Chapter 302: The Gaze from Astralis

When the man went out for a stroll with his Corgi, there were already quite a few people out walking on the road. The temperature in Denmark today was mild, and the sunshine made him feel exceptionally comfortable.

Walking up to a house, gla1ve knocked on the door, and a familiar face appeared before him.

Even with messy hair and wearing a simple white T-shirt and shorts, he still gave off the feeling of a lazy, handsome guy.

"I really hate this face of yours."

device murmured, "Is it a crime to be handsome?"

gla1ve pushed past the still-dazed device and walked into the house with practiced ease, pouring dog food for the Corgi named ACE.

Turning his head, he saw device leaning against the doorframe, watching him quietly. "How come you seem more familiar with my place than I am? It takes me quite some effort to find these things. Why don't you just live at my place? Whenever I can't find something, I'll just ask you."

"I have a girlfriend, don't get any ideas about me." gla1ve rolled his eyes at the suddenly slightly 'bromantic' device. "And seriously, you should find a girlfriend too. It's a real waste of that handsome face."

They had known each other since they were kids, so they spoke without any reservations.

gla1ve shouldn't have been here today either; although the two spent a lot of time together, they had just gone for a walk in the city yesterday.

But after returning from the city, device received a phone call, dumped the dog on him, and went off to play badminton.

Actually, he could understand it; device had a very deep emotional connection to badminton. Before becoming a CSGO professional, he was a professional badminton player in Denmark. If it weren't for injuries, device might be shining in the professional badminton world right now.

Now that device had made a name for himself in the CSGO professional scene, badminton had turned into a hobby, and naturally, he loved it deeply.

However, gla1ve also knew that even so, device would still be among the hardest-working people in all of CSGO.

His past experience as a professional badminton player gave him an excellent set of professional habits, and his stable performance was one of the reasons why Astralis could have such dominance in the CSGO professional scene.

"Speaking of which, the IEM Sydney final last night was really good. Did you watch it, device?"

After pouring the dog food, gla1ve sat down in the garden, basking in the sun and casually finding a topic.

device came out wearing casual sportswear, holding two drinks, and tossed one to gla1ve before sitting down himself. "I came back from playing ball last night and went straight to sleep. I'll catch up on the match later."

Generally speaking, he would rewatch high-quality matches three times to keep his own level from slipping.

The first time was to review the match from a god's-eye view, looking at the overall tactical ideas and gambits of both teams to improve his own macro-perspective.

The second time, he usually watched from the perspective of the best-performing player, using the match MVP to understand the opponent's playstyle and learn from what was worth adopting.

The third time, he watched from the perspective of the worst-performing player. At this point, he would fully immerse himself, thinking about what decisions he would make in that situation if it were him, and whether he could play better than the opponent.

This rigorous professional habit was the real reason device had maintained such a high level of competition for so many years. He wasn't like Vitality's Nice, who liked to practice aim crazily to maintain form; device preferred watching demos to keep his decision-making correct.

"Speaking of which, Liquid was the team closest to our level in the first half of the year... Do you think they have the qualifications to be our rivals?"

The two sat in the garden, mainly enjoying the daily tranquility, basking in the sun and chatting for a while. As for the content of the chat, they weren't particularly concerned; after all, with their strength, they could look down on every professional team in the world.

"Liquid's level is still quite good, and the individual strength of the five members in this lineup is very good. It's just that overall, they are still lacking that little bit of edge. They are very good at playing advantageous games and can easily produce crushing performances, but in some uphill battles, their strength is a bit strained." device tapped his fingers on the table, expressing his understanding of the Liquid team.

Liquid now held the title of the 'Aimbot Team', almost on par with their own 'Wallhack Team', which was already a great honor.

However, in the last two months, Vitality had been in the limelight, and everyone had also dubbed Vitality the 'USB Team'.

device had been curious before: clearly, Vitality had nothing to do with things like USB drives, so why did they have such a nickname? It wasn't until he heard netizens explain it later that he realized it was mainly a comment on Nice. When he performed excellently, people commented that Nice was a 'hacker kid with a USB drive plugged in'. When Nice performed ordinarily, people joked that it was because Nice was watching 'seeds' (torrents). That 200GB of 'seeds' from the 2018 London Major performance match had become Nice's dark history.

