This Kid Might Really Save CNCS!

Chapter 42: This Kid Might Actually Save CNCS!

Look closely, this man's name is Xiao Shuai, and he's a CS:GO professional player.

Today, he's about to start his second round of matches in the Asian RMR.

The match time is still far off, and Xiao Shuai, who's already prepared, is currently in his usual browsing session.

His outstanding performance yesterday made him eager to see what people were saying about him online.

He opened his favorite video site, about to check the comments on CSBOY's VODs, when he stumbled upon a clip from Big Brother with a Long Neck, also known as Leon Kai.

He actually quite liked Leon Kai. After he'd crushed Leon Kai in a ranked match before, other streamers had immediately accused Jiang Yang of cheating.

Leon Kai, however, had spoken very tactfully, not wanting to wrongly accuse him.

In the entire scene, Leon Kai might not create a lot of content, but his character is definitely top-notch.

Still, this clip was a real clickbait, with an incredibly exaggerated title.

Leon Kai: "Steel Helmets Ruined CNCS!"

It made Jiang Yang laugh out loud, and he instinctively clicked on it.

The first scene of the video was the incredible 1v4 clutch Jiang Yang had pulled off on Dust II.

This was also the first time Jiang Yang was seeing his clutch from a spectator's perspective, and he realized he could have handled it even better.

Of course, he was viewing it from his current perspective; his thought process and actions back then were different.

"That was really close!" Jiang Yang muttered to himself. "If Danking had landed one more shot with his pistol, the result of the first map might have been different."

If they had lost the first map, with Steel Helmets' momentum faltering, this BO3 match would have been really tough to call.

After all, even though Tyloo tended to choke, their skill was undeniable.

But this is the charm of CS:GO, where a single round, a single kill, can influence the outcome of the match.

And as the key player who determined the outcome, Jiang Yang felt incredibly awesome!

The clip continued to show highlight reels of the players clashing. On Steel Helmets' side, it was mainly Jiang Yang and DD who were dominating, while on Tyloo's side, Danking and Cy1 were also consistently performing well.

But Tyloo couldn't hold on in the final moments of the second map, and when Steel Helmets staged a comeback with unified effort, Leon Kai's eyes widened: "No way, Steel Helmets actually managed to win against Tyloo?"

Even after watching the whole thing, he was still astonished.

Leon Kai, with a smile, stared blankly at his stream for a while before coming back to his senses.

As a veteran CS:GO player, he had always hoped Tyloo would regain their 2018 glory and see Chinese players shine on the international stage.

But Tyloo had repeatedly disappointed him.

Now, they had lost to Steel Helmets, and Leon Kai, a die-hard fan, was speechless for a long time.

It felt like a football fan watching their national team lose to a group of casual players.

Leon Kai snapped back to reality and said, "Steel Helmets was truly amazing today. Let's take a look at the post-match stats."

Soon, Leon Kai opened HLTV's stats site and refreshed it a few times.

"Alright, the data is out, you can all take a look..." Leon Kai hadn't even finished speaking when his expression changed. "What is this? This Cousin has an average rating of 2.01 across two maps??"

Leon Kai took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes, as if he thought he had misread.

After confirming the data was still the same, Leon Kai stretched his neck out and exclaimed, "He got 73 kills by himself! DD only got 35 kills across both maps, and even doubling his kills wouldn't surpass this Cousin!"

[???]

[Is this Cousin even human?? Did he borrow a USB drive from S1mple for today's performance?]

[Didn't they say Little Sheep plays passively against Tyloo? Why is he getting stronger and stronger?]

[Too exaggerated, +43 kills]

[Cousin is really carrying the team]

[How did Tyloo get stomped like this?]

Leon Kai burst out laughing, unable to contain himself. "Tyloo really had no choice, did they?"

Leon Kai then began to analyze. "He got 40 kills on the first map, and fewer on the second, but still 33 kills."

"Looking at it this way, Tyloo's loss does seem justified. How can you win against Steel Helmets when they have an extra player?"

"With 73 kills, if this Cousin got 4 kills every round and Steel Helmets got one, he could carry them for 18 rounds!"

"If he got 5 kills in a row, he could carry them for 14 rounds. This guy is insane."

After looking at the stats, Leon Kai's focus shifted from questioning Tyloo to understanding them.

"A net of 43 kills, holy crap..." Leon Kai was genuinely amused. "This kid must be cheating, holy crap!"

Of course, he wasn't actually accusing Jiang Yang of cheating, but the stats Jiang Yang had put up were so outrageous that he couldn't help but exclaim in disbelief.

"Danking on the other side was already playing incredibly well, with 53 kills across two maps, but this Cousin has 20 more kills than him, averaging 10 more per map. Their performance is on a completely different level!"

Although Tyloo losing the match made Leon Kai unhappy, the performance of the prodigy on Steel Helmets gave him a glimmer of hope.

This kid might just be the one to save CNCS!

Jiang Yang happily scrolled through clips from CS:GO content creators, all praising him. He was almost floating on air.

