History Main / FourisDeath

** In "Patty Hype" when [=SpongeBob=] has a dream after falling asleep at his Pretty Patty stand, he and his pineapple house are shown aging waiting for customers to come:
--->'''[=SpongeBob=]:''' I'm ready!\\
''[Cut to a few years later; [=SpongeBob=] is now middle-aged with a receding hairline, a mustache, and glasses and his house is slightly withered]''\\
'''Middle-Aged [=SpongeBob=]:''' I'm ready.\\
''[Cut to a few more years later; [=SpongeBob=] is now an old man with a long beard and his now visibly rotten house collapses]''\\
'''Old [=SpongeBob=]:''' I'm ready.\\
''[[=SpongeBob=] is now dead, in his place is a tombstone reading "R.I.P. I'm Ready" and his house is completely gone]''

[[folder:Video Games]]
* ''VideoGame/AbyssCrossing'': Mona's undead clone of Reina has 44444 HP, on top of looking like a Jiangshi. Mona created this clone to help him destroy the world and rebuild it into his ideal one.
* ''VideoGame/AceCombat04ShatteredSkies'':
** Yellow 4 is the first story-significant enemy who [[spoiler:gets shot down by the main character, thanks to her plane being in disrepair]].
** The opposing side in 04 give Mobius One two prominent [[RedBaron nicknames]]. One is "the Grim Reaper"; so the player character in the fourth game is death.
** In a meta example, this is the reason why the game is numbered '''0'''4 rather than just 4.
* ''VideoGame/AceCombat7SkiesUnknown'':
** Mission 4, where [[spoiler:you try to rescue former president Harling from deep inside enemy territory. It calls back to a similar mission in ''VideoGame/AceCombat5TheUnsungWar'', but this time it doesn't end very well. Harling is dead]] and player character Trigger is blamed for it, sending him to...
** ...the 444th Squadron, need we say more? Driving this home, characters insistently refer to this penal unit as "four-four-four" rather than "four-forty-four" or "The 444th". Spare Squadron, a ragtag bunch of convicts flying salvaged boneyard fighters, are considered expendable and sent on suicide missions too dangerous for regular forces, made to redeem themselves for their crimes or die trying. The latter is much, ''much'' more common than the former.
* In ''VideoGame/AnimalCrossingNewLeaf'', the music that plays at [[https://youtu.be/2-5ljZpuyaI 4 AM]] is ''very'' creepy and a potent source of NightmareFuel, to the point of inspiring several CreepyPasta Dream Towns. Also, Club LOL's Japanese name, "Club 444", actually reads as "Club Shisho" (run by Dr. Shrunk, whose Japanese name is Shisho). But an alternative reading of the Japanese name, if read directly, can really mean [[PlayedForLaughs "Club Death-Death-Death"]].
* In ''VideoGame/BreathOfFireDragonQuarter'', the "names" of the [[strike:dragons]] [[NotUsingTheZWord D-Constructs]] are simply numbers in Gratuitous Russian. "Odjn" (One) is linked to the hero. "Dva" (Two, mistranslated as "Dover") is the BonusBoss. And Chetyre (Four) is, of course, the BigBad.
* ''Franchise/{{Castlevania}}'''s Death generally has 444 or 4444 HP. Death-themed items play by this trope as well. The Book of Death in ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaPortraitOfRuin Portrait of Ruin]]'' has 44 ATK, while Death's Robe in ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaChroniclesOfSorrow Dawn of Sorrow]]'' boosts STR, CON and LUCK by 4 (and Int by 13!). Death's Ring is especially noteworthy, as it boosts 4 different stats by 44 each but turns you into a OneHitPointWonder.
* ''VideoGame/DarkSavior'' loves this trope. The Golden Castle tells the story of the four slain daughters of the merchant who built the castle. While the game's five parallels each have their individual themes and goals, the fourth one revolves around Garian fighting for his very existence when it's threatened by the appearance of [[spoiler: his {{Doppelganger}}]]. Worse, his four bounty hunter friends have arrived on Jailer's Island to save him, and he must race against the clock through four castles to save them from four deadly criminals, and they will die if you don't reach them in time. It's also the only parallel that sees [[spoiler: the destruction of Jailer's Island]].
** ''Demon's Souls'': you're expected to obtain the four Archdemon souls by defeating Maiden Astraea, the Old Monk, the Dragon God, and the Storm King, before ascending to the Boletaria Castle tower to fight [[spoiler:False]] King Allant. (This was probably unintentional; not only was there originally going to be a sixth world with its own Archdemon, you're quite welcome to fight Allant at any point after beating just one Archdemon; it's just really ''inadvisable'' because he's meant to be the hardest fight by far.)
** ''Dark Souls 1'': you must obtain the four Lord Souls by defeating Seath the Scaleless, Gravelord Nito, the Witch of Izalith, and the Four Kings, before ascending to the Kiln of the First Flame to fight Gwyn. The Four Kings count as an example in their own right. They and their kingdoms were all consumed by the Abyss.
** ''Dark Souls 2'': you must obtain the four Great Souls by defeating the Lost Sinner, the Old Iron King, the Duke's Dear, and the Rotten, before ascending to the Throne of Want to fight Queen Nashandra.
** ''Dark Souls 3'': you must obtain the four Cinders of a Lord by defeating the Abyss Watchers, Yhorm the Giant, Aldrich the Devourer, and the Twin Princes, before ascending to the Kiln of the First Flame to fight the Soul of Cinder.
* In the Shmup "Diadra Empty", flying dangerously close to one of the last bosses will give you a bonus called "Abyss Walker", worth 44,444 points.
* ''[[Franchise/DragonBall Dragon Ball Z: Supersonic Warriors]]'': If Frieza's fittingly named Death Ball misses the opponent and hits the ground instead, the background music switches to ominous rumbling and the opponent has 44 seconds to KO him before the planet they're fighting on blows up, letting Frieza win by default.
* In ''VideoGame/FateEXTRA'', the protagonist learns this applies to getting into the Holy Grail War: [[spoiler:potential Masters had four days to figure out something was wrong with their school, investigate, and survive a qualifying battle. If they failed to succeed at this after four days, well... they weren't going ANYWHERE]].
* ''VideoGame/FateGrandOrder'' reveals that Primate Murder, long known by ''Franchise/{{Nasuverse}}'' veterans as the ultimate killer of humans, is the fourth of humanity's seven great evils. [[spoiler: Your TeamPet Fou[[SpellMyNameWithAnS (r)]] is its primordial form.]]
* ''Franchise/FinalFantasy'' has a history of the fourth character not having a good fate.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyII'' gives its fourth slot to a rotating list of Guest star party members. Most leave the party dead, though the first just appears dead for most of the game.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIV'' has Tellah as the fourth character, though Kain's disappearance disguises it a bit. He is the only one to die, in spite of the myriad close calls the rest of the cast outside the final party get into.
** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'':
*** Aerith is the fourth party character here and dies by the hands of Sephiroth.
*** Also, Master Tonberry, a robed green lizard like thing carrying a butcher knife and lantern that will slowly advance on your party before one hit killing you with said knife, or attack with 'Everyone's Grudge' doing 1 damage for each enemy a character has killed in the game, had 44,444HP in ''*Final Fantasy VII''.
* ''VideoGame/FireEmblemGaiden'' and its [[VideoGame/FireEmblemEchoesShadowsOfValentia remake]] feature Jedah, a villain who is completely invulnerable to attack except every fourth turn or every fourth time he is attacked, respectively.
* ''VideoGame/FirstEncounterAssaultRecon'':
** The [[spoiler:PlayerCharacter's teammates]] tend to die in circumstances involving the number 4. The [[spoiler:Point Man's Delta Force escort]] is killed right at the start of Interval 04; in ''Extraction Point'', [[spoiler:SFOD-D Douglas Holiday]] dies at the end of the fourth level, and [[spoiler:Jin Sun-Kwon]] is found dead in the single level of Interval 04; and [[spoiler:Lt. Steve Chen]] gets killed midway through the first level of Interval 04 of ''Perseus Mandate''.
** Both levels in Interval 04 take place in [[AbandonedArea a dead district of Fairport]] [[UndergroundLevel buried under an earthquake decades ago]]. Save for one single instance at the very end where you fight a Nightcrawler squad, [[BigBoosHaunt the only enemies are supernatural apparitions, and scary events are abundant all the way to the end]]. Also, it takes place right after the Origin Facility explodes and turns Fairport into a GhostCity.
* ''VideoGame/FiveNightsAtFreddys1'': There are four animatronic characters who are all out to kill you. [[spoiler:The Phone Guy gets killed on the fourth night.]] The series itself stop numbering games at the fourth game.
** Hints in the game suggest that in Five Nights at Freddy's 4, you're playing as [[spoiler:a child on his death bed]].
* In ''VideoGame/GhostTrick'', main character Sissel can use his powers to rewind time to exactly four minutes before a person's death in order to attempt to prevent it.
* ''VideoGame/GodHand'''s DynamicDifficulty goes through four levels: 1, 2, 3, and Die.
* In ''VideoGame/GranblueFantasy'':
** Feower/Quatre is the Eternal themed after the number four (as his name is even an easy indication from the Eternals' NumericalThemeNaming). His initial Charge Attack is named Memento Mori, which translates to "Remember, you will die" from Latin. {{Inverted|Trope}} after his 5★ upgrade, as it gets renamed to Memento Vita, or "Remember, you will live".
** The summon Death, in exchange for knocking out the fourth character in your party, deals damage to all enemies and grants guaranteed multiple attacks to the rest of the party. Once Death is upgraded to 4★, this buff lasts for four turns.
* A good number of ''VideoGame/HarvestMoon'' games do evil things to you at precisely 4:44 when you perform a specific action. For example: looking at the TV in ''VideoGame/HarvestMoonFriendsOfMineralTown''. This feature is often removed from the US version, and in some cases is related to more serious glitches caused by a bad removal! Maybe it ''is'' cursed. Also, if you go to your doghouse at 4.44am in ''VideoGame/HarvestMoonDS'' sends you into some sort of battle game with all the main bachelorettes.
* ''VideoGame/AHatInTime'': In Chapter 3, Act 1, The Snatcher will threaten Hat Kid to make her sign his contract, and if she refuses four times, he'll kill her.
* ''VideoGame/HauntingGround'' has four psychotic stalkers pursuing the main character trying to kill her.
