14 Alex's Perspective

-110 000 points. I stumbled onto the floor because I was so shocked. I was thankful to Allan as he tried to help me back up. I already guessed Allan wasn't surprised because he went through this experience two weeks ago. But, it was really different when you were the one that was actually in this situation.

The worse thing was that I was the one that brought upon this situation. When Rika asked me for a one hour nap, I refused and kept on spraying more water on Rika so she wouldn't fall asleep. This led Rika to get a bad cold. Since she got a bad cold, she couldn't focus on the exam and got even worse grades than last time.

This was a how I got minus points for the first time in my life.

However, what I didn't expect was that Rika would get a fever later from her cold two days later. That meant that I had to earn 2x the amount of points to earn enough for both of us and get rid of minus points.

I guess this was how Luke felt when Rika got sick last time. I was wondering why Luke volunteered himself for many events when they had a stable amount of points. But I guess there was no way his points were safe with a partner like Rika. I was starting to feel sorry for Luke now.

Now thinking about it, Luke did seem very busy all the time, spending almost all his time with Rika. While Michelle and I were partners, we didn't spend that much time with each other and would only talk to each other when it was necessary. That's why I spent more time with Allan than Michelle.

Luke. You worked hard for your own survival. Spending almost all your free time teaching Rika and watching her health to make sure it didn't backfire on you.

I started to walk to the billboard full of events posted to earn some points. When I looked at the top right, there was this one event where I would get 80 000 points:

Teacher's Assistant Wanted For One Day!

The duties include preparing all the classroom materials and doing whatever the teachers need help with.

Well, it was only for one day. I was sure that it couldn't be that bad, so I took the posting and decided to take this job.

One day later.

I took that all back! I was forced to hold all the stuff to wherever the teachers wanted, take part in the teachers' mana experimentation research, do some of their work for them and the list never ended! No wonder it was 80 000 points!

Well now we had -30 000 points. Sigh. \"Alex, did you get ready for the exam today?\" Luke asked worriedly as I looked busy yesterday.

At this point, I was glad I liked to learn class materials ahead of time.

After I wrote the exam, I got an additional 40 000 points. Finally! I had 10 000 points! I bought myself a meal from the cafeteria for the first time in five days!

When Luke was about to share some of his portion of food as usual while thinking I didn't eat again, I told him, \"I bought myself a meal already with the points I earned.\"

Luke looked surprised. So I told him about the points I earned from the exam and the unique event. \"I guess the teachers felt bad making Rika write a exam when she was really sick. So that's why they posted a event like this for the first time ever.\" Luke replied softly.

There was never a event like this? \"How do you know that this event never existed before?\" I asked.

\"I went to the event billboard almost every single day in elementary school when Rika got sick for a week.\" Luke answered back.

Of course Luke did. \"It must have been hard,\" I said consolingly.

\"Well I'm used to it.\" Luke said while smiling gently.

\"I'm just waiting till Rika grows up a bit so I could get some more free time of my own like I have right now.\" Luke added.

At this rate, Luke was like Rika's mother. Not that I didn't understand why Luke became this way.

Ever since Luke and I were born, we hung out together until we were two years old. Since we were both born in strict families, we had tutors attending to our education at the age of one once we learned how to talk. Our families would use the space-time rooms so that we would get into a prestigious school that was fitting to our family names.

However, Luke failed to get into the same school as he got matched with Rika. The reason being was that Rika had an unusual high amount of mana. It was so outstanding that no one in the first district could come close to her level of mana except for Luke who was praised to have the greatest amount of mana in his family. Luke's family came from a powerhouse of people with extremely high levels of mana that showed their high status and influence in the first district. So they were delighted when they had a son like Luke.

So while they were disappointed with Luke failing to get into the school that they wanted him to attend, his parents were pretty satisfied with his partner as this would secure the next generation of the Roselia house.

After eating my dinner, I was heading to meet Allan to practice mana together. While I was walking to the mana practice room, I encountered Michelle talking to someone using her translucent marble.

\"Sure, I'll transfer the files over right now.\" Michelle said cheerfully.

\"Thanks!\"

The person on the other side of the call, reminded me of Rika. Even though I have only occasionally met Rika few times ever since kindergarten, I had a long-lasting memory of her each time we met due to her eccentric behaviour.

However, there was especially two that stood out lately:

One was when she made Allan kneel down at the field for about six hours. Both Helena and I knew that whenever Allan doesn't get what he really wants, he throws tantrums by sitting down somewhere and not moving from that spot until he gets what he wants.

That was the tactic that Allan used to persuade Rika when she thought of doing a very 'Rika-thing' to do and decided not to attend any classes. Anyone who grew up in the first district couldn't imagine skipping classes due to our strict upbringing ingrained within us ever since we were born.

Allan told me he was absolutely shocked when he heard that from Rika (not that I blame him though). At that time, both Allan and I felt even worse for Luke that had to keep Rika in check all the time.

Another one was where we got -110 000 points. Of course, the minus points shocked me, but Rika getting sick for about one week was surprising. When I sneaked into the infirmary room to check up on how she was doing, Rika looked very pale and somber.

I suddenly felt really ashamed of myself for trying to keep Rika awake with a water gun. I knew I had to apologize sometime, but I didn't know how. At that time, I just didn't want to get -100 000 points like Allan did.

I rarely apologized to other people, because my family had a high standing even in the first district. The only families that could rival our status and power was the families of Luke and Michelle.

So after pondering for a while, I decided to go where Rika was and get the apology over with and asked Michelle where Rika may be.

I hoped Rika wouldn't overexert herself after she got better, or else I would have to continue earning enough points for the two of us.