God's Imitator

One week later.

The players gathered in the community hall and waited in quiet.

Lin Sizhi sat near the window, drinking coffee, quietly observing the expressions and reactions of the other players.

He found himself missing Wei Yinzhang a little.

If the community had an openly known Imitator, that person could at least occasionally share information with the other players, keeping everyone informed of the latest developments in the Gallery’s invitations. Many things would have been considerably simpler.

Take the current situation: if Wei Yinzhang were here, she would presumably have shared news about the ’Role-Play Game’ type with the others.

After receiving the game type invitation, Lin Sizhi had submitted the basic framework and format for ’Role-Play Games,’ and the Gallery had adopted it one day later.

The Gallery had then sent out a game design invitation to all Imitators, requiring them to design a game in the Role-Play format.

However, since Lin Sizhi was the designer of this game type, the rules barred him from participating in the design. He could not serve as both judge and contestant.

This first Role-Play Game would have to be designed by other Imitators. Subsequent ones would carry no such restriction.Lin Sizhi had no way of knowing what kind of design the other Imitators would produce, nor whether they would grasp the genuine intent behind this game type and deliver something that matched what he had envisioned.

But regardless, he was genuinely curious to see what answer the other Imitators would offer.

Before long, a broadcast notification appeared on the large screen, announcing that a game was opening.

[Good morning, players!]

[The Gallery will open in 15 minutes.]

[The name of this game is ’Jury Game,’ and the game type is ’Role-Play.’]

[This game will select 48 players from 8 communities to participate, and they may be assigned one of the following three roles:]

[1. Actor (4 players)] [Players will be compulsorily selected from four different communities, each contributing one player with a professional background similar to ’wealthy merchant, doctor, lawyer, or detective.’]

[2. Audience Representative (4 players)] [One player from each of the other 4 communities without an ’Actor’ will be compulsorily selected.]

[3. General Audience (40 players)] [Other players may voluntarily sign up, with 5 players per community.]

[This community’s Actor is: Lin Sizhi.]

[Please confirm the 5 audience members before the game begins. If more than 5 sign up, players will be selected at random.]

[Please make your preparations.]

A fifteen-minute countdown appeared on the large screen.

14:59... 14:58...

The invitation clearly caught everyone off guard.

”A Role-Play Game? What kind of game type is that? This has never appeared before, has it?” Ye Lin’s brow furrowed. She looked at Lin Sizhi, Shen Bowen, and Zhang Yan in turn, and received denials from all three.

Evidently this was an entirely new type, one that players from different regions had not encountered in the First Stage either.

”Role-play? Playing what?

”Acting?

”And this selection rule is unusual too. It’s directly filtering by professional background, with mandatory participation.

”Since the role is called ’Actor,’ does that mean you’re playing that profession in the game? Or playing some other identity?”

Ye Lin’s brow remained furrowed as she instinctively began analysing potential strategies.

Huang Shengjie also looked a little lost. He glanced at Lin Sizhi and asked, ”Brother Lin, you don’t tend to show much expression. Can you actually act?”

Qin Cheng looked at him and felt the question was somewhat obtuse, ”This round selects players based on specific professional backgrounds. So once Lawyer Lin enters, he should still be playing a lawyer.

”It would essentially be playing himself.

”He’d just need to behave the way he normally does at work.

”What I’m more interested in is what the specific game mechanics will look like.

”If there’s acting involved, will there be a script? If not, is it completely improvised? But then it’s hard to call it acting in any real sense.

”And if there is a script, how does strategy factor in?

”That seems like the more important question.”

Lu Bingjun clapped his hands lightly, ”Alright. Let’s settle down for a moment.

”The preparation time is fifteen minutes, which is neither particularly long nor short. Let’s first confirm who the audience members will be.

”Being inside the game may allow certain players to play a specific role.

”Even as part of the audience, there may be voting or suggestion phases.

”Five slots: does anyone particularly want to join? Lawyer Lin, what do you think?”

Lin Sizhi shrugged, ”Whoever goes is fine.

”If someone feels short on visa time and wants to take a chance, going as part of the audience shouldn’t carry too much risk.”

Ye Lin thought for a moment, ”I’ll go.

”Lawyer Lin should be more than capable of handling this game, but since his role is ’Actor,’ the mechanics may not allow him to communicate directly with the audience.

”The five audience members might be seated together, or they might be separated.

”If they’re together, having someone to provide a bit of direction might be useful.”

Qin Cheng looked at Huang Shengjie, ”Let’s go too. I’m very curious about this new game type.

”There’ll be a debrief afterward, but I think watching the details unfold in person would be more useful.”

Huang Shengjie’s mouth twitched slightly, ”What? Again?”

Since arriving in the new world, three games had taken place and he had participated in two of them. Neither had gone smoothly, and both had been full of complications.

Huang Shengjie’s instinct was to resist and take a rest. But seeing Qin Cheng’s expression, he found it hard to say no.

Zhang Yan also volunteered, ”I’ll sign up too. As a new player, I haven’t contributed much to the community yet. I should go and see more.”

Qin Cheng then turned to Lu Qi, ”You should come as well.”

Lu Qi blinked, ”Me?”

Qin Cheng nodded, ”Yes. For those of us who only joined in the Second Stage, visa time is already limited. The community is constantly adjusting how visa time is distributed among players to share the pain penalty, and having too little makes that very difficult to manage.

”New players especially need to be more proactive.

”And this time, two of the community’s core game players are going in with you, and we have the immunity voucher available. You’d have both safety and hands-on experience. This is exactly the kind of opportunity you should take.”

Ye Lin immediately agreed, ”Qin Cheng is right. Come along.”

Lu Qi hesitated, but ultimately gave a reluctant nod, ”Alright, fine.”

Several other players had clearly wanted to volunteer as well, but seeing the current list, they didn’t feel comfortable pushing for a spot and quietly let it go.

Lu Bingjun looked around at everyone, ”Good. The five voluntary audience slots are set: Ye Lin, Qin Cheng, Huang Shengjie, Zhang Yan, and Lu Qi.

”All of you are strong players in this community. Come back in one piece.

”Good luck.”

The five each raised a hand to register. Shortly after, the countdown on the large screen reached zero.

Six players disappeared from the hall.