Guys is this a scam?

so i was gonna cross trade grow a garden for adopt me. then someone traded me and says they wanna see my offer. so i go add them then i go to grow a garden and they joined me and they said they liked my offer. then they said they will think. they said they will do it. (their frost for my raccoon and red fox) they keep saying about how they need middle man saying they need the middle man to be MY IRL FRIEND (my friends were all offline so i used my alt) they keep saying about how IT NEEDS TO BE MY IRL FRIEND. and they keep saying to make sure i wont scam them. like why does it need to be an IRL friend of MINE? why not their irl friend? ive never seen something like this before. so sorry if its a stupid question. is it like the “bring a trusted friend” scam? (i recorded video but screen recording failed to save cuz of not enough storage)