A loot chest dropped?
Wasn’t that supposed to be a low-probability event?
His luck was turning up!
Before he had even recovered from the system’s barrage of rainbow-fart praise, Meng Lang was first delighted to hear that an S-rank chest had dropped. But when he saw the item opened from the chest, [Xiao Dong’s Remnant], he could not help but pause slightly.
He carefully looked at the reward description in the dropped chest.
Xiao Dong’s Remnant?
Who was Xiao Dong?
He only knew of Da Sen’s Remnant!
This description looked absurdly overpowered!
It couldn’t be TOP1, could it?
And it was only 2022 right now. This system could actually drop something from 2024?
In truth, Meng Lang could not really be blamed for never having heard of him.
Although Donk had started playing CS at the age of four, at this point, this prodigy from Tomsk was still slaughtering his way through second-tier events in Team Spirit’s academy system. He would only officially step onto the tier-one professional stage next year, and the moment he truly began his era of domination would come another year after that.
[Attempt to fuse with “Xiao Dong’s Remnant”?]
[During fusion, time will come to a standstill. The host may only act within the meditation space.]
The system’s voice rang out in his mind once again.
Time stop?
Interesting.
Meng Lang glanced at the time in the bottom right corner of the screen: 10:25 a.m.
Without the slightest hesitation, he chose—“Yes”!
The next second, his vision suddenly went black. His consciousness was instantly dragged into a familiar space. At first, his view overlooked the entire map from the sky.
This place was… Mirage!?
Immediately afterward, his perspective was yanked downward, and he entered the body of a rifler holding an AK.
Donk!
Was it him?
At this moment, three of his teammates had already fallen. Donk carried the bomb to the outside of A1, with only one teammate holding a Tec-9 left in front of him. There were only 30 seconds left to attack, and ahead of them was Mirage’s A site, heavily defended by five CTs.
A dead end!
Meng Lang made that judgment in an instant.
But now, as he inhabited Donk’s body, as if their thoughts were connected, he could not sense even the slightest trace of fear in this young man’s heart. Instead, there was a scorching, boiling battle intent like volcanic lava!
He did not want to win.
He simply wanted to kill everyone in front of him!
Win or lose?
That could come afterward.
The next second, his teammate Magixx, holding the Tec-9, swung out to draw the crossfire and was killed by the CT inside A1. Donk immediately followed up with the trade, pre-aimed jungle, just happened to see someone peek and retreat, failed to hold the angle, then, while the opponent had not shown himself, suddenly wide-swung toward triple—
Sure enough, there was someone there!
Bang!
The AWPer at triple missed because Donk’s swing was too wide!
At this moment, Donk displayed terrifyingly strong body-position control.
He quickly tucked back in and continued holding jungle.
The next second, two CTs, one above and one below at jungle, double-swung toward A1.
Donk directly moved left and crouched, perfectly avoiding the lines of fire from under jungle and the CT at triple. Then he turned back and was the first to kill the enemy on top of jungle!
1V2!
Immediately afterward, he took half a step back and swung out again with a tiny shoulder peek, looking under jungle.
Seeing the opponent tuck back, he gave no warning before making an enormous wide swing, instantly tearing apart the AWPer at triple!
1V3!
Holy shit!
Meng Lang was stunned!
At this moment, the CT at jungle saw that things were going wrong and threw out his only molotov. Donk did not retreat but advanced instead, charging into the fire, moving while pre-aiming the cross under jungle as he pushed forward!
Without any warning,
the two CTs above and below jungle swung out at the same time!
To be precise,
the one above jungle was a step faster!
It’s over!
This was a point-blank double swing!
But in this life-and-death instant, Donk displayed terrifying aim placement and spray-transfer ability. With one flick, he first instantly killed the one above jungle, then continued the spray transfer and took down the final two!
1V5!
30 seconds!
30 bullets!
Five people!
He killed them all instantly?!
Holy shit!!!
Meng Lang was completely dumbfounded!
Among the current top ten riflers on HLTV, players like Niko, Ax1Le, KSCERATO, and the others had all had their own highlight five-kill moments, but no one had ever done it like Donk.
Why?
Because a five-kill and a clutch 1V5 were two entirely different concepts.
A clutch 1V5 meant that all opponents’ attention was focused entirely on you alone. There were no teammates to assist you with utility, and no one to gather information for you.
Donk’s 1V5 had been completed under conditions that could be called absolute despair: no utility, his position locked by four people, only two enemy positions known, and only 30 seconds left on the clock…
He did not hide, did not sneak through smoke to catch anyone, and did not even get a single side or back shot!
