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The Farmer and the Viper
(aka: Farmer And The Viper)

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The Farmer and the Viper (trope)
The moral of the story is: Don't accept rides with strangers.
"One winter a Farmer found a Viper frozen and numb with cold, and out of pity picked it up and placed it in his bosom. The Viper was no sooner revived by the warmth than it turned upon its benefactor and inflicted a fatal bite upon him; and as the poor man lay dying, he cried, 'I have only got what I deserved, for taking compassion on so villainous a creature.'"

Kindness is thrown away upon evil.

This Hard Truth Aesop is much like Curiosity Is a Crapshoot: a display of friendship, trust, and love won't always bring about redemption; sometimes a bad person is simply bad, and they won't stop being that way just because you were kind to them — in fact, they may very well betray you in any number of fashions, repaying the good turn you've done for them with evil. It's in the nature of a snake to bite, after all.

Correctly discerning the irredeemable from the redeemable is tricky, of course, and expect characters to argue over whether this trope even applies. After all, in Real Life, this belief is used to justify ignoring people in need, especially if they have ever done anything vaguely "bad". In fact, characters believing in this trope too passionately often create unsympathetic to outright villainous characters - anything from uncaring zealots to psychotic serial murderers who believe they are purging society of its permanently corrupted evil dregs since there is no hope for redemption for them.

Compare Morality Chain, where the Samaritan does somehow manage to restrain their ward's wickedness. Turn the Other Cheek is probably the Samaritan's mindset. The receiver may turn out to be Always Chaotic Evil, a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing, or a Jerk with a Heart of Jerk. When combined with Save the Villain, this is sometimes used to set up a Disney Villain Death. Compare Bad Samaritan, when it is the caregiver, not the care-receiver, who is evil. Also, compare Complaining About Rescues They Don't Like. Plays with the traditional belief of Sacred Hospitality. If such an act makes a character give up on redeeming the villain, it's Beyond Redemption. May result in Do Unto Others Before They Do Unto Us.

Common occupational hazard of a would-be Redeemer.

Inverse of Good Samaritan and Androcles' Lion. See also Befriending the Enemy, Naïve Animal Lover, Save the Villain, Taking You with Me, Take My Hand!, Prisoner's Dilemma, Ungrateful Bastard, Chronic Backstabbing Disorder, Horrible Judge of Character, Wounded Gazelle Gambit, Punished for Sympathy, Virtue Is Weakness, Taking Advantage of Generosity, and You Have Outlived Your Usefulness. Compare Pacifism Backfire (while this is "Hospitality Backfire") and the False Innocence Trick where a captured villain pretends to be harmless. See also They Were Holding You Back for a common justification for how the viper is really "helping." Compare and contrast with Bait the Dog, in which the villain pretends to be doing a kind act only to betray their victim when they least expect it.

Similar to "The Scorpion And The Frog" after a similar Fable (popularized in Orson Welles's Mr. Arkadin). A Frog carries a Scorpion across the river with the simple promise that he will not be stung, as it will lead to both their deaths. But halfway across, the Scorpion stings him anyway, mocking the Frog for trusting him even as they both drown. This story contains the additional Aesop that it is just in some people's nature to do evil, even if it leads to their own destruction. See also Orc Raised by Elves. There's also the saying "If you buy eggs from a rattlesnake, you get what you pay for" which is an Aesop warning against doing business with known conmen.

(Also, at risk of pointing out the obvious, don't take Aesop's Fables as a good guide to real-life snakes, who do not run around envenomating people out of a general desire to do evil. Venom is precious and expensive, so real snakes save it for survival purposes, something this trope would undermine.)

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    Anime & Manga 
  • The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, REALLY Love You: An exaggerated subversion in Chapter 194. Yamame finds a space alien in a wrecked spaceship and takes it home to treat its injuries and nurse it back to health. After it recovers, it reveals that it had planned to kill her once it was able to do so, but changed its mind after meeting Rentarou and the other girls. It’s later revealed that it was sent to Earth to prepare its race for an alien invasion, but it convinced its leader to call off the invasion by demonstrating kissing on it as learned from Hahari.
  • In an episode of ARIA the NATURAL, Akari spots a woman who is dressed like she's just gotten back from a funeral. She is then told a ghost story about a woman in black who asks for transport, then spirits her gondolier away. That night, the woman in black asks Akari for a ride to a graveyard. Akari takes her (This is notably not the only example of Too Dumb to Live, because the anime consistently encourages naivety). Akari goes on her way, but the woman, in a weird subversion, grabs her hand and tries to spirit her away, specifically because she was impressed with Akari's kindness. The anime implies this to be a bad thing but never makes it really clear. Cait Sith saves her, though, so we never find out.
  • Delicious in Dungeon: In order to cross a lake, Senshi befriends a Kelpie which seems to allow him to cross the lake on its back. Although he's convinced it's entirely friendly, his final time the Kelpie decides for seemingly no reason to shove him under and try to kill him. After he's rescued and Laios kills the Kelpie, he's devastated, having genuinely thought of it as a friend. As a final act of kindness, he chooses to eat the Kelpie's flesh rather than let it go to waste.
  • In The Demon Girl Next Door, Momo decides to use some of her already-diminished magical power to give her mortal enemy Lilith a controllable body just to make her happy. How does Lilith repay such a kind act? By immediately plotting to force Momo to make more. Unfortunately for her, Momo was clever enough to put in a back-door.
  • Doraemon: Nobita's Dorabian Nights has Doraemon and the gang meeting Sinbad the sailor, and Abdil, a thief who plots to steal Sinbad's magic palace for himself. Several years ago, Sinbad had rescued Abdil from the desert and treated Abdil like a guest in his palace, only to expel Abdil after finding out he's a slaver. In the present, Doraemon and gang, looking for Shizuka who's lost in the Arabian Desert with their new ally Sinbad, eventually find her... as a captive of Abdil, leading to Sinbad scolding Abdil for still dabbling in the Human Trafficking business. Rather than arresting Abdil, however, Sinbad is decent enough to give Abdil sacks of water and food before telling him to leave the desert and never come back. So Abdil repays Sinbad by convincing the thief Cassim to help him steal Sinbad's palace and artifacts, have Sinbad and everyone else sealed in a dungeon, and later as the heroes escaped, releasing hordes and hordes of vampire bats to kill everyone. Sinbad lampshades it to the gang by saying "I should've left Abdil alone in the desert instead of saving him."
  • Dragon Ball:
    • Dragon Ball Z:
      • During the fight with Raditz, Goku grabs Raditz's tail to give Piccolo an opening to kill him with the Special Beam Cannon. Raditz begs Goku for mercy, promising to leave Earth if Goku does so; over Piccolo's protests, Goku grants Raditz's mercy... and Raditz promptly knocks Goku down and ruthlessly breaks his ribs, all while rubbing in his face how stupid it was of him to fall for it. When Gohan critically injures Raditz and Goku has him restrained so Piccolo can finish him off, Raditz tries the same trick again; unfortunately for him, Goku isn't dumb enough to fall for the same ploy twice.
      • When Frieza is bisected by his own attack and begs Goku for help, Goku, after some debate, transfers a portion of his energy to Frieza to at least allow him to escape Namek's explosion (mostly out of Cruel Mercy). Frieza responds by openly mocking Goku and then — unable to accept his defeat — uses that very energy for one last-ditch attack; by this point, Goku has lost all patience with Frieza and blows him away.
    • Dragon Ball Super:
      • During the Future Trunks Saga, Gowasu did his best to help Zamasu, guide him to become a proper Supreme Kai, and get him to overcome his hatred of mortals. How does Zamasu repay him? By trying to murder him so he can become a full Supreme Kai, use the Time Rings, and enact a plan to wipe out all mortal life. Beerus is rightfully disgusted, sees Zamasu's actions as an In-Universe Moral Event Horizon, and personally kills Zamasu when he makes his move.
      • Gowasu suffers it a second time in the manga when he gives Goku Black a Last-Second Chance. Black seems willing to accept his offer and takes his hand... and then immediately runs Gowasu through with his Laser Blade, openly calling him an idiot for thinking he could be swayed, especially since Black has already killed two different incarnations of Gowasu for the sake of his plans.
      • Later on in the manga, Moro, who at this point in the story has rampaged across the universe and drained the life energy of countless beings, has been thoroughly defeated by Goku and is reduced to begging for his life. In exchange for a senzu bean to restore his energy and heal his wounds, Moro promises to submit to the Galactic Patrol and return to prison for the rest of his days. After being healed, he immediately tries to attack Goku once again and declares he has no intention of stopping his rampage.
  • The myth of the frog and scorpion is heavily discussed during the second half of Edens Bowy. The plot involves The Hero and The Rival being two of the only God Hunters in existence, two Floating Continents warring heavily to get their hands on the Hero, protected by an Angelic MacGuffin Super-Person who is responsible for said Hero's realization of his true nature. Much agonizing and angsting were had to contemplate inevitability of one's role; namely, must the hero surrender to his nature to kill his Love Interest when she's an Angel, even though she's responsible for his survival so far? The resolution to this is... complicated.
    • Interestingly, during the Where Are They Now epilogue, said rival now earns his keep by telling the tale of "The Scorpion And The Frog," with his own twist at the end.
  • In Fist of the North Star, Jagi's backstory has him almost being killed by Kenshiro, who changes his mind at the last second and spares him. Instead of repenting, it just made Jagi even worse, and he receives no mercy the next time they meet.
  • Frieren: Beyond Journey's End: Frieren is about to execute a demon child who ate a couple's daughter, but the village chief steps in and offers to help reform her. Himmel pledges his support of the decision, with Frieren reluctantly going along with it at Himmel's request (but still keeping an eye on her). It initially seems like the demon has made good progress in bonding with the chief and his daughter... and the next time we see the chief, he's lying on the ground dead, his house is on fire, and his daughter is taken hostage by the demon kid they took in. The demon mocks the townspeople and the heroes for not killing her despite actively wanting her dead, and, to twist the knife further, she offers the aforementioned couple the chief's daughter as a "replacement" for their own. This enrages Himmel and Frieren enough to immediately take action, with the former rescuing the chief's daughter and the latter dealing the killing blow to the demon.
  • Fullmetal Alchemist:
    • In Fullmetal Alchemist (2003), the disgraced and homeless Yoki is taken in by a group of Ishbalan refugees. He promptly betrays them by selling out the Serial Killer and fellow Ishbalan Scar to a bunch of bounty-hunters with the intent to split the bounty. The refugees don't take the idea of Yoki ratting out one of their own well and promptly give him a beat-down. Averted in Brotherhood and the manga, where while he does still betray Scar to bounty-hunters, the bounty-hunters are significantly more reasonable and don’t try to harm any of the refugees, and when Scar spares his life he legitimately does all he can to help from that point forward (which admittedly isn’t that much, due to Yoki being a Non-Action Guy).
    • Also Scar himself, after he kills Winry's parents after they give him life-saving medical treatment. To his credit, it was a bit accidental but still, he managed to kill both. ...depending on the source material. In the first anime, it was Mustang being forced to do his job.
    • In the later chapters, the chimera Zampano, one of Edward's allies that Ed previously spared in battle, sneaks off and contacts the Military high command to rat them out. It's all a Batman Gambit though, planned to draw one of the Homunculi to them so they can spring an ambush.
  • Invoked in Goblin Slayer; because this world's goblins are absolutely incapable of moral behavior, but possessed of enough base cunning to lie and feign otherwise, this invariably happens if someone is foolish enough to show a goblin mercy. These goblins become "Wanderers", roaming the land and migrating from nest to nest, teaching other goblins the various tactics that they saw used against themselves or their first nest — whilst many of them starve to death, those that survive make other goblin nests more dangerous, and often mature into more powerful forms themselves. This is especially true of goblin infants, who are seemingly born with the awareness of this tactic ingrained in them. Oh, and a Wanderer will always try to strike back at the person who showed them mercy the moment their guard is down, if they can. Our first exposure to a Goblin Lord is one who immediately attacked and murdered the adventurer that spared his life, and kept on doing just that, preying on the noble sentiments of adventurers. This is one of the reasons why the titular protagonist adheres to the exterminate-them-all philosophy; he knows that goblins cannot be redeemed.
  • Gundam:
  • Done during the third season of Hell Girl. A teacher saves a quiet and shy acting girl student from being bullied. Afterwards, the girl's grandmother spends the episode trying to get the teacher fired, out of what appears to be jealousy. Turns out the little girl was lying to her grandmother and claiming that it was the teacher who was bullying her. When the teacher confronts the girl after finding this out, the quiet girl just smiles and claims because it's fun.
  • Sets up the plot in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, with George Joestar and his son Jonathan as the Farmers and Dio Brando as the Viper. George and Jonathan's kindness costs them their lives, leads to countless other deaths, and nearly causes the end of the universe. Contrast to Speedwagon who was in a similar situation but when Jonathan spares him he becomes a lifelong (and beyond) friend and ally to the Joestar family.
  • In Kino's Journey, Kino saves some stranded traders. It then turns out they trade human slaves and are looking to recuperate their losses.
  • In Megalo Box Nanbu is likened to a scorpion, with the implication that Nanbu is the sort of person who continues to betray and selfishly use others for his own ends. The whole story gets told in episode 10, after The Reveal that Nanbu's plan was to get Joe into Megalonia and then fix one of his matches to make money.
  • Johan Liebert from Monster (1994) kills his foster parents — many pairs thereof. Anyone who ever does anything remotely decent or nice for him ends up as the farmer to Johan's viper, but Tenma, the one who saved his life in the first place, gets the very worst of it through the horrible things that Johan does to others in order to "repay" him.
  • Moriarty the Patriot: Before he met his adoptive brothers, Albert once helped out a thief by paying for the food he stole and gave him silverware so he wouldn't need to steal again. A while later, Albert learned the thief used the silverware to buy a weapon and went to rob a bank, resulting in the death of many people, which nearly drove Albert to suicide.
  • Naruto: Jiraiya taught Nagato and Konan the arts of a ninja so they could survive. Years later, they became terrorists who threaten the entire world, and they eventually have a confrontation with Jiraiya that leads to his death. Nagato even lampshades it, telling Jiraiya that it was foolish to keep them alive back then and he should have listened to Orochimaru's offer to kill them (out of pity, because he thought that young orphans like them didn't have much future to look up to in the war-torn Amegakure). Jiraiya responds that, although he is disappointed by how they turn out, he never regrets taking them in.
  • In Okane ga Nai, Ayase saves Kanou, only to end up 4 years later as Kanou's love slave.
  • One Piece:
    • Kaya's family takes in an apparently down-and-out man and makes him their butler. He is secretly the pirate Captain Kuro, who develops a long-term plan; kill the entire family, steal their fortune, and retire on it.
    • Done likely by accident with Aokiji and Robin: Aokiji lets her live in spite of his order from the World Government, but, in spite of his warning to keep out of trouble, she's currently part of a crew whose leader declared war on the World Government. Of course, the fact she had a bounty on her made it rather difficult to keep a low profile, even if she wanted to (and it's shown in flashbacks she did try to, multiple times), and Luffy proved to be the only person both friendly and powerful enough to protect her from the government agents hunting her down.
    • Don Krieg and his crew were starving after their fleet was destroyed by Dracule Mihawk. Sanji fed them over everyone else's protests. Don Krieg "thanked" him by attacking him the moment he felt satiated and declared his intent to claim the floating restaurant as his new flagship. Sanji likely knew this would be the outcome, but having nearly starved to death once himself, wouldn't wish such a fate on anyone. Gin, Krieg’s own subordinate, also didn’t intend for this to happen and didn’t suspect he’d try to take the Baratie.
    • In the Fishman Island arc, Robin references this trope; when Jimbei asks her to free the slaves Hammond is using for his Slave Tank, Robin is disgusted by what Hammond is doing but expresses concern that the freed slaves will attack both her allies and enemies, hating Fishman Island after what they've been through. Jimbei says that they can simply fight them off if this happens and that he can't stand Hody's men acting like the Celestial Dragons any longer, persuading Robin to free the slaves, who help the Straw Hats against the New Fishman Pirates.
    • Still in the Fishman Island arc, a flashback gives us a variation, in that kindness isn't repaid with evil, but still with unkindness. After the pirate Fisher Tiger brought the little ex-slave girl Koala back to her home, he was ambushed by Marine soldiers, who knew he would be coming. The reason being that Koala's hometown sold Tiger out to the Marines, in exchange for not taking Koala back to the nobles who enslaved her (though the latter didn't know about it); a decision possibly made easier by the fact that Tiger was a fishman. Sure, it's not kind of them to do that, but considering their reasons, it can't be called "evil", and it's pretty hard to blame them.
  • In Pokémon the Series, when the Team Rocket trio got stuck in a cave with Brock and a scientist, they agreed to help each other to get out. When they found an opening they immediately went back into stealing Pikachu.
  • Puella Magi Oriko Magica: After Mami helps Kirika find a plushie she holds dear in some bushes, Kirika does thank her properly by treating her to a crepe. However, in the name of her love for Oriko, whom she is helping to kill other magical girls, it isn't long before she attempts to kill Mami.
  • Rurouni Kenshin: The starving, lonesome little kid Enishi almost dies in the streets of a foreign country (China) until a rich Japanese family saves him, even going as far as letting him stay for however long he needs, no questions asked about his obviously painful circumstances. He slaughters them and takes all their money purely because he was jealous of how happy they were. However, since Enishi wasn't irredeemable nor did he simply see the family as mere pawns to be used (normally the viper is the viper because they have no feelings for anyone and Enishi did it because of his jealousy not because it's a defining character trait), the trope is Downplayed.
  • Subverted in an episode of Samurai Pizza Cats. Bad Bird is about to fall off a cliff, and Speedy grabs him by the arm just before he falls. Bad Bird asks why he's helping him since he's an enemy. Speedy realizes he's right and lets him fall. This is especially interesting because Bad Bird ends up being redeemed at the end of the series.
  • Shinzo: This happens quite a lot; when Yakumo shows kindness towards a villain, you can bet they'll try to kill her anyway. Even regular Enterrans will betray her kindness in a second; Yakumo saves an Enterran child, but once the villagers find out she's human, they try to burn her.
  • In Tsukigasa, a group of robbers save Kuroe's life and have him stay on as their doctor. Five years later he ends up stealing their special maps, running off, giving them to his former friend who is a samurai so they can be tracked down, and personally killing the two that hunt him down. All because they were going to rob his Love Interest.
  • Vinland Saga: An English farmer and her daughter take pity on a young boy who stumbles into their cottage, feeding and delousing him and sheltering him from the soldiers who are looking for a Viking spy and are killing all strangers on sight. In return, the boy burns down the village's dock, signaling the Vikings nearby to come take the village, which they do. Said boy is the protagonist.

