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Her left hand knows what her right hand is plotting.
Batman: But we totally had sex.... Like hardcore. Three times.
Talia: It was all a cruel ploy to gain your confidence.
Batman: That was a cruel ploy? Sign me up for another!

This trope is just like it sounds. A particularly insidious type of Romantic False Lead, this character is built up to be the Love Interest of the (or a) protagonist, but eventually The Reveal comes that they’re Evil All Along, and possibly even the Big Bad or The Dragon, or both!

This character is almost always female, and while she may pull a Sex–Face Turn (often by revealing that she became the mask and genuinely fell in love with the protagonist), they rarely if ever get back together. She is occasionally a Honey Trap as well as The Mole, but not always; sometimes the fact that she's a love interest and the fact that she's a traitor have nothing to do with each other. This can be an Ass Pull if the betrayal comes out of nowhere.

Was It All a Lie?

See also Big Bad Friend. Compare In Love with the Mark, Marrying the Mark, and Dating Catwoman.

As a Betrayal Trope, many if not all spoilers will be unmarked.


Examples:

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    Anime & Manga 
  • Saruhiko and Misaki's backstory in K, as shown in the prequel novel Lost Small World. Subverted in that they do become friends again, and probably more, once Misaki realizes that Saruhiko really just belongs in the Blue Clan, not the Red — Misaki's myopic loyalty to the Red King made him think Saruhiko was just a power-hungry Jerkass, and Saruhiko went with it until the end of the second season. It doesn't help that Saruhiko has a lot of issues left over from his Abusive Dad that others took advantage of to split Saruhiko away from the Red Clan and Poor Communication Kills as a result. It takes until the second season for Saruhiko and Misaki to both be in the position to make up. Notable for being a same-sex example.
  • In Master of Martial Hearts, it is revealed that Haruki Honma, who heroine Aya had a crush on for the whole series, and Natsume Honma, who Aya had some Homoerotic Subtext with, are two of the masterminds behind the Platonic Heart tournament and have conspired with their mother Kumi and Miko Kazuki to turn her into a Sex Slave to get Revenge by Proxy on Aya's mother, who subjected their parents to the same fate.
  • Kaworu Nagisa in the original Neon Genesis Evangelion anime. He arrives at NERV HQ as a new pilot who immediately takes an interest in poor, depressed Shinji when everyone else had either died or become estranged from him, but turns out to be the final Angel. Since he genuinely cares for Shinji despite all of this, Kaworu ultimately goes with the Heel–Face Turn option and performs a Heroic Sacrifice to save both Shinji and humanity via allowing Shinji to kill him. Another same-sex example.
  • Occult Academy has an example in Mikaze, who is set up as a love interest for the hero but ends up being the Big Bad.
  • Akio Ohtori from Revolutionary Girl Utena is a male example. He came to Utena's rescue when she was a child, she became infatuated with him, and years later they eventually consummate a relationship. In reality, he was just grooming her the entire time so he could use her Soul Sword to open the Rose Gate and regain his long-lost powers. Utena is completely blindsided by his betrayal in the anime, but in the manga, she says that she knows he's Obviously Evil but loves him and will go to him anyways.
  • Male example: Yona's beloved Su-won in Yona of the Dawn. Although he may have a genuine affection for her, he did kill her father and steal his crown.

    Comic Books 
  • Batman (Grant Morrison): Jezebel Jet dates Bruce Wayne while trying to break him on behalf of the Black Glove in Batman RIP.
  • Robot ends up being this to Monster Girl in Invincible once his true colors are revealed. Unlike most examples, he legitimately loves her (as much as someone like him can feel love) and really wishes he wasn't this trope, but she refuses to switch sides and he ultimately chooses his "duty" over his love for her.
  • In The Judas Contract, Terra is set as this to Beast Boy. Noticeable in that this original Terra is far, far nastier than the cartoon one: while cartoon Terra is a sort of Dark Magical Girl, comics Terra is a Manipulative Bitch and so psychopathic that Deathstroke is afraid of her.
  • Runaways: Alex is set up as Nico's love interest, but is ultimately revealed as the team's mole.
  • Fiona Fox in Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics) becomes this, revealing that she has been cheating on Sonic with his Evil Doppelgänger Scourge for some time. This is despite her having previously claimed to have realized her grudge against Sonic for leaving her behind in Robotnik's prison when they were kids was misguided, as she now knows he did not know she was in there; she now uses this event as a justification for her cheating and betrayal. For the rest of Archie's run until their legal troubles forced a soft reboot that removed her and several other characters from the story for good, she is firmly on the side of the villains.
  • A twist on this in Wolverines: Lady Deathstrike starts a relationship with Shogun, who is one body shared by the personalities of Sharp and Ogun. The Ogun personality is actually a former lover, and Deathstrike is playing the Sharp side for an opportunity to betray and "kill" him, so Ogun can fully take control of their body.

