He Who Fights Monsters / Fan Works

• A Crown of Stars: In an earlier chapter Daniel explained to Asuka that he fell into this a very long while ago, and during that time he made a lot of things he was not proud of, and it was thanks to his family that he managed to stop acting like the monsters that he was fighting. He says it's why he now focuses Avalon's efforts on helping and healing, rather than bringing judgement on the wicked (they still do the latter to some extent, but that's not where their primary interest seems to lie).
• A Minor Miscalculation presents Isshin Matoi (who survived as Nui went to the wrong house when trying to assassinate him) as a Well-Intentioned Extremist Anti-Hero rather than the solemn atoner he was in canon. Over the course of the war, he gradually becomes so driven to kill Ragyo, wipe out the Life Fibers, and protect Ryuko that he's willing to sacrifice anyone to do it. And then The Reveal comes in Chapter 23 that the only reason he survived is that he intentionally misdirected Nui into hitting the Mankanshoku household, knowing full well this would potentially result in the entire family dying.
• A central theme in Avatar: The Last Airbender Revised is preventing oneself from succumbing to He Who Fights Monsters by only killing when absolute necessary. This is present primarily in Katara's character arc, although it fits into those of others as well. A paraphrase of Nietzsche's quote is used as the Arc Words for the first three books to reflect this.
• Children of an Elder God: The premise of the story is the Children fighting Cthulhu Myths' Eldritch Abominations and gaining their powers after slaying them, stopping being human gradually. Gendo stated that "they gazed into the abyss, and the abyss became them."
• Child of the Storm has averting this trope as an underlying theme - essentially, Harry has problems with Suppressed Rage, not helped by the being part of the House of Odin, and susceptible to the Warrior's Madness. Combine that with his litany of traumas, and the facts that his Psychic Powers are a) massive, b) on a hair-trigger his mother invoked the Phoenix as his protection, making him a dormant host, it's unsurprising that some people are genuinely frightened that he'll turn into the next Magneto. They include Harry himself, who is downright terrified of this trope, to the point where it stunts his Telepathy. He gets over it by the early parts of the sequel, strictly adhering to Mind over Manners... and then Sinister and the Red Room happen to him, torturing him and transforming his Blank Slate body into a killing machine akin to the Winter Soldier with superpowers. When he gets his body back, he unsurprisingly snaps, and it's far worse than anyone feared - he becomes The Dark Phoenix. He is barely talked down in time, and entire pantheons live in fear of what'll happen if he snaps again.
  • Magneto, naturally, is referenced, with Wanda mentioning that she called him out for it and that he wasn't particularly pleased. However, it seems to have sunk in, since he's mellowed by the time of the story's writing, limiting his antics to occasional cases of Pay Evil unto Evil. Of course, the monsters are still terrified of him, and for damn good reason.
  • Dumbledore also goes out to avert this, avoiding seeking power on the grounds that he's perfectly aware that he could become a Dark Lord who would make Voldemort look like a fluffy bunny, in large part because of his deep frustration with the insularity of the British Wizarding World.
  • The trope is also referenced in respect to Peter Wisdom a.k.a. Regulus Black, who is ruthless, manipulative and downright vicious in terms of how he deals with supernatural evil and in acquiring allies to do so with, stopping at nothing to achieve his aim, even - especially - considering his own life meaningless, reckoning that he should have died a long time ago and that anything after that is a bonus. At one point, Sean Cassidy, not an easily shocked man, takes a step back after looking in his eyes and seeing 'a man who had gazed into the void and made damn sure that it had blinked first.' Those who first meet him think he's very like his mentor, Nick Fury. Those who know him for longer realise that this is true, but all the knobs are dialled up to eleven. Fury has limits. Wisdom doesn't. He has the tattered remnants of a conscience, but it won't stop him from doing... anything, really.
  • Doctor Strange regretfully remarks in Ghosts of the Past that in fighting monsters and manipulating history and people alike to craft what he deems to be the best timeline - specifically, the one most likely to survive the coming of Thanos - he has become something of a monster himself.