    Comic Books 
  • In Aquaman (2003), Aquaman uses his healing hand to cure Black Manta of Neron's alterations and a case of Hollywood Autism in the hopes of redeeming his foe, only for Manta to backstab him at a crucial moment and cheerfully admit to being a totally depraved person whose main goal in life is to kill him.
  • Arawn: A farmer couple provides shelter for a wandering stranger in exchange for work. The stranger repays the kindness by killing the man in his sleep, raping his wife right next to his body, and would have sacrificed their children if the woman didn't free herself in time and killed the bastard.
  • 52: Osiris, the brother-in-law of Black Adam, the (sort of) Evil Counterpart of Captain Marvel, takes in a lonely anthropomorphic crocodile as a pet/family member whom he names Sobek. For most of the series, Sobek is depicted as a cowardly yet friendly fellow with a huge appetite. He is actually one of the Four Horsemen of Apokolips, Eldritch Abominations that hail from Apokolips and given bodies by the Mad Scientists that also star in 52. "Sobek" is actually Yurrd the Unknown, Lord of Hunger. Sobek is a Big Eater because his hunger can only be satisfied with the flesh of a Marvel. He manages to trick Osiris into depowering himself while Osiris is guilt-ridden after accidentally killing an attacker. Sobek eats Osiris alive; the depiction in the comics is rather horrific. When confronted with this by Isis, Osiris' sister and wife of Black Adam, what is the traitor's response?
    Isis: How could you do this? We treated you like family. We loved you.
    "Sobek": What use is love to a reptile? My blood is cold!
  • Batman:
    • In a Detective Comics storyline, the Joker gets hit by a truck after trying to kill Robin. He gets taken in by a magician who came to Gotham to study its "fascinating" criminal element. The Joker repays his kindness by teaching him some tricks of the trade. Then the Joker garrotes him and steals his identity to facilitate (oddly enough) a Batman Gambit to get Batman into one of his more clever deathtraps, not that it works. It's the Goddamned Batman. The Joker even refers to the "Farmer and the Viper" story while recapping his scheme to Batman.
    • The Batman Adventures: The Batman & Robin Adventures story "Dagger's Tale". The title character is relating to when he followed this to a young hotheaded inmate, revealing how when he attempted to break out of prison with an Ax-Crazy partner it went horribly wrong and said crazy partner decided their partnership wasn't working out. Batman saves Dagger at the last minute. He's astonished for a second ("You-You saved me?!" "I save everyone."), but after remembering that Batman had previously gotten him captured in the first place decided to pay him back by attempting to stab him in the back, only to be punched out by the Dark Knight. After finishing things, he urges the inmate to not make a stupid mistake as he did and just serve his time out.
  • In Big Trouble in Little China, while traveling the Midnight Road, Egg and Jack ask for directions from a demon woman tied to a tree. Despite Egg's warnings, Jack takes pity on her and tries to be nice, and is nearly killed for his trouble.
  • Bone: In the prequel story Rose, Rose is forced to kill the first living thing she sees after slaying the dragon Balsaad in order to preserve the balance of the Dreaming. The first things she sees are her loyal dog Cleo and her treacherous sister Briar, who helped free the dragon to begin with. Briar begs for mercy, and Rose, not wanting to kill her sister, despite what she had done, reluctantly kills Cleo instead. However, as a prequel, we already know Briar will eventually pay back Rose's mercy by orchestrating a war between the people of the Valley and the Rat Creatures that resulted in the deaths of Rose's daughter and son-in-law and the fall of the kingdom of Atheia. Even at the end of the prequel, she begins to realize that she made a terrible mistake.
  • In Cereal, Quaker Oats stalls for time and frees Marquis de Cocoa. He "thanks" him by siring him, chains him to his own post and allows him to die in the sun, faking his own death. Granted, Quaker Oats only did it because he wanted to use the Marquis for his religious moralizing, but it's still a bit of a dick move.
  • Shazam!: In Whiz Comics #25 "The Origin of Captain Marvel, Jr.", Freddy Freeman and his grandfather were fishing in a lake when Captain Nazi is thrown into it by Captain Marvel in the middle of their battle. Freddy and his grandfather help rescue Captain Nazi, who repays them by killing the grandfather and crippling Freddy. Captain Marvel shares the power of Shazam with Freddy to save him, turning him into Captain Marvel, Jr.
  • Disney Ducks Comic Universe:
    • In Don Rosa's The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, Scrooge encounters an unnamed South Afrikaner ( who later turns out to be a younger Flintheart Glomgold) after the mining camp he had been a part of left him for dead for his numerous acts of thievery by tying him to a water buffalo. Scrooge saves his life and even shares his camp with him. The Afrikaner repays him by stealing all his supplies in the middle of the night and leaves him stranded in the wastelands. It's even lampshaded with Scrooge calling the Afrikaner a viper; he had experience dealing with unapologetic crooks, but this kind of betrayal genuinely infuriated him.
    • Used in the "Scrooge McDuck" story The Horseradish Story (September 1953) by Carl Barks. Scrooge and the nephews are trapped at sea with their enemy Chisel McSue. When Chisel seems about to drown, Scrooge contemplates whether he should let him die or not. Against his better judgment, Scrooge rescues Chisel. Shortly after, Chisel attempts to murder Scrooge... by drowning him.
  • In Frank Miller's Holy Terror, Amina is a Muslim exchange student who is shown kindness by a young person named Jaye, who invites her to a party. Amina turns out to be an Islamic terrorist and suicide bomber.
  • The idea of The Power of Love failing to redeem is featured in Johnny the Homicidal Maniac, when Devi asks Johnny on a date. All seems to be going well at first until Johnny realises that he's found someone who actually makes him feel happy. He then tries to murder her, the one person who ever showed him any kindness in order to "immortalise the moment." This goes to show how completely fucked up his mind is, as well as kill the idea of any more romance in the series. Devi gets away though.
  • The Mighty Thor: No matter how many times Thor tries to reach out to or forgive Loki, sooner or later Loki will stab him in the back. Or at least until the 00s, where Loki's character shifts so he's no longer out to deliberately hurt Thor. Loki does it again in Journey into Mystery, going so far as to lampshade it. While he keeps reassuring Thor of his good intentions, reciting him the first verses of "The Scorpion And The Frog", he still betrays him while telling "I'm no scorpion... for I am Loki!"
  • The Question recites a version of this parable to himself after he is attacked by a biker who he just saved from a fire.
  • Robin (1993): Tim tries to give Damian a second chance after their first meeting consists of Damian trying to blow him up and, though he never truly gives Damian his trust, Damian never truly stops trying to kill him, continuing sabotaging his equipment in potentially fatal ways long after he's mostly adapted to life outside the League of Assassins. Jason, on the other hand, betrays Tim thoroughly. After Tim helps Jason escape from Arkham and gives him access to the Batcave to view his portion of Bruce’s video will, Jason seems to be ready to uphold their unspoken truce but later has a complete breakdown over the message Bruce left him and nearly succeeds in killing Tim.
  • A variation on the tale itself comes in the Academy Comics' Robotech II: The Sentinels Halloween special, where after going with an Away team against the wishes of his wife Lisa, Rick Hunter explains his actions with the story, basically telling her that he's always gonna be a little headstrong and willing to take risks. Lisa teases her husband by saying: "So the moral of the story is you're a lying snake, huh?"
  • The Sandman (1989): Loki's urge to punish Morpheus because Morpheus helped him escape his eternal torment. Odin even cites this Aesop when pointing out to Morpheus how it is in Loki's nature to repay kindness with malice and ingratitude. Turns out to be an Invoked Trope on Morpheus's part; Loki's actions are all part of Morpheus's plan.
  • Deadshot references the frog and scorpion version in Secret Six after apparently betraying the team. Averted in that he was actually trying to protect the rest of his friends.
  • Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics):
    • Snively switches sides between the Freedom Fighters and Robotnik/Eggman frequently, usually for his own safety and benefit. It had gotten to the point where his sister, Hope, disowns him when his use of the trope leads to Knothole being destroyed and nearly led to the Freedom Fighters killed.
    • The original Freedom Fighters group that fought Robotnik prior to the modern heroes were betrayed by one of their own: a Mobian snake named Trey Scales. His excuse for turning on them was that it was "totally in his nature" to be a traitor due to being a snake. However, Trey failed to take into account that backstabbing was Robotnik's nature as well and he was roboticised alongside his former comrades.
  • A recurring theme throughout Sonic the Hedgehog (IDW) is that Sonic's tendency to be kind towards his enemies often has long-term consequences. His insistence on showing mercy to Eggman and Metal Sonic led to the Metal Virus nearly destroying the world. When he and Tails decided to send the Deadly Six back to their home planet rather than punish them for their crimes, their leader Zavok mocked them by promising that he would repay Sonic's compassion with violence and misery. Sonic is occasionally shown to be more than somewhat troubled by this and he has been repeatedly criticized by his friends for his leniency, but he also refuses to compromise his morals out of fear.
  • In Sonic the Comic, Super Sonic was actually Sonic's Superpowered Evil Side. During one story they got split apart, and Super Sonic lost both his power and his memory, becoming far more mellow, and befriending a magician called Ebony, who helped him get back on his feet. At the end of the series, Ebony and Super Sonic showed up at the final battle against Chaos, Super Sonic dying as a result of losing his power. Super Sonic absorbed the energy from Chaos, restoring his power... and his former Omnicidal Maniac personality. Fortunately, unlike most examples of this trope, he didn't kill Ebony. But she was forced to merge the two Sonics back together to stop Super's rampage.
  • Star Wars:
    • Star Wars: Doctor Aphra: In issue 19, Triple-Zero tells Aphra they're ultimately not that different, and for all she claims shock and disgust at his actions, she also uses and hurts people—especially those who helped he—because she likes it.
    • One Star Wars Legends one-shot comic focused on a Sith master and apprentice in the Rule of Two era. After the apprentice kills an abusive slaver (passing it off as not tolerating being insulted when the slaver assumed he was his master's property, but clearly being more upset about his abusing the slave girl) and frees his slave, he seems rather more concerned than Sith are supposed to about anyone, and once it's clear to the two she's force sensitive the apprentice requests she be allowed to come. The master reminds his apprentice of the rule of two within earshot of the girl... who promptly shoves the apprentice off a building to his death and joins the Sith with a smile on her face.
    • In the Star Wars: Age of Resistance comic featuring General Hux, Hux finds himself marooned on a strange planet after his shuttle was sabotaged, where he meets an old Alderaan guard named Bylsma who had taken refuge on the planet there since the destruction of his homeworld. Hux manages to convince Bylsma to let him use his communication device contact his friends and get help. Once "help" arrives, Hux has his Stormtroopers kill Bylsma's animal companions, then leaves the planet without Bylsma, all the while stating his intention to use the planet as a target practice for his Starkiller Base.
  • Star Wars: The Clone Wars: Darth Maul: Death Sentence: A wounded and delirious Maul is rescued from desert caves by native Blind Seer Trisjon and his granddaughter and nursed back to health because his menacing appearance and opposition to the evil mining syndicate makes them think he is The Chosen One of Trisjon's visions: the Demon of Light. Maul agrees to start Training the Peaceful Villagers, but trains them in a cold, Darwinian fashion that emphasizes being willing to abandon their friends and family, murders Trisjon for realizing he plans to use them as cannon fodder, and then goes through with that plan and risks slaughtering the entire native species just because doing so will make his plan slightly easier.
  • Supergirl:
    • In Way of the World, Supergirl breaks a mad scientist called Alphonse Luzano out of jail, hoping he will be grateful enough to help her save an ill child's life. Luzano repays Supergirl by using the lab she provided him with to give himself powers, and then attacking her.
    • The Villain Who Married Supergirl: When Raspor, space pirate Viperie's partner-in-crime, is captured and is being trasported by an impenetrable police spaceship, Viperie put on her space suit and let the cops see her adrift in space. Believing her to be a wrecked ship's sole survivor, the police crew brings her on board, and Viperie proceeded to break Raspor out.
  • Superman:
    • In Two for the Death of One, Lord Satanis is cast out of Hell and into a medieval town after a long battle. Being on the brink of death, he is found and nursed back to health by the townsfolk whom he kills as punishment for seeing him weak. Extra points for summoning poisonous snakes to do the work.
      Lord Satanis: Like the gullible fools they are, the people of this village nursed me back to health when they should have killed me as the agent of the Anti-God that I had sworn to become. Only these fools had seen me weak and helpless, and so I paid them back for their kindness... by summoning forth the great poisonous serpents which were mine to control.
    • The Death of Superman (1961): When Lex Luthor finds a cure for cancer and announces his intention to turn over a new leaf, Superman decides to give him one chance and vouch for him. Lex Luthor is released from jail, befriends Superman, and when he is ready, Luthor reveals it was just a ploy to lull Superman into a false sense of security and kill him.
      Lois Lane: Luthor would never have been released from prison if Superman hadn't gone to bat for him! He repaid Superman's kindness, by killing him!
    • The Death of Ferro Lad: Superboy saves the villainous Emerald Empress from being burned at the stake, and then gets poisoned by the Kryptonite rock in her pocket. Superboy painfully asks her to throw the Kryptonite away before it kills him so he can make her an offer (full pardon for her crimes in exchange for helping the Legion out during a crisis); rather than throw or put the Kryptonite away, though, the villainess smugly suggests Superboy to talk fast, only putting the rock back in her lead pocket when Superboy has finished talking and fallen unconscious.
    • In Superboy (1980) #17-18, a guy called Carl Draper gains powers, learns Superboy's secret identity, and attempts to kill him out of jealousy because Lana Lang will not go out with him. Rather than wipe his secret identity out from Carl's mind and drag him to Smallville police station, Superboy decides to give Carl a second chance by making him forget the whole incident, and not telling Lana anything so she won't think badly of Carl. Twelve years later, Carl, still obsessed with Lana and jealous of Kal-El, will create a new super-villain identity - the Master Jailer - to contend with Superman.
  • Played back and forth in a comic for Transformers: Animated where Ratchet is shown helping a Decepticon suffering from "Cosmic Rust", a disease some Decepticons released in the middle of a battle. Ratchet does it on the grounds that while the commanders knew the score for doing such a thing, it's no reason to abandon a soldier. Then it turns out the guy was the one that made the disease, and infects Ratchet with it after being cured. However in the process, they made a cure for the disease that Ratchet was able to take back, and he'll probably be able to save plenty of Autobots if they can manage to replicate it.
  • Usagi Yojimbo also makes use of the "Farmer and the Viper" story when a hapless fisherman rescues Jei-san after the latter was stabbed in the stomach and tossed off a cliff into a raging river and fails to notice Jei's Milky White Eyes, ominous voice, and the mysterious chill that follows him. Jei even tells the story to the fisherman right before Jei kills him with his bare hands.