Thinking of this, device couldn't help but smile knowingly.

A 200GB hardcore guy indeed!

"Actually, this Liquid team already has the look of a champion." device knew in his heart that if it were in the past, a team with such fierce aim like Liquid would probably have won countless championships in a year.

But thinking about it carefully, if Astralis hadn't led the way and established the current framework of CSGO tactical play, then this Liquid team might not have been able to utilize their aim even if they had it.

Being able to become a CSGO professional and reach the top tier meant that basically everyone was a 'gunner', but how to unleash that aim was the biggest problem.

Liquid chose to use the simplest utility combinations, plus extremely fast trade-kill efficiency, showing exaggerated firepower on the front line.

"Then who do you think has the hope of becoming our rival?" gla1ve asked.

"NAVI, Faze, Liquid, and Vitality all have the possibility, actually." device pondered for a long while. "NAVI's strength isn't weak, actually; the main problem is still their lineup."

"S1mple is just a pure freak." He complained, "We targeted him like that back at the 2018 London Major, and he could still make very critical breakthroughs. This guy is just exaggerated. Although Electronic is a bit unlucky, think about it: he can become one of the best riflemen even when unlucky. When he's not unlucky, how fierce is his firepower?"

The reason NAVI always had many fans supporting them was because of the classic 'S1mple-Electronic' duo. As star players, they were extremely outstanding, and their individual charisma attracted many netizens.

But device also understood that if they didn't change this lineup, their subsequent results would not only fail to improve but might even decline. Zeus and Edward were already too old; they couldn't maintain normal performance in top-tier matches. CSGO was a team game after all; a 'dean' (carry) couldn't stand at the peak of CSGO alone; you had to meet the right five people.

He himself was a good example. If the team gave him lots and lots of resources, and you asked him to take the initiative to carry the whole team, couldn't he do it?

He could do it too, but the win rate definitely wouldn't be as high as it was now.

If a team relied too much on one person's performance, the structure of that team was unreasonable.

NAVI was in exactly that situation right now.

"As for Faze, let's not talk about them; those who know, know. They haven't even solved the commentator problem yet." As he spoke, he looked at gla1ve. "NIKO is the strongest 'gun-toting' commander, oh~"

He also couldn't understand how NIKO managed to maintain an average rating of 1.16 while simultaneously serving as the in-game leader.

You have to realize that many legitimate riflers can't even achieve these numbers, yet NIKO's stats barely dipped at all while he was shouldering the burden of leadership.

"What's the point of that, though?" Da Congming replied to his girlfriend, then said, "NIKO's stats are indeed great, but the problem is he can't win either."

Although they had lost to Faze at the previous Blast Miami stop, the whole team hadn't been in good form; they had just gone in with the mindset of using the tournament as practice. While they found the loss to Faze unexpected, they weren't particularly devastated.

Device chuckled. That was indeed a problem. Even if NIKO's stats were great, if he couldn't win the match, it was all for nothing.

"By comparison, Vitality doesn't have such big problems," Device analyzed. "Vitality also has a very strong dual-firepower point. Nice and Zywoo are the strongest rifler and sniper combination on the market. Their problems with NAVI before were about the same, but the roster change after the Katowice Major was quite successful. At the very least, they aren't lacking in frontal firepower anymore. You've seen the results yourself—they defeated NAVI in one go to win the StarSeries championship."

"So I believe Vitality will be the team most likely to pose a threat to us."

Gla1ve listened to Device's rational analysis and couldn't help but shake his head: "Your intuition is still accurate. In last night's Sydney tournament, Vitality crushed Liquid 3-0."

"3-0? Is it really that exaggerated?"

"Not only that, but that powerful firepower point you mentioned, Nice, finished the finals with an average rating of 1.8."

