Aleksib heard a “graveyard atmosphere” at 0-4 on Inferno before w0nderful’s 18-7 turned the Beijing quarter-final NAVI’s way.
NAVI beat PARIVISION 2-1 (Mirage 14-16, Inferno 13-9, Ancient 13-10) in the first quarter-final of IEM Beijing 2026 on Friday morning, four weeks after PARIVISION had knocked them out of ESL Pro League Season 24. NAVI play The MongolZ in the semi-final at , and PARIVISION leave Beijing in fifth to sixth place.
NAVI2-1
PARIVISIONStatsMirage 14-16, Inferno 13-9, Ancient 13-10
makazze
Three T rounds on their own Mirage
NAVI picked Mirage, the map PARIVISION had taken off them at EPL, and won the pistol and the two rounds after it. Then the T side stopped. Dzhami “Jame” Ali opened four rounds in the first half without losing a duel, had 14 kills at the break and finished the map 25-15. PARIVISION won nine in a row for 9-3 and the second pistol for 11-3.
Aleksi “Aleksib” Virolainen did not hide it afterwards on ESL’s broadcast. “We were leading 3-0 and lost every round […],” he said. “So going into the second map as an IGL, you kind of think to yourself that what is happening? Like we did so much preparation and we can’t win like a round on T side.”
The CT side was a different team. Ihor “w0nderful” Zhdanov found two kills in each of the first rounds back, iM forced a team kill with a lurk nobody saw, and NAVI won nine of the next ten rounds. In overtime Aleksib won a round that had started 3v5 with three kills and seven seconds on the clock for 14-13.
Back on the T side, NAVI lost all three rounds for 16-14. They won three of their 15 T rounds on the map, all before PARIVISION’s first full buy.
“Graveyard atmosphere” at 0-4
PARIVISION’s Inferno started the same way. zweih took three kills in the pistol, NAVI managed five kills in the first four rounds, and the CT side was 0-4 down. Aleksib described what followed from the in-game leader’s seat.
I felt this graveyard atmosphere on TeamSpeak, and I was thinking, no way, now it can really crumble, but we ended up winning that one crucial round after losing 0-4, and as soon as we won that one round, I started to hear people on TeamSpeak.
w0nderful’s triple on the A site at 5-1 was the first sign of life, and at 7-2 NAVI won the last three rounds of the half, w0nderful catching FL1T and then Jame as they walked into him before makazze’s clean double closed it at 7-5. w0nderful finished Inferno 18-7 with 80.6 ADR and 86.4% KAST, the best map of the series by anyone.
NAVI took the second pistol, and at 7-7 w0nderful won a 1v1 against saved pistols that would have handed PARIVISION the lead back.
NAVI’s T side won eight of 10 rounds, mostly by doing nothing until the last 30 seconds and then hitting the site PARIVISION had left, makazze’s double entry on B at 9-8 the clearest example. PARIVISION saved in all but one of the rounds they lost. “On Inferno I think we lost control after 7-2 and decisions was bad,” coach dastan said after the match.
Aleksib put the change down to what was said between the maps. “We went outside and we also just noticed that the communication, like nothing was there, how we played against Falcons,” he said. “[…] So it was just unacceptable. And we really changed that for Inferno.”
HObbit’s ace and FL1T’s clutches keep Ancient close
NAVI started Ancient on the CT side with the pistol, led 7-2 and still only reached the half at 7-5, because Abay “HObbit” Khassenov ran out of mid with a Tec-9 for an ace and FL1T won the fights that kept PARIVISION’s economy alive. HObbit had 11 kills in the half and finished the map 17-15.
The second half opened with NAVI’s pistol and a makazze ace against the eco for 9-5, and b1t went 20-13 with 88.8 ADR, picking up the AWP for a round in which he hit every shot. PARIVISION still had two swings left: FL1T outwaited a low-HP makazze in a 1v1 for 12-8, then a 3v5 and a rifle round made it 12-10 before NAVI rushed B with the bomb for 13-10.
dastan did not sound like a coach whose team had just been eliminated. “Of course, I’m right now one minute after game I’m a bit sad. But generally I like how we play,” he said. PARIVISION start the PGL Major Singapore in Stage 1 later this month, and the coach wants rest before it: “Nowadays schedule is very tight.”
MongolZ on Saturday, without a day off
This is NAVI’s first playoff run in China since April 2019, reached through the lower bracket after a 1-2 against FURIA. w0nderful, 64-41 across the three maps, kept it short at the stage. “I’m feeling amazing,” he said. “I’m just enjoying to play here.”
The MongolZ beat FURIA to win Group A and have had two days off. “They seem to be pretty hot right now,” Aleksib said. “We need to up it up a notch. We cannot sleep like we did on the first map […].” He saw an advantage in the schedule, too: “At least there is not a day off, so we kind of […] feel the momentum of today.”
FURIA and BetBoom played the second quarter-final from for a semi-final against MOUZ. We follow both on our IEM Beijing 2026 page.
