After crying for a while into Art's old cloak, Lili found herself quickly falling asleep there on her new homes hard stone floor. Until she was rudely awakened by hard banging of the metal bars of the other slave cells down the corridor.
From the distance she could make out the constant repeat of a few words a man who sounded like a rat was making.
"Dinner, dinner. Wake up girls we have dinner, yes yes it is time to eat, dinner, dinner. Wake up you sleepy heads it is time to eat, yes yes, dinner, dinner. Yes, yes, it is dinner!"
Alerted by this sound and the fact that she was completely naked, Lili quickly got to her feet and put on her new clothes which weren't much different from the clothes she had worn a few years ago.
The loincloth only loosely covered her butt and front, pretty much leaving her sides wide open. The top on the other hand was nothing more than a round rope with a short piece of cloth attached to it. As she put the roap on herself the cloth then fell down so that it barely covered the bottom part of her developing breasts.
Looking at this Lili couldn't help but feel ashamed as these weren't real clothes. These were just 3 small pieces of rags that barely covered anything and were only kept in place by the small ropes. But luckily for her she did still have her cloak which she then quickly put on. Sadly for her, the new modifications she had done on the cloak had made it so small that no more was she able to wrap it around herself properly. So now the front side of her figure was visible with only the backside covered by the cloak.
Then she waited and listened as the sounds came ever closer. Along with the man's voice she could also hear the squeaking of old wooden wheels from a cart that the man was pushing.
Soon the simple looking cart full of bowls of food came into view as did the small rat faced looking man who was pushing the thing. The man just looked towards her and emotionlessly started hitting the metal bars of her cell with a wooden stick after which he then said.
"Eat your dinner girl, yes yes, it is good dinner."
Then he took a bowl of porridge from the cart and pushed it through a small block shaped opening in the cell door. As Lili looked at the bowl she couldn't help but notice that there was no spoon, the only other things she got were a small piece of bread, an apple and a big wooden cup of water.
looking at the food Lili couldn't help but feel a little relieved. At least the food hear did seem quite decent, but looks could always be deceiving. She couldn't help but wonder if the food might have been poisoned or something, because why else would the girls here look so unhealthy?
After giving her this food the rat faced man then moved to the cell that was right opposite if her cell. There she finally took notice of an older girl with dead looking eyes and a depressed looking face that was down cast. The girl seemed to be in her later teenage years and despite her dead expression she still looked quite pretty with her blazing red hair and a well developed figure. Despite this she couldn't help but take notice of her unhealthy looking skin along with her bruises and skinny arms.
That's when she also saw the reason for her skinny and sickly appearance. Despite the food being quite decent here the girl seemed to just refuse to eat. Was she on a hunger strike?
Seeing the girls sad appearance Lili couldn't help but feel a bit sad herself, not just for the girl but herself as well. To go on a hunger strike or simply refusing to eat in this type of a situation, that she and the other girls here were in was actually something she had heard about people doing in her past life.
The human mind was quite the powerful thing, even if the body was forcefully given all the nutrients that it might need it simply wasn't enough if the mind was not healthy. People needed other things than just food to live, they for instance needed a will to live. Without a will to live the human body would slowly start rotting away from the inside and eventually die or in a lot of cases the mind would just break down completely. Without a healthy mind you simply couldn't have a healthy body, the body and mind were always interlinked like so.
Thinking of such things made Lili feel really bad for these girls, she couldn't help but wonder what had any of them done to deserve this type of a fate. She couldn't help but wonder if she could perhaps help these girls in some way. No she had to help these girls, after all she was a former Police officer god damnit. How could she possibly ever live with herself if she didn't help these girls, how could she ever face Frank again in the afterlife if she didn't help these girls in this new life of hers.
With these thoughts in the back of her mind Lili clenched her little fist's in determination as she looked to the girl in the opposite cell to hers and said.
"Hey blazing red haired girl! You wanna live right? So cheer up and get to eating your food before it gets cold! No point in feeling sorry for yourself, you ain't getting any points for doing that here!"
Despite saying this in what she thought was quite a encouraging tone of voice the girl didn't react at all to her words.
Noticing this Lili put her hand upon her chin and started to think more upon her words. In her past she had heard a lot of motivational speeches, but the only problem was that a lot of them had something to do with the gym and being a man. So now she needed to think hard upon her next words until she finally came up with something good. For a moment the silence remained until she finally lifted up her head and ran to her cell bars and grabbed a hold of them as she then loudly said.
"Ok, girls. I know you all are hurting and feeling down on your luck and definitely don't need me to remind you of that, but fuck it I'll say these next words of mine anyway.
The world ain't all pretty and full of nice and handsome boys, no, it's a very mean and nasty place and I don't care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it.
You, me or nobody is going to hit as hard as life. But, its not about how hard you hit, but how hard it is that you can get hit and keep moving forward. It's about how much you can take and still keep moving forward. Because that's how winning is done.
Come on girls cheer up and get up. Remember that pain is only temporary, it may last for a minute, an hour or even a year, but eventually it will subside and something else will take its place. But if you quit however then it will last for an eternity.
I mean, sure shits bad right now, I get that, I really do. Because just like you I have been in this shit for a long time now. But at the end of the day I am still right here, at the end of the day I'm still alive and kicking and as long as there is still life in me, then there is hope.
