Chapter 63: Strong Luck
Qi Xia licked his dry lips and picked up a chess piece from his hand.
Lin Qin's pupils instantly dilated when she saw it.
It was a white stone.
"Qi Xia... I can only speak lies... You must not trust me..." Lin Qin screamed in her heart, hoping for a miracle that would let Qi Xia hear her.
She was terrified now, afraid that his trust in her would cost him his life.
"Don't believe me..." Lin Qin repeated over and over in her mind.
Qi Xia pondered for a moment, but instead of asking a question, he picked up a black stone.
Lin Qin furrowed her brows. She knew that whether it was black or white, she could only give the opposite answer.
Qi Xia slowly raised the black stone, holding it in front of Lin Qin's eyes, and said, "Lin Qin, tell me..."
Lin Qin covered her mouth with her hand, on the verge of breaking down.
She absolutely did not want to tell Qi Xia, "This is a white stone," but if she didn't lie, the mechanism on her glasses would trigger.
Qi Xia seemed to sense something and said calmly, "Don't be nervous, Lin Qin. Keep your mind working. Nothing is over yet."
Lin Qin nodded in despair after hearing that.
Once he was sure her emotions were relatively stable, Qi Xia asked:
"Lin Qin, tell me—what color would Old Lü say this stone is?"
"Huh?"
Lin Qin and Old Lü were both stunned. Ren Zhu's eyes also shifted slightly.
"Listen carefully to my question, Lin Qin. I'll ask again." Qi Xia repeated, "What color would Old Lü say this stone is?"
Old Lü...?
Lin Qin turned to look at Old Lü, her mind racing.
The touch of her glasses was icy cold, meaning she must speak lies. And Ren Zhu hadn't lied so far, so his rule was absolute—Old Lü would tell the truth.
Thus, Old Lü would say this stone was "black."
Just as Lin Qin was about to blurt out "black," she suddenly realized something—
She was the one who had to lie, so she couldn't give Qi Xia the answer "black."
Even if Old Lü said "black," she would have to say "white."
In that case, wouldn't everything just come back to square one?!
The key point of this game wasn't Old Lü at all—it was her.
Lin Qin bit her lip and finally forced out two words: "White."
At that moment, she felt as though she had strangled the throat of "truth"—every truth that passed through her mouth would eventually become a lie.
Old Lü covered his forehead in frustration, feeling like everything was lost.
"White, huh..." Qi Xia turned his head, seeming to look at the piece in his hand, then the corner of his mouth lifted slightly. "I see."
Ren Zhu pondered for a moment and thought to himself, "What are you going to do, Qi Xia? The person you trust most just told you that the piece in your hand is white. What choice will you make?"
Qi Xia slowly set the black stone aside and picked up the white one instead.
He held the white stone forward and handed it to Ren Zhu.
"Oh? Have you made your choice?" Ren Zhu asked.
This time, Ren Zhu had learned from the previous round and deliberately kept his tone as flat as possible.
That way, Qi Xia wouldn't be able to judge the color of the piece from his voice.
"Yes, I've chosen," Qi Xia nodded. "But it's not the one in your hand. That white piece is yours."
"What?"
Qi Xia ignored Ren Zhu, instead gripping the black stone in his hand and said, "The black stone in my hand is 'life,' and the white stone in your hand is 'death.' Game over."
As everyone stared in stunned disbelief, Qi Xia slowly removed his blindfold.
Everything was exactly as he had predicted.
The only thing that felt a little off now was that his eyes were sensitive to the light after wearing the blindfold for so long.
"You..." Ren Zhu was trembling with agitation. "What kind of joke is this..."
Qi Xia opened his eyes and looked at Ren Zhu. "I'm betting my life with you—how could it be a joke?"
He then pointed at Lin Qin and Old Lü: "Let them go. A loss is a loss."
Ren Zhu stared wide-eyed for a long time, then sighed in frustration. He took a remote control from the drawer and pressed it absentmindedly.
Lin Qin and Old Lü heard a "click"—the mechanism on their glasses was deactivated.
The two quickly removed the deadly things and tossed them aside.
"Qi Xia! You son of a bitch, you really did it!!!" Old Lü shouted excitedly, walking over and slapping Qi Xia on the back. "Have you ever won the lottery? What kind of luck is this?!"
"Luck..." Qi Xia shook his head. "This life-or-death bet didn't rely on any luck at all. Ren Zhu just underestimated me."
Ren Zhu turned his head silently and said, "I underestimated you...?"
"That's right." Qi Xia straightened his clothes and slowly stood up. "I told you long ago—a smart man doesn't rely on luck. But you didn't take it to heart."
"So you're saying..." Ren Zhu also stood up in disbelief, "that everything just now... was all planned by you?"
"Yes." Qi Xia nodded. "My strategy was very simple. As long as you picked one black and one white stone for me, then I would win—and win with one hundred percent certainty, with no chance of any accident."
Ren Zhu's eyes widened, his pupils dilating.
This was the first time he had lost so completely since becoming a "pig."
"To make sure you would choose one black and one white smoothly, I specifically told you, 'It's easier for me to choose after you've chosen.'" Qi Xia reached out, picked up two black and two white stones from the table, and held them in his hands, as if simulating Ren Zhu's mental state at the time.
"You must have struggled with it for a while, right? In the end, you realized that no matter how you chose, giving me one of each was the safest option."
From behind his mask, Ren Zhu's voice came through, laced with disbelief: "You even calculated that..."
"Are you too cautious, or too careless?" Qi Xia weighed the two white stones in his hand. "If you had trusted your first instinct and given me two white stones, I would be dead by now."
Ren Zhu said nothing, just glared at Qi Xia with resentment.
Qi Xia continued, "When I had stones of both colors in hand, I could ask the question the way I just did and know the color of the stone in my hand with absolute certainty."
Lin Qin quickly thought it over.
A moment later, her mouth fell open.
The question Qi Xia had just asked was incredibly clever.
He had asked, "What color would the other person say this stone is?" Regardless of whether the person being asked spoke truth or lies, as long as Qi Xia held the black stone, the answer would always be "white."
When he asked Lin Qin, she knew Old Lü's answer was "black," but because she had to lie, she changed it to "white."
When he asked Old Lü, Old Lü would directly give Lin Qin's answer—"white."
And even if, hypothetically, the answer Qi Xia received wasn't "white" but "black," he would immediately know that the other stone in his hand was the correct one.