God's imitator

Chapter 473 An Indifferent Match
Lin Sizhi paused slightly before continuing:

"This is because, as a 'thief,' he must determine whether the 'Emperor' as a 'sage' constructed the digital chain randomly, or whether he adopted the 'evil warden strategy,' deliberately setting a trap against the 'chain loop strategy.'"

"And '↑Demon''s' initial assessment is that '↓Emperor' has definitely set a trap."

"Because the 'Emperor' is the designer of this game, he must know these details and changes, which is why he set up these rules. He is a true 'evil warden'."

"In other words, he has very likely turned the 22 wooden boxes into several cycles of more than 7 times."

"If the '↑Demon' executes the 'chain loop' strategy, it will undoubtedly lose."

"So he chose to 'jump the chain': actively break out of the 'chain loop'."

"That is, the number 15 was chosen, but the wooden box number 15 was deliberately not opened. Instead, other wooden boxes were opened, and the 'chain loop' strategy was executed again from the next time."

"This eliminates a definite wrong answer, which can increase your success rate."

"But unfortunately, his strategy failed."

"Because he thought one step further: the Emperor deliberately adopted the strategy of 'blind spots,' arranging several chains with fewer than 7 numbers."

“Executing a ‘chain loop’ is actually the optimal solution; deliberately skipping a step significantly reduces one’s success rate.”

"Of course, the 'Emperor' also employed some supplementary strategies:"
Before the game started, he said: As a "wise man", he can give a kind reminder that there is a subtle connection between the tarot cards and numbers in this game. Fate has been predetermined. Go with the flow and fate will give you the reward you deserve.

"This is actually hinting at the 'chain loop' strategy, but the more he hints, the more the 'demon' will doubt him and the less likely he is to adopt it."

"Therefore, in the first attempt, '↑Demon' failed without any suspense."

"But soon, '↑Demon' figured this out. He quickly understood the other party's true strategy and successfully found the number given by 'Sage' in the second attempt."

"Therefore, this outcome is acceptable to both parties."

"The Emperor won and gained a lot of wealth vouchers;

"Although '↑Demon' only took the wealth vouchers from the 7 wooden boxes, he completely figured out how to play this set of rules, and had more strategic freedom afterward."

"So, what I'm actually using is just a variation of the 'chain skipping' strategy."

Lin Sizhi paused slightly before continuing to explain, "My first guess is that you won't actually use a random strategy."

"If it's a battle against other players, that's a different story."

"But since you're so obsessed with beating me, you can't rely on luck for everything."

"Based on your consideration of rule changes, you will devise a strategy that you believe is 'perfect' and has the 'best chance of winning'."

"First, you won't randomly generate or intentionally create a chain of fewer than 7 numbers, because you can't rule out the possibility that I will use a 'chained loop' strategy, and a chain of fewer than 7 numbers is bound to lose."

"Secondly, you most likely won't create a chain with more than 11 numbers."

"Since there are only 22 wooden boxes in total, if we make a chain of 11 numbers, we can make two chains; but if a chain with more than 11 numbers appears, such as 13 numbers, it means that the other chain will only have 9 numbers, which will increase the risk of being guessed correctly."

"Moreover, I can remember the numbers in the seven wooden boxes opened during the first operation; the fewer the numbers in the chain, the higher the risk."

"If you make a chain of 22 numbers and string all the numbers on all the wooden boxes together, it is a specific extreme case that will make people feel a lack of variation and instinctively generate a sense of rejection."

"Two chains with 11 digits each will appear more balanced and secure."

"So, I guess you most likely made two chains of 11 numbers each."

"There are 11 numbers in this chain, 7 of which are 'danger zones'. If a number is found in this zone, it will eventually be located through a 'chain loop'. The remaining 4 numbers are relatively safe."

"As for what these numbers are specifically, that depends on which number I choose, that is, the 'chain head number'. "You can't guess what I'll choose, but you'll most likely subconsciously avoid certain special numbers."

"For example, number 10 'Wheel of Fortune', number 6 'The Lovers', or numbers like 17 and 4."

"In other words, you would never place the wooden box containing 10 x 100-yuan wealth vouchers in one of the seven adjacent positions on the chain of wooden box number 10."

"But this also creates a fatal flaw:"
"By eliminating other strategies layer by layer, you have actually severely compressed the space for number selection, making the problem move further and further away from 'randomness' and closer and closer to 'determinism'."

"This will lead to a significant increase in the returns of the 'chain skipping strategy'."

"After I chose the number, I had 7 chances to open the wooden box in the first operation."

"If you follow a completely random strategy, whether I skip chains or not won't change the probability. The odds of winning aren't actually that high, and it depends more on luck."

"However, by specifically creating two digital chains, the returns from 'chain jumping' have increased significantly."

"Because every time I open a wooden box, I can eliminate two wrong answers: the box's own serial number and the serial number corresponding to the number of 100 wealth vouchers inside the box."

"The more you eliminate possibilities in this way, the higher the probability of finding the correct number later."

"So the final conclusion is... when playing against you, 'jumping the chain' at every step is the solution with the best chance of winning in this game."

Lin Sizhi continued, "Of course, besides these, I also considered other factors."

"For example, if I ask you, if I win in the end, do you think it's due to skill or luck?"
"This is certainly not asking whether you agree or not, but rather to reconfirm my previous speculation: to what extent you deliberately arranged the numbers in the wooden box."

"If you still answer 'luck,' it means you probably didn't make the arrangements that you thought would give you the best chance of winning, so even if I won, there was an element of luck involved."

"But if you answer 'strength,' it means that you have probably made what you believe is the best possible arrangement in the wooden box, because only in this way will you believe that my guessing the number minimizes the element of luck and is a pure strategic victory."

"This means that the situation inside the wooden box is rather special."

Han Mengying paused for a moment, then asked, "Before the game officially started, did you deliberately mention the match between '↓Emperor' and '↑Demon' for a special purpose?"

Lin Sizhi nodded: "I guess so."

"Actually, I judged before that you were probably aware of these changes and details, but I still need to confirm them a second time."

"I want to use this topic to observe your reaction and further determine which level you're thinking about."

"But unfortunately, I didn't gain anything."

“Your defense was very good. I’m not good at reading body language either, so I didn’t actually analyze anything.”

Han Mengying took a deep breath and said, "I have to admit that, judging from the results, you did indeed predict my thoughts."

"I acknowledge that this is absolute strength."

"However, such a complex analysis can lead to completely different results if any one step is wrong."

What if a low-probability event occurs?

The match time was up, and Lin Sizhi stood up.

"Perhaps you still have some misunderstandings about me. I don't actually have any particular obsession with winning."

"This is just a meaningless game for me. Even if I lose, it doesn't matter at all."

　I got back by plane today. I haven't been resting well these past two days, so I'm updating a bit late. I'll make up for the missed updates in the next few days.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)