Hope, that one day in the future I will finally get out of slavery and get out there to fulfill my dreams.
Come on girls, please don't give up and keep on fighting with me. I know together we can get through this. You just have to believe in yourselves!"
After saying this Lili felt a bit embarrassed at her own words. Holding public speeches like this was definitely not her thing and she did get a lot of goosebumps as she spoke in front of people like this, especially as they were all girls. Nonetheless, she couldn't help but also feel quite excited to see if her speech actually worked on the girls.
Looking at the blazing red haired girl Lili noticed her eyes slowly start to rise which gave her hope. She watched as the girls eyes looked upon the food In front of her and then upon her, but then they just fell back down and nothing more happened.
Looking at the girl just continuing to sit there all depressed like that, just made Lili sigh in defeat as she let go of the metal bars and fell to her knees. After sitting there for a while in contemplation she managed to get a sniff of the food behind her as she then said.
"Ah, screw you girls. If you're not going to even try and do something about our situation then I guess it's all up to me then."
With that said she turned to her food and started to eat it with her right hand just like a true Indian girl. She needed to save her left hand for later, not just because it was scarred and still hurt, but because there was no toilet paper here so her left hand would need to do that job.
Thinking of this made Lili shiver in disgust. Only barely did she manage to keep herself together as she ate. She wasn't the type of a person to just quit so easily she needed to keep on fighting and hoping for the best. After all her hope, her saviour named Art was supposedly somewhere in this city. Sure at first she didn't want to rely on the guy and hope for him to save her, but at this point she had started to feel quite desperate and with not many other options left for her. Sure she had healing magic with her now, but that wasn't much good when you needed to try and escape from slavery. But one thing was certain and that was that she couldn't quit now, not when she was so close.
Surely once she met him, he could set her free and set her back on a more normal path in life, after which she could then start to dream again about greatness, riches and helping people in need with her magical powers.
Then as time passed and Lili was done eating she then started to train herself. The cell wasn't big, but it did have a small wooden beam above it which she could use to do pull-ups and maybe later even muscle ups.
Like so she trained and stretched, did gymnastics and trained her muscles some more until finally as the floor was wet from her sweat she fell into a deep sleep.
Then as night came she awoke once more to loud sounds of cheering coming from the outside world. Curious as to what was going on Lili looked up to the barred window and then took a few running steps towards the wall, jumped against it and pushed herself off it. She managed to push herself high towards the ceiling as she then managed to grab a hold of the window.
Lili couldn't help but feel amazed at her own skill. She was such a small and short girl and yet she managed to make it to the high window which was over 2 meters high.
Pulling herself up, Lili looked past the metal bars and into the dark street in front of her. There she couldn't see much more than some drunk people laying about as they sang along to the tunes in the distance.
While Lili couldn't make out what it was that the distant song was about, she did understand these drunk people's words as they kept on singing.
"Old MacDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O
And on that farm he had a pig, E-I-E-I-O."
Lili couldn't help but roll her eyes at the words she was hearing. By the looks and sounds of what was going on she figured that it was Whimsey Warbler who was right now putting on a performance in the town. A performance full of songs that she had taught him. To think that the man would even soon be singing these songs to the royal family made Lili cringe.
She couldn't help but imagine a scene. The mighty king Uther Pendragon sitting upon his mighty throne listening to Whimsey Warbler and his band singing, old McDonald had a farm. Then as Whimsey Warbler would sing this the king and all his royal guards would soon join along in the singing.
Thinking of such a scene Lili wanted to laugh but then again she couldn't as it also made her a bit mad. After all it should have been her that was supposed to be singing those songs to the royal family.
Not wanting to see or hear anymore of this Lili hopped off the window and went back to lay upon the pile of straws. There she just layed for a while lost in her own thoughts.
She so wanted to sue that Whimsey Warbler for stealing her songs and not giving her any of the profits. Then again she wasn't sure if such things could even be doable in this world, did they even have a working court system?
While thinking of this she turned to look at the opposite cell where the red haired girl was already sound asleep. She really wanted to help her and the others also, but obviously it wouldn't be all that easy. After all why would any of these girls listen to some small 8 year old who just one day showed up and started to hold random motivational speeches for them. No, she needed to do something herself and fast.
Looking at her right-hand Lili wondered if she should just start to heal herself. She could fix herself right back up and get all her senses back she figured, but then again it wasn't like those things had really helped her thus far.
Being a pretty girl definitely wasn't going to up her chances to get freed from slavery. After all the prettier you were the more men would just want to keep you as their slave.
Faced with this dilemma she hesitated and then decided to walk to the cell door. She reached out her hand towards the sleeping red haired girl and then focused on her magical core of light.
With all her might she tried to envision a beem of light flying out of her hand and into the sleeping girl. Like so she hoped to heal her at least. She could worry about healing herself later.
Then after a few seconds Lili felt something start to happen as her hand then started to faintly glow. Focusing even more on it Lili managed to expand it slowly forward.
The cell block glowed as if there were a bright candle light there. Lilis head started to throb out of pain and she felt lightheaded, but she didn't stop. The light had already formed into a beam that was at least 30 centimetres long.
Sure there might have been still some 5 meters or so left to go, but she didn't quit, she was a fighter.
She gritted her teeth and then as if someone had shut off the lights, Lilis whole world went dark and she fell unconscious on the hard stone floor.