He relied entirely on terrifying reaction speed, heaven-defying aim placement, and unmatched gun skill, purely forcing his way out through frontal duels!
Extreme explosiveness!
Extreme precision!
It was truly too ridiculous!
This was definitely the most terrifying 1V5 Meng Lang had ever seen. With just one look, he understood that this rifler named Donk possessed terrifying gun skill that did not belong to this era!
Just then, the system’s mechanical voice rang out in his mind again:
[This is an AK47. You need only move your mouse onto the enemy’s head to kill the target. Now, enter Donk’s body and use what you have just learned to complete this 1V5 clutch!]
[System prompt: After the host is killed, time rewind will be triggered. Only when the host breaks through and kills all five enemies head-on will time resume its flow, and the host leave the meditation space!]
Huh?
Use what I just learned?
I only watched the POV replay once. What the hell did I learn?!
Meng Lang almost lost it!
Also, what did it mean that dying would trigger infinite rewind? So if he could not complete this 1V5, he would be permanently locked inside this meditation space?
Was this meditation space the CS prison version of Edge of Tomorrow!?
Meng Lang went mad with complaints inside.
But then, on second thought, he realized that he had just watched Donk’s perspective, and that the situation he faced was not completely identical to what Donk had faced back then.
At the very least, he clearly remembered where every enemy was.
Maybe… it wouldn’t be that hard?
Holding on to this sliver of hope, Meng Lang began his first attempt.
Standing outside A1, he recalled the position of the enemy at T ramp inside A1 from the scene just now. He took a deep breath, and at the instant his teammate swung out to draw the crossfire, he rushed in!
The next second, Magixx died on the spot.
And within five seconds, he returned to the outside of A1 with a completely confused look on his face.
Bites the Dust!
It was not that Meng Lang was too bad, but rather that he realized he had been wrong.
Not only was the CT inside A1 not in the original position, but when Donk had gone up the slope, there had originally been no one at jungle—yet now there was an extra CT peeking there…
He quickly realized a serious problem—the five CTs he was facing were completely dynamic, autonomous, and unfixed!
If he wanted to win, he had to gather information himself and catch the timing himself!
What the fuck…
The corner of Meng Lang’s eye twitched.
After that, he forcefully attacked from the front of A1 and rewound more than thirty times in a row. At most, he managed to get to 1V3 before being traded out…
Fuck!!!
A clutch was already a player’s highlight moment to begin with!
Even if you asked the original player himself to do it again, he might not be able to replicate it. And now the system had even given him dynamic defense. Wasn’t this just purely screwing with him?!
Just as he was nearly falling into despair, Meng Lang suddenly had a flash of inspiration!
Wait!
Why did I have to go this way?
I could retreat out of A1 and rotate from T spawn to connector!
Or I could fast-rotate B, plant at the absolute limit, and wait for the retake!
Anything was better than hard-peeking into five guns!
Thinking this, he turned and was about to retreat.
But after taking barely two steps back, he was blocked by an invisible wall of air!
Meng Lang: ???
Staring at the air wall before him, he fell into a long silence.
At this moment, he finally truly understood the weight behind the system’s phrase [break through and kill all five enemies head-on]. His whole body went numb.
Damn it!
I think I’ve been set up by the system!
…
…
…
“Dormammu, I’ve come to fall in love!”
“Bah! I mean, I’m here to plant the bomb!”
Inside A1, after the good brother named Magixx stepped forward for the umpteenth time to draw the crossfire and died instantly, Meng Lang observed a second of silence for him!
Then he swiftly peeked to check jungle. Discovering that no one was there, he decisively swung out, killed the CT inside A1, tucked back in, and dodged a burst from jungle!
Up to this point, it was not that difficult.
Meng Lang only needed to prevent the CT at jungle from shooting him in the side while using the gun line drawn by Magixx to quickly trade the CT in A1.
Out of ten attempts, Meng Lang could succeed at least five times.
But if this were a stage-clearing game, this was only the first stage.
Hiding behind the wall, he had to kill his way into A site within the next twenty-something seconds.
Stay still?
Once the countdown ended, everything would rewind back to the starting point.
If he wanted to break out of the loop, there was only one path:
Kill straight through all five enemies head-on!
The true difficulty had arrived!
What was currently known:
There was an AWP at triple, two rifles above and below jungle, and the enemy still had one molotov.
And him?
27 bullets, 20 seconds, 1V4!
The second stage was asking him to charge into A site under the enemy’s gun lines when his position had already been exposed.
