Yang Yuting also lowered her head in thought: "I can't figure out how trust is established between the imitator and the players in Community 1 either."

Li Renshu, who seemed to have pondered this question before, explained:

"I think there are two possibilities.

"The first possibility is that Zhong Yuanyuan is the passive party.

"As a clumsy imitator, she didn't hide herself well, and due to various reasons, she was exposed early on.

"Community 1 couldn't quickly decide how to deal with her, and under the monitoring of the entire community, the players collectively coerced the imitator into designing and revealing the game's secrets, turning the community into a black market.

"The second possibility is that Zhong Yuanyuan is the active party.

"She first established her core position within the community through some means and solidly bound at least five highly trustworthy key players to ensure she wouldn't be threatened by the community's resolutions.

"Then she passed a resolution within the community to evenly distribute visa time, binding everyone with interests.

"Finally, she revealed her hand, using both coercion and inducements to turn Community 1 into a black market."

Zheng Jie pondered: "It seems like the second possibility is more likely? After all, Zhong Yuanyuan is in the safest position in the game."

Cai Zhiyuan shook his head: "You can't be so sure. It could also be that other players voluntarily chose to protect her. After all, finding such an easily manipulated imitator isn't easy; they couldn't let her die easily in the game."

Wang Yongxin stroked his chin: "But in either case, we can be sure of one thing:

"For the imitator and players to cooperate and turn the community into a black market, the relationship must be one of power imbalance rather than equality.

"One strong, one weak—one side coercing the other makes the cooperation stable."

Some smart ones caught on to his implication: Community 17 doesn't have such fertile ground.

Currently, it appears that the average IQ of Community 17 is clearly higher than that of Community 1, even arguably higher than most of the communities seen so far.

In community confrontation, this is certainly good, but it also introduces a problem:

It's very difficult for a Community 17 imitator to gain the players' trust.

If the imitator isn't very smart, seeing the high average IQ of the community, they would be extremely cautious to hide their identity, not daring to expose themselves.

If the imitator is very smart, then they would hide themselves perfectly.

From the current analysis, it's likely the latter.

In the short term, players dare not openly search for the imitator; even if they look, they can't find them. For various reasons, the imitator doesn't want to or dares not massacre players for a reset.

Instead, everything has stalemated.

If 'finding the imitator' is a game of werewolf, other communities might have reached the endgame as soon as the game started.

The imitator is quickly exposed by accident or chooses to expose themselves.

But Community 17 has tenaciously played up to now, with no visible progress at all.

Jiang He looked at everyone, puzzled: "Since such a cooperation mechanism exists, shouldn't our community's imitator just come forward?

"We could open a black market too!

"With so many smart people in our community, revealing a bit of the game rules in advance could place us in an invincible position?"

With those words, the hall fell into an eerie silence.

Li Renshu looked at Fu Chen, smiling: "Fu Chen! Could it be that you are the imitator?"

Fu Chen was taken aback, then smiled: "Ah, yes, yes, I am. You've all found me out."

Li Renshu pressed on: "Then what's the next game? Spill it!"

Fu Chen spread his hands: "How should I know! I haven't even started designing it yet!"

Li Renshu asked earnestly: "Then when will it be ready?"

Fu Chen sighed: "You're more persistent than Walkway! Why not become the Walkway yourself?"

Everyone laughed. Clearly, it was a joke.

The imitator would never confess their identity willingly.

Wang Yongxin sighed: "Since it's hard for our community to establish such a cooperation mechanism, doesn't that put us at a disadvantage in future games?

"In this 'Matchmaking Game,' four other communities witnessed Community 1's black market incident besides us.

"Will they be inspired and adopt Community 1's approach when they return?

"Even though Zhong Yuanyuan is dead, Walkway could easily provide them with a new imitator.

"Community 1 players could easily coerce a new imitator to continue this model.

"In that case, whenever we enter the game, we might encounter an imitator who knows all the rules and players who have learned them in advance too.

"How do we even play the game then? No one would enjoy a situation where everyone has a script but us."

Jiang He nodded: "Exactly! So, our community's imitator, whoever you are, please step forward!

"It's for our shared benefit; we must cooperate now!"

Wang Yongxin glanced at Jiang He, hesitating to say more.

Jiang He's behavior was a bit silly because Community 17's imitator obviously wouldn't come forward; shouting was in vain.

But sometimes, community discussions need these somewhat silly remarks as a catalyst.

Otherwise, if everyone were smart, it'd be like a table full of riddle-speakers, just staring at each other, unable to play.

Cai Zhiyuan thought aloud: "The more we say, the more unbelievable it seems that Lawyer Lin could dismantle this black market.

"After all, 'the imitator could open a black market' is the biggest information gap.

"If not for realizing this, one might only suspect Gao Jialiang or Fang Wencong.

"Failing to kill Zhong Yuanyuan, the game wouldn't end and might drag oneself into danger instead.

"Lawyer Lin, how did you come up with this?"

Lin Sizhi looked at Cao Haichuan: "Actually, it was inspired by my chat with Officer Cao earlier.

"Officer Cao explained a lot about solving cases; simply put, the key to uncovering the imitator is deducing their motive through the game rules.

"For example, the motive in the 'Matchmaking Game' is easy to deduce: the diverse killing rules make 'I want to kill more to earn visa time' as clear as day.

"According to the game mechanics, in order to kill more, one has to quickly incite gender hatred and opposition.

"Without enough hatred, it's hard for a mutual harm spiral to form among male and female players in the last four hours, resulting in fewer deaths.

"Therefore, the imitator must use broadcasts to stir opposition early and, after the game enters the second phase where killing rules update, quickly kill to create fear.

"Wanting to kill quickly requires ample preparation.

"With this reasoning, the probability of finding the imitator greatly increases. 'Broadcasting early,' 'abnormal praise-to-criticism ratio,' these two clues made it easy for me to lock onto Community 1.

"I wasn't 100% sure, but in such conditions, the best possible effort had to be made to try."

The crowd followed his gaze to look at Cao Haichuan.

Cao Haichuan nodded: "I did explain my thought process, but being able to implement this strategy in a high-risk environment where you can't communicate with players from your own community and could die at any moment is indeed commendable."

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