"Hey, guys! What's it like to duo-queue against two NIP pros in S Division and still win? In this episode, I'll take you into the match for a first-person look at the atmosphere..."
After seeing that the video had racked up tens of thousands of likes in just one day, Xiao Yujun finally breathed a sigh of relief. All that overtime had paid off!
He opened the comments to take a look. Everything was going just as he'd expected.
[The Genius Youth is really delivering these days. As long as he doesn't get banned, he's doing great!]
[Holy crap! This Cape's Number One Breakthrough Player is something else! I'm opening Cape and making some breakthroughs too!]
[Hahaha! Even foreign pros have to behave and hand over their knives on Perfect World Platform. That's CNCS for you.]
[This guy's pretty good! His stats are better than both pros'!]
[I even checked the Demo just now. He charges into Bomb Site like a rabid dog, no rhyme or reason. The pros couldn't even handle that wide swing.]
[Is this Cape's Number One Breakthrough Player cheating? Some of those reactions are really suspicious.]
[Case closed: the guy above is D Division at best.]
[...]
Just as expected, the video had blown up, with tens of thousands of likes and hundreds of thousands of views.
But he knew what players on his platform were like, so plenty of people, including some creators, had downloaded the Demo to study it.
If they actually found evidence of cheating, all they'd have to do was post another video. Wouldn't that be the key to going viral?
But the results were disappointing. They repeatedly compared the gameplay and the team's voice comms, and everything looked normal for S Division players.
Xiao Yujun was overjoyed at the income the video had brought in, but a new problem soon cropped up: he couldn't find any fresh material.
There was only so much rice in one bowl. Once you'd eaten it, it was gone.
"I should've written a CSGO novel. No need to look for material—the whole plot can just be made up."
Xiao Yujun had a bold idea, but quickly stamped it out. Who'd read something written without the skill to back it up?
He opened the materials he'd collected before, one by one, hoping to find some fresh inspiration.
When he reached the latest clip he'd saved, featuring a NIP pro, he stared at the ID [Cape's Number One Breakthrough Player] for a few seconds.
It wasn't because of the MVP. CSGO depended too much on feel and form. Someone could be the MVP and dominate one match, then end up at the bottom of the board the next.
It was mainly that the ID was so unusual that he couldn't help staring at it for a few seconds.
Then, intrigued, he opened Perfect World Platform and searched for the ID.
He wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it himself!
The player had been C+ last season, but was already S this season!
He checked the recent match records. They were nothing special, but the overall stats were steadily improving.
For example, on the day he first reached S, this [Cape's Number One Breakthrough Player] had put up a 0.49 Rating Wanquan Division Poet performance.
But his stats had improved in line with the timeline. Over the past few days, even his worst Rating had been around 0.9.
At this rate, reaching Gold S or even Diamond S was totally within reach!
He scrolled quickly down through Su Zhe's match history, all the way back to the C+ he'd started the season at.
That was when it came back to him. Wasn't this the kid Leon Kai had personally clarified wasn't a cheater?
People on the internet had short memories.
After Su Zhe reached A Division, he'd started to fall off, and people gradually stopped paying attention to him.
Without Leon Kai, who would care about a player hovering around A Division? Even if he really were cheating, hardly anyone would notice.
Cheaters only became famous when they reached the platform's highest division, kept running into streamers, and utterly destroyed them.
Xiao Yujun hadn't expected the kid to improve this much in a month!
Going from A to S Division in a month wasn't that crazy, but what about going from C+ to S in around forty days...
And not just any S, either—he'd crushed pros and become the MVP...
Inspiration hit him all at once!
It turned out Leon Kai's Douyin account was nowhere near as successful as it could've been.
When Xiao Yujun made a video centered on [Cape's Number One Breakthrough Player], it beat Leon Kai's twenty videos in likes, views, and comments.
And that was without even mentioning how shamelessly he'd borrowed the video style of Hualong Esports from the next platform over.
"Zhe! Did you pay someone to make a video about you?"
Fat Brother and Xiao Guang were stunned as they watched the video on their phones. It had already reached forty thousand likes!
Fat Brother was especially surprised. He'd been a Genius Youth himself back in the day, reaching S Division in about a thousand hours.
Back then, he'd posted his match history online to show off, only for people to call him average and claim they'd reached S in just three or four hundred hours.
Su Zhe had already played over eight hundred hours, so why was he getting treated so differently?
There were already four Douyin videos about him.
Xiao Guang sighed. "You don't get it... Five hundred hours to reach C+, then suddenly hitting S just over a month later? That's a huge contrast."
"And honestly, the video itself is pretty well made..."
Just then, the audio from the phone began to play softly...
"This episode's star is once again the MVP who crushed the NIP duo. With over a month of hard work, he's proven what it means to bloom late..."
"He didn't accept his supposedly mediocre talent, even after taking five hundred hours to reach C+..."
"With relentless effort, playing at least a dozen high-intensity Ladder matches every day, he's improved at a visible pace..."
The comments below were all supportive and full of encouragement.
[I knew that ID in the last video looked familiar. What a journey!]
[I used to doubt him. Now I wake up in the middle of the night and slap myself twice.]
"Damn, I mean, this talent is seriously amazing! Those reactions! Those entries! I'm practically soaking! Could he really go pro?"
[@TYLOO Esports Club, come see if he's got what it takes to go pro!]
[I've got five hundred hours and I'm still C+. Does that mean I'm also a talented player who's just a late bloomer?]
[I think you're more suited to working on an assembly line...]
After watching the video, Fat Brother walked over to Su Zhe and put a hand on his shoulder. In a solemn tone, he said, "I've got a plan to make money. Wanna hear it?"
Su Zhe had a feeling that this big, burly otaku couldn't be up to any good, but curiosity got the better of him. "What is it?"
Fat Brother said, "I think you could totally start streaming now. These two videos have gotten so much attention. You'd definitely rake in the cash!"
Su Zhe brushed his hand away. "No way! I have no streaming experience at all."
Xiao Guang chimed in from the side. "What's so hard about that? As soon as you start streaming, just say, 'I'm going pro! I'm going to the Shanghai Major!' The cash will come pouring straight into your pockets!"
"Fat Brother can wear an s1mple jersey, and I'll wear a Niko jersey. We'll be right there making a Show Effect for your stream..."
Su Zhe promptly shut the conversation down. "I'm going pro and making a name for myself. Why would I settle for being some little streamer?"
The next day at noon.
Su Zhe looked at the webcam he'd just bought and asked Fat Brother, "When I start streaming in a bit, should I just show my hands, or should I get all three of us in the shot?"
Before you continue