CS: The Last Dance, a Dance That Leads to Professional Success

Chapter 78 The Shipbreaker! Dark is Gone?! (Seeking first subscriptions and monthly votes)
It's no wonder that the internet was in an uproar!

After all, in the CS:GO ecosystem, the Challengers and Legends are, to some extent, two different worlds.

In the Legends Division, you might randomly draw an opponent who is one of the top teams in the HLTV World Rankings from last year or this year.

These are all genuine top-tier clubs, boasting large coaching staffs and data analyst teams.

Rookies like Meng Lang, who are newcomers and have just made a name for themselves in the Challenger Group, are easily targeted by the opponent's research team in their first match after advancing. The team will analyze the match footage repeatedly to figure out his positioning habits, gun skills, and item usage, and then make various highly targeted arrangements during the match!

This is also a major reason why many rising stars either "brightly shine" or "quickly fade into obscurity" in the Legends group.

But what the heck was today's match?

FAZE Clan, this is a genuine, luxurious galactic battleship!

They are the newly crowned champions who just crushed G2 at IEM Katowice and lifted the championship trophy!

Today, they were actually defeated by G2, who only changed one new player.
Moreover, the match was anything but "sticky." Although it wasn't a 16-3 victory, the 16-7 score was still a clean and decisive crushing defeat, directly sinking the roaring FAZE super team!
What the hell is this plot?

At this moment, HLTV's official post-match comment section was already flooded with comments from all over the world, completely exploding in chaos:

[My God! I can't believe my eyes! G2 completely tore apart FaZe's defenses today thanks to that rookie named Dark! He's a monster!]

Honestly, did Karrigan not study Dark at all before the match? He seemed completely clueless about this rookie! That's so unprofessional! Or is Dark just too strong to be countered?

Karrigan was truly stunned this time; his tactics completely failed. Dark's performance was phenomenal; he deserved this victory!

Welcome to the Legends Group, Dark! Your perfect debut showed everyone that you belong here! FAZE is now just your backdrop!

[Can anyone tell me why a contestant from the Challenger group made the Galactic Battleship look like paper in front of him?! Is he a shipbreaker?]

At the same time, the comment section of the Perfect World CS:GO community in China also completely erupted:
"You said you wouldn't do research and you really meant it! Big cousin, you're something else! (Thumbs up)"

"Hilarious! That big pig is such an honest guy!"

"Holy crap! I have a feeling that Dark's performance today seems to be very familiar with FAZE's tactics!"

"You know what, especially that psychological battle with Ropz, he was even leisurely playing with the flashbang, completely unfazed, and he was certain that Ropz would come back to his death! His mental fortitude is amazing!"

"That's right! Also, Dark's tactical responses to my cousin's attacks felt like... 'nothing special, just practice makes perfect.' He was so calm!"

"It feels like today it wasn't FAZE figuring out Dark, but rather FAZE being figured out by G2, or rather, by Dark!"

"Damn, which team actually fought their way up from the Challenger Group?! This is a huge shock to my worldview!"

……

Antwerp Legends Studio.

On the G2 bench, Leonardo DiCaprio took off his headphones, let out a long sigh of relief, and smiled with barely suppressed excitement. He turned to Meng Lang, who was packing up his peripherals, and patted him hard on the shoulder: "Well done, Meng! How did you know that Big Brother would set up the defense like that for those last few points? You were amazing!"

Upon hearing this, Niko, his cousin, and m0NESY also curiously gathered around, focusing their attention on Meng Lang.

In the crucial final points of the second half of the match, Meng Lang, who usually focuses on his individual performance and doesn't participate much in overall tactical decisions, unusually shared his thoughts briefly in voice chat before each game, speculating on FAZE's possible default defensive positioning and possible forward push routes.

On several occasions, he actually guessed right, either by allowing G2's attack to avoid heavy firepower points or by seizing the timing of CT's forward push.

At the time, the competition was in full swing, and everyone just thought it was Meng Lang's hot streak or good luck, without having time to think about it in detail.

But now that the match is over, and everyone has calmed down and thought back, a sense of surprise welled up in their hearts!
That's the FAZE Clan!
It's the galactic battleship that's roaring on the CS stage today!

G2 has suffered losses at their hands before. Karrigan's tactical manual, known for its "thickness" and "depth," once gave even the academically trained strategist, DiCaprio, a real headache.

But today, Leonardo DiCaprio seemed to be playing with unusual "smoothness," and towards the end, he even felt that Fazer's defense wasn't all that great.
But at this moment, Leonardo DiCaprio also clearly realized how crucial Meng Lang's seemingly unintentional remarks and seemingly "intuitive" judgments played during the game!
That seems to be the case.
It wasn't luck, was it?
What else could it be but luck?
He was just a 17-year-old rookie who had just joined the Legends team!
Little Li stared at Meng Lang with great curiosity.

