God's Imitator

Three days later.

A broadcast announcing a new game appeared in Community 2’s hall.

[Good morning, everyone.]

[The Gallery will open in 5 minutes.]

[The name of this game is ‘Trust Marketplace’. The game type is Elimination.]

[The offender player from this community required to participate is: Wen Wan.]

[You may designate three players from this community to act as audience members, entering the game together to provide assistance.]

[The first designated player will become the Audience Representative. Please choose a player you ’trust absolutely and mutually.’]

[The remaining two designated players will become Regular Audience Members. Please choose players you ’trust relatively, with a certain degree of capability.’]

[In this game, audience members carry no risk of death.][If selections are not completed before the game begins, players will be randomly drawn from the community.]

[Please select your audience members as soon as possible and prepare yourselves.]

The new broadcast set off an immediate stir throughout the room.

”An Elimination-type game!”

Lu Bingjun’s brow furrowed deeply, ”So it’s finally arrived.”

In truth, many players had already had a sense this was coming, even before this particular announcement.

The game types that had appeared so far in the second stage were, in order: Selection, Judgment, Distribution, and Role-Play. By that pattern, an Elimination-type game was logically next in line.

Elimination-type games, defined by extremely high mortality rates and the primary goal of eliminating players, had already appeared during the first stage.

Now that the second stage had pushed the overall intensity higher, there was no reason to expect this type of game to simply disappear. It was bound to resurface eventually.

No one had been hoping to see it, but now that it had arrived, there was no choice but to accept it.

Wen Wan’s face had gone completely pale, as though she’d been run through with a blade. She sat frozen in her seat, unable to move, struggling to come to terms with the reality of it.

Zhou Wanlin quickly gripped her shoulders and gave her a firm shake, ”Stay with me! You need to choose your three audience members right now, or it’ll be random!”

Wen Wan forced herself back to focus, her eyes sweeping across the room.

Huang Shengjie felt a genuine wave of sympathy for her, a feeling he could relate to directly.

If he were honest with himself, if he suddenly discovered a game invitation had named him specifically, and for a dangerous Elimination-type game no less, he might well react in exactly the same way.

It was, in effect, death reaching out to introduce itself in person.

Even so, once he’d calmed down a little, Huang Shengjie found himself curious how Wen Wan would actually choose her three players.

The invitation had already specified that the Audience Representative should ideally be someone she ’trusted absolutely and mutually,’ while Regular Audience Members should be people she ’trusted relatively, with a certain degree of capability.’

Invitations like this were generally understood to be truthful, without any deliberately misleading information baked in, which was thought to be part of the Gallery’s underlying rules.

Huang Shengjie thought it through. If he were in Wen Wan’s position, this is roughly how he imagined he might choose.

For Audience Representative, he’d probably pick Zhou Wanlin.

Based on how things had played out in the community so far, both Wen Wan and Zhou Wanlin came across as the type who simply got on with everyday life, and the two of them seemed reasonably close. When Wen Wan had experienced pain in the community for the first time, it was Zhou Wanlin she had turned to for comfort.

For the Regular Audience Members, Huang Shengjie suspected she would likely choose Lin Sizhi or Lu Bingjun.

The reasoning behind choosing Lin Sizhi hardly needed explaining. He was currently the strongest player in the entire community, and having someone of that calibre as an audience member would offer a measure of reassurance.

And among the two factions that had started to form in the community, Wen Wan seemed, relatively speaking, closer to Lu Bingjun’s side.

It hadn’t been especially obvious, but judging from her reaction to Deng Xiao’s death in ‘A Single Word to Settle a Case’, and from how she had engaged in the community’s day-to-day discussions, if forced to choose between Lu Bingjun and Ye Lin, Wen Wan would likely lean toward Lu Bingjun.

So Huang Shengjie’s instinctive guess was: Zhou Wanlin, Lin Sizhi, Lu Bingjun.

Using two of the community’s three core game players at once felt somewhat extravagant, but given how dangerous an Elimination-type game was, everyone would surely understand.

The five-minute window was painfully short, and Wen Wan was forced to make her decision under real pressure.

”I choose, Lu Qi, Ye Lin, and Huang Shengjie.”

Hearing his own name, Huang Shengjie was visibly caught off guard.

”Wait, me?”

Even more startled than Huang Shengjie was Lu Qi, who pointed at herself, momentarily too stunned to even ask a question.

Ye Lin also looked mildly surprised. Her brow furrowed as she said, ”If you’re certain you want me involved, of course I’ll do everything I can to help.

”But you should think it over once more. Are you sure about the three of us? There might be better choices.

”To be honest, I don’t think I’m the strongest of the three core players.”

Wen Wan seemed to have steadied herself somewhat from her earlier shock. Visible fear still lingered on her face, but she gave a firm, deliberate nod.

”Yes. The three of you. I’ve already made up my mind.

”Lu Qi, no matter what, you’re the person in this entire community I trust the most. And I believe the same is true the other way around, that you trust me the most too. Don’t you?”

The question caught Lu Qi off guard, and she looked genuinely uncertain, ”I suppose, maybe? But how would either of us really know that for sure, I don’t,”

Wen Wan cut her off, ”It doesn’t matter. The way you just reacted says everything I need to know. I trust you.

”Once we’re in the game, just trust me unconditionally in return.

”Can you do that? I believe you can.”

Lu Qi still looked uncertain, but gave an instinctive nod anyway, ”Yes. I can do that.”

Wen Wan turned to look at Huang Shengjie and Ye Lin, ”There’s no time left to explain things properly, so all I can say is, please, I’m counting on you. All right?

”Whatever happens in this game, I’ll take responsibility for my own decision.

”Especially you, Shengjie. I trust you. I trust you a great deal.”

She took hold of both of Huang Shengjie’s hands, her eyes glistening with tears.

Huang Shengjie, momentarily at a loss for how to respond, could only manage, ”I, I’ll do everything I can!”

The other players clearly weren’t entirely in agreement with Wen Wan’s choices, and some looked genuinely puzzled by the decision.

But her resolve was unmistakable. This was a choice she had made after real thought, and she was completely certain of it.

So there was little room left to argue.

Lu Bingjun offered some reassurance, ”Just do your best, all of you.

”Our community still has the Death Exemption Ticket. If anyone’s life is genuinely at risk, we will use it without a moment’s hesitation. You can all be assured of that.”

No one had the chance to say anything further, because the five-minute countdown on the large screen had already reached zero.

Wen Wan, Lu Qi, Ye Lin, and Huang Shengjie vanished from the hall.

The remaining players settled back into their seats, visibly uneasy, waiting for the screen to update with the detailed rules of the game.