Anyone who wasn’t too stupid could gather some information from the data:

If 75% of male players had already taken the initiative to pay, what would happen to the male players who still insisted on splitting the bill?

If 35% of players would actively bring items into the meeting room, how many of these do you think were male players?

What were they bringing items for?

What would happen to male players who didn’t bring items into the meeting room?

And after this data was released, do you think it would continue to grow?

It was clearly just a simple percentage figure, but the amount of information contained within was quite substantial, with very strong implications.

"The so-called items should refer to the things sold in the vending machine, right? That is, some people actively bring water or snacks in to share with the players they meet, thereby earning thumbs-ups? ...You can do that??"

Zheng Jie suddenly felt he was too naive, completely unable to keep up with this game’s tricks.

He was certainly among the 75% who pressed "I’ll Pay," and originally felt quite wronged about being forced to actively pay money. But after seeing this data, he felt that since most male players were doing this, it was quite normal.

Moreover, he really needed to buy something to bring into the meeting room.

Because after this data was disclosed, male players who realized they should buy things would definitely increase.

By the next meeting, if everyone brought something, then bringing something might not necessarily benefit Zheng Jie, but not bringing something would definitely be detrimental.

He might get thumbs-downed then.

He could certainly thumbs-down back in retaliation, but the problem was you only get one thumbs-down per hour.

Besides, he was here for blind dating, not to argue. Since leaving the game would give him a fixed income of 30,000 minutes of visa time, why bother calculating these trivial matters?

Zheng Jie hurried to the vending machine to check the item list.

"So expensive! This is highway robbery!"

Unlike the vending machines in the community, this one only had necessary food and drinks. Not only were there far fewer varieties, but the prices had almost all increased by 5 to 10 times.

A bottle of ordinary mineral water cost 5 minutes of visa time in the community, but here it cost 50 minutes.

Additionally, at the bottom of the product list, there was a special category of goods: visa time exchange vouchers.

There were three types of vouchers: 1,000 minutes, 5,000 minutes, and 10,000 minutes, requiring 1,200 minutes, 6,000 minutes, and 12,000 minutes of visa time respectively to purchase.

There was also a note: [Once purchased, exchange vouchers cannot be converted back into visa time by the buyer and can only be given to other players through the meeting room.]

"Isn’t this pure loss? What sucker would buy these things!"

The expensive prices made Zheng Jie hesitate.

After struggling for a while, he only bought a bottle of the cheapest mineral water.

Returning to his seat, there was just over a minute left in the rest time.

Zheng Jie looked again at the two pieces of data on the big screen. As he looked, his brow furrowed.

"Huh? Wait, something’s wrong! This data seems problematic!"

Initially, Zheng Jie hadn’t paid much attention because he instinctively believed that since data queries were part of the game rules, even if the data seemed somewhat counterintuitive, it must be true.

But after examining the wording several more times, Zheng Jie suddenly realized something was wrong: the data was indeed true, but had limiting conditions.

[As of current time, among all male players, the proportion of male players who have pressed the ’I’ll Pay’ button is: ’75%’.]

But two meetings had already taken place. As long as a male player had pressed the "I’ll Pay" button once, they would be counted in the numerator.

This didn’t mean they would press "I’ll Pay" every time, nor did it mean both parties had reached agreement.

The next piece of data had even bigger problems.

[As of current time, the proportion of players who actively brought items into the meeting room is: ’35%’.]

This 35% didn’t seem low at first glance, creating an illusion that "more than half of male players are actively buying water and snacks for female players."

But actually, careful consideration revealed this definitely included female players, as well as those who simply bought a bottle of water for themselves to drink.

Only after excluding these would you get the actual cases of male players specifically buying water or food to share with female players in the meeting room.

But when querying, one could manipulatively manipulate the preconditions for proportion calculations to mislead other players.

For example, this 35% created a false impression that "many male players have already taken action to actively buy water and snacks for female players."

Zheng Jie looked speechless.

"Come on, how can these people be so devious!"

Initially, he wondered if this Qian Li and Lu Xinyi had conspired together to release such data to influence all male players.

But he quickly felt this possibility was unlikely.

Because besides the meeting room, players had no way to communicate privately.

Moreover, Qian Li and Lu Xinyi belonged to Communities 1 and 3 respectively, so there was no possibility of prior conspiracy.

Most likely, after seeing the rules related to data queries and broadcasts, they immediately realized this usage and put it into practice at the first opportunity.

Among 40 players, there were definitely quite a few smart ones.

For a smart player like Lu Xinyi to guess this through the game rules, Zheng Jie wasn’t surprised at all.

"But... this function seems unusable for male players, right? This isn’t fair!"

Zheng Jie temporarily couldn’t think of any data that, when broadcast, would benefit male players.

While he was thinking, the third meeting began.

...

Zheng Jie entered the meeting room, but as soon as he saw his counterpart, he froze.

Because both of them were men.

[Community 1 - Fang Wencong].

This was an unremarkable-looking man, thin and small in stature, with a short beard, looking somewhat unkempt.

The two looked at the mineral water bottles in each other’s hands, and the scene became somewhat awkward for a moment.

However, Zheng Jie noticed that the other person’s mineral water seemed to be already opened and only half full, appearing not to be intended as a gift but for his own consumption.

After a moment of silence, he said, "Excuse me, what is your gender?"

Zheng Jie tried to make his question sound more polite through his tone.

Fang Wencong looked at him somewhat bewildered, "Is this hard to tell? Male."

Zheng Jie was even more confused, "Strange, I’m male too. Did this game make an error? How can two men go on a blind date? Could it be that this game’s designer is LGBT? Quite trendy."

The two took their seats.

Fang Wencong put his mineral water aside, somewhat speechless, "What’s all the fuss about? The game rules never said you could only be matched with the opposite sex. Besides, this activity is strictly called a ’meeting,’ not a ’blind date.’"

Zheng Jie was clearly not convinced, "But this game is called ’Blind Dating Game’! Does same-sex blind dating make sense?"

Fang Wencong shrugged, "How would I know? Go ask the game designer."

Compared to the previous two meetings, Zheng Jie was obviously much more relaxed.

So was Fang Wencong. Originally somewhat tense, he now comfortably slumped in his seat and stretched.

"What about the room fee? Split it?"

"Of course."

The two quickly reached agreement and each pressed the Split button to pay the meeting room usage fee.