    Comic Strips 
  • Prince Valiant had the Frog and Scorpion tale being told to justify an Enemy Mine situation...up to the point where the frog swims across the river with the scorpion on its back. Later on, the person telling the tale privately reveals the Downer Ending and jokes dryly that the story is a lot better without it.

    Fan Works 

Crossovers

  • In the Batman and Harry Potter crossover Ace of Spades, Harry becomes obsessed with Jim Gorden due to how he treated him nicely while he was in Arkham. Later, Jim adopts Harry into his family, and is rewarded for the gesture by Harry and his son Jimmy working with the Joker to murder Jim's wife and daughter.
  • Avatar: Legend of Diamond Tiara: Twilight forgives Trixie for everything she's done, offering her a chance at redemption. Trixie's response is to strike while Twilight's guard is down, then mock her as she lies dying before her.
  • Death Note Equestria: When the thief who killed Angel Bunny is released on parole, Fluttershy offers him some sympathy and kindness. Once his parole is over, however, he breaks into another house... and this time, he kills a little filly.
  • The very first lesson Littlepip learns in Fallout: Equestria. Upon leaving the stable, she's captured by slavers alongside a stallion named Monterey Jack, and she helps him escape. As soon as they're in the clear, he turns his guns on the weaker Littlepip and demands her supplies. Much later, they meet again, and this time Monterey pays back for his crime with such Disproportionate Retribution Littlepip begins to regret even pursuing this vengeance.
  • Guardians, Wizards, and Kung-Fu Fighters: The Mage released Nerissa with the hopes of redeeming her, only for Nerissa to murder her and steal her identity.
  • Harry Potter and the Mystic Force: When he turns upon Harry in the Dark Wish world, Voldemort simply says "Frog and the Scorpion," implicitly chiding Harry for being willing to trust him in the first place.
  • Marvel Gems Universe: After learning that Steven was forced to hand the corrupted Gems over to Titus and Holly Blue, Rocket berates him for falling into this trap, as he's already dealt with people who treated him kindly only to stab him in the back later.
  • Discussed in My Little Balladeer: Twilight notes that Thorne could have earned the wealth and renown he desires through his knowledge and skills, wondering why he's so keen on doing terrible things. Applejack replies that "For some skunks, it's just plain fun ta get what they want by hurtin' somepony else."
  • The novelized fanwork The Myth of Link & Zelda: Breath of the Wild at one point has Paya and Link traveling together through the Blatchery Plain, and they rescue a woman from a Bokoblin attack, but they're too late to save the man she's with, implied to be her husband. Paya realizes too late that the wounds on the dead man are from a slit throat, not from being clubbed to death. The woman they saved is actually a Yiga Clan Footsoldier, and she quickly attempts to kill Link and Paya. Link puts a stop to that very quickly, but that betrayal really leaves an impact on Paya.
  • Point Me at the Skyrim: Antares spares Raven's life, even though she's clearly a remorseless murderer and rapist of a bandit, and Raven attempts to clobber her as soon as Victoria turns her back on her.
    Antares: Fucking why?!
    Raven: You let your guard down. I had to give it a shot.
    Antares: I held back. I gave you a second chance and saved you from giant spiders. From being executed even!
    Raven: Ya. Thanks.
    Antares: Fuck you.
  • A Spartan in Westeros: In one Omake, Master Chief tells Sansa about "The Frog and the Scorpion", warning her that Joffery will never come around and start caring about her. Not beyond how much power he holds over her, or how much he can hurt her, anyway.
  • Star Wars vs Warhammer 40K: In Season 3, Ahsoka saves an Imperial Guardsman who she found trapped inside of a wrecked Imperial Knight that had a jammed access hatch. Upon being freed, the Guardsman initially seems grateful and thankful towards his rescuer... until he sees what Ahsoka looks like and realizes she isn't a human. Even though Ahsoka points out that she literally just rescued him, he doesn't hesitate to pull out his sidearm and try dumping his entire magazine into her while screaming at her to die. Played With in that despite this initial reaction, she eventually manages to get him to realize she isn't going to eat him or suck out his soul, and convinces him to take a message to his superiors in hopes of negotiating a ceasefire. But on the other hand, he was only willing to hear her out once he found out she was from a Human Subspecies.
  • Played With in The Wedding Crashers: So far as Jacob and the rest of Leah's packmates are concerned, she's an Ungrateful Bitch who doesn't deserve to be so generously included in their family, much less involved with the wedding. In reality, all of her so-called benefactors are blithely ignoring the fact that Leah wants nothing more to do with any of them, as they've done nothing but treat her like trash, constantly rubbing in how much they look down upon her with their Condescending Compassion and constant harping on how she should be grateful for their casually callous treatment. When Jacob accidentally frees her from being packbound, she gleefully takes her revenge, which they view as her being a backstabbing bitch.

Avatar: The Last Airbender

  • The Fire Chapters: After helping a little girl, Zuko finds himself being chased by soldiers. Seeing where he's hidden, the girl yells that she's found "the man with the scar"... and points the opposite way, sending his pursuers off in the wrong direction.
  • Fractures: The Chaunli interlude has the titular innkeeper taking in an injured man, letting him stay for free while nursing him back to health. Unfortunately, his kindness is repaid by the man (revealed to be Admiral Zhao) stabbing him in the throat with a knife after he overhears the admiral plotting to restore Ozai's firebending.

Danny Phantom

  • Danny Phantom: Stranded: Colette Bevier repays Stella's years of love and pampering by bullying her daughter Star, even trying to kill and ruin her life by framing her, along with developing no respect for Stella and just treating her as a means to an end at best.
  • The Phantom Twins: How did Blizzard repay Frostbite for taking him in as his apprentice? Why, by turning against him and trying to take over the Far Frozen, of course!

Death Note

Dragon Ball

  • In Honor Trip, Cell finds out the hard way that you shouldn't try and forgive somebody who has been literally programmed to be an Omnicidal Maniac.
  • What If Krillin Became a Saiyan?: Krillin teams up with Vegeta after the Saiyan Prince comes to him insisting that they have to work together to deal with the Ginyu Force. After they've taken down Ginyu and two other members, with Krillin being seriously injured in the process, Vegeta steals the Senzu Beans and kidnaps Dende, abandoning him with no source of healing or other backup to deal with the wrath of the two remaining members.

Fire Emblem

  • An Eagle Among Lions: Discussed in Chapter 59: Kronya recounts the tale of "The Scorpion And The Frog" to Ingrid, stating that the reason why she's following Dedue's orders despite not being able to stand them is "Because I'm a scorpion, and it's simply in my nature to sting." She then turns this into a "Not So Different" Remark:
    Kronya: You think I don't have anything in common with a girl who just instinctively capitulates whenever someone tells her that their needs come before hers? Face it, Ingry — you may be a dirty, primitive human, but you and I were built the same. We're both a pair of scorpions. Look on the bright side. At least you're not a frog.

Gravity Falls

  • run:gifocalypse:
    • Mabel starts pitying Professor Sonia after learning that Sonia believes she's not "perfect enough" to play music in public. So she encourages her, eventually giving Sonia the confidence... to try "playing music" by capturing the main gang and shipping them to .GIFfany. This sends Mabel into a Heroic BSoD over the betrayal, as she was more familiar with the other copies acting like Card-Carrying Villains.
    • Subverted with Professor Dian, who comes off as even more pathetic and self-battering than Sonia, but ultimately turns out to be one of the nicest copies.
    • Ultimately played with regarding Soos' attempt to redeem .GIFfany herself. While he offers her a place at the Mystery Shack as her secondary home and she gets a job working there alongside Melody, it turns out that she's still trying to win him back. While she's no longer nearly as violent as before, and clearly did learn something, she remains quite selfish.

Judge Dredd

  • Early on in the Fan Film Judge Minty, Minty tries to grant mercy to a member of the Kovaks gang who opened fire on him (which carries an instant death sentence in the Dredd universe), only to get shot for his trouble. He doesn't make the same mistake at the end of the film.

The Legend of Zelda

  • Occurs in one of the fairy tales told in Once Upon a Fairy Tale. A mortal finds his way to the realm of the fairies searching for a stolen treasure and the fairy queen takes pity on him, helping her extensively in his search and showing him the wonders of their world. The guest repays the queen by killing her with the intent of taking over as ruler. It's later revealed that this is Sheik's rewriting of her mother, the wicked queen, entered the world of the Twili and killed the then-queen, Midna, who had tried to use their meeting as an attempt to reconcile their peoples.

Let the Right One In

  • A Darker Take: Maggan is a compassionate woman who takes in Oskar and Eli out of pity, only to learn the hard way how a newly-turned vampire is likely to repay such kindness. A sadly similar situation plays out with the mother in Sweet Kids.

Love Hina

  • For His Own Sake: Granny Hina eventually realizes — far too late — that Naru is so self-absorbed that she will unhesitatingly stab anyone in the back if she thinks it will benefit her. Including her own family, and the woman who did so much to enable her for so long.

Minecraft

  • My Craft: While being chased by Nephrait, Cobb turns around and saves her from being killed by a horde of Zombie Pigmen. She repays him by knocking him out and sending him to The Pit.

Miraculous Ladybug

  • In BURN THE WITCH, Lila rewards Marinette's efforts to protect her from Witch Hunter and the mob by complaining, snarking, and attempting to throw her under the bus and get her lynched as an 'accomplice' in order to distract the mob. That last bit backfires, however, as it only serves to alert the mob to her position, and adds the betrayal to Witch Hunter's list of her crimes.
  • Feralnette AU: Amelie formed several informal contracts with her best friend Emelie as a way of maintaining their connection despite Gabriel being a Control Freak. After Emelie mysteriously disappeared, Gabriel started exploiting those contracts, aiming to line his own pockets at Amelie's expense while trying to destroy her business. And he combined this all with a healthy helping of emotional extortion:
    Felix: [quoting Gabriel] "The least you can do for your 'sister' is aid her family. You wouldn't hurt Adrien by hurting my own business, would you?"
  • Played With in Happy Birthday, Miss Bustier: Prior to Lila coming along, Chloé was the student who benefitted the most from Caline Bustier's insistence that it fell upon the victims of bullying to "lead by example" and forgive their tormentors while refusing to punish the culprits. Yet Chloé repays Caline's "kindness" by having the Bourgeois lawyers help lead the legal charge against her teacher... because she's befriended Marinette, and because she's pissed off that Caline let Lila sexually harass Adrien.
  • The Karma of Lies: Highlighted as one of Adrien's Fatal Flaws; even when he knows that somebody is acting cruelly, he dismisses their behavior so long as it doesn't personally affect him. This comes back to bite him hard several times over.
    • With Lila, he firmly believes that he's safe from her scheming since he already knows that she's a liar... and a bad one at that. Or so he thinks; Lila uses his underestimation of him to lure him into a false sense of security, setting a trap that he wanders right into... in fact, she's astounded upon seeing that he doesn't think twice about entering his bank account passwords right in front of her.
    • After learning that his own father was Hawkmoth all along, Adrien begins defending his Archnemesis Dad by insisting nobody was really hurt by his reign of terror, since Ladybug's Miraculous Cure repaired all the physical damage done... provided, of course, that she was able to win the fight and purify the akumatizing butterfly. Not only does this turn public opinion against both of his identities (Adrien for being the son of a supervillain and Chat Noir for defending Hawkmoth), Gabriel has no problem blaming Adrien for the failure of his schemes. Including the fact that the only "emergency account" Adrien had access to was a secret, hidden account that Gabriel intended to use for more evil, with him angrily lashing out at his son upon learning Adrien accidentally handed Lila the opportunity to clean it out.
    • When he goes after Mayura, he offers her a hand up after seeing that she's Nathalie. She rewards this gesture by swiping the Black Cat Ring right off his finger, which gets misinterpreted by the media as him willingly handing over the Ring.
    • Adrien also finds himself hard-pressed to convince anyone of the truth. Not only is the truth not helping his case by revealing his self-centered attitude, others naturally question why he'd be stupid enough to lower his guard so much around somebody he knew to be untrustworthy?
  • Prince Charming: Discussed by Adrien and Plagg after they realize that True Love's Kiss can break the Werecat curse that Adrien uses as a loophole to get around being Blessed with Suck, meaning that he can't be with the girl he loves:
    Adrien: Thank you for this gift, Misfortune. My compliments to you, you really know how to turn a wish into a double-edged sword.
    Plagg: Hm. You say that as if I did it on purpose. I did not grant your wish with malice.
    Adrien: I know. It's your nature. You can't help it, just like I can't help enslaving those around me.
  • In this what-if scenario where Felix is one of Marinette and Adrien's classmates, Adrien desperately tries to avoid exposing Lila as a Bitch in Sheep's Clothing even as Felix verbally backs him into a corner. When Alya misinterprets matters and thinks Adrien misled Marinette to think she was a liar, Lila leaps at the chance to play the victim at his expense. Felix isn't surprised by this; Adrien very much is.

