: Re: How to write a chaotic neutral protagonist and prevent my readers from thinking they are evil? I've come across a problem with one of the main characters in my book. The "heroine" of my story

@Pierce369

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I'm going to challenge the frame of this question: You say you want the character to be "Chaotic Neutral" while being self-centered but following her own strict moral code.

Your character is Lawful Evil. But, Evil doesn't mean Bad.

First, some definitions I'll be using - since it's hard to have a meaningful discourse over Good, Evil, Law, and Chaos without a shared understanding of what those entail.

Good means you're altruistic - sacrificing of yourself for the benefit of others. Neutral people are one of two things - either sacrificing of themselves for their own benefit, or sacrificing of others for the benefit of others. Evil means you're selfish - sacrificing of others for your own benefit.

Lawful means you are a champion of some sort of rules (your own, the law of the land, whatever) - following the rules isn't enough to classify as Lawful, just as not following the rules isn't enough to classify as Chaotic. Chaotic on this scale means you actively work against any sort of rules. Neutral people neither force their rules on others or actively work to dismantle rules.

And, importantly, the Source of Truth for what kind of alignment an action is rests solely on the person doing those actions - motivation and perception matter. And you can play around with what "SELF" means in context - if a character identifies as their family unit or their cult or whatever, they can be Evil while technically helping others (or Good while sacrificing of others) iff they identify primarily as "Member of Group" over "individual".

With that, your hacker is Lawful Evil. She does what she does primarily for her own enjoyment and thrill - thus she must be Neutral or Evil. She does these things at the expense of others, though (she appears totally safe, not taking a ton of risk, and other people will definitely suffer). Which puts her squarely under Evil. She also has a rock-solid moral code under her - it's not conventional, but it's important to her and she takes some actions based on it (not joining a group and getting annoyed about it).

Now, I'll note that you seem to be falling in a pit a lot of RPG players do - you want a character that acts and plays like Evil is defined, but you don't want the stigma associated with walking to the table with an "Evil" character (or rather, writing your character as Evil). Evil is not a bad thing. Evil characters can still be good protagonists. Their motives aren't as noble, but that doesn't mean their actions are less heroic - if an Evil character saves the world, it's usually because they live there... but they still saved the world.

With that in mind, for your writing you still have to make the character relatable. Something that can help with that is toning down the arrogance and high-horses Joyce sits on (don't push your fascist beliefs on me, angry yelling). And maybe trying to resolve some of the contradiction ("I don't throw people under the bus to get what I want"... while presumably throwing the company she just hacked under the bus for a bit of cash).

Other than broadcasting unlikeable traits a little less, you can also broadcast likeable traits a bit more - maybe she's got a sweet spot for kids, or a love of dogs, or maintains a super-useful FOSS library at a high standard. Whatever it is, you need something "nice" or at least enviable for readers to identify with or like about her.

When it comes down to it, if your character starts off as purely self-centered and self-motivated, she's selfish, plain and simple. If she comes of as selfish and unlikeable, readers probably won't like her - and that's okay. If there's a good supporting cast that helps captivate the audience while Joyce moves from Evil towards Neutral or Good (or even just a more likeable Evil), that's great. Don't get hung up on your character being Evil - after all, plenty of awesome characters are Evil (Tony Stark at many points, Loki, Boromir (Identifying as Gondorian > Individual), etc) and plenty of antagonists even are Good by their own lens. Good vs Evil isn't a great lens to even think about, unless you're in a setting that requires the concepts to exist - mostly because it pushes the connotation that Evil=Bad and Good=Awesome, which can lead to stale storytelling.

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