CS: I became Top 1 by grinding my skill level

Sunny noon

Two blocks away from the Orange Team's base, there is a food street that is packed with people every evening.

But it was noon, and there were only a few people coming and going. One of them was particularly eye-catching. He was 1.95 meters tall, with shoulders as broad as a double-door refrigerator, and arms thicker than the thighs of an average adult man.

Zhou Wanli walked down the street with a bulging bag on his back. His exaggerated physique attracted the attention of shopkeepers and passersby around him. It was impossible to tell that he was just a twenty-year-old boy.

"Buzz—"

My phone vibrated in my pocket; it seemed someone was calling.

Zhou Wanli took out his phone with his large hand, glanced at the caller, and then hung up and blocked the number in one smooth motion.

He strode forward, his thick legs carrying him, but after a few steps, he grew increasingly angry. "Damn it!"

"I came all this way to play against a bunch of noobs! And you won't even cover my food expenses!"

Zhou Wanli felt he had been cheated out of his life. He had traveled all the way from Yanbei Province to Quancheng, and the dog captain had said that all his food and lodging would be covered, and if he could get into the offline competition, he would get a third of the prize money.

Yesterday, when asked to settle his current bonus, Zhou Wanli said he had already pocketed the entire amount. How could Zhou Wanli not be furious?

Since that's the case, if you're ruthless, don't blame me for being ruthless too. He came up with a plan. In the morning, he obediently followed the team into the venue. But when the game was about to start, he simply grabbed his bag and ran out of the venue, leaving those bastards to mess around!

I'm so angry! It's all those guys' fault for breaking their promise. This trip was a complete waste.

He kicked a pebble on the roadside, sending it flying far away. After flying more than ten meters, the pebble landed with a "thud" in front of a small shop on the street.

"Hmm? Xinyuan Roasted Chicken Shop? I wonder if it tastes good enough. I was so angry with those idiots this morning that I didn't have much of an appetite."

Zhou Wanli frowned and rubbed his stomach.

A dozen seconds later, at Xinyuan Roasted Chicken Shop, a staff member who was looking down at his phone suddenly found a shadow falling over his face. Was it cloudy? Where was the sun?

Looking up, he nearly dropped his phone in fright. A giant from Attack on Titan had appeared there at some point, silently looking down at him.

Five fruitwood-roasted chickens!

Zhou Wanli made a "five" gesture and spoke to the shop assistant in front of him in a deep voice.

"Phew~"

The shop assistant finally calmed down. It turned out to be a customer; he had just thought he was going to be eaten.

"Five pieces, right? How many people are eating? Would you like me to cut them up for you?"

"Five of them! Eat them here!"

Zhou Wanli opened his large, fan-like hand and waved it in front of the shop assistant's face.

Fifteen minutes later.

He waved three fingers at the shop assistant.

"The flavor is quite strong. I'll have three more honey-glazed ones for dessert."

......

Luzon is separated from China by thousands of kilometers of sea.

Outside the city center of the capital city of Mara, in a somewhat dilapidated five-story office building.

After looking at the match prediction data on the screen in front of him, the man with black-rimmed glasses turned his head and roared at the three young men in front of him who were all dressed in suits and white shirts.

"Who set up the betting odds? Why would they offer odds on such a lousy match?"

Huang Jun only discovered this when the odds data was updated. There was a match that ended before it even started. He checked it and found that odds were being offered for matches that were almost entirely played by random teams.

"Vice President Huang, this isn't our business..."

The chubby young man with a buzz cut on the far left explained cautiously.

"It was...it was General Manager Huang who sent us!"

The young man in the middle with green hair raised his hand.

"Did my brother let you run this kind of betting competition?"

Hearing this explanation, Huang Jun's expression gradually softened.

Huang Jun and his brother Huang Mingyuan are the general manager and deputy general manager of this branch, which is officially named Juxingde Esports Betting Mara Branch.

Juxingde is a betting company registered on Luzon Island a decade ago. The company headquarters is in Singapore and has branches in many Southeast Asian countries. Each branch is responsible for different game betting businesses.

Throughout the company's many years of development, they have dominated the FPS betting industry in East Asia by leveraging the ample cash flow brought by family capital, outstanding technical personnel, and first-mover advantage.

Since the launch of CS:GO, due to the weakness of the Chinese region itself, no major tournament organizers have come to participate. Whether in the world or in China, CS tournaments are currently not receiving much attention.

Therefore, at this time, not only is the internal supervision of esports betting and match-fixing in the China region not strict, but the World Esports Integrity Committee (ESIC) also finds it difficult to intervene in most of the second and third-tier esports events in the Asian region.

Taking this opportunity, Juxingde Company has gained a monopolistic level of control over the betting business in the Chinese esports region by bribing and cooperating with a large number of managers of Chinese esports teams.

"Ring ring—"

On the mahogany desk beside me, a slightly old-fashioned desktop telephone suddenly rang.

Huang Jun waved for the young men in front of him to leave, glanced at the incoming call number, slowly picked up the receiver, and a smile appeared on his face.

"Brother? How's life in Singapore?"

"Haha, that's fine then. But I just saw the odds for that little cup tournament in Jinan..."

"Huh? SG Starry Sky team planted a new 'line'? Haha, then this betting odds are definitely worth it!"

"But... the quarterfinals (Group B) game suddenly crashed, and customer service reports many people are requesting refunds..."

"Oh... okay, I'll go and refund them right away."

After gently hanging up the phone, Huang Jun's hand, adorned with a gold ring, skillfully tapped on the keyboard of his laptop, seemingly quite experienced in dealing with things like canceling bets.

After finishing all this, just as he was about to close his laptop, he seemed to suddenly remember something. He took out his phone, opened several video platform apps in China, and opened a video in the CS section. Looking at the 120 million views on Bilibili, he frowned slightly.

"What a crappy website! It can't even get on the trending topics list. We spent 20,000 yuan and this is all the traffic we got?"

"No, the title is still too bad. I'll call that guy surnamed Liu later and ask him to change it."

Huang Jun only nodded in satisfaction when he clicked on the same video on Douyin and saw that it had 350 million views.

"That's why everyone says short videos are the mainstream of the future."

......

"Huh? Someone in the live chat is asking who has a better chance of winning between Long Xiao and SG Xingkong?"

"To put it simply, unless Beihai and Tangzuo can replicate their championship-winning form from 05..."

"Otherwise, how can they compete with regular youth training teams? SG has tournament organizers and coaches, and the average age of their players is less than 19. How are these old veterans supposed to compete against ranked players?"

At this moment, on the Maoya Live CS section, Ma Xixi is providing commentary on another match in Group B.

He was originally going to commentate on the match between Orange Team and PL, but unexpectedly, the match ended before it even started, and PL withdrew directly.

Masisi also wanted to see how Zero could ignite a spark with Routing, who came from the European youth academy.

"Sigh~"

Seeing that Longxiao lost by a large margin in the first map, Fallen Tower, and that SG also won the first half of the second map, Desert City, by a large margin, Maxixi felt that this match should be over.

But after switching sides, the situation suddenly changed.

"What's wrong with SG's sniper? He missed every single shot in the second half!"

"I just don't understand this game. Why did those two from SG rush out of the smoke from A1 just a few seconds into the game? Isn't that just feeding?"

"Huh?! There's still time to unpack it! You're not going to open it already??"