My Hero Academia

  • Cain:
    • Katsuki repeatedly rewards Izuku's efforts to reach out to him with vehemence and violence. For instance, at one point Katsuki breaks his own fingers while trying to punch Izuku. Izuku offers him a hand up, asking if he's okay; Katsuki interprets this as mocking, grabs his hand, and uses his Quirk to heat up the sprinkler water on Izuku's skin.
    • This also applies to his relationship with All Might. While Katsuki doesn't make the best first impression upon Toshinori, especially when he threatens to reveal his secret unless he lets him join their training sessions at the beach, Toshinori still sincerely tries to teach him what it truly means to be a hero. But Katsuki repays his efforts with Malicious Slander, trying to convince Inko that Toshinori's a predator abusing her son so that he can have All Might all to himself.
  • Reality Check: Throughout the story, Shinsou rewards his new classmates' efforts to reach out to him with scorn, disdain, and spite, gradually driving them away. The biggest victim of this is Momo; throughout the whole school year, she repeatedly offers to help him with his studies, which he blows off and treats as Condescending Compassion rather than sincere efforts to help. Then he finally decides to accept her offer... on his terms, by brainwashing her into giving him a copy of her essay before deleting it off her own computer, wanting to Plagiarize her work and screw her over. Afterwards, Momo slaps and furiously calls him out on his ingratitude.

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic

  • The Conversion Bureau: The Other Side of the Spectrum: All of PHL!Trixie's efforts to help Focus Ray result in the good guys being betrayed and hurt. Ultimately, she's forced to kill him.
  • Fools And Drunks: Gladstone repays all the kindness and compassion Ruby Gift shows him by helping the other residents of Sunney Towne Kill the Cutie.
  • In Sympathy for the Siren, Fluttershy finds Sonata Dusk alone and helpless in an alleyway, feels sorry for her and gives her a home, and befriends her. But when she goes to sleep, she wakes to find Sonata gone. Where'd she go? Well, it turns out that this was just her plan to get the Dazzlings' powers back using the ritual sacrifice of Fluttershy's animal friends, and she also plans on making Fluttershy her pet. She succeeds, too.

Naruto

  • Blackkat's Reverse: Kakashi finds Kurama Uzumaki, a homeless but skilled Shell-Shocked Veteran presumably from the dead village Uzushio, who helped him rescue the daimyo's daughter from bandits. Kakashi takes Kurama back to Konoha to reward him for his help and help him land back on his feet. Kurama ends up kidnapping Naruto, the young son of Kakashi's late sensei. But Kurama is actually a Peggy Sue trying to rewrite the past who kidnapped Naruto because he couldn't stand to see the child version of his Only Friend be ignored, abused and kept ignorant of his heritage.
  • Déjà vu no Jutsu: Homura is spared from being executed alongside Danzo since he wasn't truly involved with ROOT. He then decides to get revenge upon Natsumi by lying to the Kurama clan, falsely informing them that she shares their bloodline. The Kurama then kidnap her with the intent of forcing her to become a mind-broken broodmare.
  • The Kakashi Way: Hiruzen was well aware of Danzo's ambitions, as well as his jealousy over him being named the third Hokage. He also knew that Danzo had a hand in causing the Uchiha Massacre, yet kept him around, trusting that Danzo's devotion to protecting Konoha would outweigh his worse aspects. He comes to regret this after a time-displaced Sasuke attacks Danzo and exposes the depths of his treachery, starting with ripping off his arm filled with stolen Sharingan. Then they discover the private records Danzo kept detailing all of his schemes, including all the people he'd targeted to hurt their loved ones.
  • The Moon Cries in Reverse: Jiraiya learns that Team Ten, here consisting of Naruto, Sakura and Shikamaru, has been systematically abused due to Anko, Ibiki and Hiruzen's irrational fear that Shikamaru's intelligence could make him the next Orochimaru. Jiraiya attempts to prevent this from becoming a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy. After Team Ten betrays Konoha anyway during the Crush attempt, Jiraiya reflects upon the story, wondering "Is this like that story about a man saving a snake, only to be bitten for his kindness? For expecting a reward from the wicked?"

One Piece

  • In New Game Plus, Luffy's Breaking Speech to Garp involves forcing him to face the fact that he simply cannot trust the Marines not to stab him in the back simply for being the son of a revolutionary.
    Luffy: I'm not saying it would happen right away. It might take weeks; it might take months. Hell, it might be years. But sooner or later, they'll start to think it. That I'm a sleeper agent. Or that I'm leaking information. Or that my goddamn blood is just dirty. And it wouldn't matter if I was the Commander-in-Chief when it happened. They would kill me without a second thought, 'for the good of the world'. And there wouldn't be anything I could do to defend myself. For my sin, is existing.
    Garp: No, no, they wouldn't do that!
    Luffy: Baterilla! Based on the rumor of a rumor, Marines spent over a year scouring the island for a sign, any at all, of a child of the Pirate King. Pregnant women were kidnapped to be put through blood tests. Infants were put through the most invasive, comprehensive battery of exams available. Any who resisted were executed. And if they had found such a child, he would have been murdered in his cradle. In the womb. This is how much stock the Government puts in a person's bloodline. Do you deny it?

Pokémon

  • For The Mission: Ian/Nate invokes this after revealing to the rest of Wigglytuff's Guild that he's Grovyle's partner, as part of a Zero-Approval Gambit to help everyone see that returning the Time Gears didn't restore time to those areas.

Rosario + Vampire

RWBY:

  • Abyssal Infinitum: In Liar's Gambit, Sarah decides to betray the man who saved her life, giving her shelter and a job, as part of a desperate bid to make it to Vale before the Fall of Beacon.

Tolkien's Legendarium

  • Splint: After Old Granny nearly kills Cadoc and is revealed to have killed some members of the Gundbarashal tribe, Grazad pleads for mercy on their behalf, trying to convince Durkarn to lock them up rather than executing them. Old Granny shows absolutely no gratitude for Grazad's efforts to take care of them; after several weeks, they betray their would-be protector and attempt to kill them, alongside others, before being put down.

Touhou Project

The Twilight Saga

  • For You, I Will: When Embry imprints on a seemingly nice and accepting girl named Melanie, the rest of the Quileute pack are nothing but kind towards her. Then it turns out that Melanie is a sociopath, who quickly takes advantage of the fact Embry can't say no to any of her demands. In the end, when the Quileutes finally start wising up to Melanie's true nature and plan on doing something about it, she orders Embry to kill them all.

Worm

  • Here Comes the New Boss:
    • When Muscular challenged Needler for leadership of the Teeth, she easily defeated him. While she destroyed one of his eyes, Needler spared Muscular at the time as she felt the Teeth needed every cape they had given the situation in the city. Muscular repaid this mercy by betraying the Teeth to the Nine, leaving only two surviving members. The Butchers never spared a failed challenger again.
    • As a general principle, Ironclad approves of leniency and second chances, but he thinks that the Undersiders, specifically, won't step up and justify any of it. Amy is much more vocal about it being a bad idea. Subverted when they prove to be quite loyal to Elpis, even refusing her orders to throw her under the bus to save their own reputations once she's exposed.
      "When this all goes to hell, I'll be right there saying I told you so... I agree with the sentiment, I just don't think it's going to work with these guys."

    Fairy Tales 
  • The Farmer and the Viper (Aesop's Fables): Trope Namer. The farmer only tries to save the viper from the cold, but it kills him in return.
  • "The Death of Koschei the Deathless": Ivan finds the evil sorcerer Koschei trapped in a dungeon and begging for some water. Ivan takes pity on him and gives him three buckets of water, whereupon Koschei becomes completely recovered, snaps his chains, and kidnaps Ivan's wife.
  • In "Little Otik", one childless couple finds and adopts one strange baby monster who ends up eating them whole.
  • "The Spirit in the Bottle": Mercurius begs the protagonist to be let free, but when the protagonist obeys, Mercurius threatens to kill him. But after being tricked into the bottle again, Mercurius promises him he will be rewarded if he frees it again and Mercurius keeps its promise.
  • "Water of Life (Brothers Grimm)": The youngest son asks the dwarf to free his two brothers and on their way the two swap the youngest's Water of Life with sea water, so when he gives it to his ill father, his illness becomes worse and he is accused of poisoning him. Then the two older brothers give their father the real Water of Life, so they could be praised for saving him.
  • "The Wolf Of Zhongshan": Dongguo saves a wolf from some hunters, but instead of showing gratitude, the wolf threatens to eat him, otherwise it would starve.
  • Joseph Jacobs' "Yallery Brown" (link). The main character releases a small spirit trapped under a stone, and the creature puts a bad luck curse on him.

    Films — Animation 
  • Doctor DeSoto: The titular mouse dentist takes a chance to treat a fox's toothache when the fox begs him for help, and the very grateful fox plans to eat him anyway. Dr. DeSoto finishes the job out of professional pride and survives by gluing the fox's mouth shut on the way out, having no illusions about the fox's intentions.
  • Frozen (2013): From the moment they meet, Anna shows Prince Hans nothing but kindness and love, and even considers him her One True Love. In fact, both share their similar backgrounds of older siblings ignoring them and even quickly agree to a Fourth-Date Marriage despite meeting each other on the same day, something which they get called on. It doesn't stop his plot to seize control of Arendelle by faking his romance with Anna and doesn't soften his attitude towards her — in fact, when he reveals his true colors, he cruelly mocks her for quickly agreeing to marry him "just like that," which made his plan easier than expected. It briefly left her despondent, but Anna realizes there are others (Olaf and Kristoff) who still care for her. Hans has been confirmed to be a "frozen-hearted" man and a subversion of the classical Prince Charming Disney is known for. Also, Hans is later revealed to be Anna's Evil Counterpart, Foil, and Shadow Archetype, as while she manages to reconcile with Elsa after 13 years of separation and retains her optimism, he remains bitter against his 12 brothers and makes it clear to Anna that he will never reconcile with them.
  • Happy Halloween, Scooby-Doo!: Velma is trying to talk to Professor Jonathan Crane in the armored car transporting him to prison, and they fall under attack by the Jackal Lanterns. Crane asks for his Scarecrow gear back, citing "Extenuating circumstances" to her. She actually cites the story of the Scorpion and the Frog as she returns Crane's gear to him, acknowledging that she's making a risky choice. Ultimately subverted, as Crane shows Villainous Valor and focuses his attention solely on the monsters attacking them, shouting to Mystery Inc, "This is no time for bravery! RUN!"
  • Kung Fu Panda 3 has this in the villain's backstory. Kai and Master Oogway were old friends who went into battle together as warlords of Ancient China. Oogway was injured in battle and Kai carried him for days looking for help. They came across a village of pandas who saved Oogway's life using chi techniques the world had never seen before. Kai's reaction to them helping his friend, for sharing their secret arts out of the goodness of their hearts? Try and kill them all and steal their power for himself. Thankfully, Oogway stopped him, but he managed to come back from the dead hundreds of years later to menace China for the "betrayal" from Oogway.
  • The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part: During the first stage of the Duplo Invasion, Emmet built a LEGO heart that he gave to the Duplo aliens as a peace-offering...only to have them smash it, swallow the pieces, and then start destroying the city. Turns out that the aliens actually were trying to make peace in the only way they knew how, because Bianca thought a game based on breaking things was the only one Finn would enjoy.
  • The Lion King (1994): Mufasa learns the hard way that being nice to an Obviously Evil sibling, who was scheming right behind his back, isn't going to change his heart. And not even entirely behind his back. Scar all but announces on the day of Simba's presentation that he hates the new cub, wants the throne, that Mufasa should beware of him, and that he won't attempt to seize it by challenging him directly.
  • In Toy Story 3, Buzz and Woody risk their lives to save Lotso from the dump shredder, even though he had previously tried to kill them. Then, at the dump incinerator a few minutes later, it's Lotso's turn to repay the favor. Instead, he leaves Buzz, Woody, and all the toys to burn to death. Unfortunately for Lotso, karma makes sure he pays for the act by a garbage man, who finds him and attaches him to the grille of his truck.
  • Zootopia: Subverted. While it appears at first that Nick Wilde is the traditional sly, untrustworthy fox when he takes advantage of Judy Hopps' naivete to pull her into his pawpsicle hustle and later delivers a solid Break Them by Talking speech to her, over the course of the film, it's revealed that Nick was originally as idealistic as Judy until a childhood trauma caused him to live up to the stereotype that society had about foxes. His character development arc reveals that his kind and idealistic side still exists, it was just buried and Judy's faith in him helps that resurface. At the end Nick abandons his con-mammal ways and joins Judy as a police officer in the ZPD.

