: Re: How to keep a dark protagonist who wants to keep his humanity dark? My MC is in a dark line of work. He is an assassin. He is also someone with lines he does not cross. He has been duped

Start with an assassin, a person who kills.
Then delete everything you don't want him to be.
He is not a mad dog, a psycho or the dreaded emo guy who kills (which I will assume is a reference to Dexter). So he is not a victim of bad brain chemistry or a twisted personal psychology, yet he makes his living by ending other peoples' lives.
That leaves an enormous question hanging unanswered...

Why does he kill?

Sure, he might have taken the first few jobs for the money, but after that, with six or seven digits in the bank, there are a lot of easier careers to pursue. Yet he keeps
killing.

Find the answer to that question, and you will find out what distinguishes your dark gentleman from his murderous trope brethren.

My favorite answer to that question is that he is kind. He is a skilled murderer, with an unparalleled talent for painlessly transitioning his victims into the after life. He would be happy to quit, but he can't trust anyone else to do as good a job. He honestly cares for the quality of his victims life, right up to the moment that he reduces their quantity of remaining life to zero.

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: Your demons likely wouldn't be speaking English either. Yet you write your story in English, not because the demons speak English, but because the readers do. A lot of English words stem from

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: Writing a letter of apology and requesting financial assistance Situation: I have spent almost all of my money due to my wrong decisions, and I need to ask a person to help. He knows that

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: Creating character imagery without describing their physical looks This is more for my own curiosity than anything else but I was wondering if when reading about a character with no specified

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: I'll set out my stall straight away: I think a theme is essential. However, I don't see how you can write something worthwhile that doesn't have a theme. If you are trying to appeal to

: Re: How to keep a dark protagonist who wants to keep his humanity dark? My MC is in a dark line of work. He is an assassin. He is also someone with lines he does not cross. He has been duped

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: Your demons likely wouldn't be speaking English either. Yet you write your story in English, not because the demons speak English, but because the readers do. A lot of English words stem from

: Writing a letter of apology and requesting financial assistance Situation: I have spent almost all of my money due to my wrong decisions, and I need to ask a person to help. He knows that

: Creating character imagery without describing their physical looks This is more for my own curiosity than anything else but I was wondering if when reading about a character with no specified

: I'll set out my stall straight away: I think a theme is essential. However, I don't see how you can write something worthwhile that doesn't have a theme. If you are trying to appeal to

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