Chapter 430: The Commander
After these words, Saturday, Luo Shiyi, and Qiu Shiliu also shot Qi Xia strange looks.
If it had been anyone else, Qi Xia's words would have been enough for them to retort, but Wang Ba was an exception. No one from the "Cat" team could be bullied by outsiders, but no one wanted to speak up for Wang Ba either.
"Am I sowing discord...?" Qi Xia nodded. "Alright, let's follow your train of thought. I have a few questions for you."
"What questions?"
"First, even if the teammates we send out each time can bring back at most three 'food' items, how can we ensure the 'satiety value' for all five of us?"
"I..." Wang Ba's eyes rolled. "This is just my preliminary plan. Later on, I'll send two people each time!"
"Two people?"
"Yeah, if both succeed, we get six fruits per round. Even if one fails, we still get three." Wang Ba emphasized. "I don't believe our luck is so bad that both 'mice' get caught by the cat."
"But from what we just saw, each room only has four fruits." Qi Xia squinted. "The first time a 'mouse' can take three fruits, but starting from the second visit to that room, he can take at most one. Even if we ignore the probability of failure and both people bring back fruits, that's still a maximum of two. And we have five people. Who do you decide 'starves'?"
"Moreover..." Qi Xia shifted his tone and continued, "We can't even be sure that the remaining rooms all have four fruits."
Hearing this, Wang Ba scratched his head. After thinking it over carefully, he realized it was indeed a problem.
"I, I just came up with this plan on the spot! It's definitely not that perfect. That's why we're discussing it!" After saying this, Wang Ba glanced at the others, seemingly hoping someone would speak for him. "I'm just trying to keep my teammates alive, isn't that the right direction?"
"That's exactly my second point." Qi Xia said. "If you send out a single 'mouse' and he doesn't come back, where do you plan to rescue him?"
"The 'Cat House'!" Wang Ba said. "Is there a problem?"
"No problem. But what if he's been caught by a 'mousetrap'?"
"This..."
Wang Ba suddenly remembered that a 'mouse' caught by a 'mousetrap' would be locked in the room until a teammate came to rescue him or the 'cat' took him away.
"Given the current situation, when the 'cat' is active, we get locked in our rooms. How do you determine whether our teammate was taken by the 'cat' or trapped in the room he was searching?" Qi Xia held up five fingers. "There's a 50% chance of being wrong. Are we going to guess? Once we guess wrong, there will be a chain reaction. We might lose another teammate in the next round, and then we have to choose to 'rescue' again. Each rescue attempt has a 50% success rate. Are you willing to gamble on that?"
Hearing Qi Xia throw out such a rapid-fire analysis in such a short time, Wang Ba's expression gradually darkened.
"Fine... even... even if you think a lot..." Wang Ba gritted his teeth. "Even if you're better than me... then tell us what we should do?"
"Since you don't have a plan, you'll have to listen to my command." Qi Xia said. "In the first round, we send out four people directly to 'search,' targeting any four rooms."
"Four people...?" Saturday found it hard to understand. "Tsk, one person or five people, I can understand the point... but what's the significance of four?"
"We 'mice' need a 'commander'..." Qi Xia said. "This game has a typical blind spot. Due to the 'prisoner's dilemma,' each of us 'mice' loses contact with the others after entering a room. So we can't confirm what's happening in the other mice's rooms. This makes it very difficult for us to make decisions starting from the second round."
"What, tsk...?" Saturday was stunned. "Prisoner's dilemma?"
"Yes. If a 'mouse' doesn't come back the next day, we can't determine where to 'rescue.' The groundhog already thought of this, which is why he wants us to 'rescue each other.' He knows that whether we succeed or fail in the rescue, it's not good for us." Qi Xia said. "Luckily, you're a well-coordinated team. If we were all strangers, with some wanting to rescue and others not, it would probably be even more complicated."
Luo Shiyi was silent for a moment, then asked, "So what do you mean by a 'commander'...?"
"We need one 'mouse' who doesn't take any action to oversee the whole field." Qi Xia said. "This 'mouse' will be our eyes and our control center, responsible for watching every move of the 'cat.'"
"Huh?" The few of them were taken aback at once. The statement felt strange, but they couldn't quite put their finger on why.
"Wait, wait a second..." Wang Ba spoke up first. "That's not right... How is he supposed to watch the 'cat's' activities? According to what you're saying... to know all the 'cat's' movements, he'd have to stand in the hallway and watch which room the cat enters. But none of the three options for us 'mice' include standing in the hallway."
Qi Xia acted as if he hadn't heard anything, his gaze shifting from Wang Ba's face. He then asked the others, "Is there anyone who can ask a question that uses their brain?"
"You..." Wang Ba glared at Qi Xia angrily. "Just answer me!"
"Um..." Qiu Shiliu also felt it was a bit unreliable. "Assuming we really could stand in the hallway and watch the 'cat'... how would this 'mouse' act as the 'commander'?"
"That's easy." Qi Xia replied. "Other teams would naturally exchange information after returning to the 'mouse house' on the second night. But we have a more convenient method..."
Qi Xia turned to look at Saturday. "As long as Saturday is here, we should be able to get the 'cat's' whereabouts immediately."
"Tsk, using 'telepathy'...?" Saturday frowned. "I've never used 'telepathy' in a game before... I don't know if there would be a problem..."
"Problem...? I want to know the specific limitations of your 'telepathy.'" Qi Xia said. "Can you communicate with the four of us from any corner?"
"Tsk, saying it that way... it's not wrong." Saturday nodded. "So I'll be the 'commander'?"
"No." Qi Xia shook his head. "Anyone can be. As long as you can talk to the 'commander,' in theory, you can spread the information to all of us."
Saturday nodded, half-understanding.
"We'll choose one person each night to stand in the hallway as the 'commander,' and the other four will go out to search for food." Qi Xia continued. "The 'commander's' job is to determine which room the cat enters and which person the cat takes away. Then, the remaining 'mice' will rescue them in the second round."