My Level Zero System-Chapter 320: Long-Term Vision

"Something is not right."

A thought flashed through Cyrus's mind as he observed the bidding board.

All the other players, including himself, had bid 0 gold coins.

Except for one person: the Raymon Family representative.

By bidding 20 gold coins, this person's gold coins had dropped to 18 gold coins. 𝚏𝗿𝗲𝐞𝚠𝕖𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝕖𝚕.𝚌𝗼𝗺

This made Cyrus recognize a certain pattern.

"The third time is the charm."

Starting from bidding turn 2 up until this turn 4, the winning bidders were all players who held 18 gold coins in turn 2 of the game.

Or more precisely, they were the players who had bid 2 gold coins in bidding turn 1.

At this point, Cyrus realized that the trap he had set in turn 1 had inadvertently established a condition that helped a group of players form an alliance.

Looking back at turns 2, 3, and 4, each abnormality was quickly deduced. Although he didn't have the full details, when he applied the premise that "the four players from the Zento, Flamed, Raymon, and Don Families have cooperated," everything was explained.

Thinking of this, Cyrus's expression couldn't help but darken, but it only lasted for a split second before quickly returning to normal.

Everything was still within control, as long as he could still execute his plan.

After all... Cyrus had now accumulated 30 gold coins in hand. By the end of turn 4 and entering turn 5, he would have 40 gold coins, and this amount of money could accomplish many things.

However, Cyrus needed to confirm one thing first: whether that alliance would continue to use tricks to deceive the other players by pretending that the winning bidder would attack another player.

If that happened, it meant the alliance had chosen a safe strategy to continue preserving the gold coins in their hands.

If that did not happen, it meant the alliance wanted to make a risky move.

Suppose the Raymon Family representative did not intend to deceive others regarding his use of authority and instead directly put the 20 gold coins into the treasury; his treasury would then total 26 gold coins.

Thus, the maximum amount a winning player could steal from the Raymon Family representative's treasury would be half, which is 13 gold coins.

And for this stolen gold to be considered profitable, the general bidding price would have to be kept under 10 gold coins. For example: use 10 gold coins to win, forfeit those 10 gold coins to execute the treasury theft, and gain 13 gold coins into one's own treasury, resulting in a 3 gold coin profit.

This was roughly the best-case scenario and also the trap that the alliance had set.

With the trend continuing from turn 2 until now, players were extremely cautious with their bidding money. Unless they were certain of something, they would all choose to bid 0 gold coins.

Once the general bidding amount was limited to under 10 gold coins to ensure profit for the winner, the last remaining member of the alliance—the Don Family representative—could completely bid an amount far exceeding the 10 gold coin mark, thereby successfully putting money into their treasury.

By the end of turn 5, the treasuries of the four representatives from the Zento, Flamed, Raymon, and Don Families would all have 20 gold coins or more.

The treasuries of the Raymon and Don representatives would be exposed to the other players, making them potential targets.

But at this point, a very interesting situation would emerge.

In turn 6, the other players would face three choices:

Choice 1: Continue to keep their heads down and accumulate money by bidding 0 gold coins.

Choice 2: Find a way to win the bid while keeping it under 10 gold coins, so there is still a profit when performing a treasury theft.

Choice 3: Bid an amount higher than the 10 gold coin limit, then instead of stealing a treasury, put that money into their own treasury, ensuring their treasury balance remains lower than those of the Raymon and Don representatives. In other words, in the next turn, even if there is a winning bidder who wants to steal a treasury, they won't be the target.

Regardless of which choice the players made, the beneficiary would still be the alliance.

With Choice 1, the alliance members, after easily winning the bid, would choose not to put more money into their treasury since they already had enough. Instead, they would use that money to attack those who intended to accumulate a large amount of gold coins in hand.

Faced with this, to avoid being targeted and attacked, those players would be left only with Choice 2 or Choice 3.

Switching to Choice 2, the alliance group could also easily counter this once they released an amount of gold coins exceeding the profitable level in the bid, and the money of those failed players would be completely wasted.

Thus, they could only pick Choice 3: bid an amount exceeding 10 gold coins, put it into their treasury, and maintain a treasury balance smaller than that of the two alliance members.

This choice might seem good, but always having to keep one's treasury lower than others would result in a loss when the game is totaled after 50 turns.

This was the path to victory and the power of the alliance. A single player basically couldn't control this situation, but four players could, holding the game tightly in the palm of their hands.

The other six individual players were just a disorganized bunch who hardly dared to be reckless. The outcome of being reckless would likely be the same as the Madea Family or Acer Family representatives—not only nearly losing all the gold coins they spent but also eroding their competitiveness in subsequent turns.

Cyrus contemplated.

He still had a chance, now that he saw the situation clearly.

But the question was: besides him, did anyone else see the situation as clearly as Cyrus did?

And if they did see it clearly, what would that person—whoever it might be—do?