[Objective]

Etherwave - You grow to be one of the more inexperienced writers I look forward to reading from due to the potential and growth I see. Since this is a tournament I'm going to be extra nitpicky as well, but hope it inspires/motivates as opposed to leaving a defeating feeling lingering. I have a strong tendency of rambling on, so read what you want lmfao

The intro and closure is always super important as it sets the tone for how you enter a piece and what you feel and are left with when you exit it, and I tend to notice certain "hiccups" and "do's and dont's" here more than anywhere else.
Cosmic crisis. You can call it karmic chaos. This loss of life. Our whole existence a crisis of conscience.
^Atmosphere dope, imagery great. Wording? Repetitive usage of "crisis". Even if used to underline what kind of crisis it is you've already established that and saying it twice. Why this is important is because you're not adding anything to what you've already said, and that is a thing to avoid going forward unless you have an even clearer and more solid reason for using crisis twice so close to each other. Also, in a short piece/story the repetitive usage of words is even more highlighted than it would in a novel with chapters or paragraphs between each use for example.

I love the assonance in "nuisance", "hubris" and "human", rolls well off the tongue as we get into the finer details of the crisis going on. Also enjoy this stanza a lot, this would be a better opener in my opinion because it's poignant, not repetitive and "Such a nuisance, the hubris of a human. The passion. The rage. The fear we couldn't face, manifesting as the war we waged"" sets a wonderful tone in both language and scene.

And we called out to our creator to no avail. Our wails just echos in open space. <- This is pretty cool as well, so I might have repurposed what you used for the intro here instead as it also expands from human, to nature, to creator, to space and then existence so it reads like this:
And we called out to our creator to no avail. Our wails just echos in open space. Cosmic crisis. You can call it karmic chaos. This loss of life. Our whole existence a crisis of conscience.
^it drives the story further as the second half comes along which would have guided me through your vision a slight bit clearer.

We sailed to the edge of the Earth to seek what we craved. There was no God, no guide, no trail left paved.
^Alright, liking this and looking to see where you're going with it.

We reached out to our maker, but the silence couldn't save us and no semblance of peace remained. The black hole, that the absence of hope left in humanity, didn't pale in comparison to the way we failed as a species. We knew too much to have no meaning.
^Also enjoying this but sometimes less is more. I don't think you have to say "as a species", and if it's important a different phrasing, or adding another sentence, would help a lot with flow as "remained" and "failed" kinda flows better than a longer sentence adding on even more to a pretty long bar. A technique to help with this is reading it out loud for yourself, see when you start to breathe, where you're stumbling while reading or any inconsistencies in the fluidity of the content you read. That was a key moment for me to when I could start finding and playing with longer drawn out sentences, or short hard breaks. When and where to use them. Altho I still got a way to go I think my feedback here may help you as well if you don't already do this.

So the universe wasn't much surprised, when we decided to program our own demise in AI.
^Love the concept but the execution needs work as the ending is very abrupt in terms of flow. AI don't work that well with surprised or demise, mainly due to the "ice"-ending as opposed to "I", AIs would have worked better in this regard.
Or simply removed "in" (not needed) and "own" (as "our" is self explanatory to who owns what) and worded it to something like:
"our AI demise" with focus on the "ice"-rhymes (see what I did there? huehue). Also, you're creating a comma where comma isn't needed, so the pause created comes off as a bit more awkward than it needs to be. This is where battlerap/text tend to differ from topical as the comma makes sense with a beat patterm but you're more freeform in topical in terms of who's going to read it and for what purpose. I might be the only one here that cares about punctuation like this tho.

Our intelligence was artificial long before our art was officially comprised of all the hate we let our gardens grow with the seeds we'd sown. Our creation turned against its creator, as we had our own.
^Love the use of "comprised" as an internal to the previous stanza and transitioning to the end of your piece. Content-wise this is great. I like the closure and wrap up of your story. However, like with your intro you break "rules" by rhyming a word that consist of another word (sown & own), repititive without really repeating any words but the structure of them makes it so. Something to keep in mind in terms of rhymes going forward.

All in all I enjoyed the read. Enjoyed the content matter and the journey of humanity vs AI from the down to earth and digestible parts to the more cosmic and extravagant. A pretty cool piece in and of itself with a few hiccups that can be fixed with editing/spending more time (figuring out syllables to move, structure and trajection/pace from start to finish) and being aware of the do's and don't's we all have preferences for, but ultimately affects us as readers/voters.

Good shit bruh, keep posting & joining tourneys. Looking forward to see where your writing journey takes you

VS

Master Rock - A seasoned writer and one I enjoy reading. Intro is gripping and attention grabbing, it's always fun playing with themes of reality even if somewhat predictable in this context. Where you take it is where it matters tho.

these terrors of a technological scheme, the broken man versus scrap metal machines,
bioengineering society transcending into cybernetical fiends, the oracle once prophesied of the production of these things,
^Dug this all the way to "these things". Come on, haha, that's a lazy way to end it when you've done so much amazing work at the verbiage beforehand. It sticks out unless you stick to the theme of your writing, nah'mean? (See what I did there? huehuehue)

Aaaah, "these things" -> "it brings", I see you. Kinda wish you had kept it going when "sing" comes into play. Something like "they never sleep, sing, dance or twist". Other than that I see what you're doing but I still kinda wish you had gone for a bit higher vebiage instead of "these things" when you've kept the vocabulary as complex as you did up until that part.

I like the direction the story is going with questioning the situation you're wrapped up and forced into. I like the added humor of "biting the bits" despite the gravity of it all. Also liking the "oozing/ooing"-internals. However, "Born in an age where my childhood is what I reminisce" feels like a better intro as I'm now put into a new situation from someone being caught in a war.

stranger than fiction nightmares come to life like Optimus prime
^Is Optimus Prime a nightmare? Wouldn't that be Megatron? I feel like content got sacrificed for rhymes here.

Loving the closure "there's no greater truth than when we lie". Interesting, we love to believe our lies until that becomes truth but I struggle seeing where that fits into what was said previously.
The way I see AI and everything they did in your story is very much real and doesn't disrupt the fabric of reality theme you were mentioning in the start. Re-reading the start I now see that it says "seems like a dream" instead of stitching fabric of reality back together as the concept, the character is torn dealing with this situation, and as your story progress go from telling their life up until dreaming and waking up to a nightmare.

After re-reading the story again it's a little bit more clear but could definitely need a solid edit and polishing to the quality of what I've seen from Master Rock in the past.

MVGT: @Etherwave. Somewhat similar topics, and altho I enjoyed Etherwaves direction/concept a bit more the imagery, flow and overall execution was better on Master Rock's verse imo. Spending a bit more time on the text as a whole from Etherwave, and fixing up the quality of life hiccups + playing more with rhymeschemes/internals/syllable lengths and this would have been a way easier vote. As it stands now Etherwave took out the more seasoned of the two, but the potential for improvement is huge. For both. Love mecha-shit in the right setting, so this was definitely an entertaining read and battle with great showing from both altho one left more to desire than the other.