The game continued, reaching the 16th round.

[Current total wealth: 1,285,000 minutes of visa time].

Since there was no need to consider distribution ratios, the commoner players reaped all of their work earnings and most of their investment returns. Although it didn't reach the perfect theoretical maximum, it wasn't far off.

The total wealth was growing rapidly.

Moreover, the visa time of just over 100,000 that Qin Yao, Cai Zhiyuan, and Zhou Guifen "magically" produced from unknown sources had already been accounted for in the total wealth.

Although total wealth was increasing, the players Han Mengying and Qi Fan, who controlled most of the Wealth Value among the Wealthy Conglomerates, were already cleaned out.

The Management Room imposed a 100% inheritance tax on Wealthy Conglomerate players, making it nearly impossible to transfer much wealth even through investments.

Meanwhile, two other players, due to the unique age structure of the Wealthy Conglomerate, hadn't died yet, so they retained their original Wealth Value.

One player, Sun De, was in the 'elderly' stage with more than 110,000 visa minutes remaining. In the 13th and 14th rounds, he had entered the management, benefiting from the inheritance tax when Han Mengying died.

The other player was in the 'middle-aged' stage, with more than 40,000 visa minutes left.

This 'middle-aged' player was the fourth among the Wealthy Community, apart from Han Mengying, Qi Fan, and Sun De, and had the most unique position in the age structure: he had no peers.

Initially, the person with this unique identity was Fan Zehui, but after a change in the Wealthy Family, it shifted to him.

At the start of the 11th round, when Qin Yao and others seized management, he had just been reborn, bequeathing his inheritance to Han Mengying.

From the 11th round onwards, with commoners maxing out the tax rates for Wealthy Conglomerates, his Wealth Value remained at zero.

This situation changed in the 15th round: because he had no peers, once he reached middle-aged or elderly, he would inevitably enter management and thus successfully benefited from Qi Fan's inheritance tax.

At this time, the management consisted of only him as a middle-aged player and Lin Sizhi as an elderly player, so he received half, about 40,000.

As for Sun De, he had just entered the elderly stage, so he hadn't yet been hit by the inheritance tax.

Although other commoner players wanted to divide his visa time, unfortunately, within this game mechanism, it was impossible; they had to wait for him to die.

Of course, there was another special rule in this game, which was Departure.

As long as the Wealth Value exceeded 100,000, one could choose to depart and no longer be constrained by any game rules.

But Lin Sizhi certainly wouldn't let Sun De exploit this, having long since maxed out the Departure tax for Wealthy Conglomerate players to 100%.

So, Sun De couldn't depart and couldn't do anything, but wait.

As for the wealth composition of the commoner players, it was much more complex.

Cai Zhiyuan, Qin Yao, and Zhou Guifen, were direct beneficiaries of the strategy, having over 80,000 visa minutes by the 10th round and spending a long time in management, where they also earned a substantial amount from taxes.

The three of them purposefully transferred wealth to Lin Sizhi through investments and other means.

Additionally, these four firmly seized the main work and investment earnings.

Not only did they invest in each other, but they also required other commoner players to invest in them and share the profits equally.

Therefore, these four individuals now had the highest Wealth Value, ranging from 190,000 to 230,000.

As for the remaining four commoner players, Fan Zehui, Zhou Rong, Luo Wei, and He Ming, each had Wealth Values around 50,000 visa minutes.

They dared not express any dissatisfaction because Lin Sizhi didn't pursue their previous betrayals, which was already a considerable concession, so how could they dare to fight for more returns?

Although they were all commoners, no one dared to challenge Lin Sizhi's authority within the game rules, as no one dared to gamble on what other tricks Lin Sizhi might have.

If Lin Sizhi decided to change his Wealthy Conglomerate identity or collaborate with Community 4, they wouldn't even retain this wealth.

Moreover, Lin Sizhi made a promise to these four that the investment returns of the last four rounds would be left entirely for them, which was a substantial amount.

Now, with the final four rounds of the game imminent, Fan Zehui and others were eagerly anticipating maximizing their investment returns for these four rounds.

...

As for Han Mengying, she had given up hope but was still unwilling, recalling all the rules in her mind, comparing them one by one, and thinking deeply.

She still wanted to know how that 100,000 magically appeared.

She had a vague sense that it could only be the 'expired investment coupons' issue.

But even if she thought of this, the entire plan still had too many doubts.

Finally, Han Mengying figured out most of the details and the crucial part of the plan.

"Making Zhou Guifen the Finance... was actually part of this plan too!"

...

This plan had to start with the investment rule.

Players must obtain investment returns after 2 game rounds; if expired, it would cause serious losses.

So, almost all players would frequently check the time of each investment coupon and redeem investment returns at the right time.

They would also try to avoid coinciding with other players' investment times.

Occasionally encountering an expired coupon would be a painful experience.

They could only exchange it for 2,000 at the start of the next round.

But in this rule, there was also a textual trap lying in wait.

[After an investment coupon expires, it becomes a 'recovery coupon', allowing only 'recovery' of 2,000 minutes of visa time]

Because the coupon turned into a recovery coupon and gained visa time through recovery, it wasn't considered investment income and wasn't restricted by investment rules.

It could break through the investment income cap for each game round, with no limit on the exchange times, and, more importantly, it wouldn't be subject to 'investment tax'.

In the 4th round of the game, the three communities initially reached an agreement to establish the distribution ratio of total wealth.

From that time onwards, Lin Sizhi and Cai Zhiyuan had been making arrangements and plans.

Simply put, they aimed to extract as much visa time as possible from reliable players, purchase investment coupons, and allow them to expire.

All these expired investment coupons were hidden, waiting for the right moment to recover them all at once and seize management.

...

Yet when Han Mengying thought of this, she didn't suddenly become enlightened but instead was filled with more doubts.

"Hiding investment coupons seems like a great strategy, but the problem is, wouldn't this cause various data anomalies?

"The total wealth would decrease, and the wealth ratio between the three communities would become unbalanced.

"Hiding an investment coupon would result in a loss of 1,000 minutes of visa time.

"If only Community 17 was hiding investment coupons, then its total wealth would always be less than that of Community 12.

"But such abnormalities never occurred before; the total Wealth Values of Community 17 and Community 12 have always been similar.

"That leaves only one explanation: Community 12 was also hiding them, so the wealth ratio between the two commoner communities didn't become unbalanced.

"But the problem is, from everyone's reaction, it's obvious that Fan Zehui, Zhou Rong, He Ming, and Luo Wei didn't know about this plan.

"If this plan leaked, it would fail completely, so Lin Sizhi mustn't have informed all the commoners, only a few trusted ones.

"Cai Zhiyuan, Qin Yao, and... Zhou Guifen!

"This means... Zhou Guifen was part of this plan from the beginning?

"The premise for Zhou Guifen hiding so many coupons without Fan Zehui discovering was her becoming 'Finance'.

"This means... Cai Zhiyuan's suggestion for Lin Sizhi to become Finance was actually to select Zhou Guifen the opposite way??"

Han Mengying never expected that it was also a setup.

This also meant that the timing of Lin Sizhi and Cai Zhiyuan's arrangements was even earlier than the 4th round.

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