Chapter 432 - Obtaining Funds (3) - Delia's POV

Deciding I would stall for more time once they discovered she wasn't at the café, I followed them. I needed more time to come up with a plan to help cover for her. I stiffened as I noticed Rika was already at the café from receiving my message. She looked extremely exhausted since this was the second last day of our operations. Her uniform was drenched with sweat like all the other club members who couldn't take a break from the stall.

In fact, she seemed to be burning with almost a dangerous fever. I guessed we had overworked her in using teleportation too many times. We would normally give her a smoothie to help her regain some energy but there was no way I could do this now. The smoothies we made resembled very effective mana chargers, making them more attractive for people to purchase. One of the reasons why the teachers had their own stockpile of them.

"I couldn't come to the study session today since I couldn't move after finishing the errands from the teachers," Rika followed the script.

"Why didn't you send me a message?" Luke frowned after taking her temperature.

When my marble vibrated, I read the message Rika had sent me a few seconds ago while distracting Luke and Alex. I was to replace her role since she would serve as the lookout now. I nodded to quickly leave her alone to deal with them. However, Alex blocked the door to prevent me from leaving from Luke's subtle signal.

"How did Rika get this sick?" Luke turned to me after Rika lost her consciousness for a moment.

"It has to be from one of their fights together," Alex held a grudge from when I threatened him to not tell Luke.

"Our fights weren't that bad," I glared at him since it had ended weeks ago.

"Rika will get better soon. Don't you think you're being a bit overprotective?" I wished I could give her a smoothie right now.

"Don't you know how frail her body is?" Luke's eyes slightly flickered with anger.

"This will take at least a day to recover inside the infirmary. It's like she didn't have any rest ever since the week started," he instantly hit the mark.

"What do you do during the breaks anyway?" Alex asked for him.

"Does it even matter? You're invading her privacy," I couldn't reveal anything for both of our sakes.

"My cousin works really hard to keep Rika from visiting the infirmary in school," he shot a quick look at Luke that he would take care of this.

"It's fine Alex. I'll just make sure to keep a stricter leash on Rika on who she can spend her time with," Luke sighed while holding her in his arms.

My jaw almost dropped from his absurd words. He was thinking of separating her from her friends from this one incident. It would become harder for her to visit the café either way even if I told him about the truth. I clenched my hands into fists, knowing I couldn't leave Rika alone when it was mostly my fault.

"I'm sorry that I couldn't take care of Rika. I didn't know she would get sick this easily. Please let us go, just once," I pleaded to them.

"Delia is right, it wasn't their fault," Rika opened her eyes.

"I'm not that sick anyways," she tried to escape from Luke's arms.

"Try walking to the infirmary on your own," Luke pointed out.

"I will," she struggled to rise to stand up.

"Can't I use teleportation instead?" She turned to him.

"You're thinking of using teleportation in this state?" He began to raise his voice.

Before he could say something, she vanished in front of his eyes. While they were distracted, I received another message from Rika that she would quickly drink a smoothie since she had one in her inventory. Knowing this was my chance to run, I teleported out of the café to go to the infirmary. We didn't have a lot of time until they would come here. Rika quickly transferred me everything she had, including the containers and the food to take over her role.

"I'll somehow convince them to let me go for tomorrow," she urged me to leave.

"Once we're finished for the day, we'll come back to help you," I promised her.

I quickly found myself exhausted from Rika's role as my supply of mana dramatically decreased within an hour. I never knew her role would be this difficult since she never complained about it. I had to be everywhere, making sure our supply line was operating properly. There was no way anyone other than Rika could do this role.

"How was trying to cover for Rika?" Henry seemed curious.

"It's not possible. I don't know how she handles them every day," I pitied her.

"I still need to convince them to not confine her anywhere after we close the stall," I sighed.

"Is it that bad?" Cillian wondered.

"Come with me," I would need more help.

This was how we ended up taking turns in doing Rika's role. Our mana supply decreased rapidly, showing how much Rika had taken the burden for us. I started to understand Luke, who was angry with us since we didn't think much of her condition when she showed signs that she was more tired than the rest of us. Instead of giving her more smoothies, we should have given her the chance to take a rest.