Lickety-Split has sold out Ponyville to an evil frost fiend for the secret of delicious ice-cream and is about to bring about a frosty apocalypse. This can only mean one thing: It's Saturday, and there's only 22 1/2 minutes to save the world!
Only... Lyra's been having a dream. The same dream, again and again all of her life. There's something coming. Something terrible coming from out of the darkness, and it is going to destroy everything. Princess Luna seems very unwilling to do anything about it. Lyra's on her own.
It's Ponyville. Nothing bad ever happens in Ponyville.
But there is an old story. Perhaps the oldest story ever told. Even in Arcadia, there am I.
Entry for the More Most Dangerous Game thing.
Chapters (1)
THOSE IMPLICATIONS.
Waiting for the r34 lesbian clopfic for Lickety-Split. Don't let us down, Blue!
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Oh no what is happening, I have this shaver in my hand and I tripped over and it accidentally shaved your beard off forever D: D:
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Yes.
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Impossible. The beard is constant. Forever. A thing that existence shat out and called art. For with its mighty judgement the beard sees all, hears all, smells all, tastes all, and yes, even touches all. You and I can feel it on our cheeks now. Its hairs perpetuate the divine whims of the universe and calls bullshit on what makes right or wrong. For the beard is above all, undoubtably, holy it is, for it is the judgement at the end of times and the one who was there at the very beginning. No mere razor could trim it, and neigh, not even the beard can destroy itself. For it is just that all-powerful and all-mighty. Blessed be it Obs who holds the beard's power. Blessed be his might which keeps its tremendous possibilities under his own responsibility. And yes, blessed be it Obs, and his beardliness, that protects us all in these times of doubt and shines a light in the dark that suffocates this universe so that we may have meaning still.
Amen the beard, brotha.
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Oh and the story was good, too. I guess.
5546065 I concur, and I accept this responsibility, neigh, the honor of spreading the ways of the Beard amongst my kin. In hopes that they too shall spread it's tale. The believers shall proliferate, spreading across the county- NO, the world. I prey to it's mighty follicles, the chalices that beget the very strands of the one true facial hair. I will prey to it, and it will recognize us as it's children. Obs, the holder of the Beard, he shall be the judge of my body. Then, when my life ends, I shall trust my soul to be judged by the Beards infinite and glorious wisdom. Until then, I shall continue to traverse the lighted path that shines through the fainted darkness, paved way by--
That's it, I'm bored. Going to sleep now.
Nice story I guess. Couldn't really tell through the gibberish though.
Hurts brain my.
Don't be afraid, Lyra! It just wants to give you scritchies!
Edit: Huh. Not that far off, actually.
This has a pleasant chill-ness to it, probably for the whole Luna As An Old God aspect. Something about the melding of worlds and ancient long forgotten beings still watching over all
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I love you Blueshift.
I love you so very much.
I liked this. You saved me, Blueshift.
I reviewed this story. You can find my review here.
5549328 Woop, thanks!
That's very odd, I'm following you but that blog post didn't show up on my feed!
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You're welcome! Thank you for writing a good story.
Huh. That is strange.
Holy crap. I can't go to sleep tonight. I can't ever go to sleep again.
So, what prompt was this for?
This is beautiful. It deserves way more than the handful of upvotes it has now.
I'm going to take a minute for myself, just to think about this.
Actually, never mind, thinking about it is stressing me out.
I will say though, this is quite well.
Still, the implications are...leaving me uneasy.
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Anthropology, presumably.
5553161 It is based on the Nicolas Poussin painting
Definitely a beautiful sorrow.
This was a beautiful piece. It really touched me. Keep up the splendid work.
Wow, you used The Littlest Cancer Patient and It Was All Just a Dream in one story? Gutsy. Somebody likes to play The Most Dangerous Game on hard mode!
5553748 Translate away!
I hope to have the first fic in Klingon.
5556591 I live life on the edge
The implications are great, but I wasn't a huge fan of this story. Maybe it was the fact that it didn't really feel sad with all of the meta-humor included in the narrative. I didn't like the ending all that much, either, though the writing itself was really good. There's just some sort of tonal dissonance in the story that really irks me.
Beautiful story, touching. Gonna say this contest produced a lot of interesting things.
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Thanks for the comments. I'm a big fan of experimenting with tonal dissonance myself and like to try to push what you can do with it.
Really, it isn't meant to be a sad story per se, I just wasn't sure what to tag it as.
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Thanks, Mr Kettle!
It's a powerful story, well-told. I had a little recurring niggling awareness that we know death already is present in Equestria. The parable with the shepherds is very well-done--did you come up with that yourself?--but it ruined the good feelings I had about the story, by ending on the lesson that we should be grateful for death because it brought art into the world. Death is bad, kids. Art does not require death. Don't be grateful for death. Fuck death.
...not literally. Turns out that's illegal in most states.
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Thanks for the comment, Mr Horse! Glad you liked it!
Is death present in Equestria? I mean, certainly it is one of the underlying assumptions that it is, or else where are all the really old characters. Applejack's parents are conspicuous by their absense and I guess we saw a coffin once, but it is all very much 'in the moment' cartoon logic. Perhaps there is, perhaps there isn't, but it isn't something that is ever confronted or even alluded to.