* ''VideoGame/JoJosBizarreAdventureAllStarBattle'' and ''VideoGame/JoJosBizarreAdventureEyesOfHeaven'': Guido Mista's fear of the number 4, listed above in anime, is also present in both of his playable appearances: In both games he has a tracker of how many bullets he has and, if he has 4 bullets for more than a second he'll start losing heart gauge, a similar effect as when a downed character gets taunted.
* ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'':
** In the original game, the Hades Cup is the fourth tournament at Olympus Coliseum. Aside from the fact that the Lord of the Dead is behind the tournament ''and'' part of it, the whole thing is harder and longer than the past three combined, having 50 matches instead of 10 with every tenth one being a boss battle.
** In ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsChainOfMemories'', Vexen, the fourth member of Organization XIII, is the first one to die, assassinated by Axel when he attempts to reveal Marluxia's trap—and more subtly, Roxas's existence—to Sora. Also, the fourth [[spoiler:and final, in Sora's story]] member you fight in ''Chain of Memories'' is Marluxia himself. Fitting, what with having a SinisterScythe and all.
** In ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'', the final battle of the hardest Coliseum tournament in the game is against Hades...but the penultimate battle is against four brutal opponents: Leon, Yuffie, Tifa, and Cloud, all at once. Good luck.
** In ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsBirthBySleep'', the No Heart {{Superboss}} can insert a secret command called Wrath of Darkness in your deck. Every time you use it, you'll be inflicted with a status effect--use it four times, you'll be inflicted with Doom, which will almost be an instant kill.
* In ''VideoGame/LaMulana'', the last of the four key seals which must be found is the Death Seal, whose symbol contains the game's numeral 4. However, the Sage of Death (who unlocks the path to the Death Seal) will likely be the ''first'' of the four sages the player has to talk to.
* In ''VideoGame/LeagueOfLegends'', the character [[Characters/LeagueOfLegendsJhin Jhin]] is heavily based on this motif, with nearly every aspect of the character being based on this, from the number of shots in his pistol, the number of his active abilities, [[BreadEggsBreadedEggs to the number of shots in his abilities.]] He is also from an [[{{Wutai}} Asian-inspired region in the lore,]] furthering his connection to this trope, as well as being a [[MadArtist "virtuoso"]] with lots of [[CommonTime musical themes revolving around him.]]
* ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsOfColdSteel IV'' has [[spoiler:[[TheHero Rean]], in his fourth game as the protagonist, ends up dying at the end of the normal ending of the game. He's joined by both Crow and Millium.]]
* ''Franchise/TheLegendOfZelda'' usually brings in themes of death and darkness in the fourth dungeon of various installments:
** ''VideoGame/ZeldaIITheAdventureOfLink'': The fourth palace, the Maze Island Palace which is found in a labyrinthine island in East Hyrule, is an eerie, purple-colored palace overrun by Wizzrobes and undead enemies.
** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaALinkToThePast'': It takes four Silver Arrows to destroy Ganon.
** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaOcarinaOfTime'':
*** The fourth dungeon in the game overall is the Forest Temple, and you'll spend most of it hunting the four Poe Sisters who have sealed the way to the boss. Furthermore, the fourth sister splits into four clones to attack. Also, the temple's boss is Phantom Ganon, a ghastly construct modeled after one of the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse.
*** The fourth dungeon that Adult Link goes through is the [[BigBoosHaunt Shadow Temple]], which deals with the undead and features torture equipment in several rooms. According to lore, this place is a reminder of the darkest chapters in the history of Hyrule. However, like all temples, its Sage aims to protect Hyrule and assists the others in the process to seal Ganon after his defeat.
** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaMajorasMask'': The game is ''built'' on this trope:
*** Clock Town has four districts, there are four temples in the four areas outside of Clock Town which require four separate songs to unlock, Link has four forms that he shape-shifts between throughout the game, and the game is set across four days. The whole goal is to [[GroundhogDayLoop keep circling through a three-day cycle]] to prevent the end of the world at the dawn of the fourth day.
*** The theme is taken furthest in the fourth area, Ikana Canyon. You have to fraternize with skeletons, mummies, and ghosts to navigate the area, and it carries an overall bleak atmosphere everywhere but the temple, [[RuleOfSymbolism which being themed around light and sky, represents death in a different way]]. You also need four masks in this area[[note]]The Garo Mask to gain entrance and gather information from the lingering Garo spirits; the Captain's Hat to speak with Stalchildren and obtain the Song of Storms from Beneath the Graveyard; the Gibdo Mask to speak with Gibdos and navigate Beneath the Well to the Ancient Castle of Ikana; and the Giant's Mask that allows Link to grow to tremendous size in the Stone Tower boss's lair (and absolutely nowhere else; it's not strictly required to beat Twinmold, but ''not'' using it is a self-imposed challenge)[[/note]], you defeat four undead denizens before entering the Stone Tower (Keeta, Flat, Sharp, and Igos du Ikana), and the song you use to navigate the Stone Tower and reach the temple lets you create four statues. Furthermore, the Poe Collector presides over two areas with four optional bosses each: the aforementioned Poe Sisters in one and the first mini-boss of each temple in the other.
** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker'', there are six coral reefs, known as One-, Two-, Three-, Four-, Five- and Six-Eyed Reefs. Four-Eyed Reef is the closest to Forsaken Fortress, which serves as the base of operations of the BigBad. In addition, Forsaken Fortress itself is the fourth dungeon in the game completion-wise[[note]]it's the first appearance-wise[[/note]], and its surroundings are under a curse that leaves it in perpetual nighttime; even Tetra and her pirate crew hesitate to approach it, and Lenzo the photographer advises Link against getting there as well. Lastly, out of all fragments in which the Triforce of Courage was split, the fourth is retrieved after finding the chart that lies inside the dreaded, undead-themed GhostShip.
** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTwilightPrincess'':
*** The Arbiter's Grounds, which serves as the game's fourth dungeon, is an ancient gibbet located in the desert where the worst criminals of Hyrule are housed and executed; it is overrun by spectral beings (from four larger-than-usual Poes to the MiniBoss, [[EldritchAbomination Death Sword]]), [[DemBones skeletal monsters]] (Bubbles, Stalfos and the giant skeletal dragon, Stallord, who serves as the Boss) and living mummies. In addition, the dungeon reuses the same concept as ''Ocarina of Time'''s Forest Temple: the aforementioned four Poes seal the way to the boss, as well as the item needed to defeat it (the Spinner), and Link has to hunt down and defeat them to reopen the gate, with the last one having the ability to split into four clones. The dungeon is also home to the Mirror of Twilight, which serves as the portal leading to the Twilight Realm, where many of its inmates were exiled, [[spoiler:including Ganondorf]].
*** [[ArtifactOfDoom Both the Fused Shadows and the Mirror of Twilight]], artifacts on the decidedly dark side, [[PlotCoupon are split into four pieces]]. Midna's helmet is one-fourth of the Fused Shadows and she enlists Link's help to seek out the remaining three to take back her kingdom from Zant, originally used by three of the four Light Spirits to seal away the Dark Interlopers during the Interloper War, now guarded by the first three bosses of the game[[spoiler:, but are then stolen by Zant]]. As far as the Mirror of Twilight, when Link and Midna finish exploring the Arbiter's Grounds and reach the Mirror Chamber, they find only one-fourth of the mirror intact, having been fragmented by Zant and preventing them from entering the Twilight Realm[[note]]only the real leader of the Twili, Midna herself, can utterly shatter the Mirror of Twilight, and the fact that Zant could only break it into shards was proof of his false kingship[[/note]], prompting another adventure to recover the remaining three shards so they can finally enter the Twilight Realm, face down Zant [[spoiler:and reclaim the stolen Fused Shadows]].
** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaPhantomHourglass'': The fourth dungeon is the Ghost Ship, which steals the life force of any unfortunate victim who approaches it, and the dungeon's boss is a quartet of ghastly demons.
** ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaSkywardSword'': The fourth dungeon is the Ancient Cistern, a sacred location which is themed around life and death. Whereas the main floor features a vibrant design and atmosphere, the basement is a grim necropolis that features Cursed Bokoblins and deadly pools of toxic fluid.
* ''VideoGame/LeisureSuitLarry'' has no 4; skips right to 5. According to [[WordOfGod Al Lowe]] what started as a flippant comment about finishing the original trilogy turned into a marketing coup. Sequels include in-game references to the "lost" game as "Leisure Suit Larry 4: The Missing Floppies."
* ''Makeruna! Makendou Z'' features four demon queens during the second half of the game: Honmanimou (a big-breasted cow woman), Honmadecker (a prison wardeness, who upon defeat [[spoiler: turns out to be Doro's wife, now back to her senses]]), Honmadengunner (a cyborg), and Honmayaner (an archer woman). Main villain Dr. Mud also tried to enslave Makenkah (whose real name was Kaimyouji Eizan) as a fourth cyborg general of his, the other three being Dinosaur, Chuuko, and Shou. Even further, this game is the fourth installment of the Makendou series (if you count the OAV), and seems slightly darker and edgier than the previous two games, ending with [[spoiler: the school building collapsing (with who knows how many people inside).]]
* ''Franchise/MegaMan'':
** ''VideoGame/MegaManBattleNetwork 6'' features [=EraseMan=].EXE (aptly named [=KillerMan=].EXE in the original Japanese version), an assassin Navi whose design draws on ''{{shinigami}}''. When Mega Man fuses with [=EraseMan=], he gains the ability to instantly kill viruses when the digit 4 is in their HP. As for Navis, they get an HP-sapping bug that eventually does them in.
** The first game has Wily acquire four superprograms to create the Life Virus. Later on, ''Battle Network'' '''''4''''' has the impending impact of a meteor that will wipe out Planet Earth -- which turns out to be an insanely powerful and near-omnipresent robot called Duo.
* Subverted in the ''VideoGame/MonsterHunter'' series. The maximum number of players on a single hunt is four. This is justified in-universe by a tradition that it's unlucky for ''five'' hunters to go out together (a fatal incident involving a Lao-Shan Lung hunting quest prior to the events of [[VideoGame/MonsterHunter2004 the original game]] led the Guild to officially prohibit hunts performed by groups of over four).