"How much???" Device felt like he had misheard. "Are you sure it wasn't 1.81 for a single map?"

Da Congming said softly: "If it were 1.81 for a single map, I wouldn't find it so strange... If you want to know more, you can check the forums now. It should be full of discussions about the match. Three five-kills on Map 1—it's just too foul."

Was it that intense? There were actually three five-kills on Map 1... Device felt like he had missed a spectacular match.

Da Congming was enjoying the scenery while picking up his phone to browse the messages on the forum.

As soon as he opened it, he saw someone posting memes on the forum.

Soon, he saw a topic thread:

【Only CSGO players understand the gold content of this photo】

Device clicked on it to take a look. It was a photo of Xu Beifang. Actually, he was quite familiar with similar photos; he had watched plenty of Xu Beifang's replays and often saw Xu Beifang with his face pressed against the screen, his face glowing with a yellow light, as if his soul had been sucked into the monitor.

He knew this was a way for Xu Beifang to focus more.

After Xu Beifang mentioned it in an interview before, Device had tried it too, but the effect wasn't great; instead, it made his judgment of the peripheral vision around the screen unclear, so he eventually went back to his original sitting posture.

In this photo, red-eye effects had been added to Xu Beifang's eyes.

What's wrong with this photo? Isn't this Xu Beifang's normal state?... Device looked at the title and the image, feeling a bit confused.

The comments below only made him more puzzled.

【What the hell is this overwhelming sense of oppression?】

【Do you even understand the gold content of a BOSS starting in the second phase?】

【Liquid: This BOSS doesn't play by the rules either】

【I'm already starting to sweat】

【Don't tell me there are people who actually think the red eyes are an effect】

【Those three five-kills last night were simply insane; Liquid's mentality completely collapsed】

Device wanted to ask Da Congming, but he found that Da Congming was already on a video call with his girlfriend. He knew that a man in love is the most unreasonable creature.

So he decided to solve the mystery himself. He roughly understood that the issue must have stemmed from those three five-kills.

So he had to find the source.

He quickly found a recording uploaded by a fairly famous English-language caster on his phone.

He found Map 1 and started playing it.

Just as it began, all sorts of bullet comments started flying across the top of the screen:

【Came here by reputation】

【Here to see how he managed to get a 3.07 rating】

【Busy lifting the trophy and going to dinner】

【Totally insane!!】

【Can two fists really not beat four hands?】

【Nice: Even if my teammates don't get a single kill, I can still lead them to victory】

As the video started, Device soon saw Liquid's successful explosive bomb attack in the pistol round, and the scene where they were preparing to surround Xu Beifang at the jump platform.

As a result, before his eyes, Xu Beifang just fired left and right, killing everyone.

"Liquid is too impatient. If NAF could have stayed steady in this wave, or if the Director in front had let him bait with footsteps, Nice wouldn't have been able to pull that off."

His long-standing personality led him to quickly seek the optimal solution in matches. Although it didn't look like Liquid made any huge mistakes, he still thought there were quite a few small errors.

Liquid's playstyle, which pursues individual ability, doesn't have particularly high requirements for player coordination, which leads to relatively rough details.

However, he also realized that Nice was indeed very strong. Even when surrounded in this situation, he didn't do any unnecessary moves; he seized every opportunity Liquid gave him to operate.

Nice had pulled off the first five-kill, so whose was the second?

Da Congming's phone call was endless. Device set it to double speed and started watching ahead. It wasn't until the final round of the first half, when the bullet comments warned 【High energy ahead】, that he slowed down to watch this round carefully.

Xu Beifang's playstyle was as aggressive as ever. His constant forward-pushing on Mirage was an eye-opener for him. This round was also a forward push, but by suddenly changing his position, he caught Liquid off guard.

Then, under his gaze, in this round, Xu Beifang managed to win against Liquid in a clutch situation, once again securing a five-kill.

"That's the second time. Could the third time also be a Nice five-kill?"