The story is one of the interpretations of the famous 'Shepherds of Arcadia' painting by Poussin (that is the painting some believe offers a clue to the location of the Holy Grail). I wouldn't go so far as to say there is a moral about being grateful for death becuase of art (though I subscribe to writing having the meaning the reader finds rather than the author intends) but more about art transcending death, in that the discovery of a fixed end to all things directly causes the discovery of a form of immortality via art. Or rather, you can exist or you can live, and art is one of the signifiers of the latter.
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It Was All Just A Dream is an awful, awful trope. It either works wonderfully or completely ruins a piece.
I wrote a "It Was All Just A Dream" story once and I got a comment back that I could do better than that.
Wow, this was flooring.
Feels, man. I almost cried.
5578860 It certainly demands exceptional skill of its wielder. Very difficult not to make your audience feel foolish for emotionally investing in the story up to that point.
The only two stories I can think of that use the trope well are The Matrix (It's all a dream, and you must wake up) and Inception (It was all just a dream...or was it?) Neither of them really plays the trope straight.
5617206 I was surprised. This is the story I was most worried about. On the bright side for you, Blueshift, I've recalled those assassins.
(Eh, we know Aquaman's comedy is going to take it anyway.)
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Oh, that's a shame. Well, can't win 'em all.
Comfy as fuck tbh
Hit that favorite like a wrecking ball.
I didn't trust you and I was right not to. That picture is not familiar to me at all.
Interesting story though.
I wanna let you know this fic isn't brain-hurty or gibberishy, not one single bit, and I absolutely love how well it comes together and how fucking chilling the armored man's scenes and Lyra's terror are and how on point your humor is throughout and the tonal shifts are fitting and so well executed and it is just so PERFECT. "Nothing bad ever happens in Ponyville" and details and side jokes use meta humor to get laughs, but the revelation at the climax of the story gives them so much deeper meaning, but while it's sobering and saddening—and it is, so much—the world and the jokes remain funny and fun, and that's why Lyra makes the choice she does, because the light-heartedness and whimsicality of this world is something she can live with! Hohmigawd this story's too good
And I for one am also a huge fan of the intro and outro! You're just like, "Take us home, Poussin!" and your narrative voice works so well and aaaaaaaa
I don't think the intro and outro were unnecessary. While, as Titanium said, the intro is explained in the story, I must add that the outro isn't, and it's the important part! Its eloquent expounding on the moral of the story just makes me realize more about the allegory than I did before and it wraps everything up so, so neatly and touching-ly, I wouldn't change a thing about this fic
except for these bits
You switched around the words "ever" and "bad".
Gentle hug.
"Dads" shouldn't have an apostrophe in it. And now that I look at the sentence a second time, I think your use of the present-tense "isn’t" as opposed to the past-tense "wasn't" might be debatable.
But yeah! Thanks for writing good fic! You just got yourself a new follower! I can't believe I've barely read any of your stories; I've been doing you a terrible injustice and this must be rectified quickly . . . ohhhh, but I think this story was finally the tipping point to send me on a Luna fic kick that I've been trying to hold back for a while now. My productivity is soon to take a drastic drop. But it will be for the sake of reading fics about best princess!
What was brain-hurty and gibberishy and went over my head was FanOfMostEverything's entry for the "Cupcakes" prompt
5618335 For me, this should have been a finalist. I haven't got through all the entries by any means, but I can't see how this wouldn't be right up there. Lovely, wrenching work.
My god, how are you so good at this.
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Didn't even get past the first round of the comp though! :v
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The judges were fools.
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We're all still confused. Bad Horse even had to call back his assassins!
Good, but could use another editing pass. That's the only reason I can come up with for why this didn't make it further in the competition
Some more glitches I detected:
The evils of self-replicating spaces. Remember to neuter them!
Backed*
This is more your insurgent space. Note the stealth camouflage and boot-knife.
This unwanted apostrophe might be an orphan. Take it away and give it gentle cuddles.
Ahh, the evils of those subversive inverted quotation marks. Zero tolerance. It's the only way.
The only other such things I noted while reading was that your adverb and exclamation mark usage felt a little heavy-handed. A few less of each would make it an easier read, but not so much so that it's a large problem – just a suggestion from an evil overlord.
Also, I'd be very wary of sentences like this one:
While context might carry it, the sentence itself is essentially meaningless. She almost bounded out of the door, meaning that she actually didn't. Nor did she apparently actually do anything else either.
Anyway, that lot aside, add me to the 'WTF were they thinking' camp. I mean, I'd say I enjoyed it more than the winner, but after the lashing I gave that it should be clear that I've enjoyed indigestion more than that, so it isn't saying a lot. Of the stories I've read this far, I'm guessing I'd have stuck it somewhere between 6th and 8th, but there are still a couple of stories around there I haven't read, so... eh.
The comedy was hit and miss, for me, but I'll generally take a few cringe-worthy groans with a few genuine LOLs and call it a good day's work. The imagery was strong, the repetition well used, and the story convincingly told. Not quite favourite material, but definitely solid.
-M
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Thank you good sir!
How did this NOT make it through the first round?
How did this not make it into the Top 10?
We don't even.
Personally, for us - this is one of the best tales we have ever read, just due to the idea behind it all.
Our personal, first place worthy, favourite tale.
Elements of the story which at first appear to be bad writing are later revealed to be clues to a (rather cliche') conclusion. Nonetheless it felt to me like I was reading a bad story for the first half of the experience. Whether or not that is a flaw depends on your philosophies regarding art.
My overall impressions:
Writing: 4 / 5 (above average)
Plot: 3 / 5 (average)