God's Imitator

The ’Fool Card’ image showed a cartoon-style Western farmer bent over working, with a prominent giant ’fist’ gesture in an eye-catching position on the upper part of the card face.

The ’Sage Card’ image showed a Western merchant holding gold coins with a small mustache, with an open five-finger ’paper’ gesture in the prominent upper position.

The ’Thief Card’ image showed a thief wearing black night clothes and an eye mask, carrying a bundle, with a ’scissors’ gesture extending the index and middle fingers in the prominent position.

Overall, the cards in this game simply replaced ’rock-paper-scissors’ with ’fool’, ’thief’, and ’sage’ respectively, using these three types of cards to create two different decks but this also meant the sage deck would have a significant advantage.

Excluding the identical parts in the decks, the fool deck had two remaining ‘Fool Cards’, that is, ’rock’, while the sage deck had two remaining ‘Sage Cards’, that is, ’paper’.

Under normal play conditions, because paper beats rock, ’Sage Card’ facing ’Fool Card’ would inevitably see a significantly increased win rate.

The reason ’Rock Paper Scissors’ was considered a generally balanced game was because there were no restrictions on using the three moves but making them into cards and limiting the number of cards to just five would lead to enormous imbalance between decks.

If only considering deck strength, players should mindlessly choose the ’Sage Deck’.

On the large screen, the rule introduction continued.

[During the first hour ’practice period’ of the game, what players need to do is very simple:][Each round, players can collect a new deck (i.e., 5 new cards) beside the door.]

[You will be matched with other players in the ’Battle Room’ and proceed to the ’Battle Platform’ for combat.]

A three-dimensional image of the battle platform appeared on the large screen. It looked like a rectangular tabletop with very high black dividers in the middle and on both sides, blocking each side’s line of sight.

The two players could only see each other’s chest and above, unable to see specific hand movements.

On the player’s right side was a relatively large coin slot, presumably for depositing chips.

On the left side were two buttons, labeled [Return Coins] and [Start].

In the center was also a screen displaying the opponent’s specific chip deposit amount and previous match results.

[The two battling players go to both ends of the battle platform and respectively deposit chips into the coin slot. After both confirm everything is correct, each presses the ’Start’ button.]

[Otherwise, please press the ’Return Coins’ button to return chips.]

[In the first stage, there is only the most basic betting amount: 1000 chips per game. After entering the second stage, both sides can freely bet.]

[After the game officially starts, four prompt tones will sound. Please place the card you want to play in the designated area before the prompt tones end.]

[The battle platform will automatically check both sides’ compliance. If temporary card changes, late card plays, placing multiple cards, etc. occur, the match is invalid.]

[If both sides play cards compliantly, the black barrier will be removed, and both sides’ cards will automatically flip and confirm the result.]

[Cards that have been used will be automatically destroyed by the battle platform. Unused cards must also be placed in the recycling device beside the door for destruction before returning to the rest room. Any hoarding or transferring of cards is considered a violation.]

[To encourage players to actively play, when both sides’ chips are the 1000 minimum bet, the winner will ’receive an additional 1000 chips as a gift’. Please seize the opportunity!]

[After 1 hour, the game will enter the second stage. All players will be divided into 10 ’Sage Players’ and 30 ’Fool Players’ based on their first stage performance.]

[’Sage Players’ and ’Fool Players’ will permanently receive decks corresponding to their identities.]

[Players who obtain ’Sage Identity’ will activate some additional privileges.]

[At the same time, all players will enter the ’Game Hall’ and proceed with subsequent games through free matching.]

[Besides this, there are a small number of new rules in the second stage, which will be announced when the second stage begins.]

[These rules may allow players who continue to stay in the venue to earn more chips, or may cause players to lose everything. Please consider carefully!]

[This game strictly prohibits all violations and violent behavior. Violators will suffer instant death penalty.]

[Finally, the God’s Imitator who designed this game sends a small gift to each ’Fool’.]

[On the coffee table in the rest area, there is a gift box with a countdown.]

[After the countdown ends, it will automatically open, and players will additionally receive ’chips equal to 10% of their total visa time’ and a piece of game advice.]

[This advice is 100% reliable and practical.]

[But before that, if the wooden box suffers any damage, the chips inside will disappear into thin air.]

[Please remember, if you fall into difficulty, please make good use of ’the fool’s wisdom’.]

[The game will officially start in 10 minutes. Please change clothes and wear your oxygen masks properly, and prepare yourselves!]

The rule introduction finished, and the timer also changed to a 10-minute countdown.

This was the most precious thinking time before the game officially started.

Just from the first stage rules, this game was very safe, with no overly simple and brutal instant death penalties.

The only problem was that the debt was quite heavy.

Initially receiving 10,000 chips but bearing 30,000 in debt meant players had to earn 20,000 in the game to ensure they neither lost nor gained.

Considering expenses like oxygen replenishment, the pressure was even greater.

However, the good news was that the game had a setting similar to ’minimum security’. When both players only bet the minimum 1000 chips, the winner could receive an additional 1000 chips as a gift.

In this situation, the game would become positive-sum.

If there were enough game rounds and both sides could establish mutual trust to maximize the minimum security, it would still be sufficient to repay debt and achieve the goal of safely leaving.

Of course, Lin Sizhi also clearly knew this wouldn’t be so simple.

Because this game involved wearing masks throughout, although players from the same community participated, they weren’t easy to find. Players from different communities would deceive each other, and mutual trust wasn’t so easy to establish.

Moreover, winning players couldn’t possibly leave so readily. They would always want to win more.

If players couldn’t win enough chips in the game, they’d have to exchange their own visa time to fill this hole.

If the visa time gap was too large, they might also suffer instant death penalty when the game ended.

Additionally, after the game entered the second stage, there would be new rules, so how the situation would specifically develop remained unclear.

Lin Sizhi first came to the wardrobe and selected a men’s dress suit to change into.

These dresses had special designs with internal support frames that could produce obvious modification effects, making heavier people look trim while thinner people looked sturdy.

The oxygen masks also seemed to have voice changers.

Obviously, this was all to keep players unfamiliar with each other after entering the official game venue, avoiding same-community players smoothly meeting each other and teaming up, causing the game to enter a team state too early but completely preventing players from recognizing each other should be impossible under the existing rules.

These masks were different animal images. Lin Sizhi guessed each player’s mask should all be different, otherwise ’face collision’ situations would occur.

Lin Sizhi couldn’t find an animal that could better represent himself among these. After simple selection, he ultimately chose ’Owl’ as his oxygen mask.