Thanks @Terminal. I found myself thinking the same thing, especially once you mentioned it. I probably should have by rights, stuck with what I knew. Or rather, what I didn't know? Either way, lesson learned. Don't submit unfinished work! And thanks to the other reviewers who took time to read what I wrote and share their opinions. I'll be waiting to take another crack at the next contest for certain!

-The Authour of In-Between-Box. :)

I was kinda waiting with this until the official end of this RPGC and until all the reviews were in, but since the new writing competition started, I'll post my response to the feedback now.

@Dark Wind
That’s a good point about the Liador. Most citizens will have heard stories about them and some might have actually seen them, but for the reader a bit more visualisation is needed. The moral is also something that should get a little more attention.
I’ve made some changes to that part and posted it below if you’re interested.
I’m glad you enjoyed the story, I like these kind of stories too. I want to try and use my bard more often.

@Blitz
Thanks for your review, and vote, I’m glad you enjoyed the story :)

@The Grey Dust
To answer your question, the bard was with the Lade of the Forgotten Songs when the warrior went back in time and that is why he wasn’t influenced by the effects. He stood out of time at that moment, if that makes sense.
At the moment I’m not sure what I can add to explain that in the story (I'd prefer not to use a narrator who can explain to the reader how everything works). The bard is not a person to understand how linear time works and the Lady only explained she could see the flow of time, nothing more, so the bard can't explain what happened in his story.
It's something like this, the Lady of the Forgotten Songs lives outside the linear time. That’s why she can see the flow of time, show the events of what happened and even create a portal to it. That portal part is something I should add to the story, that the pond does in fact work as a portal too and not just to view past events. Is that something the reader must get explained or does it work to leave the reader wondering how she does things the way she does?

A bard should be descriptive yes, but at the same time I wanted to give this the feeling of a folk tale, without the obvious moral a story like that should have. The bard isn’t at a castle where the noble or royal family wants to be entertained after a heavy meal, his listeners are people who also have other things to do, so he can’t tell an elaborate story. With this in mind I kept the events between X and Y a bit vague on purpose, but calling the journey long and treacherous is something I think a bard would say. In fairytales or folk tales you sometimes see that too, that the hero travelled far or ‘over icy planes and high mountains’ to get to where he or she needs to be. Or just ‘the hero traveled to this place’ and then did the things the story is about. But I agree the travel itself can be a little more detailed.

I made some changes to these part and posted them below, I hope it’s better this way.

@The Grey Dust

My quick review/critiques of the story I read.

I obviously don't want to cover every last thing. But I'll give examples and explain as best I can. The * * * separates each point and the red text, is bits from the story itself.

* * *

The most boring critiques are the missing capitalization for many sentences. And the typos like...

“hoping to find the inspiration of his muses with ever breath.” *every

* * *

You love the word 'And' And it should die. You had a ton of sentences that used a comma, and then used and. That's what the comma tends to be for. If you deleted those and's the sentences would have flown better. There's also lot of descriptor words, that could/should be cut. A rule I also occasionally break myself, but if something is obvious it doesn't need the descriptor. Like “Wee” Ant. Ants are tiny already. The mind can process that without any help.

Also you repeated yourself a lot...Repetition every now and then and work for dramatic effect, you certainly we're trying to do just that. But like repeating the same sentences that have the same literary point, over and over again. Doesn't really make the story/narrative stronger.

Like this, two sentences mean the same thing and also start/end with the same phrase.

“Though like all storms it died out, for the way the story was to be structured, the way it was to be told, was to be read first from top to bottom by the reader, until the very last line. Yes, it was the last line which actually implied the story was to be read in reverse, from the bottom line to the paragraph above.”

And though the last part seems to be the meat of the story, it seems loaded down with it. (though likely on purpose, to show the monotony the character experienced.) But it got a bit exhausting to read...

* * *

Also, you loved using metaphors. The story was definitely more like an artsy poem. Not a story that followed a plot, character or having any noticeable structure. Purple prose, often only benefits the writer, getting to flex their muscles. But if the metaphor is messed up, it's far worse than simply a messy sentence that builds character or plot. Because it literally loses the point of being there.

“splintering across the mirrored sky like lightening reversed.” I assume you meant lightning. Because that word means brightening.

“computer screen as the Writer stared at the abyssal grey.” Now that probably should be 'grey abyss'. Because abyssal, actually solely refers to measuring the ocean.

“The thunderous pauses with every tap of the spacebar” That should probably be 'Pauses, with every thunderous tap of the spacebar.' unless the pause itself is somehow loud. And so on, so forth.

* * *

I honestly got lost, I wasn't one hundred percent certain if any of the other parts were apart of the whole story. If the hiders were meant to separate evenly or split off. Because there were four parts.

A. One without a hider.
B. One named something different.
C. Same without a hider.
D. Another hider but with different name.

So I was questioning. Is A and C take place in the same place then B and D separately. Or does A and C occur in the same place, but B and D don't because each hider is under a different name. Etc. If all of it was suppose to mesh into a cohesive story. I ask, how much of the actual story did I even miss if I cut out A-C and just left D?

I didn't seem to have a reason to care about the character seemingly suffering, aside from that it was happening.

So, this comes off probably overly rough. But I can appreciate the interesting idea inside the poetry. I can almost see the movie of this concept playing out in my head, that I can only assume was playing in yours. I feel like this concept could be quite interesting in a short film...but it left me just a little confused.

Everybody's a critic. Grateful for the read, regardless. :3