[hider=Un-American Activities][@Keyguyperson]

... Oh? Isn't it usually that the second rule is ”unless it conflicts with the first rule”? I assume this is a intentional change, teh-heh... … … Soldier, eh. I'm noting that the doctors are saying ”it” and the general is saying ”she”... Haha.

The switch that went from casually talking about selling blood to suddenly being hit with an EMP was very sudden, as was the events that followed. I wasn't entirely sure what happened there, with the assassination and Isabelle's sudden death sentance. Hm. Oh, well.

Alright, finished reading now. I'll state that I lost focus somewhere in the explanation Dixon was making, to the degree that when you suddenly state in the author's note that ”this is a communist story” I'm like ”wait, what?”. It didn't really strike me as communist in any way, really... um... I'm still under the impression that we're stopping Alphabet Inc. to ensure robots don't take all our jobs. Am I wrong? I might be wrong. It was the impression I got from the general/admiral conversation. Otherwise, with the companies, it felt more of a warning about ”don't let it get out of hand”, or so. Eh, allow me to completely ignore any further symbolism and focus on the story itself.

I like the world. It's nicely developed, and I see how things happened. You explain the most about the world itself and the robots that are being sent out into the world, and I like that. It's a nice future world that's only, like, a hundred years or so into the future and humans are still assholes. It's a fairly relatable place despite the remarkably better technology. So I liked that.

I liked the interactions with Columbia, developing on the robot knowledge and interactions, and practically everything up until the assassination, really. Then the assassination was really fast while I was still smiling and it feels like I missed the que where I was supposed to change my mindset and that all just felt really odd. Then it was going to Mars, and by then, I was noting there wasn't much of the story left so it seemed the last of it was going to be spent in conversation, which felt a bit disappointing. Sure, spurring the main character on was important, but what I wanted to see was the consequences.

I wouldn't say I was extremely attached to the main character or particularly made an impression on if her actions were right or wrong, but I did root for her, partly because there was nobody else in the story I liked better and because I wanted to see what awaited at the end of the journey. Buuuuuuuuuut... we don't get to see that. She just kills this CEO, and apparently it felt good. Nice way to start your lifestyle as a psychotic killer. … Oh, wait, maybe that wasn't the intention. In any case. The story feels incomplete. It feels like your have act 1 through 3 here, but you're missing act 4 and 5. Perhaps a few more, depending on the length of the story. I wanted to see where it all ended, but instead, it ended... there. I must admit to feeling rather disatisfied with this.

But, still. I like the world. I fairly like the main character. So it's nice. It's still a worthy winner, even if the attention to this competition this time has been rather lackluster. I just feel it probably was intended to be more that I didn't get. Oh, well. Nicely done, anyway.[/hider]

And now, let me respond. 

Firstly, to roughly anyone who want to know a bit about my entry... I intended to write a full, proper story with this basis that I wrote Dryads with. A full story with more characters, more developments, more established setting and more of such. But, as I got very busy during the days of the competition, I decided that I would simply spend an hour or two writing down the story I had as a short story that's pretty much simply the script the larger story would have. I still intentionally made it a readable story, that I'm actually pretty proud of, but yeah, it doesn't actually contain a single actual line and it's all from the perspective of a god looking at the world, you know what I mean. It wasn't really meant to compete for the votes, but I wanted the story I had in my mind not to go to waste. Haha.

[hider=Holmishire][@Holmishire]

Thank you very much. I'm happy you found it intriguing and the ending endearing and such, haha. But yes, there's a lack of information on the setting. Basically, I imagined it being tree-people living in a pretty modern society that had developed technology under the watchful eyes of their king, so it'd remind us a lot of our own except they were... tree-people. Tree people with the natural ability to grow in specific circumstances. Haha.

But, yes. I only actually mentioned said industrial technology when I had reason to, otherwise I didn't mention it at all. Probably could have done that better, but, yeah, I didn't really write this while under a lot of pressure, more of a ”Eh, to heck with it, I'll do it like this!” and this came out on the other side. The original story would have been from the perspective of the prince as he fights his father and then travels to a new world, but runs into troubles of growth there, which probably would have been more connecting to the character...

But honestly, now, I wonder a bit if that story wouldn't have become dreadfully long and perhaps boring in the length of it, and it actually served its purpose better like this. Eh, I dunno. Thank you for your feedback. Hahaha. Now, then.[/hider]