“This guy’s pretty ruthless!”
Inside the RA base, A Zhong couldn’t help but praise him.
Only by facing him head-on could you truly feel from the opponent’s movements and playstyle just how much pressure there was.
In this Inferno, especially when they were on the attacking side, A Zhong really couldn’t read this kid’s positioning and playstyle at all.
There were basically no head-on duels; they were always getting caught from the side.
Although he wasn’t a professional player known for his game sense, for the opponent to pull this off against him meant they definitely had something going for them.
259 also got interested and directly downloaded the demo from that match, starting to watch from the first round.
Halfway through the pistol round, 259 hit pause. “You said before this kid wasn’t doing anything, but he started popping off from the pistol round, alright?”
After the pistol round started, “Stay Calm” made his way straight to A1.
Then, when the attackers threw an A1 smoke, he actively jumped to deflect the smoke grenade off course.
“No wonder the A1 smoke screwed up back then—it was this guy’s doing.” 259 clicked his tongue twice. “Playing smart.”
Then he heard the kid in the POV actively open his mic to comm: “A1 smoke I deflected. Don’t peek Link yet; I’ll bait for you.”
“At the time all our attention was on A1, and Link caught two of us from behind. I even said that guy at Link was absurdly accurate, but this is how it was.” Only now did A Zhong realize who the real culprit was.
259 was even more satisfied: “Plays smart, likes to communicate and coordinate—this kid is good!”
He really liked uncovering prodigies in matchmaking.
But these young, hot-blooded prodigies, because of their formidable individual skill, often developed path dependence, increasingly fond of forcing aim duels and relying purely on gunplay to solve problems.
But CS:GO is ultimately a team-based FPS. Communication and coordination are incredibly important.
Nowadays there was even a top-ranked pug player in CS:GO with the ID Zhao Xinglong.
This guy’s strength was also quite formidable—pure visible talent. But the problem was he didn’t like communicating, which made 259 quite regretful.
And among prodigies, problem children weren’t few in number.
Those with terrible tempers, those who liked to tilt teammates, one-trick ponies who only knew Dust 2—259 had seen way too many of those…
Pure aim didn’t carry much weight in his evaluation of “talent.”
But this kid Danking recommended not only had strong aim, but also liked to communicate, and his playstyle was inspired. 259 felt it was simply fantastic.
They continued watching, and also saw the causes of death in many of their own rounds.
For example, getting caught by Yang Yu’s one-way smoke double setup, or getting wallbanged at A2 by Yang Yu catching his timing.
And Yang Yu relying on setups from previous rounds, directly looking for opportunities in the side lane.
When they saw the moment Yang Yu ducked his head while passing VIP, they both gasped: “This guy pays attention to the details!”
Having played professionally for so many years, they knew just how much detail this game required at the professional level.
Many prodigies had extremely strong aim, but lacked various other details. Once they reached the professional stage, they couldn’t utilize their gunplay at all—it was like punching cotton.
“Gunplay hard enough, and he knows how to use all kinds of techniques to gain advantages—this guy is exactly like me when I was young!” 259 was a bit nostalgic.
A Zhong: “…”
A Zhong: “Have you no shame?”
Before they knew it, they had reached the second half of the match.
The two of them also wanted to see how this kid operated on the attacking side.
If they remembered correctly, after the side switch they had initially won a few rounds in a row, then the momentum broke at A2, after which they gradually collapsed and got rolled.
“This should be the round.”
They looked at Yang Yu’s POV.
This was a gun round. When the countdown ended, Yang Yu bought full armor, an AK, and full utility, rushing straight toward the side lane at round start.
First a Molotov toward VIP, then he came straight to the white door area to watch for a push from VIP.
“This positioning is much better than yours, Lao Jiu.”
Truly, comparisons are merciless.
259 and Yang Yu had both played from the same position, but 259’s positioning and decision-making were slightly inferior.
After throwing his Molotov, he had chosen to hold VIP from the sewer, which caused him to get caught out by a side lane timing.
In Yang Yu’s POV, after confirming no one was in VIP, only then did he open the white door, inform his teammates that he was no longer watching VIP, and begin jiggle-peeking to scout Spiral Stairs.
After his teammates were utility-locked by A Zhong and couldn’t enter Banana, Yang Yu slowly pushed toward Spiral Stairs, trying to find an opening from A2.
But just as Yang Yu was crossing Spiral Stairs, a shadow suddenly appeared in his peek. The reflexes of youth caused Yang Yu to react instinctively, snapping his crosshair over and spraying a burst.
“Da-da-da-da!”
Four bullets flew out, and a chicken exploded in a burst of feathers. A Zhong burst out laughing at the sight.
This scene made it even clearer that the opponent was a normal person—this was the subconscious reaction of a normal person seeing an unidentified object.
Immediately after, Yang Yu quickly cleared Boiler, checked close Hall, then threw a flash toward A2.
Seeing this flash, 259 also remembered: “I think I had an AWP this round!”
“When I heard this flash, I waited for it to pop before peeking him.”
His memory served him correctly. When the flash popped, Yang Yu directly peeked out, the AK47 firing.
Valorant Jett. One-tap!
Yang Yu then turned again, repositioning to hold Boiler, successfully catching a reckless CT. The A site was instantly broken open by him.
A Zhong couldn’t help but twitch the corner of his mouth seeing this.
“What are you laughing at?” 259 didn’t understand.
A Zhong waved his hand: “Nothing, nothing.”
“If you have thoughts, say them.”
A Zhong pointed at the screen, completely cracking up: “He killed you faster than he killed the chicken on the map, hahahahaha!”
259: “…”
Human joys and sorrows do not resonate. At this moment, he only found A Zhong noisy.
How the hell was that the same?
Most importantly, he had no way to refute it.
Because Yang Yu used four bullets to kill the chicken, and only one to kill him.
“You really are a hater!”
After watching the entire demo, 259 fell into thought.
A Zhong asked: “So, what do you say? Do we want this kid?”
259 couldn’t keep the corners of his mouth from turning up.
Seeing this situation, A Zhong immediately understood. “Looks like RA is about to add another great player. Our Lao Jiu Men is truly full of talented people, haha.”
After watching this demo, 259 grew fonder and fonder of the kid Danking had introduced.
Extremely strong aim, inspired playstyle, decisive communication, willing to rally the team when behind, and had a thorough understanding of matchmaking tempo—he simply couldn’t like him more.
So 259 immediately sent Yang Yu a friend request.
After waiting a while without acceptance, he immediately had Danking go say hello, and got accepted quickly.
Jiang Yang himself: “I’m RA’s current IGL. Danking recommended you to me, and I’ve watched your matchmaking demos. Your playstyle suits our taste very well, so do you have time to come to RA for an offline tryout?”
Stay Calm: “Anytime!”
…
PS: Recently everyone has been discussing a lot about whether the protagonist will join CNCS. I’ll respond here: the protagonist will enter RA extremely briefly, and will very soon afterward join a European team to compete for the championship on the Tier 1 stage.
The current RA roster is Jamyoung, 259, Hanbao, KAZE, and Mosiyu—none of the players with major scandals from before.
As for whether he’ll return to CNCS later on, I just hope these young CNCS players don’t cause another huge scandal, so that I can still piece together a Yellow River Battleship and fulfill Danking’s dream in this novel.