* In ''VideoGame/NanashiNoGame'', Riko at one point gets trapped on a creepy subway where every car is Car #4. [[spoiler:She dies at the end of that chapter.]] In addition, the company that created the game is located on the fourth floor of the building it's in -- and it's [[spoiler:been closed for four years]], which you find out from the fourth e-mail you receive on the fourth day.
* The FantasyPantheon in ''VideoGame/NexusClash'' has nine members, with three each for Good, Evil and the Unaligned. It had four for each alignment at some point, but on all three cases the fourth deity is dead or missing. In addition, the pantheon's death god [[TheGrimReaper Hashaa]] is represented in art by a four-star constellation.
* ''VideoGame/NoMoreHeroes2DesperateStruggle'' has [[spoiler:Margaret]], who is the 4th ranked assassin of the UAA, [[DualWielding wields two]] [[AwesomeButImpractical gun/scythe hybrids]] and even has [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTlIzfL7tUI&feature=sub boss music that alludes to this trope]].
* ''VideoGame/PacMan'' has four ghostly monsters that stalk the protagonist.
* In ''VideoGame/Persona3'', October 4th is a very, very bad day; not only is it the anniversary of Ken's mother's death, it's the day when [[spoiler:Ken plans to murder Shinjiro in revenge; he doesn't go through with it, but then Takaya attempts to murder Ken, only for Shinjiro to take the bullets instead and die]]. Additionally, [[TheGrimReaper The Reaper]] has 4,444 hit points.
* In ''VideoGame/PersonaQShadowOfTheLabyrinth'', [[BigBoosHaunt the Evil Spirit Club]] is an exhibit made by the 2nd year Class 4 at Yasogami High - except that there's only ''three'' 2nd year classes at that school. The school does have a haunted house exhibit (which you visit with Ayame if you're part of the school band), but it isn't done by Class 2-4.
* ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'':
** ''VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue'': Lavender Town is associated with death because of the ghost-filled Pokémon Tower, is known as Shion Town in Japan. ''Shi'' and ''Yon'' are two readings for the kanji 四.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver'': Morty, the fourth Gym Leader in Johto, is a Ghost-type specialist who has four Pokémon on his team.
** In ''VideoGame/PokemonRanger: Shadows of Almia'', the Incredible Machine atop Altru Tower normally has three power levels, the highest of which allows it to [[{{Brainwashed}} hypnotize Pokémon from a radius of 500 miles]]. The BigBad, after he unleashes Darkrai, pushes the Incredible Machine one level further: Level "Dark", which supposedly has more than enough power for him to assert complete control over the legendary Shadow Pokémon...[[EvilIsNotAToy or so he thinks]]. And there's the Go-Rock Quad from the original ''Pokémon Ranger'' game.
** ''VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl'' does it subtly. ''Platinum'' introduced a fourth Admin into the astronomy-themed Team Galactic. His name? Pluto (Charon in English), the planet/moon named after the god of death or his ferryman. Additionally, Sendoff Spring, where you can find Turnback Cave which leads to Giratina and the Distortion World, is described on the Town Map as "The fourth lake of Sinnoh that was kept secret."
* ''VideoGame/PunchOut'': In the Wii version, one of the challenges in Exhibition Mode requires you to defeat Japanese boxer Piston Hondo after blocking 44 jabs.
* In ''VideoGame/PuzzleAndDragons Z'', allowing an enemy Anubis to take its turn will cause it to use the Banish to Hell skill, which inflicts a {{fixed|DamageAttack}} 44444 damage. The first time you encounter it, it guarantees a OneHitKill.
* ''Franchise/ResidentEvil'':
** In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil2'', an unlockable minigame, the 4th Survivor features an Umbrella Soldier codenamed Hunk. In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil3Nemesis's'' epilogue files, it's revealed that Hunk is nicknamed "Mister Death", and has a habit of being the only member of his squad to survive.
** Hunk comes back as one of the four characters in the Mercenaries mode of ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil4''. Consequentially, the fourth stage has the deadliest enemy in the game, which can spawn twice in a run; completing said stage also unlocks Albert Wesker, the BigBad of the majority of the RE games (though not in that game itself).
** The Keeper's Diary in [[VideoGame/ResidentEvil1 the first game]]. Since it's his own personal ApocalypticLog, the inexplicable "4" at the top of the last entry may have been a mistranslation. Since [[spoiler:the keeper attacks you before you get a chance to read the diary]], it can mean death for you, too.
** In the [=REmake=], you only get to see the last few pages of [[spoiler:Lisa Trevor]]'s journal while picking it up in the cabin near the cemetery. When combined with the remaining pages that you later find elsewhere, they form an Apocalyptic Log, which slowly deteriorates into illiterate writing as the dates proceed, as a WantonCrueltyToTheCommonComma, until it ends with the same inexplicable numeral "4" at the top of the last entry as in the Keeper's Diary. Since [[spoiler:[[TragicMonster Lisa]] attacks you as you are about to leave the cabin after reading the last page of her journal]], it can also mean death for you.
* ''VideoGame/ShadeWrathOfAngels'' have the backstory where four ancient angels who oversees balance between humans and demons have their peace disturbed by their fourth member, the power-hungry Dark Angel, destroying all except the Angel of Faith who serves as your benefactor when the Dark Angel abducted the entire population of a small town, your brother included. Then it turns out [[spoiler:the Angel of Faith is actually the Dark Angel, using you to collect the souls for her; in the final battle the other three lawful angels suddenly arrives to assist you]].
* In ''VideoGame/ShantaeAndThePiratesCurse'', the fourth island that Shantae travels to is Mud Bog Island, which contains [[FireAndBrimstoneHell the Village of Lost Souls]].
* In ''VideoGame/SilentHill1'', an elevator in an AbandonedHospital that previously had only three floors [[MissingFloor suddenly gains a fourth floor button]]. Travelling to this "fourth floor" triggers a trip to the town's hellish DarkWorld.
* In ''VideoGame/SilentHill2'', the [[spoiler:fourth time that James meets Eddie and Angela, they die]].
* {{Invoked|Trope}} in ''VideoGame/SleepingDogs'', when Wei and Old Salty Crab use a triad boss' superstitious beliefs and adherence to ''feng shui'' by [[{{Gaslighting}} vandalizing his home]], in particular smashing all but four decorative vases and setting the clock to read 4:44. The "Year of the Snake" DLC also has a cultist car rigged with a bomb that has "44" in its license plate, which causes the police dispatcher to audibly wonder "who ever heard of a license plate with two fours in it?".
* In ''VideoGame/SlyCooperAndTheThieviusRaccoonus'', one of the safes has the code being 4... 4....... 4... Bentley says he "had to overcome some personal demons to calculate this one".
* A variant in the early ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'' games, where ''Five'' is Death, in defense of Four. In-universe terminology refers to four general freedoms (of speech, of religion, from want, and from fear), with the "Fifth Freedom" being used as a DeadlyEuphemism for doing whatever is necessary to defend the other four.
* ''Franchise/SuperMarioBros'':
** ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor'':
*** Mario's quest for the fourth Crystal Star takes him to the [[BigBoosHaunt Creepy Steeple]] located in [[AlwaysNight the dark and grim Twilight Town]], which is home to a troublemaking, shapeshifting ghost named Doopliss, who had been turning the town's residents into pigs [[ItAmusedMe for his personal amusement]], and then, would [[GrandTheftMe steal Mario's identity and teammates and reduce him to shadow form]].
*** Cabin 004 of the Excess Express, which is next door to Mario's cabin, is where Ghost T. resides in. He died in there.
** In ''VideoGame/SuperPaperMario'', the Flower People's civilization went into the Dark Ages in their year 444. You have to pay 4 coins for the ferryman to ferry you across River Twygz.
** In ''VideoGame/SuperMarioGalaxy'', the rolling ball stages are full of massive iron dice blocks threatening to knock you into the abyss. Every side on these dice blocks read four.
* In ''VideoGame/TokyoXtremeRacer Zero'' and ''Import Tuner Challenge'', the number for the final boss is "400", connecting the number "4" to the unlucky and demonic number.
* ''Franchise/TouhouProject'' BonusBoss Raiko Horikawa numbers her magical attacks: First Drum, Second Drum, etc. Her fourth attack is "Death Drum".
* In the Japanese escape-the-room game ''[[http://hilgreed.natsu.gs/game/usen2/Usen2.html U-Sensor 2]]'', you have to find a way out of a deserted office building in which it's rumored that there was a murder on the fourth floor in spite of the elevator not having a button available for that floor. [[spoiler:It turns out that a vengeful ghost haunts that seemingly nonexistent floor and will kill you if you don't prevent the elevator from stopping at the fourth floor during the endgame. If you get the Bad Ending where the ghost kills you, your character sprite will be shown turning around exactly four times in the elevator before the ghost catches him.]]
* Rare Western example: in ''VideoGame/UltimaII'', while travelling through space, hyperwarping to coordinates 4-4-4 will send your spaceship crashing into the Sun resulting in instant death.
* ''VideoGame/TheWorldEndsWithYou'' has Mitsuki Konishi, aka Tigris Cantus, who likewise has 4444 HP.
** In ''VideoGame/NEOTheWorldEndsWithYou'', the foretold Inversion of Shibuya [[spoiler:takes place at 4:44:44 PM on the Final Day of the third week. Seventh day minus third week is four, for that extra-fatal kick]].
* ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'': Sylvanas Windrunner, the leader of the undead Forsaken race, became the Horde's fourth warchief in ''Legion''.
* In the 2011 version of ''VideoGame/YouDontKnowJack'', the segue into the fourth question features a bunch of dancing 4s. In one game, one of the 4s is shot and killed, and subsequent episodes feature a crime scene, the remaining 4s dancing sadly without the other 4, and finally, a graveyard where the 4's funeral is being held.
[[/folder]]

