Chapter 163: A Battle of Wits and Courage
The game began.
As a game of "combat," Ground Chicken pushed the concept of "combat" to its absolute limits.
On one side, a battle of wits; on the other, a battle of courage.
If either side made a single mistake at any point, both would surely die.
In the oppressive atmosphere, the girl across from him spoke first.
"Do you want to draw first, or should I?"
"Doesn't matter," Qi Xia said. "You go first."
The girl nodded, picked up a card, but didn't look at its contents. She simply placed it face down in front of herself.
Qi Xia also reached out and drew a card, placing it face down in front of him.
Neither of them looked at their cards as they drew. Their eyes were locked on each other the entire time.
This card game was now a matter of life and death, so the psychological battle had already begun during the drawing phase.
They took turns placing cards in front of themselves, revealing no openings.
Inside the glass room, Dr. Zhao and the tall young man both watched the scene, nervously swallowing their saliva.
After each had drawn five cards, Qi Xia picked his five cards up, slowly opened them, and took a look.
The situation was extremely unfavorable.
Shield, rock, rope, rope, rope.
They were called "weapon cards," but judging by the card faces, they might as well have been from the Stone Age.
He slowly closed his cards together and once again looked up at the girl before him.
The girl's expression remained unchanged. She also glanced at her cards briefly before lifting her head to meet Qi Xia's gaze.
"My name is Qi Xia. What should I call you?"
"Su Shan," the girl replied.
"Shan?" Qi Xia found the name a bit interesting. "The 'Shan' in 'shining'?"
"Yes," the girl confirmed.
"Pleasure to meet you." Qi Xia gave a perfunctory nod, then looked at the deck on the table.
Right now, he had one rock and three ropes in his hand. It was possible that the deck contained a higher proportion of "rock" and "rope" cards.
If that was the case, then among so-called "weapon cards," the more lethal the card, the rarer it must be.
"Stick" should be even rarer than "rock," and "knife" should be the rarest of all.
Of course, there was a second possibility—that all cards were equal in number, and he was simply unlucky.
So... what cards had this girl named Su Shan drawn?
Was she in the "Stone Age" too?
Did she have a "knife"?
Did she have two "life cards" and one "death card"?
"If you two have decided, please play your cards!" Ground Chicken interrupted their train of thought, reaching out to knock on the table.
Qi Xia thought for a moment, silently placed a card face down on the table, and then looked up to ask, "Su Shan, is there a possibility..."
"What?"
"That we use up all our cards, but the game doesn't end, so it's considered a 'draw'?"
"Would it?" Su Shan replied noncommittally, then placed a card face down in front of her. "A draw... that would be best, wouldn't it?"
"So let's both be gentle. There's no need to kill each other," Qi Xia said.
"Fine." Su Shan nodded and pushed her face-down card forward.
Qi Xia nodded as well and pushed one of his own cards forward.
Cards had been played.
Dr. Zhao and the young man named Zichen were so tense they could barely breathe. Seeing the two of them calmly choose their cards from a distance, they immediately rushed under the ceiling and stared up at the opening above.
This was where their first "weapon" would drop.
"Please reveal your cards," Ground Chicken said.
As soon as the words fell, Qi Xia and Su Shan simultaneously flipped over the cards in front of them.
At the same time, the two openings above Dr. Zhao and Zichen's heads opened, and dark objects fell down.
The two of them frantically scrambled to pick up their "weapons." But Dr. Zhao was instantly dumbfounded.
What had fallen was a "rope."
He immediately grabbed the rope, then turned around abruptly, only to see that ten paces away, the one-meter-nine young man was slowly picking up a chopping knife that had fallen to the ground.
"Ah!" Dr. Zhao let out a heart-wrenching scream. "What the hell is this?! Qi Xia, are you fucking with me?!"
Without a second thought, he ran to the glass wall, slapping it with the rope. "Qi Xia! Are you fucking with me?!"
Fortunately, the glass wall appeared to be custom-made and was very sturdy. No matter how hard Dr. Zhao slapped it, not a single crack appeared.
Qi Xia frowned slightly.
So the other side had drawn a "knife."
Because she anticipated that he wouldn't play a "shield" in the first round, she went all in on the "knife"?
Qi Xia took a deep breath and said, "It's certainly not wrong to use rock-paper-scissors logic to play this game. Unfortunately, there are other things to consider."
"Like what?" Su Shan asked.
"Like... the human heart."
At that moment, Ground Chicken picked up a walkie-talkie beside him and spoke into it. "First round, please let the 'fighters' begin."
A broadcast sounded in the room where Dr. Zhao and Zichen were.
The ten-second countdown beside them also began.
"B-begin?" Dr. Zhao stumbled backward several steps upon hearing this.
"Ahhhhh!" Zichen shouted to bolster his own courage, stepping forward with the chopping knife in hand.
Dr. Zhao gripped the rope tightly, his entire body trembling.
He knew he wasn't Wong Fei-hung—he couldn't use a rope to whip the knife out of the other man's hand.
The other man's height and weight completely surpassed his own, and now he had a more powerful "weapon" to boot. How was he supposed to fight?
"I... I!" Zichen was trembling uncontrollably, the knife in his hand shaking. He didn't seem much better off than Dr. Zhao.
"D-don't do anything rash!" Dr. Zhao shouted, his voice tinged with tears. "You're committing murder!!"
"I know!! Even if I kill you... I have to... I have to..." Zichen gritted his teeth and kept walking forward.
But he simply couldn't bring himself to do it.
Imagine locking a normal person in a glass room, handing them a knife, and telling them that if they don't kill, they will die.
How many times would an average person manage to swing the knife within ten seconds?
The answer is: not even once.
Qi Xia stared expressionlessly through the glass wall at the tall man.
Ten seconds was simply too short.
Due to "catastrophe bias," the man hadn't yet built up enough psychological preparation. He still thought the situation couldn't possibly be that bad.
But little did he know that Su Shan had planned everything well in advance. She had moved past the "catastrophe bias" phase and devised a perfect strategy, intending to go all out from the very start, trying to win the game in one decisive blow.
There was a disconnect in the other side's cooperative thinking.
Or rather, their IQs were on completely different levels.
Playing a "knife" as the first card was the best possible move in a "battle of wits." That card would cut off the opponent's reaction time. If the glass room had contained two mindless virtual avatars, Qi Xia would have already lost.
But unfortunately, the human heart is complicated.
The ten seconds passed in the blink of an eye. The action time was over.
In those ten seconds, the young man named Zichen had done nothing besides take three steps forward.
That was the full extent of what a normal person could manage.
"Please both of you discard your items into the opening," Ground Chicken said into the walkie-talkie.
"Zichen... you!" The girl slammed the table in frustration, looking extremely unwilling. "How could you be so stupid!!"
Qi Xia shook his head helplessly. There was no need to mention that the young man inside looked at most twenty years old. Even if it were the battle-hardened Zhang Shan in there, there was no guarantee he could have killed the other person decisively in the first round.
Zichen, looking regretful, slowly tossed the chopping knife back into the opening, then angrily slapped himself several times.
Dr. Zhao, feeling as if he had narrowly escaped death, tremblingly threw the rope away as well.