    Comic Strips 
  • Axa: Jon encounters Axa in the wilderness, and claims that he has forsaken the Domed City to be with her. Axa catches Jon radioing his position and discovers too late that she's being captured and taken back to the Domed City.

    Fan Works 
  • Cold Reception: Rachel T. McKenzie, the former Numbuh 362 and the girl Nigel loves, is the TND traitor he's been sent to hunt down. When Nigel learns this (after a brief period of believing his best friend Abby is the traitor), he completely shuts down and can't even bring himself to scream as Rachel pushes him and Abby out of an airlock while they're still in the sky.
  • In Danganronpa: In Harmony's Wake, Sunset Shimmer and Adagio Dazzle start a relationship together very early in the Killing Game, and stick together for most of it. It is even noted by other passengers that Adagio has slowly become a lot nicer thanks to Sunset's influence on her and the two eventually share a Love Confession together. In Chapter Five though, Monoponi leaves behind evidence revealing how Sunset was responsible for Adagio and her sisters losing their magic. This causes her to turn against Sunset, breaking off their relationship and eventually trying to kill her, though her plan is discovered by Trixie, who kills Adagio herself in order to save Sunset. This is an interesting example since the whole reason Adagio betrayed Sunset is because she saw Sunset herself as the true traitor to their relationship.
  • In The Flash Sentry Chronicles, Cozy Glow is introduced as a love interest for Fire Heart, with it being implied in several chapters that he has a crush on her. But during the events of "School Raze" she still betrays him and everyone else with her plot to drain all the magic from Equestria, with her knocking him and his sister Shining Soul into the same trap she was keeping Starlight Glimmer in. Cozy does offer Heart the chance to join her, with her implying she had a Villainous Crush on him herself, but when he refuses she has no problem leaving him to his fate. Though Cozy is stopped by the end, Heart is still left devastated by her betrayal and says he is never going to get that close with someone again.
  • In Loved and Lost, an extended retelling of "A Canterlot Wedding", Prince Jewelius is this to Twilight Sparkle. As she ends up on bad terms with her brother, friends, and mentor as per canon, Jewelius acts like a perfect gentleman and patient listener around her, even singing "Love is in Bloom" and dancing with her. However, after he helps her stop the Changelings herself and steals Equestria's throne by using the other heroes' mistakes to denigrate and exile them, he manipulates Twilight into losing all trust in her brother, friends, and mentor. In just one week, Equestria's fresh king convinces her to accept his proposal, but he wants to marry her only because he believes that the powerful unicorn mare will bear him powerful offspring who'll continue his legacy. He even privately admits to Twilight's imprisoned friends and brother that if he happened to discover an even more powerful unicorn mare, he might stage an "accident" for Twilight so that he can marry the other mare.
    • The same story has also a villain-on-villain example. Jewelius originally stroke a partnership of villainous affection with Queen Chrysalis when they decided to conquer Equestria together. However, once he decided Twilight Sparkle to be a more valuable pawn to him, he broke his partnership with the Changelings and helped Twilight stop their invasion as well as imprison them. Chrysalis honestly didn't expect Jewelius to double-cross her, and he mockingly asks if she really thought he'd let "a despicable animal" like her by his side. She tries to have revenge on him after she escapes from his dungeons, succeeding in the climax.
  • In Where Talent Goes to Die, shortly before the final trial, Miura makes a Love Confession to Edogawa, which the latter accepts. During the final trial, Kagami claims that Edogawa is the mastermind, and she allowed Miura to fall in love with her to relish Miura's despair at the inevitable betrayal. Subverted when it turns out that not only is Kagami wrong, but his pointing the finger at Edogawa was a last-ditch attempt to prevent Miura from exposing him as the true mastermind.