!!Examples:

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

* In ''Franchise/DotHack GU'', Tri-Edge's mark looks like a stylized rendering of the Arabic numeral "4", rotated to its side (or mirrored, depending on how you look at it). The mark signifies those that have been killed by the enigmatic Tri-Edge, making the people that got killed [[YourMindMakesItReal fall into comas left and right]].
* In ''Manga/AkumaNoRiddle'', Chitaru is out for revenge on Angel Trumpet, a merciless assassin who kills for fun, doesn't care if the victim is innocent, and uses [[PoisonIsEvil poison]]. Chitaru knows her target is a student in Class Black but doesn't know which one. She should have remembered her numerology: Angel Trumpet is number 4 in class order and is staying in ''room'' 4.
* In ''Anime/BattleSpiritsShonenToppaBashin'': ''Battle Spirits Double Drive'' has the character Shishi [[spoiler: who is ultimately revealed to be a fragment of the BigBad and is pure evil]].
* The Godhand in ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' originally had four members before Griffith did his epic FaceHeelTurn.
* In ''[[Manga/BlackButler Black Butler II]]'', Ciel and Alois arrange to have a formal duel while their {{Battle Butler}}s face off. Ciel explains that it is traditional, in duels, to take ten paces away from each other before the beginning, but, after reaching four (which is deliberately pronounced "shi" rather than "yon") Ciel attempts to cheat by attacking. He is thwarted, but this starts off the duel nonetheless, with it ending in [[spoiler:Ciel stabbing Alois, which later leads to his death]].
** More humorously, a fake informercial by the Grim Reapers has [[Main/FiveFiveFive the number to call]] as just 4 for every digit.
* The four of spades in the Creator/OsamuTezuka ReusedCharacterDesign playing card deck is Kiriko, the doctor of death from ''Manga/BlackJack''.
* In ''Manga/BlackLagoon'', Roanapur is controlled by four criminal organisations -- {{the Triads|AndTheTongs}} headed by Mr. Chang, [[TheMafiya the Russian Mafiya]] headed by Balalaika, [[TheMafia the Italian Mafia]] headed by Verrochio ([[spoiler:and succeeded by Ronny the Jaws following the Vampire Twins arc]]), and a [[TheCartel Colombian drug cartel]] headed by Abrego.
* ''Manga/{{Bleach}}'':
** Ulquiorra Cifer is the most powerful espada Ichigo fights, leading Ichigo to initially assume he's number one. Not quite. He's ranked fourth. He's also the only Espada with a second [[SuperMode release state]], and the first release is so powerful it shouldn't be used under the dome of Las Noches. He also has deathly pale skin, black hair, permanently cold-looking eyes with lines underneath running down his cheeks like tear marks... you get the picture.
** The Eleventh Division's fourth seat is empty for both the superstition and because Yumichika thinks the kanji for "Four" is ugly.
** Unohana Retsu, the captain of the Fourth Division is TheDreaded. [[spoiler:She is also the ''First'' Kenpachi of the Eleventh Division, and the '''''worst''''' criminal to ever exist in Soul Society. Meaning that she was (and still is) worse than '''''Aizen'''''. Her actual name is Unohana Yachiru, the person Zaraki Kenpachi respected the most, and Yachiru's namesake. The name "Yachiru" means 8000 styles, referring to the fact that she has mastered ''every'' sword style in Soul Society. To top it all off, she is the inventor of the Art of ''Killing'', which she plans on teaching to her tenth successor. She is probably the most blatant example in all of ''Bleach''.]]
** Askin Nakk le Vaar holds the letter designation "D", the alphabet's fourth letter, and his ability is "The Deathdealing." [[spoiler:His power is the ability to change the "lethal dosage" of any substance he takes into his body in sufficient quantity, which lets him do anything from become completely immune to an attack to making something as simple as ''oxygen'' fatal to anyone around him. He demonstrates this by making the blood in a foe's body toxic, and the only way to escape his power is to bleed to death since he made the "lethal dosage" lower than what the body needs to survive. Oh, and it's almost impossible for him to die -- even finally being taken down by Oetsu didn't stick, courtesy of Yhwach's Auswählen.]]
** A subtle example occurs in Yamamoto's past, which reveals that he previously went by the nickname Eijisai, written 丿字斎 -- with the first character being the fourth kanji radical. [[spoiler:This is revealed as part of the lead-in to the fight ending in his death.]]
* Episode 68 of ''Anime/BoboboboBobobo'' has the characters participating in a popularity contest (The results of which are based on an actual contest in Shonen Jump), and Dengakuman ends up in fourth place. Afterwards, he climbs into a coffin.
* ''Manga/ChieShinoharaTheBestCollection'' has the one-shot ''Suicide Room Number 404'', a room on the fourth floor, which is said to be cursed and cause women to commit suicide over scorned love.
* One episode of ''Manga/{{Chobits}}'' deals with an apparently haunted Room 104.
* ''Manga/{{Claymore}}''s work in fours when participating in group demon-exterminating missions. In addition, when Number 6 (Claymores are ranked by power) lists the top five for her companions to watch out for, the only one to warrant emphasis and additional description is not Number 1 (by definition the strongest) but rather Number 4, who ''"cares nothing for the lives of her comrades or the lives of humans in general... A woman who lusts for battle and the blood spilled."'' The Number 4 to take over for her, Miata, is also little more than a PsychopathicManchild, leading at least a few to conclude that all Number 4 Claymores are crazy.
* In ''[[Franchise/CodeGeass Code Geass R2]]'':
** The first person to die against Suzaku's new Lancelot Albion is [[BitCharacter Dorothea Ernst]], the debuting Knight of Four, who was a completely new addition to the cast and was created to censor the death of a fan-favorite Knight of the Round (Nonette Enneagram, the Knight of Nine). To add insult to injury, we never even get to see Dorothea's Knightmare Frame before she is unceremoniously killed off in said Knightmare's explosion.
** The [[AmazonBrigade Valkyrie Squadron]], a group of female pilots under the command of [[PsychoForHire Luciano Bradley]], are four in number... and they are the first to be killed by [[AcePilot Kallen]] in the Guren S.E.I.T.E.N. before she takes on Luciano. Weirdly enough, one of them, Marika Soresi, is revealed to have survived in ''Manga/CodeGeassOzTheReflection''.
* ''Manga/Cyborg009'': Albert Heinrich, aka Cyborg 004, is the most heavily reconstructed and had most of his body replaced with various weapons. The original manga even saddled him with the nickname "[[{{Shinigami}} God of Death]]", and his original personality was that of a rather frightening vengeance-seeker that enjoyed battling Black Ghost. However, his character evolved over the years, and in the 2001 version, he's more of a [[GermanicDepressives withdrawn]], BigBrotherMentor who's very disturbed by his enhancements.
* ''Manga/DeadmanWonderland'': The earthquake happened on 4/4/2014, measured 11.4 on the Richter scale, and 148,000 people died/went missing. The odd number out is that it happened at 5 PM.
* The numbers 4, 40 and 400 are all over ''Manga/DeathNote''... for obvious reasons.
** Once a name is written in it, that person dies 40 seconds later of a heart attack unless a specific cause is written during that time.
** You have six minutes and forty seconds to write the details of the death after the name and cause -- in other words, 400 seconds.
** One of the rules unmentioned in the series is that writing a name incorrectly four times in the Death Note by accident will grant the person who the user was trying to kill immunity to that Death Note. However, writing the name four times incorrectly on purpose will not only not render the target immune to that Death Note, but kill the user who wrote the name.
** When first debuting as the second Kira in order to meet the real one, Misa delivers ultimatums with deadlines of four days.
** Light has a scrap of Death Note paper hidden in his watch for emergencies, which is revealed by pulling on the watch's crown four times in less than a second.
** On a far more obscure note, Light's given name is spelt as "moon" (月). This has four strokes, which is ... crashingly unlucky and symbolic. Poor Light, doomed from birth. On top of that, Mikami's office is number 4. Also, Rem is Shinigami ranked number 4.
* In ''Manga/DGrayMan'' a Level 4 Akuma could take on Generals easily and was close to annihilating the Black Order.
* ''Franchise/{{Digimon}}'':
** ''Anime/DigimonAdventure'':
*** Takeru's partner Patamon is the fourth partner Digimon to appear. He is the only partner Digimon to die in the season, pulling a HeroicSacrifice at the end of the first arc to destroy Devimon and reincarnating as a Digi-Egg.
*** The fourth BigBad of the series is, instead of one powerful and evil Digimon, a quartet called the Dark Masters. They kill several of the good guys' allies.
** ''Anime/DigimonTamers'': The fourth Tamer shown to gain a Digimon partner is Juri/Jeri. She is the only Tamer whose partner dies during the series, and she spends the second half of the season in depression.
** ''Anime/DigimonFrontier'': Mercurymon is the fourth and most dangerous of the non-human Warriors. The first time he fights, he kills Seraphimon in one strike and absorbs his data, and when he goes all-out against the Warriors with his Beast Spirit, it takes six episodes for them to defeat him, five of which were part of a XanatosGambit to gauge their skills so he could nullify them.
** In the original Japanese version of ''Anime/DigimonFusion'', Tactimon calls his attacks in increasing levels of severity (e.g. Ichi no Tachi, Ni no Tachi, San no Tachi). His most fearsome attack is called Shi no Tachi. Using the ''on'yomi'' for "four", the anime plays on both meanings of the term "shi".
* ''Manga/{{Doraemon}}'': In one chapter, Tamako chases the cat while repeatedly saying "shishishishi", ('''Japanese:''' しししし) and one panel later, she becomes a "money box" and her mouth spawns a lots of money. "Shi" is the same sound as four, which is used as the password Doraemon and Nobita had set. The Chinese version translated it to "die", seen [[https://imgur.com/RsDOHgb here.]] The 2005 anime adaptation changed the password to "1529".
* ''Franchise/DragonBall'':
** Inverted with the Four-Star Dragon Ball, which saves Son Goku's life during his first battle against Tao Pai Pai. This Dragon Ball is a memento to his grandfather Son Gohan. In the anime, after Goku's first son was born, he [[LastMinuteBabyNaming gave him the name of his grandfather]] [[LineOfSightName when Goku looked up to the Dragon Ball]].
** ''Anime/DragonBallGT'' takes this inverted trope even further with the Devil Dragon/Shadow Dragon of the Four Star Dragon Ball, Si Xing Long/Nuova Shenron. Si Xing Long is the TokenGoodTeammate, the NobleDemon and the AntiVillain among the seven Devil Dragons. He even saves his enemy/friend Goku on several occasions.
** Played straight with [[EvilOverlord Frieza]] having four forms, not counting his Full Power and Golden forms, which are simply extensions of his fourth.
* In the animal adventure episode of ''Anime/ExcelSaga'', one of the dogs is portrayed as a gambler who compulsively fiddles with a pair of dice. At one point he rolls a 4 and 2 ("shi ni", meaning "to death") and remarks that it's a bad omen.
* The Phantom Lord guild from ''Manga/FairyTail'' has the Element 4, a FourElementEnsemble of wizards and the equivalent of Fairy Tail's S-Class wizards: [[BlowYouAway Aria]], [[MakingASplash Juvia]], [[DishingOutDirt Sol]], and [[PlayingWithFire Totomaru]].
