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I just really like killing them at the end of the story. There’s something satisfying about a fictional life ending just like a real one. I actually had this teacher once who told us that “a short story is a small slice of a life, but a novel starts at birth and ends in death”, but I may have taken that a bit too literal :3c
That famous old writing advice, “make only nice things happen to your favourite characters, who are perfect”
Or the opposite, edgy extreme trauma without end! Look, my very deep character is named Bloodvein, and everyone they knew and loved was brutally murdered as a child! They were abducted by government agents and forced to become the ultimate killing machine, by making them relive those memories—as the murderer. After years of brutality enacted massacre inside the experimental silo, Bloodvein became the coldest and coolest secret operative ever. One time, their arm was chopped off in a fight, and Bloodvein beat the assailant to death with it. Now they have a cyborg arm, badass.
I think my favourite version of that is when the character gets a single taste of emotionally fulfilling relationships and all their defense mechanisms end up becoming their biggest hurdle. Or something like how they did Evil Eye in Dandadan, similar idea.
Because putting them through that trauma is an excellent exercise in working through my own.
“Write what you know”, after all.