    Films — Animation 

    Films — Live-Action 
  • In Batman: The Movie, Bruce falls in love with Kitka only to find out she's Catwoman (and definitely a villain in this incarnation).
  • The Dark Knight Rises has Bruce romance his business associate Miranda Tate, who is later revealed to be Talia al'Ghul, and also the Big Bad of the movie.
  • The infamous The Garbage Pail Kids Movie has the equally-infamous Tangerine (infamous because she looks about ten years older than her early-teens leading guy; the actors are a year apart in real life). Her loyalty turns out to be to a street gang, and the poor girl gets pooped and vomited on at the end of the movie by the title characters for it.
  • Get Out (2017) has this as one of the big reveals. Rose, the girlfriend of protagonist Chris, has been in on the Arimitage family's bodyjacking and brainwashing legacy the entire time, and has led several other black lovers to that horrifying fate. She fully intended on Chris being used the same way, and in the climax was even willing to kill him.
  • Something similar to this trope happens in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, resulting from the adaptation combining the characters Cho Chang and Marietta Edgecombe. In the movie, it's implied that poor Cho was under a Truth Serum, but that doesn't stop Harry from dumping her (in the novel, she dumps him over realising that they simply didn't work out, since Cho was still massively hurting over the death of her boyfriend Cedric, murdered by Voldemort in front of Harry).
  • Elsa from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. To be fair, she genuinely loved Indy (and... uh... Indy's dad too, apparently), but she's single-mindedly obsessed with getting her hands on the Holy Grail to the point of working with Nazis.
  • James Bond:
    • About half of The World Is Not Enough is spent building up Broken Bird Elektra King as Bond's new one and only, replacing dear departed Tracy. The film is full of Call Backs to Tracy, comparisons between the two, and includes the most explicit Tracy reference of the Brosnan era, all the while implying that Elektra may not be completely right in the head (she enjoys fiddling with ice cubes mid-coitus, for one thing). Then, at around the midpoint of the movie, it comes out that Elektra is in fact a Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds who is not only in on Renard the Anarchist's plot to nuke Istanbul, she's co-author of it! Ultimately, Bond is forced to Shoot the Dog in a vain attempt to stop her from telling Renard to move the stolen nuclear submarine into Istanbul's waters.
    • Casino Royale (2006) has Vesper, playing along with Bond until she steals the money to get her boyfriend (who she's still in love with) back. However, it's suggested that she did fall for Bond as well, cutting a deal to save his life in exchange for going through with the theft. Bond's Roaring Rampage of Revenge in the next film culminates with the reveal that the original boyfriend is himself a traitor, seducing women with access to state secrets and using them to obtain and sell said secrets. Fortunately(?), Vesper's killed before she finds out about that facet of his personality. She dies thinking that she has at least saved the lives of the two men she loved.
  • Peggy Brandt in The Mask, as part of the Betty and Veronica Switch.
  • No Exit: One of the people trapped in the tourist center with Darby is a young man named Ash who flirts with her in addition to having a Fake-Out Make-Out to keep Lars' suspicions off of them discussing the kidnapper. Well, turns out Ash is one of the kidnappers, and went with the romance with Darby to keep himself off her radar.
  • In North By Northwest, Eve Kendall helps protagonist Roger hide from the police after he's Mistaken for Murderer and things quickly get steamy. She's soon shown to be in contact with the bad guys, receiving instructions and sending Roger on a Snipe Hunt designed to get him killed. Subverted when it turns out that she's actually The Mole for the good guys and hated sending Roger into danger, but had to do so to avoid blowing her cover, and her feelings for Roger are genuine.
  • Phoenix (2014): Nelly survives a concentration camp and yearns to be with her husband Johnny again. However, Johnny doesn't recognize her and instead hires her to impersonate the wife he believes is dead so he can collect her inheritance. That gives a pretty good hint that Johnny is really a scumbag, but Nelly goes along with it out of love anyway, hoping he'll recognize her eventually. In the end, Nelly learns that Johnny was the one who sold her to the Nazis and had her put in the concentration camp, and that's when she decides to leave him.
  • Sky High (2005) features a generally dorky Nice Guy named Will going out with an older girl named Gwen, whose role is basically showing him the ropes of superhero school in between being sweet on him. Turns out she just wanted the weaponized Fountain of Youth in his basement...
  • Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over has Juni's girlfriend in the virtual world, Demetra, turn out to be a program inserted into it to trick players into freeing the Big Bad (who's also trapped there). In all fairness, she didn't want to do it, and ends up rebelling against her programming and holding open the virtual reality's physical exit(!?) so the human characters can escape. She's never mentioned again after this. One can only hope the agency didn't delete the virtual reality with her still in there...
  • Valentine: Kate's boyfriend Adam is actually a cover identity of Jeremy Melton, the Fallen Cupid Serial Killer cutting his way through her friends over a False Rape Accusation while in junior high. His feelings for her appear to be genuine, primarily because she was the only person who treated him with any sort of kindness.
  • Warriors of Virtue (also known as "that one with the ninja kangaroos") does this with the girl joining up with the hamalicious Big Bad to avenge her brother, who had been accidentally killed by a kangaroo ninja. She's ultimately killed by her boss when she has a change of heart and helps the hero escape.