    Music 
  • Al Wilson's "The Snake" is a variation of the trope-naming story set to music. A "tender-hearted woman" finds a "poor half-frozen snake", and takes it home with her and warms it up, but is bitten in much the manner of the farmer.
    "I saved you," cried the woman, "and you bit me, but why?
    You know your bite is poisonous and now I'm gonna die."
    "Oh, shut up, silly woman," said the reptile with a grin,
    "You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in."
  • In ASP's "Die kleine Ballade vom schwarzen Schmetterling", the Black Butterfly twice says "Kann nichts dafür, ich bin doch nur ein wildes Tier" (It's not my fault, I'm just a wild animal) in order to excuse torturing (and maybe killing) the protagonist.
  • The song "The Snake" by Mediaeval Baebes is sung in Old Spanish and matches this trope almost completely with the difference being that the snake starts growing dangerously big and when the farmer tries to kick it out of his house, it squeezes him to death instead of stinging him. The lyrics apparently come from a fable from El Libro de Buen Amor (The Good Book of Love) by Juan Ruiz, Archpriest of Hita from the 14th century AD/CE.
  • Megadeth's song "The Scorpion" alludes to "The Frog and the Scorpion" in the refrain. The lyrics are otherwise more about a figurative scorpion rather than a literal one.
  • Given a Perspective Flip in Nick Cave's song "Fable of the Brown Ape", where the snake is portrayed as a victim rather than a threat.
  • In the old Scottish folk song "The Fair Flower of Northumberland", in Northumberland (just south of Scotland), a prisoner from Scotland is locked up. The chief magistrate's 15-year-old daughter unlocks him after he promises to marry her "and make [her] a lady of high degree." Once they're in Scotland, he displays nothing but contempt for her— beginning with "Get down from that horse, you're a brazen-faced whore."

    Myths & Religion 
  • The Scorpion and the Frog is an ancient African and European fable commonly misattributed to Aesop is equally if not more popular than the trope namer, but also deals with how evil is ultimately unconsciously self-destructive. In the fable, a scorpion asks a frog for a ride across a river, with the scorpion promising the frog that he won't sting the frog. But as the frog is crossing the river, the scorpion stings him anyway, and both the scorpion and the frog die. Just before the frog dies, it asks the scorpion why it would doom them both, to which the scorpion replies that being evil is just in its nature, and the scorpion couldn't help itself. The myth has a lesson that being nice to evil people is just going to get it thrown back in your face.
  • A variation involves the Lion and the Unicorn. The two were enemies, but the Unicorn agreed to let the Lion borrow its horn. The Lion then ambushed the Unicorn and stabbed it with the horn. When the Unicorn asked why the Lion did this, the Lion responded by asking why the Unicorn trusted its worst enemy in the first place.
    • The Lion and the Unicorn are respectively the heraldic supporters for England and Scotland, by the by. It's probably best not to elaborate on this point.
  • A version of the story from the American South comes from the collection that became Song of the South. In it, Brer Possum helps Brer Snake out of one jam after another, only to be told at the last, "Well, you knowed I was a snake when you put me in your pocket!"
  • A Zen parable tells of two monks who were washing their bowls at a river. One monk saw a drowning scorpion and saved it, only to be stung — again and again. The other monk asks why his brother keeps saving a creature whose nature is to harm, and the first monk replies that his nature is to help.
  • In addition to the Trope Namer, Aesop also told a fable in which a wolf starts hanging around a shepherd's flock but doesn't seem to be causing any trouble and in fact helps manage the flock. The shepherd then makes the mistake of leaving the flock in the wolf's care, and you can guess how that works out. This is where we get the phrase "once a wolf, always a wolf."
  • In India there is the story of "The Tiger and the Farmer". The gist is that a farmer was traveling on a road when he saw a tiger in a cage, the tiger promised that if the farmer opened it, he would flee into the jungle. The farmer was suspicious but let the tiger go, only for the tiger, who blamed the predicament on the farmer for trusting a hungry predator, to try and eat the farmer. Just then a wise man came upon the scene and asked what happened. When they told him, the wise man insisted that the tiger was too big to fit in the cage, the tiger got inside to prove he could fit, the wise man locked the cage, and he and the farmer left the tiger to his fate.
  • Japanese Mythology has a kind of Yōkai called the Konaki-jiji, which normally looks like an ordinary baby and poses as a baby someone abandoned. As soon as someone tries to pick it up, it grows really big and crushes them. In the stories, Konaki-jiji doesn't even gain anything from this, so it's just crushing people For the Evulz.
  • The Four Gospels: This is an often overlooked part of Jesus' "pearls before swine" parable in Matthew 7:6-7 (NKJ): "Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you in pieces."

    Professional Wrestling 
  • Many times, "Stone Cold" Steve Austin would act friendly to somebody else only to kick them in the gut and then stun them for the hell of it. Sometimes, he even lampshaded it by saying "DTA! Don't trust anybody!" right after.
  • Happens again and again whenever the heel is a Dirty Coward. You can bet farthings to fritters that as soon as the face has overpowered the heel, he'll be on his knees crying: "Nooo! Noooooo!" Any face who is not savvy enough to just hit the guy anyway after that will be deservedly punished with a thumb to the eye or an even more painful indignity. (If Ric Flair is the heel, the odds of this not happening are nil.)
  • Jake The Snake once referenced the Aesop in a story as well, demonstrating that the concept has been in the ring for decades. However, in his version, the man asked the snake why he betrayed him as he lay dying, and the snake spoke "Oh, come on. You knew I was a snake the day you found me."
  • A rare example of a Heel doing this to another Heel:
    • During the build to ECW Barely Legal, April 13, 1997, a masked man who was believed to be Rick Rude was threatening "The Franchise" Shane Douglas and promised to unmask if Douglas successfully defended his ECW World Television Championship against Pitbull #2 (w/Pitbull #1) at the PPV. Douglas won his match, and what was believed to be Rude's voice came over the sound system, saying that he'd take his mask off, but Douglas has to "give up the girl" (Francine) or he'd give Douglas "the ass-kicking of a lifetime." The masked man then walked out in Rude's trademark robe. Shane pushed Francine toward him. The masked man kissed Francine, who, believing it was Rude, appeared to pass out in delight. Then, one of Douglas's riot guards took off his helmet, revealing himself to be Rick Rude. The masked man unmasked and took off his robe, revealing, instead, Douglas's Triple Threat ally "Bulldozer" Brian Lee, who then choke-slammed Douglas. Douglas, Chris Candido, and a clearly disgusted Francine ran off, vowing revenge.
    • After a few more months of making trouble for Douglas for his own amusement (including pulling up Francine's dress to reveal her panties during Douglas's match with Chris Chetti at Buffalo Invasion on May 17th), he surprisingly turned on Tommy Dreamer and the Sandman in a six-man-tag against Rob Van Dam, Sabu and Jerry Lawler at Heatwave on July 19th, giving the Triple Threat hand sign. Douglas defeated ECW World Heavyweight Champion Sabu and Terry Funk in a three-way-dance to win the title at ECW's second PPV, Hardcore Heaven, on August 17th. This led to Rude becoming a manager for the Triple Threat (now, Douglas, Candido, and Bam Bam Bigelow, w/Francine) and handpicking opponents for him, as thanks for Douglas giving Rude one night with Francine. Douglas defeated Al Snow, Balls Mahoney, and Phil LaFon. Then came the October 16th show at the Elk's Lodge in Queens, NY. Rude told Douglas that he had found him an opponent who "ran roughshod over the WWF." Douglas asked, "You got me the Boy Toy?"note  Then, "Welcome to the Jungle" started playing, with Douglas doing a great Eye Take, as BAM BAM BIGELOW was revealed to be Douglas's opponent, meaning that Rude had tricked Douglas TWICE in SIX MONTHS.
  • In Ring of Honor, CM Punk started as a heel, turned face, and was receiving massive cheers by the time he won the ROH World Heavyweight Champion, at which point he made a promo referencing Aesop's story and declared "I'm still a snake, you idiots!", declaring that he was going to take the title belt with him to WWE, and signing his WWE contract on the ROH title belt. Of course, as an indie darling and a good performer, he was face for over a year (and not just with indie fans) since hitting WWE...and then he assaulted fan favorite Jeff Hardy and stole his title after Jeff had been champion for about five minutes.
  • Edge did something similar in 2010. Returning from injury during the Royal Rumble, he came back to a huge ovation as he won the match and went into Wrestlemania as the challenger for the World Heavyweight Champion. After coming up short too many times and then getting traded to Raw, Edge revealed his true nature in a rant, going on about how switching shows ruined his opportunity to be the top face of Smackdown.
  • Torrie Wilson fell victim to this in a match where she teamed with Sable against Dawn Marie and Nidia (w/Jamie Noble) on the May 1 (taped April 29), 2003 WWE SmackDown. Torrie started for her team, and the heels worked over her leg...and that was pretty much the entire match, as Sable stepped off of the apron and started walking away from the ring, deliberately avoiding Torrie's attempt at a tag. Torrie eventually submitted to Dawn Marie's single-leg crab and could only lie there on the mat in pain visibly saying over and over, "You bitch!"

    Radio 
  • In a 2014 episode of The Now Show, John Finnemore updates "The Frog and the Scorpion" as "The Business Secretary and the Hedge Fund Managers", with the moral that hedge fund managers (who are definitely not scorpions) can't be expected not to manipulate shares of public services to maximise their profits if they have the opportunity to because that's their job, and it should be the job of the government not to give them the opportunity if doing so would be bad for the country, instead of just trusting they won't. It's also mentioned that the hedge fund managers aren't vindictive, just uncaring; rather than trusting a scorpion not to sting, it's more like trusting a fire not to burn.

