Deceitful Game

Chapter 7 I'll Bet My Life With You

The voice coming from under the fish mask was that of a somewhat lazy young man, who seemed to be half asleep.

"you……"

Suddenly scolded, the raccoon frowned and wanted to scold back.

"The farce is over, you idiots. I'm truly saddened by your low intelligence."

Before the raccoon could say anything, the fish interrupted him directly: "If you do a little probability calculation, you can figure out the result. With seven of us voting, the final total number of results is 2 to the power of 7, which is 128 possibilities."

"According to the plan the rabbit mentioned, we set the majority to M, and require M to eventually be an even number, that is, M=4 or M=6. In this case, plus the fact that the number of narrators is exactly odd, a steady state is reached. I just did a rough calculation, and these two possibilities add up to 84. This probability is approximately 65.6%, which is the probability of us surviving this round of voting."

At this point, Mr. Fish pushed up the center of his mask.

That's where the glasses should have been.

"But what if we happen not to have chosen that possibility?"

He countered, "You know, there are 42 possibilities for M=5, which is a full third. Hmph... 42, the ultimate answer of the universe."

Fish chuckled and continued, "At that time, two people died, and we would still have six people left. The game would then proceed to the next round. Because there are five voters, there are 32 possibilities left."

"Let's say the majority in the second round of voting is M1. When M1=5, the next narrator dies, and the two eliminated in the previous round make up the total of three. When M1=4, we enter a steady state, and the number of deaths is still one, plus the total of three from the previous round."

"When M1=3, we will still eliminate two more people, leaving four people, and the game will enter the final round. By this time, we have already killed four people."

"Now do you understand, you idiots? I have no idea what you're playing at."

Fish pushed up his glasses again and said calmly, "In other words, when M=4, there are three dead; when M=5, there are at least three dead; when M=6, there is one dead. This seems to be the best possibility... but unfortunately, there are only 14 possibilities, and the probability is only 10.9%."

By the time he finished speaking, Lin Ya's face had turned pale.

She was trembling, her body shaking uncontrollably.

Because she was very smart... when she heard this, she already realized what a huge mistake she had made.

"That means when M=7, the narrator is eliminated."

Yu chuckled coldly and slowly said, "There are only two possibilities. According to normal randomness, the probability of achieving this is only 1.5%. M=6 and M=7 together have a total of 16 possibilities, with a probability of exactly 12.5%—this is the possibility of the 'least victim' that we can only achieve through randomness."

"It's very small, isn't it? But there's another possibility... We just need to make a choice, and we're guaranteed to succeed. Its success rate is 100%."

At this point, he slapped the armrest on his right hand forcefully.

He looked arrogantly at the soft-spoken raccoon and commanded, "Listen, no random selection. Everyone, choose red now."

"If the wolf randomly gets red, then we eliminate the rabbit; if the wolf randomly gets blue, then we eliminate the wolf, and we will still win."

He looked up at Mingpo, avoiding eye contact, his eyes filled with the arrogance of a genius.

Listen, wolf.

The fish warned, "If you don't want to die, choose red with us."

"This is the real winning formula!"

--Wonderful!

The host, sitting in the center of the table, exclaimed inwardly.

That's pure data, absolute logic.

At the same time... it is also a clever sophistry.

In his chaotic and confusing logical calculations involving various numbers, algebra, and probabilities, the premise of "not intentionally killing anyone" had somehow vanished without a trace.

By comparing the success rate of "backstabbing the negotiator" with that of "fair competition based on merit," he is attempting to confuse the two concepts.

Fish's arrogant and haughty demeanor, along with the massive amount of data he piled up, was merely a way to create a "genius" persona, fool the crowd, and get by.

—Yes, to fool them.

Because no matter how much he argues, he cannot change one important fact:

That's the strategy, which is essentially the same as the "dog's" strategy at the beginning!

By banding together to avoid betrayal, they first eliminate the narrator. The dogs hope this process will continue indefinitely, constantly reducing the number of those ahead of them. This conspiracy is so easily exposed that it was discovered by the people.

But fish are a bit more sophisticated—

In even-numbered draws, the premise for a tacit agreement to tie is that everyone believes everyone else will do the same.

This kind of trust relationship without any guarantees is precarious.

As soon as people realize that others might betray them, everyone will fall into a standard prisoner's dilemma!

In other words: if you believe that others will tie, then everyone will tie and everyone will survive; if you choose to betray, then you will definitely survive and receive more rewards; if you believe that others will tie but are betrayed, then you will be executed.

The host has been running this deceptive game for almost ten years.

He certainly knew that in the Prisoner's Dilemma, the expectation of "mutual trust" is optimal when playing countless rounds; but in the case of playing only once, betrayal is definitely the best option.

Therefore, if the fish's plan succeeds, he will definitely betray him in the next round!

His plan was to use this backstab in the end of the draw to drastically reduce the number of survivors, thereby directly securing victory!

That's why he can't accept the possibility of "random failure".

Even if that possibility is only one in three.

but……

The host looked at the fish with great interest.

The only problem is that "Fish" overlooked one point.

The other people at the table weren't fools either.

From God's perspective, the host sees it very clearly:

If the rabbit is eliminated, the wolf will be the narrator in the next round.

Starting from the position closest to the wolf, to the wolf's left are a fox, a fish, and a red panda, and to the wolf's right are a bear, a raccoon, and a butterfly.

The fox beside the fish, and the butterfly and bear opposite him, are all intelligent beings. They all realize that they have fallen into a prisoner's dilemma.

This situation differs from the Prisoner's Dilemma in that if your teammates do not choose to betray, but many on the opposing side do, you will die!