    Literature 
  • Book of Judges: Samson, an Israelite who had great strength because of his unshorn hair (a symbol of a vow to God), was betrayed by his lover Delilah, who had a man sent by the Philistines shave his head and handed him over to the Philistines who blinded him and made him a slave.
  • Soeraja turns out to be this in Cigarette Girl, as he leaked his ex-fiancée Dasiyah's tobacco sauce formula to her family's largest business rival, Soedjagad.
  • In Dragon Bones, there is some flirting between Bastilla and Ward, and the woman turns out to be a traitor. It doesn't develop into an actual relationship before it becomes clear who is with the villains, though.
  • James Bond:
    • In For Special Services, Bond thinks Nena is the sympathetic Bond Girl, but it turns out she's the Big Bad.
    • Subverted in Icebreaker with Bond's Finnish girlfriend Paula Vacker, who initially seems to be on NSAA's payroll, but turns out to be an agent of SUPO (Finnish intelligence agency) working within the organization. The trope is played straight with the other love interest Rivke Ingber, who is revealed to be working for them when the former's allegiance is made clear.
    • Two women accompany Bond throughout Nobody Lives for Ever as he makes way to SPECTRE's base, and once he reaches it, one of them is revealed to be working for them.
  • The Maze Runner: Thomas' relationship with Teresa shatters when she and Aris reveal themselves to be lovers and WICKED's agents, therefore betraying him. In fact, the betrayal was staged; she and Aris were contracted by WICKED to make Thomas feel cheated as part of the trials, in exchange for sparing him. But despite learning this, Thomas can't bring himself to trust Teresa ever again (even the thought of getting close with her repulses him), and he instead develops a stronger bond with Brenda, who is also a WICKED agent but wasn't sent to do such a scandalous work.
  • In Moonlight Becomes You, Liam is revealed to be this to Maggie. He only began pursuing her romantically in order to get close to her and find out if Nuala had told her anything about her suspicions surrounding Latham Manor. When she gets too close to the truth, Liam tries to murder her in an extremely sadistic manner.
  • In October Daye, Devin was Toby's first love and mentor, years back and she even lost her virginity to him. They even rekindle their relationship during the first novel of the series, Rosemary and Rue, only for it turn out he was using her and is the true Big Bad of the book.
  • Red Queen: Maven is revealed to be one of the two masterminds of the plot to bring down King Tiberias, using Mare's love for him to gain access to the Scarlet Guard and implicate them in the plot. He invites her to rule together with him as queen, but she categorically refuses and instead escapes as a fugitive, intending to fight for another day.
  • Sisterhood Series by Fern Michaels: Starting with Final Justice, Little Fish is set up to be a love interest for Countess Anne "Annie" Ryland de Silva, and Stu Franklin is set up as a love interest for Isabelle Flanders. However, by Cross Roads, both relationships are falling apart. The final blow comes when Little Fish and Stu Franklin are revealed to be Co-Dragons for Big Bad Henry "Hank" Jellicoe — as well as cold-blooded murderers. Ouch!
  • Utopia 58: LE905/Ellie seems to fall in love with KB209/Kay and gives new meaning to his life, inspiring him to rebel against Isonomia and seek freedom, and they have a loving relationship. Then she turns out to be the Father, the Big Bad themself, and reveals she used Kay to snuff out the rebels threatening her empire. She explains that she “loved” him but in a shallow way.
  • Wonder Woman: Warbringer: Jason to Diana. They bond about wanting to prove themselves and even kiss, and then it turns out he's been sabotaging The Quest the whole time.
  • In the Wraith Squadron trilogy this is the situation from the perspective of Myn Donos in that he falls in love with Lara Nostil only to find that she was the infiltrator that destroyed his squadron. Though more generally it is more of a Dating Catwoman scenario in that the reader fully knows who she is. It is also more complicated in that while she was originally an infiltrator, she defected to the New Republic without telling them.