If they were in front of him right now, Jiang Yang would definitely have to play it humble.

Then, Jiang Yang heard his Cousin shouting as he ran over, "Yang Yang, quick, look! HLTV actually featured you in their weekly best of!!"

Hearing Ma Xixi's voice, Jiang Yang turned his head and glanced over.

Just a few minutes ago, HLTV had released their weekly highlight reel.

It was titled directly as young VS Tyloo.

HLTV is a professional data analysis website for CS:GO, and player rankings each year are based on its data.

When there are matches, HLTV also releases highlight clips of players every week.

But generally, only players who are outstanding enough catch HLTV's eye.

Jiang Yang hadn't expected to be selected.

The video played slowly, and Jiang Yang saw his 1v4 clutch on Dust II.

Ma Xixi was watching alongside him. Even though he'd seen it a few times, he was still amazed by Jiang Yang's decisions and execution at the time.

He was just too C+.

Jiang Yang smiled with satisfaction.

Ma Xixi also praised him, "You played really well yesterday. Keep it up today. I won't talk about huge goals, but if you work hard, you really have a chance to take down VG too. Once those stickers come out, you'll really have a stable footing in this scene."

"I'll give it my all! I heard those stickers are quite profitable, right?" Jiang Yang asked.

Ma Xixi nodded. "It might be a small amount for me, but it's quite a lot for you. At the very least, after getting that money, if you don't buy a car or a house, you could use it for several years."

"You can also have Auntie and the others keep it for you then, so they know you're serious about this pro path."

Hearing this, Jiang Yang nodded.

His parents' acceptance of him playing professionally was mainly thanks to Ma Xixi.

Ma Xixi had guaranteed his parents that if he didn't make a name for himself, Ma Xixi would arrange a job for him, which finally put his parents at ease about letting him try.

But Jiang Yang knew that while his Cousin was very good to him, if he could achieve results in his professional career and earn enough income, his parents wouldn't think he was just messing around, but truly pursuing a dream.

"But I don't think we're playing VG today," Jiang Yang explained. "VG also choked yesterday, losing 2-0 to NKT, so we're playing NKT today."

"NKT, that Thai team? The one XCC is on now?" Ma Xixi asked. "Aren't they pretty weak?"

Jiang Yang replied, "I only watched a few rounds. The main thing is that VG played really timidly. During their defense, they just let people into the bombsite, completely afraid to peek."

"Plus, XCC had a great performance yesterday, he really popped off. That's how NKT took both maps with close scores. NKT as a whole is actually pretty weak."

Ma Xixi said, "Speaking of which, this Asian RMR, besides our broadcast team not being here, it's basically an internal conflict among the 18 Tyloo teams."

"Well, play well today, and don't make the same mistakes VG did."

Jiang Yang rolled his eyes. "Even if I wanted to, I couldn't. I wish I could hold back DD and the others, they get too heated."

Ma Xixi chuckled. The current Steel Helmets team, every one of them was incredibly aggressive, like wild bulls that couldn't be restrained.

"Alright, you keep practicing. I'm going to pick up your niece. What do you want for lunch? My treat."

"You guys buy whatever, I'm not picky," Jiang Yang replied, then turned back to his ladder training.

Time quickly flew by to the afternoon, and the second round of the Asian RMR officially began.

Steel Helmets faced NTK, led by XCC.

Although Ma Xixi didn't rate NTK highly, Jiang Yang still took every round seriously.

But the reality proved that NTK's performance on the first day was entirely due to XCC popping off.

Moreover, on Steel Helmets' side, after defeating Tyloo on the first day, everyone's performance seemed to have undergone a qualitative change; they all played with more confidence.

Their overall performance clearly improved, and everyone had an extremely high will to win.

Under these circumstances, except for the ECO rounds where he was allowed to go for some aggressive plays, Jiang Yang could only occasionally pick off enemies with the sniper rifle in full buy rounds.

Most of the time, he didn't need to exert himself; the match was over.

In the end, this BO3 match concluded with a final score of 2-0.

The scores for the two maps were 16:5 and 16:7, with Steel Helmets taking both maps decisively.

DD even achieved an average rating of 1.46.

Jiang Yang, however, only had a rating of 1.21. Spectators who had flocked to watch due to his outstanding performance yesterday saw this stat and jokingly called Jiang Yang washed up.

Jiang Yang was indifferent to stats; as long as they won, that was all that mattered.

Meanwhile, on the loser's bracket, in the match between Tyloo and VG, they made huge drafting mistakes, leading to VG narrowly winning 2-1.

VG later played against NKT, and this match further proved that NKT's overall strength wasn't high. VG directly eliminated them 2-0, also ending with a decisive score like Steel Helmets.

As long as they could defeat VG next, Jiang Yang could truly lead these Old Timers in Steel Helmets to shout in the stream, "I can make it to the Stockholm Major!"

Thinking of that scene, Jiang Yang felt energized.

I won't dwell too much on matches of this level; it's more fun to write about top-tier tournaments later on.