The opponents were professional players from a top-ten team in the world, not local Perfect World C+ scrubs.
Was this fucking possible?
Just this stage alone already felt like a dead end to Meng Lang.
Throughout who knew how many rewound attempts, he had had cases where he swung out and killed the player above jungle, only to be traded by the player below; cases where he first killed the player below jungle, then got taken away by the one above; and once, he even managed an extreme spray transfer to double-kill the jungle players while low HP, only to be finished off by the big AWP at triple…
Of course, more often than not, the moment he swung out, he was headshotted by a bullet from who knew where…
At this stage, Meng Lang finally experienced for himself the despair Donk had faced back then.
Your position was locked. All the enemies’ attention was on you.
No utility!
No teammate support!
No one to gather information for you…
Everything could only depend on yourself, and the AK in your hands.
Was this really a clutch a human could win?
Even with wallhacks, you couldn’t do it, right?
The countdown ticked away second by second. Meng Lang stared fixedly at jungle and triple!
When he once again successfully tore apart the big AWP, joy had only just surged in his heart, only for him to be traded by the CT swinging from jungle in the next second—
At that moment, his face finally turned like a boiled shrimp!
He was tilted!
Truly tilted!
What the hell am I supposed to shoot, your affection?!
…
In the meditation space, there was no time, no hunger, and not even fatigue.
Yes, not even mental fatigue existed.
There was only death and rewind, again and again; an A site he could never break into; and an A1 he could never leave.
Taste all the flavors of life, sit in cyber prison!
But Meng Lang had, after all, once been one of the most talented players in CNCS. He was not a blockhead. Along with each failure, each death, and each rewind, Donk’s earth-shattering 1V5 replayed continuously in his mind. His proficiency with the AK grew higher and higher, and gradually, he began to gain some insights.
To be honest, Donk’s move swinging out from A1 did not have the pleasing pre-aiming that one saw in Niko’s POV.
He was practically charging straight through the whole way!
There were not too many details.
But only after truly savoring it did Meng Lang realize that it was not that Donk lacked details. Rather, this young man had fused all the details into his movement and gun skill—his preparation for battle had in fact been extremely thorough!
For example, the several shoulder peeks of varying widths inside A1. Sometimes they were to force the opponent to swing wider; sometimes they were to increase the difficulty of the opponent landing shots during a duel… This demon child was not just some dumb aim-bro with nothing but dead muscle!
He had his own “science of dueling”!
Gradually, Meng Lang felt a trace of enlightenment arise in his heart.
At this moment, in his eyes, Donk’s terrifying 1V5 was no longer a single 1V5, but had been split into countless 1V1s.
Unknowingly, he began using the mindset of a top-tier rifler to think about how to crack this clutch.
Sometimes, a subtle shift in thinking could bring about an unexpected breakthrough.
Rewind after rewind!
Death after death!
But success was sometimes only one final step away.
There was no time, no fatigue. After who knew how many attempts…
Outside A1, Magixx once again swung out to draw the crossfire and died.
Thanks for your hard work, Old Ma!
Meng Lang took a deep breath.
At this moment, his eyes suddenly became exceptionally clear, and his mind was clearer than ever before. The opponent’s defense was no longer an unbroken iron plate in his eyes!
Instead, it was filled with fleeting openings.
This feeling… was very much like the “ZONE” state that professional players could only encounter by chance, not seek by force!
Meng Lang did not hesitate in the slightest. He first held position and traded out the CT in A1, then used cover to isolate the top and bottom of jungle, killing the one below jungle first.
After that, he shoulder-peeked with a tiny angle. He did not take the duel. The instant he baited the CT at jungle into throwing the molotov, he suddenly wide-swung out!
Because his previous shoulder peeks had been small, the AWPer at triple was also holding a very tight angle. Meng Lang’s unexpected wide swing caught the opponent off guard, causing him to miss directly!
At the same time, the CT at jungle was throwing the molotov and could not hold the angle!
Invisible to the eye, Meng Lang had once again completed an isolation.
Having wide-swung out without time to pre-aim, he directly raised his hand. Against the big AWP who had missed, he made a secondary adjustment and, with a bang, tapped the head with his AK!
Tore apart the big AWP! (√)
Immediately afterward, at the instant the CT at jungle finished throwing the fire and peeked again, Meng Lang directly swung forward and hid behind the A1 box to avoid the gun line!
Triple kill!
By this point, Meng Lang had in fact already broken out of the framework of Donk’s 1V5.
Whether it was the CTs’ dynamic defense or his own positioning, everything was completely different from Donk’s match.