    Live-Action TV 
  • In The 100, Lexa kisses Clarke and asks her to come away with her to the Grounder capital, but soon afterwards betrays Clarke to Mount Weather. Unlike most examples of this trope, Lexa had no intention of betraying Clarke when she made those romantic overtures; she just felt that the deal Mount Weather offered her was more important than her personal feelings towards Clarke.
  • Attila: Attila ends up falling in love with a woman who resembles his late wife. However, she's an assassin sent by Flavius Aetius to seduce and marry Attila so he will let his guard down at a critical moment. She succeeds with the plot by killing him on their wedding night at the cost of her own life, which she had accepted beforehand.
  • In Blake's 7, Avon discovers that his old love Anna was an undercover Federation officer assigned to betray him. This being Blake's 7, he shoots her dead and then tenderly cradles her body.
  • Cobra Kai:
    • Zigzagged with Miguel Diaz and Tory Nichols. While Miguel is the one that cheated on her by kissing Sam, Tory remains fully loyal to Kreese and his teachings, which causes Miguel (who has become an Internal Reformist at that point) to break up with her and go back to Sam.
    • Also zigzagged with Samantha LaRusso and Robby Keene. Sam does cheat on Robby with Miguel, and eventually gets back together with the latter late in season 3. Robby catches them together after getting out of juvie, and is later swayed by Tory into siding with Kreese's Cobra Kai out of vengeance (and a loss of hope for that matter).
  • In Criminal Minds, Garcia goes on a date with a man who then shoots her. The team learns that it wasn't the first time he'd done this and that his other victims didn't survive.
  • Doctor Who: In "The Runaway Bride", Donna Noble discovers that her fiancé Lance only offered her coffee to begin with so he could dose her with huon particles to benefit the evil alien empress he was secretly working for. He only accepted her marriage proposal because he couldn't risk her running off.
  • The Dukes of Hazzard: In "Mrs. Rosco P. Coltrane", a bank robber named Sue Ann — who happens to be married — pulls a computer dating scam, and Rosco is lured into the trap. The two actually fall in love and are planned to be wed, but the Duke boys confirm that Sue Ann is a part of a criminal gang of robbers and ride to Rosco's rescue when she turns on him. In the end, Sue Ann (as she is being taken into custody) admits she actually started having feelings for Rosco.
  • Saffron in Firefly. An episode has Mal being (unintentionally) married to her for a reward, but she turns out to be a con artist, intent on killing the crew (by leaving them to die) and selling their ship. Her appearance in a later episode reveals this to be her standard operating procedure: seduce (and/or marry), steal, leave 'em for dead, repeat...
  • In The Flash (2014), Zoom in his Jay Garrick persona strengthened his façade by posing as a love interest to Caitlin. He is just using Team Flash to cure his deadly condition by robbing Barry's speed and be free to commit more atrocities across the multiverse. After being unmasked, Zoom kidnaps Caitlin, imprisons and threatens her and her doppelganger from his world. All because, in his sick twisted way, he'd grown attached to her like he had to Barry, wanting both of them to embrace villainy like he (and Caitlin's doppelganger) had and thus validate his dark world-view.
  • Subverted and Played for Laughs in Haven when Jennifer, under the influence of a substance that induces paranoia, loudly and abruptly accuses Duke of seducing her for her supernatural abilities the episode after their Relationship Upgrade. This comes right the hell out of nowhere for Duke, who was not aware she had been affected, and his response is priceless.
    Duke: Wait, I'm the guy here, okay? I'm supposed to be the one who gets close and then pushes you away and freaks out. You're kind of throwing me off here.
  • Homecoming: In 2022, as she's trying to make sense of her missing memories from Homecoming, Heidi kindles a brief romance with "Hunter", a divorced veteran who's willing to listen to her problems; he even drives her back to Tampa when she decides to return to the Homecoming facility to investigate. It's actually her old boss, Colin, trying to find out what she knows and steer her away from remembering the truth about Homecoming — she just doesn't remember who he is.
  • The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power: Galadriel and Halbrand form an unlikely friendship, with her encouraging him to seek power and fulfill his destiny and him counseling her to be more manipulative and savvy in her dealings with humans. Although nothing physical happens, there's copious Ship Tease and when he finally reveals himself to be her sworn enemy and the embodiment of evil, Sauron, he proposes they rule as King and Queen of Middle Earth.
  • The Mentalist features a male example in Craig O'Laughlin, an FBI agent who begins dating and eventually gets engaged to Grace Van Pelt. He turns out to be an associate of serial killer Red John. Unfortunately, they don't figure this out until after Van Pelt and Lisbon have let him in on the location of a key witness against Red John, and Van Pelt ends up having to shoot him to protect Lisbon and the witness.
    O'Laughlin: [after the revelation; his last words] Sorry about this, Grace. Truly. I've grown genuinely fond of you.
  • The Orville: In "Ja'loja", Captain Mercer starts dating a female Orville officer named Janel Tyler. Then in "Nothing Left on Earth Excepting Fishes", they're both taken prisoner by the Krill, who threaten her life to get him to hand over intelligence. Afterwards, he's visited by Krill recurrer Teleya, who reveals to Ed's dismay that "Janel Tyler" was her cover identity.
  • Supernatural:
    • Sam's (demonic) love interest across two seasons, Ruby, who'd claimed to be on the Winchesters' side as an Enemy Mine against the demons in charge, turns out to have been manipulating Sam into freeing Lucifer and starting the apocalypse all along. She clearly thinks she's been helping him discover his true nature despite himself, but Sam is enraged and horrified and kills her as she relishes the moment of succeeding in her deep-cover mission and boasts of her unmatched loyalty to Lucifer.
    • In Season 9, Castiel has been turned human and is homeless and struggling. He's taken in a kind young woman, April Kelly, and he has a one-night stand with her before she reveals herself to be a reaper intent on torturing and killing him.
  • Total Recall 2070: After a passenger transport blows up, Dr. Olham is visited by her former husband, whose brother was killed in the explosion. She even has sex with him again. He later turns out to be working with the people who assassinated his brother.