* In Episode 4 of ''LightNovel/FateApocrypha'', [[spoiler:Siegfried, The Saber of Black, [[HeroicSacrifice dies after he transplants his heart into the wounded Homunculus]]]].
* Lord Fungus in ''Anime/FinalFantasyUnlimited'' survived the first three shots from Kaze's Magun, but the fourth did him in.
* In ''Manga/FistOfTheNorthStar'', there are four heirs of the Hokuto school of combat. And there is a reason if Kenshiro, the ''fourth'' of them, is the {{Trope Namer|s}} for YouAreAlreadyDead.
* In Episode 4 of ''Anime/{{FLCL}}'', Naota gets beaned by Haruko during the 4th inning of the baseball game at the beginning of the episode. The umpire even shouts "dead ball!"
* At the very beginning of ''Manga/GhostHunt'', Mai and two other girls are telling ghost stories, at the end of which they count one-by-one, and there's supposed to be an imaginary fourth person. Only, Naru sneaks in and fills the role for real, with obvious results.
* ''Anime/GhostStories'':
** Akane-san from the broadcasting room will kill without fail any and all people who hear her voice. She counts aloud the exact time of the sunset before she finally kills her victim, carefully avoiding the number 4. Her spirit can be repelled if one interrupts her count and say the number 4 out loud. To seal her, [[spoiler:she has to hear the chime that indicates the end of a broadcast before sunset]]. That makes four bell rings.
** If you hear the piano ghost play a particular piece of music four times, you will die. (Coincidentally, this episode was the fourth to air.)
** A ghost named Datto, the spirit of a boy who ran track, returns to the school on the day of the sports festival to take the feet of a runner in the race. The runner attacked is in lane four. Datto attacks them at 4:44 PM.
* ''Anime/TheGirlWhoLeaptThroughTime'': Makoto [[spoiler: alternately, Kousuke and Kaho]] is fatally hit by a train just as the town clock strikes 4:00.
* The opening of ''LightNovel/GoblinSlayer'' shows a bunch of dice coming up with the number four, each time the titular swordsman cuts down his enemies.
* ''Franchise/{{Gundam}}'''s sequels and {{Spiritual Successor}}s like toying with this:
** Being the protagonist's TemporaryLoveInterest, Four Murasame in ''[[Anime/MobileSuitZetaGundam Zeta Gundam]]'' was so predestined to die. And she did. Twice. And again in the {{Compilation Movie}}s with a bullet to the head.
** The soundtracks for both ''Zeta Gundam'' and ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamZZ Gundam ZZ]]'' have a sting specifically for significant character deaths, which is exactly four chords of descending notes. [[SubvertedTrope Subverted]] at least once for a FakeKillScare, when the person who was thought killed turned up alive later.
** The second season of ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundam00 Gundam 00]]'' seems to go to complete overkill with regards to the number four: it takes place 4 years at the end of the first season, the main Gundam Meisters are still composed of 4 members, the titular mobile suit's model number is GN-0000 and it is also the only 4th generation model when it debuts. And if you want to take things further, said unit is powered by two GN-Drives, one's from the very first (0) Gundam, while the other is from the protagonist's previous unit which is part of the third generation. Thus 1 + 3 = 4. And [[spoiler:the [[ArtificialHuman Innovades]] are '''four''' pairs, and it includes the BigBad and Tieria]].
** Also worth mention is that both ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundam00 Gundam 00]]'' and ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamSeed Gundam SEED]]'' skip the obvious fours in their Gundam lineups (there is no GN-004 or GAT-X104). We then later find out what became of 004: it's [[spoiler:hidden underneath GN-005, [[{{Bishonen}} Tieria]]'s Gundam Virtue. It's a girly looking FragileSpeedster down to the flowing red "hair" coming out of its head and is called Gundam Nadleeh, which is incidentally the word for [[UsefulNotes/{{Transgender}} people of the third, fourth, and fifth genders]] in Navajo culture]], which only deepens the mystery of [[spoiler: whether Tieria's a GenderBender.]]
** The ''Gundam 00'' side stories play it straight: In ''00P'' (the precursor to the TV series), the GNY-004 Gundam Plutone suffered a major malfunction which killed two of the Gundam Meisters and horribly scarred a third (including [[LockedIntoStrangeness her hair turning white]]). The survivor, who ends up running a Celestial Being sub-group years later in ''Gundam 00F'', is understandably reluctant to allow the Plutone to be used again.
** ''[[Anime/MobileSuitGundamWing Gundam Wing]]'' has an interesting take on this, Quatre Winner is the fourth Gundam Pilot (it's even in his name), and has an aversion to killing whenever possible. [[spoiler: Yet with his destruction of a whole colony with Wing Zero he has the highest body count of any of the Gundam Boys.]] Also [[AllThereInTheManual he apparently killed his Mother giving birth to him]].
* Parodied in Episode 2 of ''Manga/HaruhiChan'', when a dying Asakura claims to be part of a 'Radical Big Four', the [[SortingAlgorithmOfEvil rest of whom will soon attack]]. [[DeadpanSnarker Kyon]] proceeds to call her story cheesy. They never come, nor are they ever mentioned again.
* In the KoreanWebtoon ''Hello Hellper'' there's a group of four {{Shinigami}} known as the Four Poisons (smoking, drinking, gambling, and women). The Gambler asserts that the phrase was named after them, not the other way around, because they were so terrifying not even [[{{Reincarnation}} reincarnated souls]] could forget them.
* ''Manga/HunterXHunter'':
** During the Hunter Exam arc, Hisoka, one of the most deadly villains, is participant #44. And as the (fake) member of the Phantom Troupe, his tattoo has the #4 (though, we don't know for what the numbers of the Phantom Troupe actually stand for).
** The fourth Zoldyck sibling Alluka has a special power, [[spoiler:a symbiote called Nanika]] who can grant a person a wish at one condition: they have to accept three of her requests. If they ask for something extremely hard to obtain (like money), the next target will pay, as [[spoiler:Nanika will ask for their body parts, usually vital organs like liver or brains. If they refuse four times... well, their head, as well as the ones of the people they love, are crushed [[YourHeadASplode and explode]]]].
* Guido Mista of ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureGoldenWind'' has a very Japanese-like obsession with the number 4, which is [[CreatorProvincialism all the more bizarre]] since he's Italian. When Bucciarati's gang is first introduced Mista is freaking out because the waiter at their restaurant brought them four pieces of cake, [[spoiler:and the first to take a slice, Abbachio, is also the first to die]]. When the gang rents a yacht he very fervently tells Bucciarati not to rent Boat #4. This even extends to his [[FightingSpirit Stand]] Sex Pistols, a group of six [[GripingAboutGremlins gremlin]]-like creatures who help guide his bullets; they have numbers on their foreheads, but naturally, they skip the number 4. Number #5, the fourth member, is quite timid compared to the others, though in a twist of irony, this aspect of being fourth regularly proves to be a lifesaver, as he tends to hang back when his compatriots rush into the fight and quickly get killed off. Near the end of the story, Mista accidentally drops four bullets and begs someone else to drop one more, [[spoiler:just before Narancia's death. During the second half, [[AnyoneCanDie the villain attacks and kills multiple members of the main group]], and in a twist of cruel irony, there are only ''four'' protagonists left alive when it's all over, one of which is Mista.]]
** [[InvertedTrope Inverted]] in ''[[Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventureDiamondIsUnbreakable Diamond Is Unbreakable]]'': Being Part ''4'' of the saga, it has one of the lowest body counts of any Part, even in spite of its main villain being a SerialKiller. It helps that said SerialKiller has enough self-discipline to not kill as much as necessary.
* ''Manga/JoshiKausei'': In "The High School Girl and the Unlucky Day", Momoko starts her day by spilling coffee on her sweater in the shape of a 4. At the end of the episode, a crow poops on her sweater in the same shape.
* In ''Anime/KillLaKill'', Nonon Jakuzure is the fourth of the Council Ryuuko fights and the one with the most death focused visual motif, what with the skulls and bones.
* In ''Literature/LegendOfTheGalacticHeroes'' the first fleet to be defeated is the 4th fleet.
* ''Franchise/LyricalNanoha'':
** ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaAs'' has the four Wolkenritter, harbingers of the destruction the Book of Darkness will bring.
** ''Anime/MagicalGirlLyricalNanohaStrikers'':
*** There are four models of MechaMooks used by the BigBad. Types I through III are relatively benign: sure, they might hurt you and knock you out for a bit, but they are not really meant to kill people. [=Type IVs=], on the other hand, are the HeroKiller kind, designed specifically to make people (especially mages) very dead. In addition to redshirts, their rap sheet almost included the title character herself and [[spoiler:Vita]] by the end of the series. And it's also probable that they killed [[spoiler:Subaru and Ginga's mother Quint when they showed up, and Lutecia's mother Megane barely survived]].
*** Quattro is one of the two most evil Numbers (the other is Due), and she [[ForTheEvulz enjoys to do evil things]], including bringing people to death. Ironically, she is also one of the two weakest Numbers (the other is Uno).
* In a FictionalDocument in ''Manga/{{Monster}}'', called "The Nameless Monster", the Nameless Monster goes through four hosts. [[spoiler: The first three are consumed from the inside out. The fourth consumes everyone who knows his name.]]
* ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia'':
** Hero Killer Stain made a point of always striking four times in any given city, whether that meant killing or crippling. Much later, he claims that he's killed a total of 40 heroes.
** Tomura Shigaraki, TheHeavy who [[MakeThemRot decays anything he touches with five fingers]], was born on April 4th, or 4/4. In ''VideoGame/MyHeroOnesJustice'', hitting an opponent with his special move four times kills them instantly. The pop-up that appears upon connecting displays a number that increases with each hit, until the fourth one, which says "DEAD!".
* From ''Manga/{{Naruto}}'':