• In The Crow: Phoenix Rising it's lampshaded that Harry (as the Crow's avatar) has become a monster that's just as bad if not worse than the Death Eaters he's fighting.
• Danganronpa: Paradise Lost: Heavily discussed in Chapter 6 concerning the masterminds: Junpei and Momiji, seeking revenge against those they blame for their trauma relating to the Killing Games, orchestrate a Killing Game of their own, unconcerned with how many others will be caught in the crossfire to satisfy their own vendettas.
• DOOM: Repercussions of Evil
  "No! I must kill the demons" he shouted. The radio said "No, John. You are the demons". And Then John Was a Zombie.
• The Dee-Dee Morgendorffer (Daria's school nickname) of the long-running Daria shared-world series The Hallowed Halls Of Fielding fits this trope like a glove. In a world of horrible students, an administration and parents that make looking in the other direction a honored tradition and corruption of everyone in the manner of a virus, Daria (a middle-class girl there because of her grandmother's footing the bill) decides that she's not happy with the way things are (even though the system's been working for a couple of hundred years). In the space of two years, she's caused a few disruptions so severe that they've literally changed the face of the school (and the society they service forever)...
• Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality plays with this trope. As early as the Sorting Hat, people have known that Harry could be a terrible force for evil if he turned. Dumbledore even considers an alternate interpretation of the prophecy, that the Dark Lord shall mark him as his equal, to be that Harry will become his successor. Meanwhile, Quirell himself seems to be actively attempting to use this trope on Harry. Even Harry is worried about it, given how far he's strayed to the Slytherin side of things since the beginning of the story, and how he refers to Hermione, Neville, and McGonagall as his consciences. However, while he fights with Slytherin tactics, and even declares early on his desire to become a god and rule the world, he and Voldemort have very deeply different goals, and Harry is disgusted by the level of cruelty displayed by Voldemort, and has never once displayed the same cruelty.
  • It's implied that this trope happened to Dumbledore and while he never became Voldemort, and still doesn't understand why Voldemort did the things he did, fighting Grindelwald brought him so close to the abyss that fighting Voldemort made him break several rules and do many things he regretted.
• Not only the theme but the name of He Who Fights Monsters; a Rosario + Vampire story where Tsukune never meets Moka or the others. To keep anyone from finding out that he's human (and thus stay alive), he's eaten bugs, made several Improvised Weapons, and killed 5 students, including Inner Moka. "When your life's on the line, there's nothing that you won't do to survive."
• The Immortal Game: After Twilight Sparkle is freed from Nihilus' control and her mind splits in two, she , or rather, her dominant personality, Sparkle, becomes an Actual Pacifist, as she fears that this trope will come into play — she was forced to watch Nihilus perform countless acts of violence and torture For the Evulz, and is afraid that if she starts fighting those responsible for her transformation, she'll start enjoying it. When Titan's torture causes her mind to fuse back together, she realizes she was being foolish — she is nothing like Nihilus, and she will never let herself sink so low. Cue asskicking.
• A fanfiction rewriting the 372nd chapter of Fairy Tail, Erza ends up in this path, though she still calls herself an innocent victim and calls Kyouka the true villain, as she tortures her.
• In Low Light L realizes he's become this when he kills Misa with the Death Note.
• Kimi No Na Iowa: The abyssals want to genocide Japan as punishment for its war crimes, which took the lives of 30 million, as well as the USA for Breaking the Oath to do just that the previous time, and any other country who suffered under Japan previously but refuses to fight them now as Quislings to be similarly executed. To this end, they have killed millions themselves, and the accomplishment of their goals would see 3 billion dead, a hundred times what Japan did. The supreme commander explicitly warns her cadre against indulging in the same cruelty and sadism as the Japanese lest they become alike and void their cause, but that's not going to be much reassurance to the dead.
• Kingdom Hearts: The Antipode: Xemnas' actions in manipulating others and dooming worlds in pursuit of Kingdom Hearts have arguably made him no better than his sworn enemy Xehanort. The Lingering Will is well aware of this and lampshades it when confronting him on their Station of Awakening.
