Reading through this, I liked it fine. Probably enough to upvote it normally, or more likely not bother and novote like I do on everything else, but…. I am a person of context, and in the context of this particular contest, this article falls pretty flat.
The "what if?" of this is supposed to be "what if The End became aware that humans became aware of its methods?", which is just, a pretty weak premise to begin with. The effects are so localized, I know that The End is a pretty big shot level, but it's still just one level. And it isn't even something major like The End ceasing to exist or completely changing, just it "becoming aware" of something. However, I am critiquing an article, not a random sentence in the discussion page, so let's talk about how this What If? connects to the article.
My biggest annoyance with this article is that I can't derive the premise from the article at all. What exactly is the "becoming aware" part? Is it the fact that the Wanderer noclips into a different level, which usually doesn't happen? I'm fairly certain it doesn't have anything to do with the actor, or really anything in the article. With most of the other articles the "What If?" is really obvious, an exit to the backrooms, or the government created the backrooms, or the world ends or whatever.
I don't want to complain about an article not having a big enough scope or world shattering implications, but that is kind of what the contest is about isn't it? Your entry doesn't have to inspire me to write about and think about your alternate universe as I sleep, but I do want to feel like there's at least more to be said about the world of an article than is shown. No part of this really feels like a "self contained canon" or that I'm peering through the looking glass into another reality. This article could easily take place within the canon of almost every article on the site. I wouldn't even bat an eye about it not being typical behaviour for The End, levels do weird atypical stuff all the time.
Overall, this is fine enough meandering slice of life tale, but that isn't want I need from a contest entry. Maybe after the contest I'll scan through this a couple more times and see if there's anything more to it that would make me change my vote.
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