Chapter 433: Food Control
"Huh...?" Saturday didn't quite understand what Qi Xia was getting at. "What are you planning...?"
"I'm going to trigger a bout of 'Rage,'" Qi Xia said. "Right before the 'daytime period' ends, you'll tell her exactly what I said. Because Qiu Shiliu is emotionally unstable and her 'Echo' is useless, she's the first one I'm giving up on. That's the leader's decision."
"Tsk, are you sure...?" Saturday paused. "From what I know about Shiliu, 'betrayal' is the kind of thing that would absolutely infuriate her..."
"Good if it infuriates her to death." Qi Xia gave a nod of agreement, then turned around and said to Wang Ba, "Sorry for the harsh words earlier, but I should know what kind of person you are now. Starting from now, I'll lay out my real plan for all of you one by one. Please follow my arrangements."
"You..."
"This 'game' isn't just about training," Qi Xia said. "First, I want to win. Second, I want all of you to achieve 'Echo.' Third, I want you to know what I'm capable of. Fourth, I want to take down 'Dishu.'"
After hearing Qi Xia's words, the three of them could only look at each other in bewilderment. This man before them seemed normal, but was he actually a madman?
A normal person entering a tier-4 game wouldn't even dare to say "I want to win"—they'd only say "I want to survive." Yet he had laid out four objectives in one breath, expecting to accomplish all of them in this hazy, confusing game.
"H-Hold on, forget the others for now..." Luo Shiyi frowned at Qi Xia. "You just said you want to take down 'Dishu'...?"
"Yes." Qi Xia nodded. "I've roughly figured out how to ensure everyone survives and wins this game, but at the final moment... I want to corner Dishu. I'll need your help for that."
Luo Shiyi felt his brain had ground to a halt. From the moment they'd finished hearing the rules until now, less than twenty minutes had passed.
Since everyone had twenty minutes, why was it that this man named Qi Xia could think so much?
"Luo Shiyi." Qi Xia called out, then looked at the pomegranate in his hand. "Are you sure there was only one fruit in your room?"
"I'm sure." Luo Shiyi nodded. "When I went in, there was only one pomegranate on the plate."
Qi Xia turned to look at the other two. "What about you two? How many fruits were in your rooms?"
"Four little tangerines," said Liu. "Those little tangerines really stressed me out. I could grab them all with one hand, but I could only take three."
Wang Ba was silent for a moment, then said, "You've all seen my room. Four dragon fruits. I took three too."
Qi Xia looked at the three peaches in his own hand and felt this was bad news—the total number of fruits probably wasn't enough for five people to survive.
As Qi Xia had predicted from the start, for five people to avoid dying of "hunger" over six rounds, they needed at least twenty fruits.
But now, one room had only a single fruit.
Even if all the other rooms had four fruits, the total would only be seventeen. At least two "mice" would starve.
But... could there be another scenario?
"Tsk, so the number of fruits in each room isn't fixed..." Saturday thought for a moment, then asked, "But there's one room we haven't been to... Could that room have...?"
"Most likely not." Qi Xia shook his head. "Following your logic, the remaining room would need at least seven fruits just to meet our survival needs. That's not reasonable."
Seeing Saturday's confused expression, Qi Xia pointed at the little tangerines in her hand. "Even these small fruits are only placed in sets of four, which suggests fruit size doesn't affect the quantity. 'Four' should be the standard."
"Then why did my room only have one pomegranate?" Luo Shiyi asked in confusion. "Isn't it because the pomegranate is too big?"
"We'll only know the answer after we see Qiu Shiliu," Qi Xia said. "Next round, we need to seize a room."
"Tsk, how do we do that?" Saturday asked. "Should we try to enter the third room we haven't been to yet and take the four fruits inside?"
"No... that room will be the 'cat's' key focus next round," Qi Xia said. "Whether it's a 'mouse trap' or 'search,' one strategy will target the third room. From the 'mice's' perspective, that room has the most gains, so we have to avoid it for now and not make any reckless moves."
"Then..."
"Next round, two people will go for the 'rescue,' and the other two will continue 'searching' in rooms already explored," Qi Xia said.
"Two people for the rescue?" Wang Ba was taken aback. "We've already confirmed Qiu Shiliu is in the 'cat room.' Why do we need two people to rescue her?"
Qi Xia thought for a few seconds. "I just have a hunch, so I need to go see the 'cat room' myself. If this hunch is correct, I can't do it alone—I'll need someone to cooperate with me."
The others fell silent again.
"I'll go with you," Luo Shiyi said.
"Good." Qi Xia nodded, then turned to Saturday and Wang Ba. "We'll be responsible for bringing Qiu Shiliu back. You two keep 'searching.' Remember, you can go to any room except Room Three."
"Tsk, but this time we can only get at most two fruits," Saturday said. "Besides, if one of me and Wang Ba gets caught, we'll only bring back one fruit and lose a teammate. What do we do then?"
"That's not how you should look at it," Qi Xia said. "According to the rules... unless both of you get caught, we'll bring back at least two fruits."
"What?"
"The rules say that the person 'transporting fruits' can not only carry their own fruits but also all the fruits 'searched' by everyone else," Qi Xia paused, then continued. "In other words, even if you're caught or chased by the cat, you should be able to hand over the fruits you're carrying to a teammate. Other than that, I can't think of any situation where you'd be transporting someone else's fruits."
Saturday and Luo Shiyi nodded and looked at the fruits in their hands. This round, they'd gotten ten fruits, enough to keep all the "mice" full for two rounds. But what about the later rounds?
Food would only get scarcer, and the "mice's" situation would become more dangerous.
"Should we consume the fruits now?" Luo Shiyi tentatively asked Qi Xia.
"No..." Qi Xia shook his head. "Only you and I need to consume ours. The others shouldn't."
"What?" Luo Shiyi and Saturday were taken aback. "Logically, all five of us have decreased satiety. You're only consuming two fruits?"
"You need to understand something," Qi Xia said. "Even real mice don't split the food they find equally among all their companions. If we want each of us to be full, there's no way to win this game. Only the mice on the front lines get to share the bulk of the food."
"What about the others?" Luo Shiyi asked.
"Keep their satiety at one bar as much as possible," Qi Xia said. "Dishu said even if satiety drops to zero, we won't die. As long as it doesn't drop below zero, our collars won't explode. The optimal solution for this game should be that at the moment we win, everyone's satiety is exactly zero."