Pride Online

Chapter 420: A.L.I.C.E Part IV

“But if there’s nothing that person has to do with, then why are you mad, Miss Waree? He’s just a man that you don’t have to care about, isn’t he?”

“That...!”

Her finger that was pointing at her brother was hanging there as she paused like that was something stuck in her mouth. All Waree did after that was blush, turning her face away like she did not want to continue with this conversation at all. Seeing that, Wisana sighed with an amused smile. And finally, he just reached up to rock her head left to right without saying anything more about this.

“Anyway, earlier, there’s something Thada said that I don’t understand.”

‘Yeah?”

“Waree turned to look at her brother again. She appreciated that he changed the subject purposely for her to stop being frustrated.

“What ‘s Alice he talked about?”

Hearing that question, Waree widened her eyes a little, before she curled up a delighted smile.

“I never thought that you would be interested in this kind of thing. Every time I see you only playing the game without caring about these systems or technology at all, do you?”

“You want to pick a fight with me or something?” The older one bared his teeth at her.

“Sorry.” Waree hurriedly waved her hand around with a laugh. “Well, Alice he talked about is the heart, or the main core of the Pride world.”

“A core?” Wisana’s eyebrows arched in not understanding.

“Briefly, Alice is like a huge supercomputer working as a core of every Pride server around the world. It processes every current that is online in the Pride world. it also arranges every brain wave from every PM (Pride Mutilation) user, too.”

“Ugh, sounds like it’s a delicate tool.” Wisana’s face twitched. “I heard that brain waves are something very delicate, too. So, a tool to handle human’s brain waves is totally, entirely complicated.”

Listening to that, Waree giggled. Maybe that was because her brother was making a face that said he never really understood these electronic tools or machines in the first place.

“Yes, it is delicate. There’re many more things that Alice can do, run the game, predict, and calculate the chances of something that might be happening in the server. Of course, it’s very precise, too, you know.”

“So, it can predict the game’s future?”

“That’s why Alice is so cool,” Waree said with a smile on her face. “Also. The name Alice is from Alicé, which was my grandmother’s name.”

“Eh?”

Wisana raised his eyebrows at the added information he just got. He often forgot about the fact that Waree, his sister, was a grandchild of “Payu,” the father of Pride. But as far as he knew, Waree’s grandmother had passed away a decade ago.

“Your grandmother’s name?” Wisana repeated with a curious face.

“Right. You know that my grandfather is the founder of Pride, so he named Pride’s server’s core after her.”

“That sounds weirdly romantic.”

Waree chuckled at her brother’s words.

“And it’s like Alice the server’s core got some personalities from grandma as well.”

“A main server has personalities?” Wisana raised his voice in surprise.

“It’s just similar to AIs. But like you said, the tool that handles the brain waves in Pride is delicate, so I don’t know much about it. If you want more details, I think you should go to Da. He’s an expert on this kind of stuff, and what I know is just a brief.”

Wisana creased his mouth, quite impressed by what he just heard.

“Where’s this Alice located, though? Is it in Bangkok? Thada seems familiar with it. He probably works with it a lot.”

“You might have seen it already, haven’t you?” Waree raised her eyebrows slightly.

“Huh?”

“It’s in the Pride office. The large machine in the center of the building with staff in normal suits walking busily around it, that’s Alice.”

Hearing that, the older one drawled an ‘Ohhhhhhh.’ sound as he recalled the room that looked like a NASA base in the Pride building that day, that day he went to ask for his internship approval from Miss Marisa, Maysa’s aunt.

“Oh, it’s that thing. I see. People who work in that room always look like NASA building up a spaceship or something.”

“Well, the tool is delicate. They need to keep the temperature minus 5 degrees in that room. I feel deeply sorry for the engineers who work there. I went in the room once when I was a kid and I remember it was freezing as heck.”

The pretty girl crossed her arms around her chest as she spoke, making her brother crack into a soft laugh.

After that, he stroked his sister’s hair out of endearment.

“Anyway, why did you ask about this though?”

Wisana raised his eyebrows slightly but then faked a smile as if there was nothing to the question.

“It’s nothing. I heard Thada say it and just got curious.”

Hearing that, Waree smiled at him without asking further. But what Wisana said was not quite all true. He felt awfully familiar with this name as if he had heard it from somewhere before, but he just could not figure it out.

“Well, then, I’ll get going now, Na.”

One moment later, Waree spoke like she wanted to end their conversation. The slender one got up and stretched, making her brother look at her with an interested face.

“Where are you going?” He asked.

“Of course, I’m going to get ready for Mother Wimon’s birthday party in the evening.”

“What?!” Wisana yelled, looking at the clock on the wall. “The party starts at 8, doesn’t it? Now it is only 10 in the morning, why are you in such a hurry?”

After he spoke, Waree reached her index finger to her brother’s mouth softly.

“It takes longer for girls to get ready. Also, Mother Wimon has a good stylist to help dress us up, you know.”

Wisana let out a long sigh after he heard that. Of course, girls were beyond logic and did not need understanding. So, taking all day just to get dressed up like this could be like visiting an amusement park for them, too.

He thought, but suddenly, he cracked into a laugh.

Because that would be like hell for Nuchjaree.

“Anyway, have you seen Tun and Nuch? I haven’t seen them all morning. And it’s very weird for Tun to wake up before me like this.”

Hearing the question, Waree shrugged as she did not know where they could have been either.

“Wait, Tun, stop. I told you that we need to talk!”

Suddenly, there was a familiar voice shouting up as two familiar-looking figures passed by the living room’s doorway quickly. Tunwa had his hands covering his ears like he did not want to hear anything, followed by lady Nuchjaree who was stomping, looking like she was about to fight someone.

“Stop talking about this already, Nuch!”

“No, no, I won’t. Until you promise me not to do anything so dumb like solo invading to rescue me at the base of the Cataral guild.”

“Ugh, you’re the one who doesn’t listen. I told you that we are going to invade Sven guy’s base eventually. So, don’t get the wrong idea. I’m not going there to rescue you. I kind of feel sorry for those guys actually. They could have captured anyone, but they chose a big-mouthed gorilla as their hostage.”

“Excuse me!!:

“ARGH, can you please leave it alone and stop being obsessed about the game already? Today’s Mother’s birthday!”

“No, I can’t. Until you promise me not to invade Cataral’s base stupidly.”

Two storms of shouting were crashing into each other, making the siblings turn and blink awkwardly. Wisana then rubbed on his temples like he was having a terrible headache.

“Looks like they’ve sneaked out to have a fight somewhere else.”

Waree said with a dry laugh, while Wisana was shaking his head wryly.

“And it’s a fight over a stupid thing. These two should learn how to communicate properly. Especially Tunwa, he really sucks at explaining and stating reasons.”

Then, the brother and sister huffed out a sigh in unison.

“What’s this habit called again? That word that Ae always calls May.”

“Tsu ...tsu,” Waree looked like she was trying to get the word out of her mouth. “Oh! Tsundere.”

“Yeah, that’s the one.” Wisana let out a long sigh again. “The word doesn’t describe May though. It’s made for these two especially. Like damn, what could possibly happen when two dumbass peas are put in the same pot except for troubles?”

After that, the siblings could only shake their heads, feeling pity for this somehow.