    Tabletop Games 
  • BattleTech:
    • ComStar Precentor Martial Anastasius Focht relates the Scorpion and the Frog version to Primus Myndo Waterly as a warning that her attempt to play the Clans and Inner Sphere against each other with the intent to usurp both of them will only lead to ComStar's ruin. Myndo completely misses the point, and names her supposed masterstroke to bring the Great Houses and Clans to their knees "Operation Scorpion." It fails miserably, and does indeed leave Myndo's successor as Primus working overtime to keep ComStar relevant, despite the shattering victory of the ComGuards over the Clans at the Battle of Tukayyid.
    • Count Nicholas Fisk is this in the later Fed-Com Civil War timeline. Despite supporting Katherine Steiner-Davion (who at this point has lapsed into full tyranny) and participating in a couple of war crimes himself, Fisk would be pardoned by the victorious Victor Steiner-Davion and allowed to remain Count of Odessa as a gesture of magnanimity. Later, Fisk would be caught working with the fanatical Word of Blake splinter faction despite being spared worse punishments earlier. Not only was Fisk on the Blakist take, he was also poisoning his own world and reaping massive profits from it. Adam Steiner, now Archon of the Lyran Commonwealth, proved too Genre Savvy and too cranky to tolerate the shenanigans of the Fisk family. Steiner publicly declared Fisk and his heirs unworthy and stripped the entire line of their noble titles and assets, nipping further potential betrayals in the bud. This also gave Steiner considerable leverage against other noble families who might consider going down similar routes, as it demonstrated that even a two-hundred-year noble lineage was not immune to Steiner's fair but unflinching hand.
  • In the game Legend of the Five Rings, the classic story of the frog and the scorpion is told, but when the frog asks the scorpion why he doomed them both:
    Frog: Now we shall both die! Why on earth did you do that?
    Scorpion: Little frog, I can swim.
    • In fact, "I can swim." is literally the family motto of the Bayushi, the primary Scorpion Clan family.
    • Specifically, Bayushi smiled after he heard the story, telling Shinsei that he understood the meaning of the story. His eyes revealed that he didn't really have enlightenment. So Shinsei hit him in the mouth. Bayushi then covered his mouth, because it was what had lied. The Scorpion Clan wear masks in memory of the event, and to make it easier to lie. It's hard to believe that a spymaster and the man that taught an Empire to deceive somehow couldn't stop smiling.
  • Defied in Princess: The Hopeful: A Mender Princess' first Oath states they are supposed to heal and help anyone who requests it, regardless of who that person is, but it also points out they are allowed to take precautions to protect themselves and their loved ones should this trope be a possibility. After all, just because you must help everyone doesn't mean you have to be stupid about it.
  • The Imperium of Man loves this fable, since their state religion is founded on Absolute Xenophobia.
    • The Tau, meanwhile, are xenophiles, so they tend to be more willing to coexist with aliens (including humans). Sometimes, such as with the Kroot, it mostly kind of works. Other times, not so much; for example, the human population of Kronos rewarded the Tau for their public works projects and Ork control efforts by siding en masse with Lukas Alexander's Imperial Guard. If the Tau win the Dark Crusade campaign, it's implied that a covert sterilization program is deployed to make sure they don't pull it twice, which is certainly a harsh option, but given that in the reverse circumstances the Imperium would have either scoured the planet from orbit or put most of them to the torch it's hard to view it as too over-the-top.