    Video Games 
  • The player character, in Baldur's Gate II, has this possibility. In chapter V, the player character is disguised as a Drow to infiltrate their city, and a relationship of sorts can be established between the player and one of the Drow, but ultimately the player will betray them one way or another. Of course, being Drow, most relationships are basically based on betrayal anyway.
  • In Baten Kaitos:
    • Xelha falls in love with Kalas very badly, but he has other priorities, like avenging his grandfather and brother and helping the Big Bad unleash a Sealed Evil in a Can. They get together in the end.
    • In the prequel, Milly drops from the sky to aid Sagi and Guillo, and unconditionally helps their quest while spying on the party's activities for one Big Bad, who's also her dad. She has a big crush on Sagi through, and eventually, they elope together.
  • Dead In Vinland: The snarky teenage daughter of the protagonist family can have a romance with a sweet gentle young man who's willing to turn away from his religious vows for her... and he later turns out to be a possibly-demonically-possessed Serial Killer who murders another party member.
  • Played with in the Deus Ex Universe prequel games, with Megan Reed, protagonist Adam Jensen's ex. She is kidnapped in the beginning of Deus Ex: Human Revolution, and Adam spends almost the entire game trying to find her only to find her being treated rather comfortably in an Illuminati facility. Adam can also discover evidence that she might've gotten close to him only for the purpose of obtaining a genetic sample. The post-credits stinger shows Megan conversing with Bob Page, the Big Bad of the original Deus Ex. In Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, Adam can find a data pad in a Versa-Lifenote  vault stating that Megan is continuing to use his DNA to build superior bonding processes for mechanical augmentations, but the process can also be used as a particularly nasty bioweapon against augmented people. It is an Ambiguous Situation whether she is being used or is in on Bob Page's schemes.
  • Do It For Me:
    • The girlfriend who tells the protagonist to go on his journey to kill the Wooffles is actually the real Big Bad who has been using him to kill innocent high-schoolers (the “Wooffles”). The girlfriend betrays the player in the "Puppet" and "Innocent Love" endings, by framing him for the massacre and killing him for refusing to carry out the massacre, respectively.
    • The protagonist himself betrays the girlfriend in the "Psychopath" ending, where he says he was killing the students of his own will. Averted in the other endings where he is a Love Martyr.
  • Dragon Age:
    • Played with for Morrigan if you romance her from Dragon Age: Origins. At the start of the game, her mysterious witch hermit mother saves the Player Character and their Number Two Alistair from certain death, and both assure you they have no ulterior motive besides wanting to aid you in saving the world from the Blight, despite them both exuding Dark Is Evil vibes. If the male protagonist pursues a relationship with Morrigan, she's convinced Love Is a Weakness, struggles with What Is This Feeling?, and practically begs you to break up. Towards the end of the game, she reveals she and her mother always planned to convince you (or one of your male Grey Warden companions) to impregnate her in a mysterious dark magic ritual that will lead to her fetus being possessed by the soul of an Old God, after which she'll leave to raise the child Maker knows where for Maker knows what reason. The player can accuse her of betrayal, though she argues that she was always upfront about wanting to aid you till the Blight was over, and she has done just that. For the Witch Hunt DLC, the protagonist may agree with her, or stab her for it. However, her reappearance in Inquisition shows that if she was romanced and survived, she really does love the Warden and is still in contact with them, and is being a genuinely good mother to her son Kieran, regardless of whether or not he has the Old God soul. She even stands up to Flemeth for his sake.
    • Anders in Dragon Age II if he is your love interest. No matter what you do, he will blow up the Chantry near the end of the game in order to start a war between the two major factions, even if you are trying to be neutral.
    • Dragon Age: Inquisition:
      • Solas to a female elven protagonist who romances him. Turns out he was the Greater-Scope Villain all along, although he assures you that what you had was real, and he only broke up with you because he knows you're the only person who can still talk him out of trying to destroy the current world to restore the old one.
      • Averted for the Iron Bull should you romance him, since he tells you straight up when you first meet that he's a spy for the Qunari and will be sending reports back to them (and them to you) as-needed. Subverted in the Trespasser DLC if you had Iron Bull reaffirm his loyalty to the Qunari in his personal quest. The Qunari reveal they were always planning on betraying you and had sent him as a sleeper agent. If you convinced him to stay loyal to the Qun, then when his commanding officer orders him to kill you he coldly tells you "Nothing personal, Basnote ", forcing you to kill him. To be fair, you have sacrificed his True Companions which is implied to be his rock when he was Kicked Upstairs by the Qun in order to secure the alliance so one could say that the player deserved Bull's reprisal. If you had convinced him to leave the Qunari and save his men instead, then he basically tells his former commanding officer to shove it when she orders him to kill you.
  • Played with in Fire Emblem: Awakening: The Avatar can be one of Prince Chrom's love interests if female, and has massive Ho Yay with Chrom if male... but the part where s/he kills Chrom and thus kicks off the Bad Future happens whether the Avatar is a male or a female and whether a girl Avatar is married to Chrom or not. Also, s/he doesn't do it willingly but only when his/her body is taken over by the Evil God Grima, whom s/he is supposed to be the vessel of... and the plot of the game as a whole is about preventing the Bad Future (and thus the Avatar's betrayal) from taking place.
  • If you're playing Fire Emblem: Three Houses and didn't choose to witness Edelgard's coronation in the Black Eagles route, you're in for a nasty shock if you're trying to A-Support Edelgard or Hubert with just about anyone they can potentially marry.
  • Yuna from Final Fantasy X. When she finds out that Seymour killed his father and plans more deaths, she agrees to marry him, so she could get close to him and kill him. Later, when he's already dead she marries his ghost so she could send him to the Farplane, making her rare heroic example of this trope.
  • Grand Theft Auto IV has this in the form of "Michelle", Niko's first potential girlfriend, who actually works for a shadowy government agency. Played with, as she's terrible at getting information from Niko, and it's clear that she regrets lying to him.
  • Life Is Strange: Before the Storm introduces Eliot, one of Chloe's closest friends and (it's implied) the guy she recently lost her virginity to. The first couple of episodes make it seem like he'll be the Straight Option Satellite Love Interest in contrast to the central relationship between Chloe and Rachel — much like Warren in the original game. However, the final episode reveals that he's dangerously obsessed with controlling Chloe, to the point where she eventually fears for her safety enough to call the police when he corners her. Downplayed only in that Rachel is still very much the central love interest of the game, whether the player chooses to explicitly hook her up with Chloe or not.
  • One of the big elements in the Start of Darkness for the Big Bad of Live A Live. In the unlockable Medieval Age, the player Oersted is motivated by his love of Princess Alethea during the first part of the chapter, even getting married to her after saving the kingdom. Towards the chapter's end, however, it's revealed that she was seduced by Oersted's treacherous rival, Streibough, who framed Oersted for regicide and destroyed his reputation with her help. When she sees Oersted has cut Streibough down, she is horrified, denouncing Oersted for killing her "true love" and then committing suicide rather than live without Streibough. This last betrayal pushes Oersted over the edge, causing him to become Odio and then create incarnations of himself throughout time to punish humanity for her and Streibough's treachery.
  • While he's not a full Love Interest due to his plot being mostly Dummied Out, Bishop of Neverwinter Nights 2 for a female protagonist. He will always betray her to the King of Shadows at the end of the game, and there is nothing she can do to stop it; at best she can persuade him to walk away from the battlefield, but he won't rejoin her side. And then a bunch of rocks fall on them both.
  • Resident Evil has several of these throughout the franchise, though mostly Ship Tease as opposed to explicit romance.
  • Penelope of the Sly Cooper games. She betrays Bentley due to his devotion to his friends over her, and becomes a major antagonist in the fourth game.
  • In Tales of Xillia, Alvin was this to Presa in the past. A rare case where the traitor is on your side (well, at least half the time) and the one betrayed is a villain. (Though she's actually a Type IV Anti-Villain) It's implied she genuinely loved him, but... a complicated string of betrayals got in the way.