But he had already taken three kills, with only the last two remaining before the ace!
These two were also the final stage that had caused him to fail countless times and rewind infinitely!
But this time!
Meng Lang only felt his chest boiling like molten lava!
Killing intent surged in his mind!
At this moment, what he thought about was no longer escaping this cyber prison!
He only wanted to kill!
He only wanted to smash these two CTs to death!
The footsteps of the CTs gradually drew closer—the CTs with dynamic defense inside the system space, after locking onto Meng Lang’s position, had begun actively pushing forward to clear him!
No!
He absolutely could not give the opponent the chance to pre-aim the headshot angle behind the A1 box!
A voice roared in Meng Lang’s heart!
Even if, in the system data, his [Reaction] stat was as high as 91, already at a world T0 level, CS was not a game that purely tested reaction speed!
Pre-aim was something reaction speed could not beat!
What was pre-aim?
It meant the opponent had long assumed that someone was there. Ninety-nine percent of the preparation to fire had already been completed, and all that was missing was the press of a finger. But you still needed to receive the signal of the enemy appearing, process it through your brain, and then press the mouse!
A hair’s breadth of difference could lead to a thousand miles of error!
He absolutely could not sit and wait for death.
The next moment, Meng Lang’s eyes sharpened!
He directly crouch-swung out, first rapidly aiming and instantly killing the CT sneaking in from below jungle. Then, at the instant gunfire exploded above his head, he suddenly yanked his crosshair upward like a dragon raising its head and spray-transferred!
Headshot!
One body!
One head!
Double kill!
1V5…
I!
Finally killed them all!!!!
Holy shit!!!
Meng Lang froze briefly, then was unable to suppress the surging excitement in his heart!
He had once thought it was impossible to do. But when he truly completed it, he realized it was not impossible after all!
There was certainly an element of luck involved, but every brilliant clutch was a combination of luck and gun skill to begin with, sending a person to heaven or hell in a single thought!
Just then, the system’s voice rang out in his mind:
[Congratulations to the host for perfectly solving Donk’s clutch! That which cannot knock you down will ultimately make you stronger!]
[Xiao Dong’s Remnant has completed fusion. When the host is equipped with an AK, gun skill +15.]
Gun skill +15 when equipped with an AK?
Meng Lang remembered that because of his hand injury, his base gun skill stat in the system was only 79. With this sudden +15, wouldn’t it surpass 90 and reach 94?!
According to the system’s stat divisions: above 90 was world T0 level, 80-90 was T1, 70-80 was T2, and 60 was the minimum passing line for a professional. That meant Meng Lang had basically stepped into the ranks of the world’s top star riflers in one leap!
Although the prerequisite was that he had to use the [signature weapon], the AK,
this was still extremely remarkable!
One had to know that even when Meng Lang equipped the AWP he was most skilled with, it only gave +10, raising him to 89 at most—barely a tier-one sniper!
There was still a bit of distance between him and the very top snipers.
And that bit of distance was also the hardest gap to cross!
But now, after fusing with [Xiao Dong’s Remnant], when equipped with his signature weapon AK, his base gun skill actually broke through the 90 barrier in one go, stepping into the ranks of world T0 top-tier riflers. How could Meng Lang not feel delighted inside?!
As for why his results had been mediocre after switching to rifler, one reason was that riflers required a great deal of pre-aiming. His previous hand injury made it very difficult for his right hand to control the mouse stably and smoothly for long periods like Niko.
On the other hand, Meng Lang’s style had never been that of a vacuum-cleaner rifler slowly clearing every angle!
He preferred wide, sweeping aggression!
Frontal gunfights!
Just now, after entering Donk’s body, he had immediately felt that familiar aura!
Not much pre-aiming. Pure dry swings, pure reaction, pure speed and precision. Most of the kills relied on secondary aim adjustment.
This was exactly the same as his former sniping style!
And after fusing with “Xiao Dong’s Remnant,” he gained an even deeper understanding of this style of rifle combat!
At this moment, as the system prompt ended, the scene before Meng Lang’s eyes suddenly began to spin and twist, until it shattered inch by inch.
The next second, he returned to the G2 base, in front of his own computer.
At this moment, after spending who knew how long inside that cyber prison, a sudden emotion rose in his heart, as though an entire lifetime had passed!
He was finally out of jail!
The sunlight outside the window was bright.
He lowered his head and looked at the time in the bottom right corner of the screen.
10:25 a.m.!
Meng Lang’s first reaction:
Holy shit!
The time stop was real!!!