He continued watching. Soon he saw the pistol round of the second half, where Vitality started in a 2-vs-5 clutch. At this point, Device even felt some anticipation. He had a premonition that the answer he wanted was in this round.

Sure enough, in the first wave of the 2-vs-5, they only got one kill, but Nice and JackZ retreated safely to the back point. Immediately after, JackZ was killed, and the Liquid trio saw the bomb and set up a position where they could quickly trade kills.

Then, he saw Xu Beifang rush out and, with three bullets, instantly kill all three Liquid players.

"Whoa!!!!" Device's eyes were filled with astonishment. "Is that how Liquid lost last night?"

Da Congming heard his question and nodded perfunctorily.

Device looked at his phone screen; the bullet comments had already covered the entire screen at this moment:

【Liquid's combined kills are about the same as Nice's alone; top-tier stuff】

【Nice has no waves in his heart; he even wants to laugh】

【The Boss drank Liquid like it was water】

【He's made history, right? This guy's firepower is too fierce】

【Three five-kills, ten kills in the pistol rounds—I wouldn't even dare to dream of this】

【The BOSS is getting a feel for fish-frying】

Looking at the bullet comments that almost covered the phone screen, Device recalled the photo on the forum again.

Once he thought of it, he finally understood why the forum netizens said that photo had such a strong sense of oppression.

"So it turns out Nice got three five-kills in a single match!!"

As if hearing Device's self-talk, Da Congming turned his head and added: "It's not just three five-kills in a single match; his average rating for the entire final was 1.81."

"Ah!!"

What kind of concept is 1.81?

No matter what kind of match it is, 1.81 can be considered carrying the team forward, but this was Nice's average over three maps.

Was Liquid really that miserable?

Device was already a bit disoriented.

Da Congming finished his call, recalled Device's inquiry, and vividly explained the specific situation from last night:

"When Nice got his first five-kill last night, the Liquid players were stunned. They never expected that just as the final started, Nice would pull off a five-kill... At that time, the director cut to their camera, and they looked completely lost. Liquid didn't know whether to call a timeout or not."

Because he was watching the video at double speed, Device hadn't carefully observed the players' facial expressions during the halftime break.

Now, listening to Gla1ve's explanation, he could almost see Stewie2K's sour face and couldn't help but laugh out loud: "Haha, I can imagine how awkward that scene was."

They had also encountered such difficult problems before, but with Da Congming as their anchor, they could always handle the issues quickly.

Gla1ve said to Device: "It seems that, as you said, our next opponent will very likely be Vitality."

In the past, Vitality was purely a Bastille. Although they had top-tier players, their strength was never quite enough to look at. But now, I'm afraid no one would question Vitality's strength, after all, they have consecutively defeated top-tier teams like NAVI and Liquid.

And Device believed that compared to Liquid, Vitality also had more outstanding tactical ability. Following this trend, they would definitely be able to become a top-tier team in the future.

He couldn't help but recall the first time he met Xu Beifang, when Xu Beifang was just a silly rifler.

At that time, he wanted to trick Xu Beifang into playing badminton with him to enjoy the pleasure of fish-frying, but he didn't expect to be seen through immediately.

That was when Xu Beifang was still with that group of old men from VP. Device initially thought Xu Beifang would eventually become the dean of VP, becoming the next Walde.

But he didn't expect that although Xu Beifang served as dean for a few months, he escaped that cage even faster, and now he is no longer the silly rifler who couldn't even play a clutch.

Speaking of which, it's a bit pretentious, but he hasn't had such a strong desire to compete in a long time.

The current A-Team, in the first-tier professional scene, can only be said to be unprecedented.

As long as they can participate in a tournament, they can enter the finals, and it's very easy for them to win the championship.

They had no more honors to win, which led to them being very exhausted in the last few months, so they entered a rest state.

Device didn't expect that just by watching a Vitality match today, he would have the desire to win once again.

Device rubbed his hands, looking at Xu Beifang, who was still killing everyone in the mobile video; he suddenly really wanted to face Vitality once.

A transitional chapter, written from the perspective of other players—a small experiment.