Noticing the curious and inquisitive gazes of Leonardo DiCaprio and the others, Meng Lang thought seriously for a moment and then answered sincerely, "It's probably because I study FAZE every night while I'm sleeping!"

"..."

Everyone was stunned. Researching while sleeping?
Researching in dreams?

Immediately, everyone burst into laughter.

This kid,
He has a great sense of humor.

"He's not joking!"

Old Ni chuckled and put his arm around Meng Lang's shoulder. He said to the others with a grin, "You guys probably don't know, but Meng was talking in his sleep this morning, muttering something about 'when playing FAZE, you have to be aggressive and not go easy on'... He really was studying how to play FAZE even in his dreams!"

"real or fake?"

The child asked curiously, his face showing disbelief.

“Of course it’s true.” Niko nodded with a smile.

Upon hearing this, Xiao Li looked somewhat ashamed.

He has always considered himself to be very dedicated. After joining G2, when the team's performance was poor in the first half of the year, he often spent a lot of time staying up late to review the games and study tactics. He believed that he had put in just as much effort as anyone else.

But someone like Meng Lang, who even studies his opponents in his dreams... he knew he probably couldn't do that.

Thinking of this,

He couldn't help but feel a surge of emotion once again!
really!

Outsiders only saw the sudden emergence of a genius!
But there is no such thing as genius that comes out of thin air. Behind every genius is hard work and effort, which is the reward of diligence!

"Alright, guys, time to go shake hands across the street."

Niko suddenly smiled mischievously and pointed towards FAZE's playing area, "I bet Karrigan is already 'impatient' to get here."

……

At this moment, the atmosphere in FAZE's booth was somber.

Karrigan, the older cousin, leaned back in his gaming chair, his gaze somewhat vacant, his eyes momentarily unfocused!
He looked at the tactical notebook he had placed on the table, but it was as if he saw the notebook being riddled with holes by invisible AK bullets.

Moreover, he felt that his tactics manual was transparent.

It feels like I've been completely seen through.

This was something he had never experienced before.

You know, Big Brother's tactics have always been known for their "thickness" and "depth," so how could they possibly be completely seen through?

Is there anyone in this world who understands him better than he understands himself?
As the older cousin thought about it, his face started to turn red, and his head began to spin a little.

The CPU is about to burn out!

The next second, when he looked up somewhat dazedly, a familiar face appeared before him—his former teammate Niko. Old Niko shook his hand with a smile, and then, as usual, hugged his old friend. Just as Big Cousin was feeling a bit warm, the next second Old Niko's 37-degree mouth uttered words that sounded like minus 37 degrees Celsius.

"Next time... let's target that newbie on our team a little more," Niko said jokingly. "Although, he might not fall for your targeting tactics."

Upon hearing this, the older cousin's face instantly darkened, and he almost fainted.

Immediately afterwards, the G2 players took turns shaking hands with him.

Soon, it was Meng Lang's turn.

Looking at the young, Asian face before him, Karrigan, the older cousin, seemed somewhat dazed as he tried to search his memory.

After thinking for a moment, he couldn't help but ask, "You played very well, to be precise, extremely well... By the way, have we played against each other before? I feel... somewhat familiar, yet also very unfamiliar."

Meng Lang's smile remained unchanged as he calmly replied, "Of course we've fought."

The older cousin was stunned, and even more puzzled.

Meng Lang chuckled and reminded me, "In the Blast Premier Spring Group Stage this January, it was my first official match, and you guys just kicked me to death. I was the team's sniper back then."

My older cousin immediately realized what was going on!

Yes, that's true!

However, when he played against EG, his attention was mainly focused on those established players from EG, and he didn't pay much attention to this newcomer who was making his debut in a top-tier tournament.

His database doesn't even record anything.

There's no way around it; there are just too many newcomers like this in the professional CS scene. They play a few games and if they don't perform well, they're demoted again—the big boss's database won't store players like that.

He only records opponents who are valuable.

But who could have imagined that in just a few months, that unremarkable sniper would transform into a rifleman and, in such a stunning way, kick over their super team on the bigger stage of the Major Legends!

Looking at the other person's right hand wrapped in bandages,
My cousin is so confused!
This world is so crazy!
He shook his head, though he wanted to curse, but he tried to maintain the composure of a veteran: "Your rifle... is excellent! Switching to a different role might be a very wise choice for you."

Upon hearing this, Meng Lang's smile widened, revealing a youthful and undisguised confidence as he said, "Actually, my sniper rifle is pretty good too. I'll let you see it sometime."

"It will happen, it definitely will." My older cousin nodded firmly, his tone returning to its usual calm.