  But we all know who you really are, Xehanort.
• Kingdom Hearts 4: New Light: Patria seems to be approaching this territory. There have been mentions of her having mass amounts of inner darkness, along with her suggestion to use a Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique, and her Hair-Trigger Temper and preference for violence as a solution. On top of it all, both Diaval and Pith, the latter her own brother, have made a "Not So Different" Remark from Maleficent.
• MLP Next Generation: Know Fear!: It's been noted both in-universe and out that the more Starburst uses her Fear ring, the more she becomes like the griffons she's fighting. Which she comes to realize herself when Emperor Stratus gives her a "Not So Different" Remark when she's about to kill him in cold blood. She decides she's better than this and doesn't kill him... at which point Nox/Shadow Wing does, in order to make Stratus a martyr and to frame Star.
• The Night Unfurls: By the time the story reached the Rebel Scum Arc, a major point of discussion is whether Kyril's morally questionable methods in the war effort, such as executing prisoners who surrendered beforehand, and quelling the rebellion in Ken by force, makes him no different than the Black Dogs he is fighting against. Particularly, Claudia believes that not only does he play this trope straight, his actions would risk tarnishing Celestine's reputation as The High Queen. Even those who back Kyril's approach, like Alicia and Lily, have admitted that they would not defend his actions. Nonetheless, the narrative makes it clear why this trope will never happen to Kyril. Unlike the Black Dogs, Kyril and his followers have never raped, enslaved, or experimented on innocent bystanders. Instead, his objectives are to Make an Example of Them and to swiftly prevent the escalating war from continuing to devastate the populace, however questionable those methods may be. Furthermore, Kyril knows all too well what this trope entails during his Dark and Troubled Past, having witnessed his fellow Hunters gradually and literally becoming as bloodthirsty as the beasts they hunt. His conclusion? In face of an uncompromising threat, Violence is the Only Option, because the people who suffer because of said threat are the ones that matter. For a last touch of irony, Kyril Sutherland Was Once a Man, transformed into an eldritch entity, yet demonstrates such self-discipline that no inhuman being can ever reach.
• Discussed and rejected in Parting Words. Celestia finds it ridiculous that people can believe standing up to bullies would make one as bad as them.
• The Pony POV Series has the Mane Six in one of the alternate universes seen in the Gate of Truth. In this universe, they've become Knight Templar dictators of the world using the Elements to 'correct' anyone they see as disharmonic. It gets so bad Cadence goes Nightmare as a last resort to stop them.
  • In Dark World, we have the Nameless Passenger, AKA, Nightmare Paradox. A potential future version and Superpowered Evil Side of Twilight, she went Nightmare to get revenge on Discord for his crimes, but ended up turning the Dark World into a "Groundhog Day" Loop and erasing it and everyone in it over and over again for the sake of punishing Discord. Even after Discord had a Heel Realization, she forces him to remain an Evil Overlord so she can keep punishing him. Most notably, she makes it a point that his daughter Fluttercruel always dies because she's the only reason he still tries anymore. It's been pointed out in a "Not So Different" Remark that she's become like Discord himself, which is one of her Berserk Buttons and the characters consider her even worse than him.
• RainbowDoubleDash's Lunaverse:
  • Luna doesn't dare take drastic action to curb the rampancy of the Night Court out of fear that she will become a tyrant little better than them. Trixie calls her out on her Fatal Flaw of irrational fear At the Grand Galloping Gala, being told that You Are Better Than You Think You Are and that the willingness to Do What Has To Be Done would in no way make her a monster. On the other hand, Trixie's willingness to put action to word resulted in a Broken Base, with some readers thinking that she has become as lawbreaking as the nobles.
  • This is also what caused Celestia to become Corona. She grew so obsessed with trying to protect her little ponies from all the dangers around them that she tried to control every aspect of their lives, becoming the Tyrant Sun. In the end, Luna had to use the Elements to banish her to the sun.