** Naruto's SuperpoweredEvilSide becomes dominant and goes into "kill everyone" mode when he grows four fox tails. At this point, he can't tell friend from foe anymore and has to be forced to simmer down.
** The Fourth Hokage spent the shortest time in office, a tenure that ended with him saving the village with a "Seal Evil" technique that required him to sacrifice his own life and seal his soul in the Death God's stomach, in eternal combat with the sealed Evil.
** Meanwhile, the Fourth Kazekage seemed to be the worst thing to ever happen to Suna. He sealed a Tailed Beast in his son (in this case Shukaku, the One-Tailed [[{{Obake}} Tanuki]]) which was already [[SealedEvilInACan contained in a tea kettle.]] Gaara wasn't born yet and as a result the Kazekage's wife died delivering him. He then proceeded to alienate the boy from birth and when Gaara showed signs of being AxCrazy (like all of Shukaku's previous hosts) he ordered the poor kid's uncle (the only person up to this point who had shown any kindness to him) to assassinate him. And to top off his career, he got his face torn off by Orochimaru as a prelude to his village being used as cannon fodder in an invasion.
** According to the Fifth Mizukage, the Fourth Mizukage was like this for the Mist Village, and is largely responsible for the "Bloody Mist" image held by most other countries. The fact that [[spoiler: he was being mind-controlled by Madara [[note]] More accurately, Obito [[/note]] probably didn't help]].
** The Forest of Death's official title is the 44th Training Ground and has 44 gates.
** The fourth stage of the Uchiha's Sharingan is the Mangekyo, which requires the user kill their best friend.
** Of the Eight Celestial Gates, first through third are Initial, Heal, and Life; the fourth, however, is the Harm Gate. When opened, this gate puts enough strain on the body that the muscles tear themselves apart. And twice that, the eighth gate, is the Death Gate ([[DeadlyUpgrade Opening that gate gives the user great power for a while and then a one-way ticket to Dead Meat County]]).
** Sasuke was going to be the fourth body Orochimaru claimed before [[spoiler:Sasuke thwarted Orochimaru and killed him]], and before that, was going to be the fourth body Orochimaru had, including his original, before the Sound Four took too long and Orochimaru had to transfer prematurely.
** Akatsuki member Kakuzu harvests the hearts of the victims he kills, and his special ability is Four Hearts Jutsu, with which he prolongs his life by adding four hearts to his own.
** The series' final war is the Fourth Shinobi World War, and the Fourth Division, who suffers the most casualties, is first to be victimized by Madara Uchiha.
* In ''Anime/NeonGenesisEvangelion'', the fourth Evangelion unit (really the fifth unit if you count the prototype 00, but being called the 04 was all it took) disappeared into a Dirac sea during a startup experiment, taking a large chunk of the Mojave Desert with it. Also, Unit 03 -- the ''real'' fourth Evangelion -- [[spoiler:got taken over by an Angel and had to be destroyed, nearly (and in the manga, ''actually'') killing Toji too, who was, of course, the Fourth Child]]. And if that wasn't enough, Toji shortly prior became the fourth person that Hikari makes lunches for. Ouch. Unit-04 was always referred to as ''yon''-gouki in dialogue. Even ''Rebuild'' does this. And when Shinji achieves a synchronization ratio of 400%, [[spoiler:his body dissolves into LCL. Don't worry, he came back]].
* ''Manga/OnePiece'':
** Chapter 4 ends with Koby getting shot.
** Chapter 44 features Gin, gaunt and nearly dead from hunger, shooting a Marine dead as he escapes.
** Chapter 444 has the Straw Hats arrive at a haunted island.
** In the Baratie Arc, Don Krieg is the fourth pirate captain that Luffy faces on his journey, and he's the first one who even comes close to killing him.
** Mr. 3 and Miss Goldenweek are the fourth-highest-ranked team in Baroque Works, and Mr. 3 is the fourth Devil Fruit user that the Straw Hats fight. The pair of them come dangerously close to defeating and killing the Straw Hats and Vivi; if it weren't for Usopp and Carue evading capture and breaking Mr. 3's wax trap and Miss Goldenweek's Colors Trap, 3 would have had no fewer than four new wax statues that were once living people.
** Alabasta Kingdom is the fourth island on the Grand Line that the Straw Hats visit. It's a desert kingdom in the middle of a drought, on the verge of civil war orchestrated by Baroque Works, is naturally infested by at least half a dozen deadly animals and natural disasters...what else? Oh, right, it features the first time that Luffy outright loses to the bad guy, who comes close to killing him four times (first by drowning him, second by burying him alive, third by dehydrating him, and fourth by poisoning him).
*** The royal family has an elite guard, the Kicking Claw Force, whose four members use a [[DeadlyUpgrade special substance that gives them tremendous power but kills them in five minutes]] to try to fight Crocodile. [[SenselessSacrifice It doesn't work at all]].
** Enel is the fourth user of a Logia-type Devil Fruit to appear in the series. He's a PsychoElectro with a [[AGodAmI God complex]] who incinerates anyone who speaks out of turn in a pillar of lightning and, in the arc's climax, [[spoiler:attempts genocide on the people he rules over, using gargantuan storm clouds to obliterate the islands]]. If Luffy wasn't [[RubberMan immune to his powers]], nothing would have been able to stop him.
** Near the end of the Water 7 arc, Nero, a new recruit to [=CP9=] who only knew four of the Six Powers martial arts, lost to Franky and was (seemingly) executed by Lucci.
** In the Enies Lobby arc, Blueno, the fourth-strongest member of [=CP9=], is the first one to fall to the Straw Hats.
** The death of [[spoiler:Going Merry, the Straw Hats' beloved first ship]], occurs during the fourth saga, which is itself divided into four arcs (excluding filler).
** The series has four superpowerful pirates known as the Four Emperors (one of whom happens to be someone extremely important to Luffy) who act as a counterbalance to the Marines and the [[LuckySeven Seven Warlords of the Sea]]. [[spoiler:Whitebeard ended up dying among the four, and Blackbeard usurped the empty spot he left.]]
** Bartholomew Kuma is the fourth Warlord that the Straw Hats meet. Both times that he meets them, he defeats them all effortlessly, nearly killing Zoro the first time and [[spoiler:dying himself, [[CyberneticsEatYourSoul by robotization]]]], less than two weeks after the second time.
** PX-4 was the first of the [[ArtificialHuman Pacifista]] to be destroyed.
** Impel Down's fourth level is the Blazing Hell. It may not be the deadliest of the prison's floors, but it is where Warden Magellan's office is, and ''nothing'' in the prison is deadlier than ''him.'' Point of fact, this floor is where [[spoiler:both Luffy and Blackbeard]] are brought down by Magellan's poison.
** The 4th Division Commander of the Whitebeard Pirates, Thatch, was the only commander who met an unfortunate end before the present story. [[spoiler:He was murdered by Marshall D. Teach because Thatch had found the one Devil Fruit Teach desired most -- the Dark-Dark Fruit.]]
** As an inversion, the fourth child of the Vinsmoke Royal Family, [[spoiler: Sanji]], is the TokenGoodTeammate and the WhiteSheep of the family because of the [[spoiler: resistant drugs his mother took when his father wanted his kids to have LackOfEmpathy and cold super soldiers]]. Taken further when you recall that he was the fourth person to [[spoiler:join Luffy]].
* In ''Manga/OutlawStar'', the #4 Caster bullets are capable of killing the shooter if they fire them in succession. (As do the #9 and #13 bullets, both also being unlucky numbers.)
* In ''Anime/ReKan'', when the [[FriendlyGhost friendly samurai ghost]] ''somehow'' manages to send a text message to Kana, his phone number appears as a string of fours.
* ''Manga/RosarioPlusVampire'':
** In the anime, Tsukune arrives at the bus stop at 4:44 pm and is attacked by rivals for Moka's love. Later on, 4:44 pm is the scheduled time for [[spoiler:his execution for being human]].
** Kuyou, the leader of the Student Police, is a [[spoiler:youko with four tails]].
* ''Manga/SaintSeiya'':
** In the Zodiac arc, the local PsychoForHire resides in the Fourth Temple of the Sanctuary, the Temple of the Giant Crab. He's actually named [[MeaningfulName Cancer Deathmask]]. {{Subverted|Trope}} in that Pisces Aphrodite is said to be actually ''worse''-Deathmask is just more blatant.
** As the fourth sign, all Cancer Saints have powers strongly associated with death and the underworld. They also tend to be violently insane because of it (canonically, Deathmask was trained by ''the ghost of one of his predecessors'').
* ''Manga/{{Sekirei}}'' gives us the Black Sekirei, #04 "Karasuba". Considered the most dangerous Sekirei in existence [[spoiler: by those that don't know about #01, Miya]], she is referred to as "MBI's dog" for her work hunting down anyone that breaks the rules of the game. She's a BloodKnight MasterSwordsman obsessed with killing the heroine during the final battle, and actively encourages her to become stronger because otherwise [[CombatSadomasochist it won't be enjoyable]]. And she's an OmnicidalManiac that intends to use her victory in the Sekirei Plan to destroy all life.
* The fourth episode of ''Manga/{{Shiki}}'' is appropriately titled "Fourth Death". It repeats for Episode 14, given the kanji used.
* ''Manga/SoulEater'':
** Weapon meisters use a form of spiritual telephone to keep in contact -- the number for direct contact with Shinigami-sama is 42-42-564 ('shini, shini, goroshi' out loud -- in other words, 'die, die, kill').
** The 'shini' part gets used for [[{{Shinigami}} Kid]] in the increase in the size of his soul - one scanlation translated Liz's comment as "42 soul-widths") and the Sanzu Line-enabled form for the Thompsons - Death Eagle .42.
** This is also the other reason that [[BlandNameProduct Death Robbins]] ice cream has 42 flavors instead of 31. Ohkubo seems to really love this trope.
** Also, the zeppelin they use to get [[spoiler:on the moon to fight the kishin]] has a big '42' painted on the side (only in the manga).
* In the light novel ''Super Cub'', the story begins when Koguma buys her titular Super Cub motorbike for the incredibly low price of only 10,000 yen (about $100). When she asks the shopkeeper why he's selling it for so cheap, he answers that it's because it caused 3 people to die. The inference is that discounting it so heavily was the only way he'd ever be able to sell the machine, as most people would not want to risk being the 4th death. Koguma doesn't mind and buys the motorbike.
* In ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnline'', [[spoiler:Yuuki Konno's]] funeral was held on April 4 (4/4), 2026.
* ''Anime/TengenToppaGurrenLagann'': In RealLife, the fourth episode was guest-directed by Osamu Kobayashi and greatly criticized for its animation quality and odd character designs.
* In ''Manga/TomorrowsJoe'', Carlos Rivera destroys Japan's #1-ranked bantamweight boxer at the end of the fourth round. He could have done so at any moment, [[InvokedTrope he just choose the fourth round because he knew what the Japanese think of the number]].
* In ''Anime/UltimateMuscle'' Tel Tel Boy ({{D|ubNameChange}}ialbolic) schedules his fight against Mantarou for 4:44 PM. Mantarou immediately notes that four is unlucky.
* Moroboshi Ataru of ''Manga/UruseiYatsura'' was marked out as a CosmicPlaything by being born on the second most ill-omened day in the Japanese calendar, the thirteenth of April: ''4''-13. (This was also on ''Butsumetsu'', the anniversary of the Buddha's death; the only unluckier day is April 4th, which is Four Is Death ''squared''.) Additionally in the first episode, his jersey has the number 4 on it.
* Appears repeatedly in ''Anime/WeissKreuz'': not only is Weiss, a team of [[ProfessionalKiller assassins]], made up of four members, so are three different groups of antagonists they go up against, and one team of allies. Sequel series ''Anime/WeissKreuz [[OddlyNamedSequel2ElectricBoogaloo Gluhen]]'', which re-forms the team into its fourth iteration, does not end well.
* In ''Manga/YakitateJapan'', Kazuma's Ja-pan Number 44 is rather dangerous. It's so delicious, anyone who eats it for the first time has a NearDeathExperience.
* In ''Anime/YourName'', October 4th is when [[spoiler:Tiamat crashes into Itomori and destroys it, killing 500 of its inhabitants]].
* In ''Manga/YuunaAndTheHauntedHotSprings'', Kogarashi's room in the Yuragi Inn is #4. Yuuna, the ghost girl's room is/was the room she had when she was alive.
[[/folder]]