After all, this was just a BO1 loss in the first round of the Legends Group.

The Galactic Battleship's greatest strength lies in returning from hell.

Losing a BO1 means you haven't even triggered the "kill line" for the Galaxy Battle.

Soon, Meng Lang also arrived beside ROPZ.

Ropz was never a talkative person, and he was even more silent at this moment.

He simply and formally shook hands with Meng Lang, but the look in his eyes as he stared at Meng Lang was filled with an extremely complex expression!
In the 6657 live stream, while playing with the machine, I saw the handshake shot captured by the director and couldn't help but pat my belly and laugh out loud!

"Hahaha! The driver's eyes are hilarious! I can't take it anymore, I have to show you all this again. Let me tell you, in today's game, Dark and Ropz faced off directly or indirectly several times, but do you know when the driver's eyes started to look completely different?"

"That's right! It was Big Brother's god-like command in the first half: planting the bomb, faking an attack, and then rotating. G2 was forced to save their weapons. Dark went to the metal plate to try and cut off the enemy's gun, but he actually predicted that Ropz was hiding in that extremely insidious position at the connector and spotted him directly!"

“At that point, no normal person could possibly see it! When the camera focused on Ropz, his eyes were already a little dazed.”

"And then there was that later wave. Dark, in the terrorist's quarters, blindly shot and took down Ropz, who was trying to imitate his broken gun, through the yellow corrugated iron wall!"

"Hahaha! Ropz was completely stunned at that moment, and he turned around to look at the referee! I bet the referee was thinking, 'Why are you looking at me when you're dead?'"

While playing with the machine, he switched to the replays of the two matches he had just played, and couldn't help but laugh again, slapping his belly repeatedly.

"But do you know which wave was the most mind-bending, the one that made Ropz question his very existence?" Wanji put away his smile and asked mysteriously, then immediately answered himself:
"That's right! It was that last clutch in the first half. Dark was at bomb site A. He clearly heard the sounds Ropz made from his fake rotation, but he just stood there, waiting for Ropz to make a huge circle and then come back to A to die!"

"Wow! After that fight, Ropz's eyes were completely glazed over. It felt like... all his thoughts and all his actions had been completely seen through! The despair of having his underwear completely exposed!"

The live stream chat was flooded with comments.

"Alright, jokes aside, let's take a look at the official post-match statistics from HLTV." The player switched pages, and the screen displayed detailed data for the match.

ID: G2-Dark
KD: 31 / 11
ADR: 145.4
Rating: 1.84
Without a doubt, Meng Lang's stats were the highest in the game, dazzlingly impressive—at this moment, on HLTV's official website's post-game MVP voting page, almost all the votes were being cast for him.

On the other hand, the data for FAZE was very evenly distributed.

Except for the eldest brother, whose rating is slightly lower, the others are all around 1.0, and their kill counts are all around ten.

However, at this moment, the focus of the comments in the 6657 live stream room was a bit off:
"Holy crap! 1.84? He's actually taking orders in the Legendary tier?"

"To be honest, after seeing Dark Sand 2's single map rating of 2.59, seeing it now at 1.84, I'm completely unmoved."

"It's so small, it even feels a bit stale."

"I'll fucking kill you! Dark's rating hasn't been below 1.5 this time, has it?"

"Purely green toy! Verdict complete!"

"The key is that he seems to always come up with something new. That USP pentakill at the start of today's game completely stunned FaZe!"

"I wonder if he'll surprise us again in his next match? I can't wait to see G2's next game!"

"You know, I've been a Dark fan for ten years!"

……

On the G2 pitch.

After shaking hands, Meng Lang returned to his seat and packed up his peripherals with Lao Ni and others. Today's post-match interview was given to the kid who also performed exceptionally well.

As soon as he sat down, several lines of system notifications clearly appeared in his mind:
[Unbelievable! The host has blasted open the gates to the Legendary Group with a crushing victory, making the entire arena tremble with your brilliance! Every bullet that strikes forms the foundation of the throne, and every kill rewrites the rules of this battlefield. This is not just a victory, but a declaration of a new era—keep burning, let the world see how you forge sparks into an inextinguishable kingdom!]

Meng Lang, with practiced ease, chose to continue his all-in bet and refused to claim the winning streak bonus now!
The system gave him another little surprise!

[Congratulations, host, you have received a reward for your performance in the competition: A-grade treasure chest * 1]

He's used to it now.

There's nothing we can do. The system malfunctioned and kept treating him like a newbie who had just started playing the game. What kind of newbie is going to dominate in the Major Legends tournament?
It would be a shame not to give such performance a small reward.

[Treasure chest being opened...]

[Congratulations, host, you have obtained: "Remnant of God A" (Hair dryer user)]

(End of this chapter)