Marian once lived in a nice suburb close to the city. The streets were clean, trees were green and looked after by the city council. Every afternoon after school, children in the neighbourhood gathered together and played games. Hide-and-seek, tag, and chasing after the little red bouncy ball to name a few. Marian was a quiet kid who sat under a tree and watched other kids play. She was new to the neighbourhood and was too shy to introduce herself. She sat in corner with a book from school library. Time to time, she would look up from her book and snitch a glance or two at the excited children chasing after a small red ball. The children barely took notice of her. She yearned to play with them, to chase after the red bouncy ball with the other kids. To have them call her name and take her in the group. Yet, she never had the courage to say hi.
She wished she had.
She opened her eyes. Her old home and the world lingered behind her eyelids, and fell apart as she stared at the dark wet stone wall of the dungeon. It was cold and damp, and had distinctive rusted iron odour that her nose would not get used to. Her boots were soaked from running through the shallow pools of water hours ago, and only got even more soggier as the leather absorbed the humidity rather than drying, and have already sipped through the oiled clothes she wrapped her feet with. She's probably going to get gangrine if she doesn't dry her feet soon. She sighed, and curled into a tighter ball. What's the point of worrying about her feet when her entire life was not certain? Her entire body was damp. From the dampness of the dungeon, she told herself, from the darn dampness.
She was covered in red. So was the walls.
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The kingdom of Eugh fought hard against the invading army of Aedean empire. But fighting hard does not always guarantee a good outcome. One cannot crack a boulder with an egg, or defeat an empire with a starved army, already half-dead from years of famine and plague. Kingdom of Eugh used to be properous with plentiful harvest, then the drought came, followed by the plague that caused people to turn insane. It all happened when Eugh refused to surrender her sovereignity to the empire, when all of her neighbouring lands have. The drought and plague drew a line on Eugh's borders and only rampaged within her boundaries, never to the neighbouring once-kingships. All knew it was not natural. But knowing did not stop the deaths.
Aedea only sent the army when the colours of life was stripped from the Eugh's landscape, and only bare cracked dirt scattered with dead and dying remained. They could have come sooner, but they had better use for the kingdom. Eugh served as an example for the neighbouring states on what could happen if they, too, disobeyed. Only once the empire was satisfied, they sent the army to behead the queen of Eugh, and hang her head over the Eughan palace gate by her long dark brown hair. May she rest in peace.
It was at this time, when twelve-years-old Marian was snatched from her world and stranded in the slum of Eugh.
People thought the screaming dirty naked girl covered in muck was infected with the insanity plague, and avoided approaching her in fear of getting infected. This was fortunate for Marian, as crime was prone in the slums. And some may even consider Marian blessed, as an old women decided to take her in, and look after her, as Marian resembled her lost daughter, despite the fear of getting infected. The old women knew she did not have much to live on to fear the plague.
The old women died the coming winter. But it was enough time for Marian to accept that she was no longer on Earth.