CS: I’m Only 16, and You Want Me to Stage an Old Veteran Comeback?

After Jiang Yang's "epiphany," the scene before his eyes gradually faded.

He still felt a lingering sense of satisfaction. This burst of inspiration, this sudden enlightenment, brought a shivering thrill to his brain. His approach was indeed correct.

The signature techniques of these top players could truly accelerate his understanding of the game. NIKO's skill this time made him realize that pre-aiming wasn’t purely muscle memory—it wasn’t something you could perfect just by memorizing maps.

In certain specific positions, pre-aiming based on memorized maps could indeed improve accuracy, such as NIKO's classic K1 position for countering snipers. But in most cases, pre-aiming required a deep understanding of the map and spatial awareness to execute effectively.

Although Valve (V社) was notorious for being lazy, they were meticulous about the content of the game. Every map's terrain wasn’t completely flat; many areas had subtle bumps and slopes, each serving a unique purpose.

So, memorizing a standard height wouldn’t allow for smooth pre-aiming like NIKO's. It required map comprehension to adapt pre-aiming strategies accordingly.

Noticing that "NIKO’s Pre-Aiming" had upgraded to Intermediate, Jiang Yang was a bit surprised but found it acceptable.

In CS:GO, knowledge sometimes outweighed mechanical skills.

With this profound realization, Jiang Yang reflected on his previous ranked plays. His past gameplay seemed crude in hindsight—too reckless and overly aggressive.

He had an inexplicable feeling that he had become frighteningly strong on the Desert 2 map!

Quickly finishing the last piece of fried dumpling, he rushed back to the "dark room" he used for streaming.

It was time to climb the ranks!

Jiang Yang powered on his computer and glanced at the time—it was just past 10 a.m.

He entered the Aimbotz training map and quickly took down 500 bots to warm up.

Even though he had just gained valuable insights and felt a bit overconfident, he knew proper preparation was essential. If he skipped warming up, his cold hands and sharp pre-aiming could still result in being counter-killed, which would ruin the fun.

After finishing with the bots, he entered the Desert 2 pathing map to review standard utilities for the map, ensuring he wouldn’t make any mistakes in an actual match. Only after confirming everything did he leave the map.

Ranked matchmaking, map: Desert 2. Matchmaking started!

As the game searched for opponents, Jiang Yang’s Xiaomi 11 buzzed.

Picking it up, he saw a message from his desk mate, Li Hua: "?"

Jiang Yang replied immediately: "1."

While responding, he scrolled through his WeChat messages, feeling a bit at a loss for words.

Just two weeks ago, they’d still been communicating like regular people, using full sentences.

But as their duo queue sessions increased, their conversations grew shorter and shorter.

The next second, Jiang Yang saw a QQ voice call from Li Hua.

“You’re up early today. Didn’t you used to wake up at noon?” Li Hua casually asked.

“I was starving, so I went downstairs for breakfast,” Jiang Yang replied, inviting Li Hua to join his party.

When Li Hua joined, Jiang Yang started matchmaking, only to be met with a prompt from Perfect World that there was a rank disparity in their party.

Li Hua was surprised. “Rank disparity? What rank did you drop to?”

Having just returned from a week-long family trip to escape the heat, Li Hua assumed Jiang Yang’s rank had dropped.

Li Hua instinctively checked Jiang Yang’s stats.

“Did you drop to D rank? Weren’t you B rank before?”

“What the hell? How are you almost A+ now?!”

Jiang Yang’s rank was A, sitting at 2109, just 91 points shy of A+.

Li Hua stared at the stats, even more shocked.

“76 matches, a 65% win rate, and an average rating of 1.26. Did you really play these yourself?!”

“What’s going on? I’m the one holding you back?! How did you almost reach A+?!”

“Maybe I just play more,” Jiang Yang explained.

Li Hua felt even worse as he glanced at his own stats: over 100 matches this season, a rating of only 0.97, and a win rate of just 48%.

The comparison was stark—he hadn’t realized the gap between them was so large.

“We’re both playing the same game, but how are you this much better than me?!”

“You’ve secretly evolved and didn’t bring me along!”

Jiang Yang laughed and suggested, “How about we borrow an account from someone in our class group?”

But Li Hua rejected the idea outright: “Forget it. I’ll cry into my pillow for a bit, just a little while. You go ahead and solo queue to climb ranks.”

“No way. I can’t accept this. I’m going to work hard and climb ranks myself! If you can get to A, so can I!”

With that, Li Hua abruptly left the voice call, evidently ready to grind for ranks in a burst of determination.

Jiang Yang could only hope that Li Hua wouldn’t drop to C+; borrowing an account in that case would be tough.

Jiang Yang resumed matchmaking, choosing only Desert 2. With its popularity in China, matchmaking was quick.

His earlier analysis was spot-on. With a deeper understanding of pre-aiming, entering this map felt like coming home.

Desert 2 was an excellent map for gunfights, offering balanced close-, mid-, and long-range engagements. This balance required more than just raw aim; utility usage and clever strategies were equally important.

Jiang Yang’s refined pre-aiming made him feel like a fish in water during these games.

Previously, he excelled more on defense, leveraging his quick reflexes and skill in ANTI-ECO situations to secure kills easily.

But now, with improved pre-aiming, his offensive capabilities had significantly improved.

His success rate in offensive plays was much higher now. Moreover, as he consistently scored kills using pre-aiming, his understanding of “NIKO’s Pre-Aiming” deepened further.

Jiang Yang felt like he was rapidly growing stronger.

From 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., he played seven matches and didn’t lose a single one!

In the second match, they were unexpectedly teamed with S-ge, a notorious smurfer. Everyone assumed they were doomed, but Jiang Yang’s exceptional performance gave his teammates confidence.

At this rank, most players cared only about their points, so the entire team worked together and managed to pull off a comeback in a thrilling overtime match.

The victory crushed S-ge, leaving him visibly frustrated.

After this match, Jiang Yang entered a hot streak, dominating the following games.

As he continued, his performance only improved, with a minimum rating of 1.36 and a peak of 2.01.

It wasn’t until Ma Xixi woke up around 3 p.m., ordered takeout, and called Jiang Yang for lunch that he finally stepped away from the computer.

By then, Jiang Yang’s rank had reached 2320—officially crossing into A+.

Now, he was only 80 points away from S rank!