i get the moral it’s trying to convey but that king is an idiot and the kingdom’s doomed. you don’t appoint an honest kid who will forthrightly admit a failure like that to leadership of a country, you put that kid in charge of like… the army, or something. the department of agriculture.
i’d send out dead seeds, then appoint the kid with the biggest and most beautiful plant anyway. ideally the same kind of plant as the dead seeds were from. and ideally a kid with a really good pokerface. that kid knows:
a) how to perceive failure early (a well developed second plant means they knew how soon the first seeds should sprout and didn’t fuck around when they didn’t)
b) how to fix the situation (a second plant of the same species means they got someone to help them identify the seeds and plant more, or are observant enough to do it themselves)
c) how to get the best people for a job in to do it (kids aren’t great gardeners. a beautiful science project probably means mom did all the work— just what you want from a child ruler and their regent)
all around, that kid (or their mom) is the kind of devious results-oriented bald-faced liar you want to go toe-to-toe with the lords of your country and the rulers of your neighbors. not a little kid who admits defeat so early and in a situation with such high stakes. ‘whoops i didn’t grow a plant’ sounds a lot less sweet when you phrase it like ‘i give up on ruling my country’.
you know, i think i’d also send agents out to encourage the kids to destroy each other’s plants. let’s see who’s good at seige warfare, too.
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