FimFiction Link - Short ID: 509579/ruler-of-equestria
Published: Jan '22
'Ruler of Equestria' is a three thousand and one hundred word oneshot, featuring the average day of Twilight after she had ascended to the throne.
I like the base concept of the story. While individually every scene in this story has a show-equivalent, FIM never really had the time or opportunity to just dedicate an episode to Twilight leading the country. The moments the author chose to depict are chosen well and give a fairly rounded look into what a day like this could look like. Most of the prose in the story is quite pleasant as well.
However, while I understand that this is a SoL fic, it sort of feels like there isn't really a highlight to this story. There is practically no conflict in this story that's resolved in three sentences or less. If you like such stories, you'll have a great time here, but if you expect an arc of sorts, you'll be left wanting. For instance it's mentioned in the story that the Everfree is encroaching on the borders of Ponyville again, but Twilight just dismisses this by saying she's working on it, after which the story goes back to arguably less interesting things.
Another thing I found a bit jarring was the scene with Celestia. Sunhorse visits Twilight and while the scene is sweet and all, it features what I'd call, for lack of a better term, anti-LUS. In nearly all of her sentences Twilight explicitly says "Celestia" for some reason, even though through most of the scene they're the only two characters there. It also felt a bit OOC for her to say that "politicking sucks."
The scene with the M6 was a bit of a mixed bag. Their interactions are endearing and I do like how despite their short interactions, the author was still able to convey that they matured a little. However, the scene quickly falls into the same issue as the throne-room one. The author throws in sentences like:
>They talked about their time apart and their memories together. They helped each other through issues that were presenting themselves
Which sounds sweet, but it's very much telling not showing. The reader has no idea what exactly happened and such matter-of-factually statements of the events have no emotional impact at all.
One more thing, I'm not even sure I'd consider a negative, but was certainly noticeable enough to get a mention, is the author's insistence on portraying food. Twilight's ravenousness is described four times throughout the fic and while I'm aware of the old joke that she likes to stuff her face, it just felt a bit out of place to me. I assume the author intended to show how much energy it takes to get her through just a single, normal day, but it never really goes anywhere in the story.
Overall: 4/10 The story features a cool concept and largely competent prose, however, the lack of memorable moments and the story's skimming over of interesting events makes it hard for me to recommend it.