Killing My Character

[TheMonotonePuppet]

So, in my story "Charisma," the brother of Sol, the MC, is bed-ridden and dying. He currently has the class Fatal Brain Cancer Patient and many alchemical agents being pumped into him. However, it has not healed him of said cancer because it has a System of its own and its locations (metastasis) inside his body gives it the advantage. I am trying to figure out whether I should kill the poor guy or not.
To clarify things, this is a grimdark story, so it does fit with the tone I have going and I am certain all readers are expecting him to kick the bucket. I already have a perfectly good reason as to why he would be killed: the main antagonist wants to push the Main Character further into the depths of insanity to boost the Miasma (essentially anti-Magic) in their body.
There are three options that I cannot choose between to save my life: either he zombifies and suffers an ego death, essentially just becoming a mass of cancerous flesh that the main character will kill; he starts dying to the disease that very day (for in-story reasons that you will not know unless you read it on RR) but Sol heals him, at the cost of turning him into a horrid monster that is servile to her, and she will struggle throughout the story to turn his mind to normal; or, last but not least, the kindest option: he coexists with the cancer due to her help and becomes the first member of the major cast.

So yeah. In short, help please?

 

[Deleted member 54065]

Option 1, I think, further reinforces the 'grimdark' part of your story.

Option 2 gives the readers a sliver of hope. It's a so-so option, I believe, for you can take your work to a more hopeless option by not giving him sanity in the end, or she succeeds in turning him back to normal.

Option 3, if you'd ask me as a reader, is my choice. I'm not a fan of heavy stuff, and the character had already suffered a lot. So a bit of relief in his end would be nice.

 

[TheMonotonePuppet]

Option 1, I think, further reinforces the 'grimdark' part of your story.

Option 2 gives the readers a sliver of hope. It's a so-so option, I believe, for you can take your work to a more hopeless option by not giving him sanity in the end, or she succeeds in turning him back to normal.

Option 3, if you'd ask me as a reader, is my choice. I'm not a fan of heavy stuff, and the character had already suffered a lot. So a bit of relief in his end would be nice.

Ok cool. Assuming there aren't a bunch of replies that pop out of nowhere saying "kill the poor guy!", I'm probably lean towards option three then. Thanks. I won't mind additional replies/advice/votes.

 

[melchi]

Option 1, I think, further reinforces the 'grimdark' part of your story.

Option 2 gives the readers a sliver of hope. It's a so-so option, I believe, for you can take your work to a more hopeless option by not giving him sanity in the end, or she succeeds in turning him back to normal.

Option 3, if you'd ask me as a reader, is my choice. I'm not a fan of heavy stuff, and the character had already suffered a lot. So a bit of relief in his end would be nice.

+1

 

[Cipiteca396]

Ok cool. Assuming there aren't a bunch of replies that pop out of nowhere saying "kill the poor guy!", I'm probably lean towards option three then. Thanks. I won't mind additional replies/advice/votes.

SH readers tend to dislike tragedy and grimdark in general, so most people here are going to say 'Spare'. (Me included.)

But it really depends on you as the author to choose what story you want to write. You can always look for a site catered towards horror/tragedy instead if you start feeling stifled.

 

[bokhi]

If you really, really can't choose, assign each scenario a number then roll a die.

Or ask a magic eight ball.