P3NGU1N on Parabellum being the first majority-Canadian team at SI: ‘It’s a nice F you to everyone who doubted the Canadians’

From the inception of the Canadian division of the NAL to its unfortunate end, it was the butt of jokes from fans, analysts, and players from the U.S. Division of the league. The Parabellum Rainbow Six Siege roster, which at the time was under the Altiora banner, was a part of the Canadian division since it began in June 2020.

They fought their way through the NA “last-chance” qualifying tournament for the 2021 Six Invitational, beating future NAL teams beastcoast and RentFree (who become XSET) in the process. And for Keagen “P3NGU1N” Smith, it felt good to prove any doubters wrong.

“When the Canadian division was announced, a lot of people were making fun of it, saying it was a bad region, that it would get slaughtered by every other team outside of the Canadian region,” P3NGU1N said in an SI press conference. “For a majority-Canadian team out of the Canadian division to qualify for SI, it was a nice F you to everyone who doubted the Canadians.”

The Parabellum roster took their lumps from the rest of the world. But after qualifying, they took unnecessary lumps from the actions of others, not words. Altiora accepted an offer to join the NAL after the Canadian division was dissolved, but the org’s actions (and the NAL moving to a LAN-bubble environment) meant that its roster wouldn’t be able to make it to Las Vegas in time to quarantine. The roster was dropped, and according to sources close to the situation, the current Challenger League “APE” roster was set to take their place.

Altiora later left Rainbow Six Siege entirely, though. And without enough time to find an organization to take on its license, it effectively relegated two rosters to the Challenger League: APE and its CA roster.

Afterward, the ex-Altiora roster was picked up by Parabellum. The team said they’d like to stay together for the Challenger League playoffs if they make them, but the future isn’t set in stone.

“There’s been a lot of stuff that’s happened in the past months, a lot of ups and downs,” P3NGU1N said. “We’re going to focus on the Invitational first and then focus on what happens after, after we’re done here.”

Parabellum are winless right now in the group stage of SI 2021. They return to action on May 14, where they’ll take on Ninjas in Pyjamas, Spacestation, and Giants.