So I'm employed at a job where I work Saturdays most of the time. Fortunately, I'm off relatively early tonight, and I get an hour-long lunch break. Time for an experiment in leveraging my hilariously poor time management skills.

When I hit submit on this story, I was pretty proud of it. Making finals was a pleasant surprise, and even now, I'm satisfied. It has a complete story arc in about 540 words, and it's also actually kind of cool. I can't wait to touch this up and expand it for Fimfiction.

That said, it's got some flaws:

1) The prose is terse to the point of curtness. Part of me wants to blame this on the minific format. After all, everyone knows that stories often get too ambitious for the minific format, and end up suffering as a result. Yet I had plenty of breathing room within the word count. So this likely can't be fixed with the minific panaceo of "add more words." I think this exacerbates the story's other major problems, as well.

2) The ending isn't ambiguous enough. What I wanted out of the ending was unclearness over whether the narrator actually was the chosen one or whether she'd just gone off the deep end. That's not what I got; everyone unanimously thought that she was crazy. I really should have seen this one coming and patched it up with a line like "'No!' said the Princess clad in friendship. 'You're good enough!'" There's certainly room to maneuver here. But that may not be the best choice, because...

3) The ending needs reconsideration entirely. I don't recall what the original goal I had in mind was, but the ending as you see it was literally decided on as it was being written. If nothing else, the whole possible mental illness thing is probably not in very good taste.

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>>Not_A_Hat I think the central idea here is wrestling with the concept of "the chosen one." Like, can the chosen one ever be horribly flawed? If she fails to live up to the most important virtues, was she ever really chosen? If not, doesn't she have to live an immaculate life?

>>georg Invicta? I was under the impression that aster is a masculine noun in the nominative case. At any rate, you've sniffed me out. My Latin education consists of reading the first two chapters of the Wikibook on it.

>>Bad Horse I'm amused that your comment basically amounts to "this story is good because it's a story."

Everyone else, thank you for your comment: >>FanOfMostEverything, >>Trick_Question, >>Monokeras, >>CoffeeMinion, and >>TheCyanRecluse. And to those who read but didn't comment, thank you too.

I don't get it. It's making use of that pie warfare gag from Over a Barrel, so it's inherently going to be a goofball story, but it's also coming across as semi-serious. That just won't do when pie assassins are involved. In other words, I don't think this is zany enough.

This is ominous and atmospheric and all, but it kinda just ends before anything actually happens. I suppose that's a better use of minific words than trying to cram the happenings into two or three sentences, but it still leaves me hanging. Still, what's here is really good.

Boy, this is rough. Lots of grammar errors. I think Death here is, ah, blandly casual; his voice is more colloquial than what I would have expected, which is fine in theory, but it just ends up being boring, like he's some random guy and not, you know, Death.

And like the other comments said, the story's kinda just...there. The ending happens, but the build-up to it isn't enough to make it particularly meaningful.

This is a good start to a story that promises to be interesting. But that's all it is, a start. Yes, I know, minific, but there isn't a complete story arc here.

I'd love to read a more complete version of this story!

This is kind of a headcanon dump. I can't really say much about it. That said, Windy Seed is super cute.

The punchline is really, really flat. So's the rest of the story, I'm sorry to say. The coupon disclaimer is easily the funniest part; I got a chuckle from the dakimakura joke.

This is quite funny. Seeing Trixie being absolutely inept at literally everything was great. The characters' voices were on point, too.

Unfortunately, minor technical and stylistic issues hold it back. Things like incorrect dialogue punctuation and inappropriate ellipses I'm not going to rag on too heavily, but they're still problems. Probably the most risible style issue is:

“Yes, yes she did!” Trixie-in-Twilight replied, not even noticing her slip-up.

It'd be funnier if you didn't point out the joke.

Polish this up and you'll have a real winner! :D

This is going to be the standard against which I rank everything--convenient, since it was the first thing on my ballot. But I'm a bit wary of the "you might become a princess too one day" angle. It might have been even more meaningful if Celestia had explained death and immortality to Twilight and expressed her feelings without trying to teach the your friends will die lesson.

Nonetheless, it's a solid story.

>>Trick_Question

I don't think Celestia here is dancing around the issue of the afterlife existing. She seems to be pretty clear that it does. The particulars aren't really relevant to the story.

YES

I HAVE A SUBMISSION

and it's pretty good too if I do say so myself

I know I've been saying "I'll join" and never did for the past few ponyfic rounds, but I think I'll be able and willing to do this one.

Probably might help that I have reliable access to the Discord now.

Oh cool I got an idea almost immediately after seeing the prompt.

Tonight, we write.

>>Trick_Question

Who says you can't have lesbian horses in a general writeoff?

Comment voting? Cool. (Except that, currently, if I try to vote on more than one comment it spits out "Bad Request" for some reason.) never mind it seems to work now

Original fiction short stories? Also cool. I'll participate if the prompt is any good, but I haven't really been enjoying any of the winning prompts lately.

>>HoofBitingActionOverload

Comments on a story automatically appear in this thread. The spreadsheet has been obviated, because reviews are directly below the story now.

CAN'T STYMIOND THE DIAMOND

(I swear that sounds a lot better when you say it aloud)

Enough with the dank memes, though. No, seriously, enough with them. This story uses the exact same Trump parody tropes as every other half-assed wag on the Internet, and that made it feel like it was just going through the motions rather than actually being an incisive satire.

>>Trick_Question
>>FanOfMostEverything

Red means the reviewer liked the track, and blue means they didn't like it. Notice that all the tracks the reviewer singles out as great are red, and the only track they pan is blue.

I like the whole fake-music-review thing. It's an unconventional choice that isn't painfully obtrusive or gimmicky. And it's surprisingly deep. The review alludes to many different stories and uses the album to tie them all together. This feels like an artifact straight from the living, breathing world of Equestria.

I like this a lot, mainly because of Diamond Tiara's characterization.

See, Diamond Tiara's first instinct is to go straight for her typical self-aggrandizing facade, and she writes some corny tripe because of it. But, really, she's better than that these days, because there are ponies she cares about, and ponies that she knows care about her. And when she realizes that, she's a lot more sincere with her words.

It's not exactly common to see any sort of character development in a minific, because there just isn't any room. But this one pulls it off.

This story's ending is a completely foregone conclusion. It spends a lot of time heavily implying that Fluttershy's mother is verbally abusive and doesn't approve of whatever Fluttershy's decided to do, then sends Fluttershy off into the lion's den. What happens after the scene cut? Exactly what you'd expect. Fluttershy comes home and she's a wreck. There's no surprise at all.

(Aside: when writing ponies, you might find it interesting to use "nag" instead of "bitch." It's ponytastic and family friendly! That's just my opinion, though.)

That was spooky, I guess? I mean, the story spends so much time setting the stage that it barely even touches on the climax. I guess this could be pretty good if it weren't hemmed in by minific limits, but this just isn't a good minific.

Wow, this is fun. The pacing is blistering fast, which is perfect for Discord doing things.

The real person part is tacky and unflattering, and the Pinkie part is cloying and preachy. This story is in all kinds of bad taste.