    Visual Novels 
  • In Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors June/Akane is this to decoy protagonist Junpei when she turns out to be the big bad Zero, who kidnapped him and 8 other people and put them in a deadly game. Unlike most examples her affection is genuine (as confirmed by Word of God) and the betrayal is more of a case of I Did What I Had to Do since the game was actually designed to save her life in the past; when all is said and done, the victim of the betrayal doesn't hold a grudge, and the two get together for real at the end of Zero Time Dilemma (where she no longer qualifies as this trope).
  • Danganronpa:
    • In Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc, protagonist Makoto Naegi wastes no time hitting it off with pop idol Sayaka Maizono. Then she tries to use him as the fall guy for a murder she plans to commit, only for the intended victim Leon Kuwata to turn things around and kill Sayaka. It's later speculated that her dying message may have been a way to apologize for her betrayal. Ironically it's also implied Leon had a crush on her, making her a Love-Interest Traitor to two boys.
    • A bit of a double case in Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair. Hajime grows particularly close to Chiaki over the course of the game, only for it turn out that she’s the Future Foundation agent hiding among the group. However, no one feels too betrayed by this, as it’s clear Chiaki genuinely valued them as her friends. Especially when it’s revealed they were all Remnants of Despair and Chiaki was actually more like the Token Good Teammate. On the other hand, Nagito, the one who tricked Chiaki into killing him in order to out her as the traitor, grew especially close to Hajime in the first chapter and was revealed to be a complete Psycho Supporter for the Ultimates at the end of said chapter. Given that his implied crush on Hajime remains afterward, poor Hajime has to have this trope thrown at him twice.
    • In Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony, protagonist Kaede Akamatsu wastes no time hitting it off with detective Shuichi Saihara. Then inverted when another student dies in Kaede's botched attempt on the mastermind's life, leaving her hopes and the protagonist title in Shuichi's hands. It also turns out that she wasn't even responsible for killing Rantaro, but this fact is only discovered after she's been convicted and executed.
  • Played with in Full Metal Daemon Muramasa. Chachamaru Ashikaga is first introduced as one of the generals for the ruthless Rokuhara Shogunate but is also presented as the Token Good Teammate of the bunch, being the most easygoing of them and routinely helping the heroes with her increasingly being set up as one of the potential love interests for the main lead Kageaki. Turns out she is manipulating just about everyone in favor of her own agenda and even resorts to brainwashing Kageaki when she gets the chance. While her love for him is genuine, her methods and goals means that they ultimately can't see eye to eye.
  • In PARANORMASIGHT: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo, the mastermind behind all the deaths and curses overtaking Honjo is Yoko Fukunaga, Shogo's friend who he has a crush on and was willing to kill others to revive in the prologue timeline. This one is particularly surprising because, besides looking like an innocent Cloudcuckoolander, Yoko dies in the very beginning of the prologue timeline and barely appears in the main timeline.
  • In the Sunrider series, Captain Kayto Shields falls in love with his kind-hearted chief engineer Chigara, and they enter a relationship in the second game. But unbeknownst to either of them, Chigara is really a Prototype spy sent to seduce and manipulate Kayto. Chigara gets activated during the Liberation Day ceremony and massacres the attendees, singlehandedly undoing everything Kayto had fought to achieve up until that point. This betrayal still haunts Kayto six years later, as does her subsequent death.
  • In Tsukihime, Kohaku is both one of the five love interests for Shiki Tohno with her own route, and the real Big Bad of the Far Side routes who masterminds the destruction of the Tohno family. The two stay together afterward.

