilan really was a new player, and a straightforwardly kind one at that, perhaps the best possible outcome in this game could be achieved more easily than expected.

But now, as expected, that hope had dissolved.

After Qin Cheng’s warning, Zheng Chunhua had not immediately called out Bai Zhilan’s pretence. Instead, he had tried to turn it against her, hoping to extract a few more bottles of Type M before she dropped the act.

But clearly, Bai Zhilan had seen through that as well.

”Uncle, I’ll be direct. You’ve almost certainly already worked out how to identify these medications, and you’ve also realised that Type M is the best one.

”Type O and Type F can also achieve complete pain relief and cure an ’Infected’ player, but both come with fairly serious side effects.

”For a Sales player, though, Type M has practically no profit margin.

”When I said I’d sell it to you at 2,000, that was also a lie. Because that exceeds the recommended retail range for this medication.

”Leaving the game with a violation on record means a percentage deducted from earnings, so that would still be a loss.

”In reality, I have no intention of selling any more Type M.

”I know what you want to say. You can also meet with the other Sales player, and they would sell you Type M, so whether I sell or not makes no difference, and selling would at least earn a small profit, whereas not selling means I can’t even recoup the Medical Points I put in at the start. Am I right?

”But I’m fairly confident already: the other Sales player won’t sell you any Type M either.”

Zheng Chunhua concentrated hard on keeping his expression neutral, but the surprise he felt inside was difficult to fully conceal.