God's Imitator

Zhang Yan paused slightly and continued:

"After the second game ended, we managed to get some replenishment quota.

"At the time, everyone’s idea was to, in front of witnesses, use up all the replenishment quota and then divide the drugs among all players.

"However, the players who entered the game and had the replenishment quota were unwilling.

"Because it was a dangerous Judgment game, one player died. Survivors also took on more or less extra risk of death, and they didn’t want to share the replenishment quota with other players.

"Finally, after a long debate, both sides compromised.

"The players with the replenishment quota offered half of it for replenishment, to be evenly distributed among other players who needed the drugs. The remaining quota they could choose to secretly replenish at an appropriate time and have it bought by themselves or trusted players.

"But even so, Community 16’s drugs remained in short supply, and most people still had to carefully ration their medication.

"Before I left, it was always like this.

"In terms of quantity, there are enough drugs.

"But in actual allocation, it’s never enough."

Lu Qi showed a difficult-to-accept expression: "Ah... this is too terrible."

Ye Lin pondered: "It’s somewhat like the ’hoarding of toilet paper’ scenario.

"Even if a certain resource is theoretically sufficient, scarcity causes everyone to hoard ’just to be safe’ or ’for insurance,’ leading to further shortages.

"This further intensifies public panic, forcing them to hoard even more, thus falling into a non-resolvable cycle.

"To break this cycle, a strong external force must regulate and forcibly constrain everyone’s behavior.

"But this creates a paradox:

"If a community has this power, clearly controlling drugs is the optimal solution;

"If a community cannot control drugs, it is equally difficult to break this cycle.

"Although Community 16 appears to have temporarily solved this problem, with time and increasing drug demand, it’s hard to maintain it for long."

Qin Cheng nodded: "So the conclusion is... nearly all communities that don’t control drugs will inevitably face drug shortages.

"Selling drugs with a license will definitely find a market, it’s just a matter of profit margins.

"Now the only question left for us is...

"Do we sell or not?"

This question plunged everyone into silence, it’s not complicated, but it’s hard to offer a clear answer.

Lu Qi asked in some confusion: "Shouldn’t we not sell?

"Isn’t our community always advocating cooperation with other communities and regulating drugs?

"In conditions of drug shortages, other communities might restrain themselves a bit. Even drug-addicted players would have to endure pain sparingly if they are low on drugs.

"The deterioration might not be so rapid.

"But if we also sell drugs, making these communities’ drug supplies more abundant, won’t that further worsen their situation?

"If after this we want to cooperate with other communities, for instance, if we want to cooperate with Community 24 and they ask us if we sold drugs, how do we respond?"

He Qinyun shook her head: "Is there a choice? We can only sell.

"Activating this license requires 2.4 million community funds. Currently, our community activated it relatively early, but that’s no high threshold.

"Other communities should soon activate theirs, some in as few as five days, a week, or up to a month, but it shouldn’t take much longer.

"If other communities sell, then the overall environment will still be disrupted. Does it matter if one community sells or not?

"If we don’t sell, these drugs will just pile up, and every time we purchase drugs, the visa time we spend is wasted.

"Why should we bear such a loss? Is it meaningful?"

Zheng Chunhua hesitated slightly: "But if all communities think this way, won’t it be..."

He Qinyun shook her head: "So what? We cannot change other communities; they’ll definitely think the same.

𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

"Furthermore, whether those communities that don’t control drugs live or die, how is that related to us?

"They’ve given up on themselves, do we have to sacrifice our own interests to forcibly pull them up?

"If this was real life, and everyone’s life wasn’t threatened, charitable acts wouldn’t be bad.

"But this is the Walkway, and we’re all risking our lives.

"We did previously advocate cooperation and drug control, but those aren’t immutable. If goodwill doesn’t bring sufficient returns, then better mind one’s own business."

Huang Shengjie looked at He Qinyun, then at Qin Cheng, and said somewhat conflictedly: "There’s no mistake in saying this, but the Walkway is certainly not well-intentioned.

"It makes us subconsciously choose the easy path, but this path is often riddled with traps; while the difficult path often brings greater benefits in the long run.

"The issue of drugs follows this pattern, doesn’t it?

"Strictly speaking, the community didn’t even provide us with a ’drug control’ option; it’s a goal we achieved through a proposal.

"So, we should still be cautious, right? What if the Walkway doesn’t follow the usual course and suddenly introduces a mechanism benefiting communities that don’t sell drugs and harming those that do?"

Clearly, there’s a split of opinion on this issue, making it hard to reach a consensus.

Other players voiced their opinions, but overall, more favored selling drugs.

Qin Cheng nodded contemplatively: "I’ve fully understood everyone’s opinions.

"Most players still support selling drugs, which is expected because we can’t see what future mechanisms might exist, but the benefits of selling drugs now are real.

"Moreover, whether we sell drugs doesn’t affect our own community internally; it only impacts other communities and the broader Walkway environment, which is a very vague topic.

"But Uncle Zheng and Shengjie’s thoughts are valid too.

"In this ghostly Walkway, where survival is uncertain, many players instinctively find perceived values and morals pointless; conversely, precisely because survival is uncertain, we need these nebulous concepts to provide us with certain beliefs, establish reliable identity recognition, and maintain internal unity.

"So, my proposal is...

"We purchase the license but not become the first community to sell drugs.

"This might sound somewhat self-deceptive, but in this world, many amorphous concepts and forms are inherently meaningful.

"What does everyone think?"

Everyone looked at each other, gradually reaching an agreement.

"Agreed."

Qin Cheng continued: "Then let’s proceed with the purchase before the next game begins, so participating players can bring some drugs into the game as needed.

"Not necessarily useful, but better to be safe than sorry."