*** The Arbiter's Grounds, which serves as the game's fourth dungeon, is an ancient gibbet located in the desert where the worst criminals of Hyrule are housed and executed; it is overrun by spectral beings (from four larger-than-usual Poes to the MiniBoss, [[EldritchAbomination Death Sword]]), skeletal monsters (Bubbles, Stalfos and the giant skeletal dragon, Stallord, who serves as the Boss) and living mummies. In addition, the dungeon reuses the same concept as ''Ocarina of Time'''s Forest Temple: the aforementioned four Poes seal the way to the boss, as well as the item needed to defeat it (the Spinner), and Link has to hunt down and defeat them to reopen the gate, with the last one having the ability to split into four clones. The dungeon is also home to the Mirror of Twilight, which serves as the portal leading to the Twilight Realm, where many of its inmates were exiled, [[spoiler:including Ganondorf]].

'''Note''': This is not a repository for every time the number 4 just happens to appear in a work (or for series where the fourth installment was [[{{Sequelitis}} particularly bad]]), nor for when bad things coincidentally happen in the fourth episode or installment; this is for when the trope is consciously addressed by having the number 4 intentionally and unambiguously associated with death or misfortune. Particular examples of common groups of four that are normally unrelated to this trope are the EliteFour, TheFourGods, the FourElementEnsemble, and the FourTemperamentEnsemble. In particular, most groups of four mini-bosses in {{Eastern RPG}}s refer to one of those or to the ''shitennō'' — often localized into the EliteFour or the Four Heavenly Kings — and have no relation to this trope.