The more people who betray you, the greater your advantage becomes!

Once the chain of suspicion—"Guess if I'm backstabbing you?" or "Guess if you're backstabbing me?"—is established, his conspiracy becomes meaningless. After all, nobody here knows anyone, and everyone is wearing masks, making it impossible to read between them. They'll then be dragged into a hell of mutual suspicion and relying on luck to kill each other.

—Somewhat clever, but not much.

However, he's still a promising talent. After all, he's a newcomer to the Deceitful Game for the first time, and the courage and plan he had to step forward and take action are already quite impressive. If it were a Deceitful Game from previous years, he might actually have been able to set things up.

If the fish survives, it can probably develop quite well after a few more rounds of gameplay and upgrading its title.

If you can upgrade to the "Zhou Zhiqingqian" level and obtain the game design rights... with a little more careful operation, you can continuously plunder the time-related chips from others.

After all, although the fish's strategy was nothing more than sophistry and had huge flaws, it was indeed useful.

Because he doesn't need to intimidate everyone.

If enough people are fooled by him, then the needs of the "majority" are automatically met.

It's like an election—

Even if smart people realize the problem, he can still win as long as he fools a larger number of fools.

Speaking of which... the quality of these unjustly deceased at this table is really quite good.

The host sighed inwardly.

Unexpectedly, in the qualifying rounds, a group of newcomers who weren't even "Time's Red Copper" managed to pull off moves at the level of "Sun's Pseudo-Gold" or even "Zhou's Clear Lead"! Even "Bear" and "Butterfly" couldn't get the better of them.

It's a bit of a pity—if he had known they were of such high caliber, he would have chosen a game with a higher survival rate for the selection competition. It's been a long time since any high-level Deceivers have emerged from among the unjustly deceased he signed contracts with.

Normally, we might only get one person here every few years, but this year we had several at one table...

With that in mind, the host turned his attention to Mingpo, continuing to record and not missing a single detail.

How will the "wolf" respond to the "fish's" bluff?

"Wait a moment."

Mingper raised his hand, signaling people to stop voting.

Although some people immediately cast red after hearing what the fish said, others with keen intuition were still hesitant.

They vaguely sensed that something was wrong—for example, the raccoon and the red panda.

Upon hearing Mingpo's words, the two of them breathed a sigh of relief as if they had been liberated, and looked at the wolf in position three and the fish in position six.

Mingpo spoke gently, asking the fish with interest, "What's your name?"

"I am Mo Qian."

The fish said indifferently, "You may have heard of me."

"Sorry, no."

Mingpo answered without hesitation.

"..."

The fish, having been rebuffed, remained silent for a moment, then retorted angrily, "What exactly do you want to do?"

"It's nothing," Mingpo simply smiled, showing no sign of nervousness. "I was just reminding you, great genius..."

"Don't forget, I'm next."

"And then there's—"

"The fish said impatiently."

But before he could finish speaking, his pupils suddenly contracted!

He had already realized the problem.

But, it's too late!

"I can indeed vote along with you guys and cast the rabbit, then we'll have a draw."

Mingpo said slowly.

"However... since everyone has decided to do this, it means that none of us consider switching votes a betrayal, right?"

The blood-stained wolf head looked so eerie at that moment: "Then, in my next round... I will no longer prohibit any form of vote-switching."

"In the next round, everyone can vote for whoever they want. You can all vote for one side and even vote me out, as long as you're not afraid of another non-peaceful round where someone will definitely die. I propose that even if someone changes their vote, they don't need to be jointly punished by everyone in the next round… After all, we've already done our part, haven't we?"

"Anyway, all I want is randomness, so I don't mind having a different kind of fun."

"Since people don't like the 66% survival rate, let's change it to 50%. That would be fairer."

Looking at the sweating fish, Mingpo said gently, "What do you think, Mr. Mo?"

He leaned forward slightly, while the fox, startled, leaned back as if afraid of accidentally blocking the wolf's view of the fish.

"To be fair..."

Just then, Old Man Xiong, who hadn't spoken since finishing his narration, suddenly spoke up.

At this point, his speech no longer contained much of a dialect accent, but instead became much more normal Mandarin.

The old man spoke in a low, kind tone, but with a sarcastic tone: "Will the first person to advocate for the election of peace be able to resist the temptation of profit and remain steadfast in the path of peace?"

"You know... the fewer people there are, the bigger the reward..."

Upon hearing Old Man Xiong's words, the atmosphere immediately became tense.

The butterfly looked at the bear in astonishment.

—He actually said it!

In contrast to the rabbit, which advocates trust.

Finally, Xiong revealed the rule that "the fewer the survivors, the greater the reward for clearing the level," a rule that no one had mentioned at the beginning, or rather, "deliberately hadn't mentioned at all," in a blatantly obvious way.

The core of this game lies here, and it's the key reason why the rabbit's plan will definitely fail—that is, the fewer people there are, the greater the reward, and those who are betrayed cannot retaliate.

"Or, everyone. I have another idea... I'll give you one last 'chance for peace'."

Mingpo spoke softly, patted the left armrest, and switched her color from red to blue.

"Now we're back to equilibrium—you chose red, I chose blue, so our probabilities are equal. Everyone else is random. Since it's random, it's fate that killed us, not you."

"Of course, you can secretly change your votes manually, I don't care. But you'll have to bear the consequences."

Mingpo pointed to the trembling fish, her voice trembling without the slightest tremor or even a hint of nervousness: "Come on, Mr. Mo."

"I'll bet my life against you, are you in or not?"