• In The Hobbit fanfic The Monstrous Company of Thorin Oakenshield, Thorin set out to create a society better than the patriarchal one the Company, who are all female in this fanfic, have fled from. Some readers have commented that Thorin is rather close to becoming the monster, as males are only allowed into reconquered Erebor if they agree to be followed by armed (female) guards all the time.
• In Respect, this happens to Yayoi Kise. She makes a contract with Kyubey to stop bullies from tormenting her... and ends as a berserk supervillain, responsible for turning her home into a Ghost Town.
• Anna Dollerious in an installment of The Secret Life of Dolls, which was named after the trope itself.
• Rosario Vampire: Brightest Darkness:
  • In Act I, Astreal dips into this territory when she decides to brainwash Rason and Dark to force them to fight Ghaldin for her and Apoch. When Apoch points out that they'd be stooping to Ghaldin's level by doing so, Astreal insists that it's not the same because Ghaldin used the two of them to kill whenever and whoever he wanted, while they won't use the boys for such actions.
  • In Act VI, Talon is dipping into this territory quite well. The members of Fairy Tale who were actually responsible for his transformation are already dead, but he doesn't care; as far as he's concerned, everyone who was ever a member of Fairy Tale, including Unwitting Pawns and those who left willingly, is equally guilty, even Dark, who was one of the heroes who took down Alucard. In Act VI chapter 35, Akua and Kahlua even flat-out tell him to his face that he's no better than those who made him what he is.
• Summer Days and Evening Flames: Sergeant Shared Justice, or "Sherry". Initially only a bit overzealous when it came to Red Hooves' crime syndicate, due to losing her husband to Red Hooves and watching him get out by LoopholeAbuse, but eventually turns as bad as the criminals she was hoping to weed out from Farrington. She initiates a gang war that gets dozens of her fellows police officers killed in an attempt to kill Red Hooves, shows no remorse when confronted, and ends the story with threatening to kill her former captain Iron Bulwark (who considered her a mother figure) and vowing to become the head-honcho of the Salliongrad Mafia.
• Harry Potter in Rise of the Wizards after defeating Voldemort and coming to power he decides its time to have his revenge against the muggle world. "Magic is Might."
• Super Mario: Dark Side: After the defeat of the Shadow Queen, Princess Peach began to have haunting dreams about herself taking over the Mushroom Kingdom, followed by a dark feeling that's slowly consuming her, given the fact that being possessed by an ancient demon gave her a traumatic experience. Adopting a With Us or Against Us mentality against her allies, she begins to impose dictatorial and extremist measures, conquers neighboring kingdoms, going so far to brainwash her subjects to form an army and use it to attack Bowser, and her cousin Princess Daisy, the ruler of the Sarasa Kingdom. And after gaining full control over the Mushroom Kingdom, she proclaims herself as Empress Peach, complete with a dress and stilettos similar to the one she wore as Shadow Queen Peach, effectively becoming a Manipulative Bitch and stone-cold tyrant, besides becoming the Big Bad of the fanfic. It's actually revealed that Peach was the reincarnation of Empress Deasalva Lumineska, the original Queen of Darkness who plunged the Mushroom Kingdom into evil before being defeated by Link and Zelda's ancestors. Peach's past self was corrupting her mind to commit such atrocities, going so far to have her seize control of the Tri-Force, becoming even more powerful. But after Peach defeats her, Deas turns to normal and has a Heel Realization where she regretted her past actions, and earns Redemption Equals Death, but not before redeeming Peach in front of her people.
• Light Yagami (the innocent amnesiac version) in The Better to Kill You With, My Dear begins with high ideals and moral principals but he slowly begins Jumping Off the Slippery Slope once again after L's kidnapping and it gets worse when they retrieve L only to find what Beyond has done to him. In his despair and desperation, he changes his mind about making use of Watari's "enhanced interrogation techniques." This coupled with his growing obsession and codependence on L is slowly turning him into a monster even more twisted than Kira ever was.
• Total Shuffled Island Series based on Total Drama featured a theme of identity in its last installment. Word of God says that this trope was Leshawna's arc, and she would realize that she and Heather were alike, because although they had opposing points of view, Leshawna acted almost as sneaky and manipulative as Heather.