    Video Games 
  • Likely in any game with multiple factions but a Gang Up on the Human mentality. If you run into a battle to save one group it's far more likely that everyone will immediately start ignoring each other and focus entirely on destroying you.
  • In Age of Wonders the Keepers attempt to raise some goblins to be good. The Cult of Storms has no trouble convincing the goblins to riot and help kill the Keepers' leader.
  • Assassin's Creed: Valhalla: Mid-way through the game, Basim tells Eivor a version of The Scorpion and the Frog story. In it, the scorpion and frog both get across the river, no harm done. Then the scorpion goes and kills someone else just because it can. At the end of the game, Basim attempts to kill Eivor and Sigurd out of desire for revenge against who they were in a past life, a fact Eivor isn't aware of, so they have absolutely no idea why their former ally has suddenly gone very insane.
  • Avencast: Rise of the Mage: The Player Character has to release the demon Kulkurazzz from centuries of imprisonment in a top-secret lab in order to breach a magical barrier. However pleasant he is to the demon, the next time it meets him, it takes Revenge by Proxy on him — never mind that he wasn't responsible for its imprisonment and had no way of knowing about it — and leaves him for dead.
  • Batman: Arkham Series:
    • Batman: Arkham Asylum: This is a core part of the backstory of Amadeus Arkham, founder and namesake of the titular asylum: he took pity on the psychotic killer who murdered his family and tried to cure him. The killer pretended to be cured and then murdered the nearest secretary he could get his hands on. This incident shattered Arkham's faith in humanity from that point, along with his sanity, eventually leading him to fatally electrocute the killer and get himself committed to his own asylum.
    • In Batman: Arkham City, during the last trip into the Steel Mill, Batman saves a Two-Face thug from being lowered into a vat of molten steel by Joker Thugs. Once the thug is offscreen (invisible to the player, even if within Batman's line of sight), he attacks Batman.
  • This trope is debated in Breath of Fire III in regards to the Nue. While Bunyan tasks Rei with killing it, Ryu and Teepo catch up and lend a hand, only for the trio to find it clutching a cave behind it in its death throes; looking inside reveals that it had cubs, all of whom are also dead. The resulting debate shows that Bunyan is fully aware of this trope, and expects the Nue cubs to do the same thing all over again next time if they were alive.
    Rei: Hold on! This thing was attacking the village just so it could feed its cubs... and you had us kill her?!
    Bunyan: If you knew that it had cubs... would you have let it live?
  • In Chapter 1 of Deltarune, Defeating the King either by fighting or simply stalling him out leads to the King collapsing to the floor, exhausted, while giving a speech about how he wasn't always such a bad person. Ralsei, the party's White Mage, takes pity upon him and heals him, which the King uses as an opportunity to hit the party with a surprise attack that nearly results in their death, only being saved by the King becoming incapacitated, either by his former minions, or Ralsei putting him to sleep. Either way, Ralsei apologizes to the team for trying to help a person who had no plans on cooperating.
  • In Demon's Souls If you save Yurt the Silent Chief he will follow you back to your home base and gradually kill every single NPC (making the game MUCH harder) before making an attempt on your life. Alternatively, if you meet Mestopholies (Yurt's accomplice) she will hire you to kill all the NPCs, and after your mission is complete, she then tries to kill you. This is because both are deadly assassins tasked by the Order of the Soul with the sole purpose of killing anyone aware of the ways of the Soul Arts in Boletaria in order to keep it secret.
  • In Dragalia Lost, this happened during the Monster Hunter: Primal Crisis crossover event. The Dyrenell Empire is ransacking a village when the Fatalis pops in and slaughters the Empire soldiers. Just as the villagers are ready to prepare a feast for their savior, it turns on the villagers and slaughters everyone except for one child who's left to tell the tale to the party.
  • In Dragon Age: Origins, Sten was left for dead when the darkspawn massacred his squad. When he came to, he found that he had lost his sword (without which he could never go home again) and slaughtered the villagers who picked him up and nursed him back to health in a blind rage. He follows the player as his own Redemption Quest because of this.
  • The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim:
    • Sometimes when fighting Bandits they'll crouch down and proclaim they yield and beg for their lives. So okay, you spare them... two seconds later they get a second wind and try to kill you again. And no, they are not ever scripted to "yield permanently".
    • In the Dragonborn DLC, one of the bosses you have to defeat, Ildari Sarothril, is a mage apprentice who served as a test subject for her master, who abandoned her after thinking she had died in the experiment. When you track her back, you find out she had since been found and nursed back to health by a group of miners. Having turned insane from the experiment, she repaid their kindness by killing most of them out of paranoia and turning the others into test subjects.
    • Another one involving bandits- there's a cave to the north where a bandit group was slaughtered by hagravens. One bandit was captured instead, and begs you to free him. But if he is freed, he tries to kill you anyway.
  • In Fable I, the Fallen Hero and bandit leader Twinblade begs the Hero of Oakvale for mercy when defeated in combat, but sends a squad of assassins after him if spared.
  • In Fallout: New Vegas
    • The Courier can horribly screw over both of the people involved in saving their life after they were shot in the head and left for dead, first by joining up with the Powder Gangers to destroy Doc Mitchell's hometown of Goodsprings, then by blowing up an army of Victor's securitron "brothers" and murdering his creator, Mr. House. The Courier could also be the victim of this trope in an event that was cut from the game: If the Courier saves Benny from Caesar (this is after Benny tried to kill The Courier twice) Benny was originally supposed to ambush The Courier afterwards.
    • Near Nipton, you may encounter two NPCs named Tomas and Jacklyn shooting each other, as they are fighting over Tomas's blue star bottlecaps. If the Courier chooses to intervene and saves Jacklyn, she'll thank the Courier for helping her, but will attack them the moment they turn their back on her to get the caps. If the Courier saves Tomas instead, they have the option of killing him for the caps.
  • Fate/Grand Order:
    • This is the default relationship of anyone who shows kindness and empathy to The Fair Folk in Fairy Round Table Domain: Avalon Le Fae. By their nature, the Fae are pure and innocent creatures...which means that they don't understand things like human morality and are very, very impulsive when it comes to fulfilling their designated "Purpose" (essentially their meaning in life, and they'll degenerate into a Mors/Moss or mutate into a Nightcall if they can't). It doesn't matter how kind you've been to them in the past, if harming you now gets them closer to fulfilling their purpose, or even if they just want to, they'll screw you over with nary a batted eye and no remorse. Their own kind aren't exempt either, with Morgan's iron-fisted grip on them being the only reason the Fae haven't just wiped themselves out entirely by impulsively killing each other over and over again. For specifics:
      • In Cornwall, poor Degas gets his head ripped off by the Cornish Fae for daring to suggest that maybe they should be friends with the Protagonist and Chaldea party instead of eating them, which he does partly to protect them too since consumption of humans is very strictly regulated by Morgan. And of course, they all start murdering each other over who gets the new meal immediately afterwards.
      • The Nameless Fairie/Hope spent her whole life doing her best to spread her namesake to her fellow Fae, as was her Purpose. How did they reward her? By callously taking all her kindness for granted and never thanking her to the point that, by the time Chaldea meets her, she's on the verge of becoming a Mors because nobody remembers her and hasn't appreciated her efforts.
      • Baobhan Sith was once a sweet young Fae who did all she could to make her fellows happy. Like with Hope above, they never thanked her for it....then they went a step further, repeatedly ripping her apart and leaving her to die once they'd taken all they could from her. When Morgan came across her and realized that this had happened to poor Sith so much that she was on her last life, she took her in and taught her to hate, be cruel to and torment the Fae simply to stop her from being killed again.
      • Even worse than that is with Morgan herself, because she's actually Aesc/Tonelico The Saviour all grown up and the previous Avalon Le Fae. She's also thoroughly disillusioned and hardened after all her efforts to save the Fae were repaid with them killing her, simply because they felt slighted that Avalon sent an Avalon Le Fae to save them as opposed to them being able to save themselves. The last straw for her was the Fae turning on and massacring almost all of her old adventuring companions save Ector on the eve of Uther's coronation as king. Why? Because the Fae didn't like the idea of anyone ruling over them, even if their ruler had saved them all and united the nation. After that, she decided to save the land of Britain itself, without caring about how much she had to abuse and dominate the Fae to do it.
      • The absolute crowner, however, is the truth about the original Six Fae and Cernunnos. After they awoke to a world completely wiped clean of anything save the oceans, Cernunnos was sent by Avalon to punish the Six Fae for slacking off on their duty (the duty in question? Forging Excalibur to deter alien threats, which led to Sefar the White Titan wiping Earth clean of all life because it wasn't around to be used against her), but because he was kind and caring he let them ride on him and even promised to build them a new home somewhere, hoping to rehabilitate them with kindness. So, how did the Six Fae repay this extremely generous treatment? They murdered him with poisoned wine, built the south of the new Fae Britain on top of his corpse and then ripped apart his priestess (who was cursed with immortality by them beforehand) to clone a new human race from for livestock and labour. All this while still having the sheer nerve to blame Cernunnos for their failings...because apparently he didn't browbeat them enough into forging Excalibur.
    • The Lostbelt's assigned Crypter, Beryl Gut, is just as bad as them...which is why he likes it there so much.
      • Kirschtaria Wodime gave up his opportunity to be the sole Crypter shaping the new Age of Gods, instead convincing the Foreign God to revive the rest of Team A and put them all in charge of one of the new Lostbelts, including Beryl. Beryl later conspires with Morgan and Koyanskaya to sabotage Wodime's plans and Fantasy Tree, then later on flat-out murders Wodime by stabbing him In the Back, because Wodime's endgame plan runs antithetical to Beryl's desire to kill as he pleases.