    Webcomics 

    Western Animation 
  • In Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix, Dolph's lover Alex betrays him during the initial heist, shooting him and leaving him for dead.
  • Helena in Neo Yokio. Despite being in love with Kaz, she tricks him into helping her and backstabs him by switching places with Sadie and running away with Charles at the end of the show.
  • In the Superman: The Animated Series episode "Superman's Pal", Jimmy discovers that his new girlfriend, Tina, is working with Metallo and only wants him as bait for Superman. The last we see of her is him locking her in a closet before going off to help the superhero.
  • Teen Titans (2003):
    • In addition to being a Sixth Ranger Traitor, the series' version of Terra was this to Beast Boy. It was implied that (unlike the original Terra), she did like Beast Boy back, trying to save him from the rest of the Titans' fate, but not enough to choose him over Slade. She ultimately rebelled against Slade when Beast Boy confronted her upon her deeds, and then performed a Heroic Sacrifice to save the whole city as well as the Titans themselves.
    • This trope is revisited in the next season when Raven falls for a handsome magician trapped in a book — who turns out to actually be an evil dragon who tried to use her as the key to return to the world, and whom Raven must re-seal and defeat. Notably, Beast Boy is the one who consoles her afterwards.

 
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Yona of the Dawn

In the first episode, Yona tries convince her father to marry her beloved Su-Won. Only for her to find her father killed by the man she loves.

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