• In a Digimon fan fiction Zero 2: Crisis on Infinite Digiworlds, one of the universes Davis travels to is a world where Kari is the only Digidestined left after taking down Davis's corrupt self Darkheart along with the absorbed Digidestined. Believing that darkness is pure evil and light is pure good, Kari began to systematically rebuild Hi-Tokyo upon the old Tokyo, creating a world where every single aspect of the people's life is controlled by the Queen of Light and completely seals any access to the Digital World in hopes to create a utopia where darkness and war will never happen. Unfortunately, this ended up completely stripping humanity of all of their free will, and judging from how her response to the old Tokyo being filled with Digimons hiding people that have not been purified by her light was to immediately purge them, this universe's version of Kari has become no better than the darkness she tried to extinguish.
• In Kill or Be Killed, the story begins with Leeteuk's death, with him serving as The Lost Lenore for Taeyeon. However, she becomes so hellbent on avenging her lover's death that she loses her sense of self to the point where she has to be killed to be stopped before she can become a big threat. Later in the story, Sunny's lover Sungmin is killed in front of her, and Sunny is so devastated that she almost commits suicide due to having nothing to live for. Her wants of avenging Sungmin's death almost turn her into a second Taeyeon to the point where, before dying, Yoona asks Yesung to tell her not to go down that road.
• Nosflutteratu: Averted with the Garlic Flank Stake, who appears at first to be the typical "all vampires are evil and must die" vampire hunter but quickly changes her tune when she learns the vampire in question is Fluttershy.
• Mortal Kombat: Desperation:
  • The story takes place after Shinnok's defeat at the end of Mortal Kombat X. The prologue references the Nietzsche quote, and is a central theme in this fanfic's plot. After he Came Back Wrong, Raiden is so blinded by rage and vengeance that he becomes just as cold-blooded and homicidal as Shinnok and Shao Kahn, to the point of alienating his ex-allies and refusing to reconsider his invasion of Outworld. Ordering the destruction of Li Mei's village (women, children and elderly included) places him into evil territory for good.
  • Sonya (after Raiden kidnaps Cassie) almost slips into this territory, though she relents and backs out at the last moment.
  • Dairou tells Shujinko that Hotaru used to be a good man before his obsession with order and killing Darrius turned him into a brutal dictator who will destroy anybody who disagreed with him.
  • Fujin (who became Earthrealm's protector god after Raiden went on his rampage) often worries if he'll end up just as monstrous as his fellow god.
• Fade: With his own Death Note and (incomplete) knowledge of events, L seeks to stop Kira by any means necessary. By the story's midpoint, L has effectively become the Kira he sought to stop. Light, meanwhile, subverts this — while still a Serial Killer, he is nowhere near as bad as L.
• A distinct worry for Suzume in Eroninja is that Naruto might not actually be a Corrupter and that she's simply jumping at shadows in her plan to expose and murder him. Her biggest moment of doubt comes when she strips naked and (not really) drunkenly begs him to fuck her. Not only does Naruto turn Suzume down and cover her up, but the next day he seems even more mortified than she does.
• Don't Haze Me is a Kim Possible oneshot where a now-adult Kim finds herself becoming increasingly violent until she's barely different than the criminals she fights.
• A Twelve-Step Program to Omnipotence:
  • This is the story's driving question: Just how far is Michael McCole really willing to go to ensure he doesn't become a victim of Thanos?
  • Shuri falls into this even harder. In order to punish Michael for the Accidental Murder of her mother, she allies with Klaw, swears fealty to Dormammu and takes up both the Darkhold and the Ghost Rider to lead the entity's forces into war with Earth.
• In Golden Threads Tie Us, Severa doesn't like when Lucina shows mercy to the mindless zombies overrunning their world, but Lucina counters that showing mercy helps them retain their humanity.
  Severa: There wasn't any need for you to put it out of its misery. They deserve the suffering.
  Lucina: (coldly) Yes, there was. There always is. If we forget that, then are we really so different from them?