* ''VideoGame/AHatInTime'':
** Hat Kid has 4 HP, so four hits will kill her. Similarly, she has four air bubbles while she's in water.
** In Chapter 3, Act 1, The Snatcher will threaten Hat Kid to make her sign his contract, and if she refuses four times, he'll kill her.

* In ''Manga/MermaidMelodyPichiPichiPitch'', the QuirkyMinibossSquad of the first arc has four members.

* ''VideoGame/DarkSouls'': you are always given a quest to hunt down exactly four plot coupons held by the BigBadEnsemble before you can ascend to TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon and fight the FinalBoss. There aren't always four members of said ensemble, but there are always four boss fights to get said plot coupons (some are DualBoss or WolfpackBoss fights).

* ''VideoGame/RidgeRacer'': there are exactly four hidden vehicles -- [[DuelBoss to defeat in a one-on-one race]] -- with four different variations in ''Type 4'', which is the fourth installment of the series not including the arcade titles.

%%*** [want to have at least four examples here] The list goes on even further in the sidequests. The Business Scrubs? Link trades four Deeds between them. The Frog Choir? Link has to locate four frogs missing from the mountain. Reuniting Kafei and Anju? You need to speak to four people (Madame Aroma, Anju, Kafei, and the Curiosity Shop owner) to complete the quest and you obtain four masks from it: the Kafei mask, the Keaton mask, Kafei's Sun mask for his wedding ceremony (Link doesn't wear it, but you have to work to get it), and the Couple's Mask.

* Subverted in the ''VideoGame/MonsterHunter'' series. The maximum number of players on a single hunt is four. This is justified in-universe by a tradition that it's unlucky for ''five'' hunters to go out together.

* ''WebAnimation/BattleForBFDI'': The new host of the season is Four, an extraterrestrial with the body of the number itself, and compared to the Announcer or any of the Speaker Boxes from the original ''WebAnimation/BattleForDreamIsland'', Four is much more AxCrazy and destructive, at least until he's resurrected in BFB 9 and becomes [[TookALevelInKindness somewhat nicer]]. Four's EstablishingCharacterMoment has him grabbing Pin and mutilating her, describing her mangled corpse as "pretty cool".

* The only "evil" Netking in WebAnimation/{{TOME}} is [[spoiler: Rubirules, who is designated as Netking Number Four]].

* In ''Fanfic/AnAcceptableArrangement]]'' from ''Series/TheUntamed'' fandom, [[OriginalCharacter Hou Yue]] dies in childbirth at the end of her fourth pregnancy. [[spoiler: Her baby, however, survives]].

* In ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/42530778/chapters/106826274#workskin An Acceptable Arrangement]]'' from ''Series/TheUntamed'' fandom, [[OriginalCharacter Hou Yue]] dies in childbirth at the end of her fourth pregnancy. [[spoiler: Her baby, however, survives]].

* The four number is carried on in ''Fanfic/KiraIsJustice'', to the point that sixteen is a number used a few times. For example, the sixteen SIS agents.
* Used lightly in the crossover ''Fanfic/TheBridge'', fittingly due to one of the properties being primarily Japanese. There are four times kaiju are brought to Equestria. The first, King Caesar is summoned by a magical being to aid historical Equestria against Tirek. The second and third times were uses of Dimension Tide. The fourth was a purposeful invasion by [[spoiler: Bagan]]
* In ''Fanfic/HorseshoesAndHandGrenades'', [[spoiler: Haruto]] gets killed by the Four of Swords card. More importantly, the death is from the ''fourth'' sword as Yayoi blocked the first three.
* In ''Fanfic/{{Mutant}}'', the 911 call rings 4 times before it goes to the answering machine. [[spoiler: And then the one who made the call dies soon after.]]
* In ''Fanfic/TheLastSpartan'', Wrex actually says four is considered a ''lucky'' number among Krogans. [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Krogans]], incidentally, hail from [[DeathWorld Tuchanka]].
* In ''[[Fanfic/AceCombatEquestriaChronicles Ace Combat: Wings of Unity]]'', the main enemy squadron of pegasi is known as the Reapers and they fly in a formation of four.
* ''Fanfic/DeathIsForcedToTakeAVacation'': Fall Harvest is sent off to work in zone four of the farm where he works. Naturally, that area is where he dies.

* In ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/42530778/chapters/106826274#workskin An Acceptable Arrangement]]'' from ''Series/TheUntamed'' fandom, [[OriginalCharacter Hou Yue]] dies in childbirth at the end of her fourth pregnancy. [[spoiler: Her baby, however, survives]].

* In ''[[https://archiveofourown.org/works/42530778/chapters/106826274#workskin An Acceptable Arrangement]] from ''Series/TheUntamed'' fandom, [[OriginalCharacter Hou Yue]] dies in childbirth at the end of her fourth pregnancy. [[spoiler: Her baby, however, survives]].

* ''Franchise/{{Castlevania}}'''s Death generally has 444 or 4444 HP.
** Death-themed items play by this trope as well. The Book of Death in ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaPortraitOfRuin Portrait of Ruin]]'' has 44 ATK, while Death's Robe in ''[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaChroniclesOfSorrow Dawn of Sorrow]]'' boosts STR, CON and LUCK by 4 (and Int by 13!). Death's Ring is especially noteworthy, as it boosts 4 different stats by 44 each but turns you into a OneHitPointWonder.

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'': Aerith is the fourth party character here and dies by the hands of Sephiroth.

** Also, the zeppelin they use to get [[spoiler:on the moon to fight the kishin]] has a big '42' painted on the side ((only in the manga)).

* In ''Manga/YuunaAndTheHauntedHotSprings'' Kogarashi's room in the Yuragi Inn is #4. Yuuna, the ghost girl's room is/was the room she had when she was alive.

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'' Aerith is the fourth party character here and dies by the hands of Sephiroth.

** In ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfZeldaTheWindWaker'', there are six coral reefs, known as One-, Two-, Three-, Four-, Five- and Six-Eyed Reefs. Four-Eyed Reef is the closest to Forsaken Fortress, which serves as the base of operations of the BigBad. In addition, Forsaken Fortress itself is the fourth dungeon in the game completion-wise,[[note]]it's the first appearance-wise[[/note]], and its surroundings are under a curse that leaves it in perpetual nighttime; even Tetra and her pirate crew hesitate to approach it, and Lenzo the photographer advises Link against getting there as well. Lastly, out of all fragments in which the Triforce of Courage was split, the fourth is retrieved after finding the chart that lies inside the dreaded, undead-themed GhostShip.

** Also, Master Tonberry, a robed green lizard like thing carrying a butcher knife and lantern that will slowly advance on your party before one hit killing you with said knife, or attack with 'Everyone's Grudge' doing 1 damage for each enemy a character has killed in the game, had 44,444HP in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII''.
** Death-themed items in Castlevania play by this trope as well. The Book of Death in Portrait of Ruin has 44 ATK, while Death's Robe in Dawn of Sorrow boosts STR, CON and LUCK by 4 (and Int by 13!). Death's Ring is especially noteworthy, as it boosts 4 different stats by 44 each but turns you into a OneHitPointWonder.

In most {{UsefulNotes/Chinese|Language}} languages and languages that borrow words from it, the words for "four" (四) and "death" (死) are written differently but pronounced similarly (somewhat like "''sì''" in Mandarin, "''sei''" in UsefulNotes/{{C|hineseDialectsAndAccents}}antonese, "''shi''" in Sino-Japanese, "tư" in Sino-Vietnamese, and "''sa''" in Sino-Korean). As a cultural trope, East Asian works of media tend to treat the number in much the way Western writers treat the number [[ThirteenIsUnlucky 13]] (a number that Arabian and European cultures consider Magical, [[TheFairFolk and usually in a bad way]]).

** During the Hunter Exam arc, Hisoka, one of the most deadly villains, is participant #44. And as the (fake) member of the Phantom Troupe, his tattoo has the #4 (though, we don't know for what the numbers of the Genei Ryodan actually stand for).

* During the Hunter Exam arc of ''Manga/HunterXHunter'', Hisoka, one of the most deadly villains, is participant #44. And as the (fake) member of the Phantom Troupe, his tattoo has the #4 (though, we don't know for what the numbers of the Genei Ryodan actually stand for).
** The fourth Zoldyck [[AmbiguousGenderIdentity sibling]] Alluka has a special power, [[spoiler:a symbiote called Nanika]] who can grant a person a wish at one condition: they have to accept three of her requests. If they ask for something extremely hard to obtain (like money), the next target will pay, as [[spoiler:Nanika will ask for their body parts, usually vital organs like liver or brains. If they refuse four times... well, their head, as well as the ones of the people they love, are crushed [[YourHeadASplode and explode]]]].

* During the Hunter Exam arc of ''Manga/HunterXHunter'', Hisoka, one of the most deadly villains, is participant #44. And as the (fake) member of the Genei Ryodan, his tattoo has the #4 (though, we don't know for what the numbers of the Genei Ryodan actually stand for).

* The [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Atlantic_hurricane_season 2019 Atlantic hurricane season]] (thus far) has given us Hurricane Dorian as its fourth named storm and first major hurricane (a Category 5), clocking in at 185 mph (295 km/h) at its peak intensity. Dorian managed to cause a total of 59 fatalities and $7.04 billion (in US dollars) worth of property damage over fifteen days.