@Prince of Seraphs, the most major reason why you're not ranking this time is inconsistency. So your character's a villain—that implies that they do bad things enough to be opposed by the heroes. Your character was neglected and abused as a child by her father, because her father hates faunus. In fact, he hated them enough to...marry one? And go mad with grief after her death? On the subject of her mother, it appears as if she was a Huntress or something similar given the nightmare blades and the 'secrets' that a little girl (read: ingenuity and disconnect with emotions and wants to normal children) learned before she was twelve, both before and after Melanie's death at age seven. In the personality section it says she's not angry, just dispassionate, but people who aren't angry continue to be abused indefinitely, not attack an abuser twice their height and likely triple their weight with enough force to pierce their ribcage and internal organs, or to get mad at a scumbag holding girls in his basement. On that subject as well, and the fate meted out to him: 'disassembled him, piece, by piece, by piece'. That sounds sociopathic to me. Sociopathy isn't lack of consciousness, but lack of an ability to form emotions like shame, guilt, sadness, or disgust. Also, being 'dead to the world' would imply that she's lost her principles, and yet she's principled enough to target bad people and not good ones in a sense of justice. How can a character be gorefest levels of insane sometimes and a honorable thief other times without being crazy? Additionally, on the subject of thieving: why did she turn to it? To survive? Then why'd she leave a calling card at each spot? For some purpose? What purpose? It's not clear.
I didn't choose you this time because you seemed to carve your character's personality and history out of conflicting traits, prioritizing drama over sense/continuity. To be fair, you wrote very well, and painted a vivid picture, and I liked the character. I'm being hard on you because you've requested my best critique in the past, and maybe a little because if I didn't go at you so hard, you'd win like every one of these contests.
My apologies I may have been unclear on this but Melanie was
Not a faunus. She had faunus in her ancestory which is where Sapphire's wolf traits came from but Melanie herself was human. I realize there is no president for that but it was the only way I could make it work in the story and if you consider genetics then it is more than possible that faunus heritage is a recessive trait that will not be displayed by all that carry it.
About Melanie's secrets I think this is in Sapphire's CS on the Swansong doc but her semblance was polymathematics which essentially means that she is able to process numbers and see patterns like an advanced computer system. This mean that she was almost inhumanly skilled at the theoretical aspect of engineering and the physical just took practice. Because of her semblance Melanie's specialty was folding weapons, she could calculate the various forces required for folding technology to a very precise degree and so her weapons were far more compacted than comparable makes (she had several patents on these, part of the reason the Rodes family is really rich). When she was alive Melanie taught Sapphire math and explained engineering to her in basic principles (after all she was seven). After she died Sapphire spent a lot of time hiding in Melanie's workshop because she knew Janus wouldn't enter it. She studied her mother's notes and things and while she never understood to her mother's proficiency level Sapphire learned the basic concepts behind folding tech.
With regards to killing Janus even someone who is naturally not an angry person has a breaking point in which they will do something completely out of character. As for the force necessary to pierce Janus' ribcage she didn't actually hit him with that much strength. The daggers as previously noted are impact activated. When she hit him with it the dagger assembled itself and because they are designed to launch from Sapphire (or at this time Melanie's) wrists into there hands the boosters on the dagger are what propelled it into Janus and killed him.
Speaking of not being an angry person: the man she took apart, she wasn't angry when she did it. She was... upset perhaps but she didn't do it in rage. She was calm and collected the entire time. Perhaps his mistreatment of the girl reminded her of her father and in a way this was retribution for all the harm he'd caused her that she was never able to repay because he died so quickly.
As for the discontinuity of her actions from one event to the next I did say she was erratic, I may have not worded it as well as I should have but what I meant was that if exposed to the wrong stimuli her mood will change completely from being uncaring to slitting a guys throat. Also as said she has not sense of consequences or responsibility. She'd not willing kill someone who just happened to stumble on her but if she had to she wouldn't sleep any worse and if her presence led to someone else getting killed she'd have no sense of responsibility towards it. She also doesn't 'target' bad people, she works as a contract thief for basically anyone. If someone wanted her to steal the last dime a family had she'd do it. The morality doesn't come in often but she has rather a complex about her own situation. She reacts very badly to domestic abuse or girls too young to defend themselves being put in danger. Past that she doesn't really have a moral compass. I would not describe her as an honorable thief, she keeps collateral damage to a minimum but it wouldn't bother her if things got out of hand and she had to go to an extreme.
Last thing, I might not have made this clear but the calling card came later. When she first started stealing it was for survival purposes, she'd shoplift and pickpocket and take anything from anyone to help her survive. The calling card came after she started thieving professionally. She did it for two reasons. Firstly it was an advertisement, "If I can steal this painting from the most secured gallery in Vale I can steal anything you want me to.", secondly it was a cry for attention. Sapphire spent her life shunned and ignored by her siblings to a degree and abused by her father. Only two people ever truly took an interest in her, Melanie and her White Fang mentor. Both are now dead. The calling card was a way for her to draw attention to herself, to say: "I'm here, come and get me if you can."
I'm sorry if not all of that was clear in the entree but I did think this through. And thank you for the hard critique and the compliment.
Also I don't think you are allowed to deem yourself the winner of a contest. Otherwise everyone would make a contest, submit a halfassed entree and proclaim themselves the winner. I know you make the rules but I don't think most people are capable of seeing their own work honestly. Look at mine, I thought it was a work of art but evidently I left a bunch of things vague and difficult to quantify. I wouldn't have seen that reading my own writing so I don't think it is fair to judge yourself and put the crown on your own head because you see the work through rosy colored glasses, you know the work, the effort and likely a bunch of backstory that didn't make it into the CS that makes it much more appealing for you than it does to anyone else just reading the hard text.
After writing that it occurs to me that you might have done that as a joke but I'd still like some clarification.
Member
Apollosarcher,
shylarah