• In The Silmarillion story A Boy, a Girl and a Dog: The Leithian Script, Luthien talks Beren out of killing Curufin, the man who attempted to kidnap her twice and get her married to his rapist of a brother, because justifying murder was what ended up turning Curufin and Celegorm into monsters, and she isn't willing to take the risk of Beren following their same path.
• Fallout: Equestria: Littlepip spends much of the story worrying that she is just as bad as the raiders she fights, since she is quick to shoot first and brutally murder anyone in her path. Yes, they deserve it, they're rapists and slavers and murderers... but can she be really sure they deserve it? Meeting Red Eye, a Well-Intentioned Extremist Shadow Archetype who is quite unashamed of the horrible things he is doing to make the Wasteland a better place, only deepens her guilt. This culminates in her massacre of a tribe of cannibals, who most certainly needed to be put down, but were still friendly folk who had given Littlepip's group aid and shelter. Killing the cannibals in front of their own children was definitely a mistake. And finally, an enchanted mirror shows Littlepip her soul at one point: A bleeding, dying raider. That image sticks with her for quite a while. It's only at the very end of the story she realizes she was looking at it wrong. The image was of an event earlier in the story where she (wearing raider armor she had scavenged) jumped to the defense of a caravan that she thought was being attacked. The "attacker" (actually a guard) shot her because she looked like a raider. This illuminates Littlepip's true virtue: Sacrifice.
• This trope is the basis of Viva La Vida. Olive is on the side of good, fighting against oddness and those who create it, but over time she begins to struggle with her feelings of turning to the "odd side" and creating oddness like the villains she fights. Otto even explicitly calls her out on being exactly like Odd Todd, which she takes offense to as she tells him that he's jealous of Odd Todd since he was her partner before Otto, but it's made strikingly clear that she's turning into a near-Distaff Counterpart of her old partner. The Bad Ending of the story has her embracing this change, while the Good Ending has her realizing just what she's become and deciding to turn back to the side of good.
• Discussed in Sixes and Sevens - Emily is worried about this happening to her, as she barely feels anything when she kills and fears she'll come to enjoy it. Madeline assures her that it's a common worry among their business, and the fact that she has these concerns means she hasn't lost herself yet.
• Shadows over Meridian:
  • As the original story hinted would happen, many of the rebels have turned to Knight Templarhood and are exacting single-minded revenge on anyone they believe to be Phobos' servants or monsters. Several characters, including the more reasonable rebels, lampshade that their inability to let go of the past grudges is making them act no better than Phobos and his minions.
  • Vera Bexley is so utterly convinced the Mogriffs are monsters and has dedicated herself to avenging her grandfather's death at their claws that she ends up defying her military superiors and Elyon's direct orders to go on a renegade mission, lying to and endangering her closest friends by tricking them into joining her, abandoning them when they refuse to continue her senseless campaign anymore, and threatening an innocent hatchling's life while losing her conscience in the process. By the end of the Snowpoint arc, multiple characters on both sides of the war have told her off for her Moral Myopia.
  • When Jade prevents Metalbeak from recklessly hunting down the Nest Butcher's descendant at the cost of leaving his clan (his mate and infant son included) unprotected, she warns him not to let his anger and thirst for revenge risk him losing them. He later reminds her of those words when she's furious enough with Vera to risk the entire Stone Nest being pulled to the Shadow Realm. When she restrains herself and apologizes, he remarks that letting one's wrath, no matter how righteous, dictate one's actions isn't worth becoming just like Vera. Taking the Nest Butcher's appearance while saying that adds to the irony, not that Vera appreciates it.
• Obito-Sensei: Following the Tail Beast Cannon attack on the Amegakure, the Akatsuki founders start to fall to the same evil that plagued the Land of Rain in their childhood. Konan takes some of the Akatsuki to fight the Hidden Cloud within the Land of Frost, just as their own country was used as a theater of war. Meanwhile, Yahiko goes behind her and Nagato's backs to preemptively destroy the Hidden Leaf through a surprise invasion.

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