      • In the British Lostbelt's past, Morgan killed the original Beryl Gut as part of reshaping the Lostbelt into a Lostworld, because he'd seen the original state of the Lostbelt (a barren wasteland with nothing but the Fantasy Tree after the Fae killed themselves to extinction) and she couldn't have his knowledge tainting the new Lostworld. However, she still goes to the trouble of cloning him perfectly and transplanting his memories over with no extra safeguards on top of that, seamlessly enough that Beryl doesn't even realise he is a clone until he thinks a little more deeply about Morgan's Mental Time Travel and the implications thereof. He repays her for this by murdering her subjects, causing general chaos, wrapping her daughter Baobhan around his finger and helps to bring her down by attacking Woodwose alongside Sith in the aftermath of his failed attack on Londinium, which is the last straw to convince him that Morgan sent him there to die and prompts him to turn on and badly injure her in the climax of Part 2.
      • Baobhan Sith is infatuated with Beryl over their shared love of murder and does just about anything to please him. He in turn never treats her with anywhere near that much affection, still being obsessed with Mash, and even teaches her unique curses that, while very powerful, have the effect of rotting the user's soul with every use. This eventually leaves Sith too weak to protect herself when Aurora and Spriggan start their uprising, letting them capture her and use her as the bargaining chip they need to prevail against and kill Morgan.
  • Heavy Rain. During the ending showdown with the Origami Killer, it is entirely possible that the fight will end up on a tall structure, and properly dodged or countered attack will leave the killer hanging by his fingertips over a deadly drop. The killer will humbly ask for your aid, and you have the option of pulling him to safety or letting him fall. Should you choose the former, the killer will give you a sincere-sounding word of thanks before immediately resuming his attempts to kill you. Even the most Genre Blind player would see this outcome a mile away, but the killer is so Faux Affably Evil that most players are tempted to at least take a chance on saving him.
  • I Became a Dog: In ending 3. Julia helps you get rid of Tomy, but you decide to lock her up in prison again so all the food can be yours.
  • Kingdom Hearts: Ansem the Wise took Terra-Xehanort in and gave him a home when he found him amnesiac on the streets. Terra-Xehanort thanks him by manipulating his other apprentices into helping him follow his plans, stealing Ansem's identity, and destroying Radiant Garden.
  • A variation: Knights of the Old Republic, Jolee Bindo, having lived as a hermit on Kashyyyk for twenty years, helps the player character out and then follows you off-world. For a good while, he claims that his reasoning is that he'd finally gotten sick of the planet, he wanted to see the stars again. But as he gets to know you he tells you a parable about a young man who one day finds a snake in his village. He follows the snake, helping it away from the village and into a great desert. Without food or water to be seen, the snake bites the young man. The snake then asked why the man followed him, and the man replies; "Did I follow you? I thought I was leading you away from everyone else!" Considering that the player character is Darth Revan, that parable might or might not apply to you. At any rate, this particular snake can choose whether or not to bite.
  • At the beginning of The Last of Us Part II, Joel and Tommy rescue a girl named Abby from a horde of Infected. She repays them by luring them into an ambush and fatally introducing Joel to the business end of a golf club.
  • During the final battle of Minecraft: Story Mode episode 7, PAMA tries to show that he redeemed himself by showing last minute regret and pleading for Jesse not to pull out the Redstone Heart. However, if you choose to forgive and give him a chance, he immediately goes back to being evil and tackles Jesse into falling to his death.
  • This is Kira's ending in Mortal Kombat: Armageddon. She uses the life energy granted to her by the Elder Gods to bring back Kobra, her old Black Dragon teammate who died in battle, and who was a pretty big Jerkass when he was alive. Kobra repays the favour by killing her, calling her weak and saying that she should have left him dead. The other way around is the same too, in Kobra's ending, he also had the Elder Gods revive Kira, who proceeds to kill him with a kiss of death.
  • Mouthwashing: The relationship between Curly and Jimmy is this. Not only is Curly the reason Jimmy even has his job to start with, vouching for him to Pony Express, he also doesn't punish Jimmy even when he finds out he raped Anya on the voyage, instead trying to smooth things over. In addition, he good-naturedly shares with him and the crew the knowledge that Pony Express is shuttered and they're all getting fired once the voyage is complete so they can prepare themselves. How does Jimmy reward Curly's generous treatment? First, he crashes the Tulpar to shirk punishment for raping Anya, responsibility for the baby born from the act and the reality of being jobless, while taking advantage of Curly's horrific injuries and incapacitation to lie to the crew that Curly was responsible and assume command himself, despite being far from ready for the responsibilities of command, force-feeding Curly meds to keep him quiet all the while. As everything starts going From Bad to Worse from Jimmy's poor decision-making, he begins verbally abusing the helpless Curly and the crew to the point that he's Forced to Watch as Anya crosses the Despair Event Horizon and overdoses in front of him while locked in Medical....while Daisuke fatally lacerates and burns himself crawling through a broken vent trying to unlock the door. All Curly can do is go Laughing Mad in despair once Jimmy finds the emergency revolver... followed by suffering through torture and mutilation when a delusional Jimmy cuts off some of his leg to feed to him trying to keep him alive, then freezes him in the final cryopod while he's Driven to Suicide as well off screen.
  • Part of Nox's history includes a warrior named Jandor growing tired of the massive war he was a part of, and eventually refusing to kill a young girl who's the last of the Northern Mages and their "cursed blood legacy", instead handing her over to be cared for by a tribe of ogres. The girl's name: Hecubah, the Big Bad of the game who's trying to Take Over the World.
  • This happens twice in Octopath Traveler, both times in Alfyn's Chapter 3.
    • Alfyn meets a badly injured man named Miguel and treats his wounds, continuing even when he hears rumors that the man is a thief and murderer (on the condition that Miguel gives up his criminal life). Miguel "thanks" him by kidnapping a small boy for ransom and mocking Alfyn's bleeding heart, all without a shred of remorse.
    • When the dust settles, the cynical apothecary Ogen recounts this happening to him in his backstory; he took a wanted criminal into his home and healed his wounds, only for the man to murder his wife.
  • In Persona 5, the protagonist is charged with assault and put on probation for the crime of trying to save a woman from a drunken molester. Said woman ended up testifying against him instead in court, kickstarting the events of the story. Justified in that the drunkard was a politician whose kind of power she would fear only naturally, especially since it's implied that he could scapegoat her for some of his illegal dealings. That said, Yusuke is rather appalled at the woman's actions after hearing the story.
  • Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction: Upon discovering his heritage as a Cragmite, Emperor Tachyon immediately got to work on wiping out the entire Lombax race (the ones who raised him from a hatchling, in spite of what he was) and coercing the Drophyds into helping him take over the galaxy and bring about the return of said Cragmites. Ratchet rightfully calls him on it:
    Ratchet: The Lombaxes raised you! How could you do this to them?
  • Resident Evil 7: Biohazard: Late into the game, Ethan discovers that the Bakers were originally a mostly normal family, up until when they rescued and sheltered Eveline from a shipwreck. Unfortunately for them, Eveline turned out to be a murderously insane bioweapon that ended up brainwashing and infecting them with the parasitic Mold, turning them into psychotic and cannibalistic killers.
  • Six Ages: Ride Like the Wind: One of the stories that your clan circle can bring up is one where the demigod Zarlen traveled for many months alongside a talking bear. Eventually the bear turned on him because, companionship or no companionship, it was still a bear.
  • Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves: Penelope is captured twice, by General Tsao and Captain LeFwee, and the Cooper Gang drop whatever they were doing to save her. She responds by betraying them to Cyrill Le Paradox, pulls Bentley into a fake relationship to get at his "potential", intends to erase the Cooper family from history out of pure spite, and destroy Murray's van with him in it. The gang respond by leaving her in 1301 to die, furious that they've befriended such a sociopathic monster who ruined their lives.
  • Small Saga: A book of fables recounts the story of a viper who wants to cross a river and asks a raven to carry her. The raven is aware of this trope but despite his instincts picks her up and flies with her... and they land safely on the other side, where the viper thanks the raven.
    "Hold up. Why didn't you bite me? You had every opportunity. Isn't biting in your nature?"
    "In all thingsss of nature, there is something of the marveloussss."
  • A good chunk of Tales of Xillia relies on this trope, so much so that it's barely even a spoiler. Jude forgives Alvin for betraying the party about four or five times, despite the fact that one of these times almost directly causes Milla's death. And of course, he just keeps on betraying you, and every time it gets worse. He's not really evil, though - he's more of an Anti-Hero.
  • The Tekken series:
    • At the end of Tekken 4, zombie cyborg former Interpol agent Bryan Fury is saved by Dr. Boskonovich and installed with a perpetual generator. Bryan's thanks is to trash the lab and kill members of the Manji clan, who were led by Dr. B's close friend Yoshimitsu.
    • Tekken 8: The DLC campaign Unforgotten Echoes ends with the Tekken Monks annihilated by Heihachi Mishima, the same man they went out of their way to save from falling into a volcano at the end of Tekken 7.
  • In Touhou Project, there was a man named Iwakasa that saved a young girl while he was on a mission to destroy a dangerous artefact. The girl tagged along with him on his mission but after some events on Mount Fuji he was killed by the girl on the descent and she took the artefact for herself.
  • Undertale: On a No Mercy route, some monsters still try to show you kindness despite you trying to kill literally everyone. Perhaps most notable is Toriel, who invites you into her home and treats you with love... only for you to murder her and all the inhabitants of the Ruins. Inverted during the final battle with Sans, where he, at one point, offers to spare the player, only to kill them once they try- justified in that they were clearly beyond helping, and they had already killed Papyrus, so Sans wasn't going to even consider letting them get away with it.
  • In Venus Blood -Frontier-, Loki flees to the mortal world in a battered skyship totally devoid of weapons...an image he deliberately orchestrated so he could claim to the Spring Valkyrie, protector of that world, that he and his demon friends were just refugees wanting to live in peace. The Valkyrie could crush him, and they both know that, but she gives him the benefit of the doubt. Within months Loki's recruited an army and set out to conquer everything she holds dear.
  • Xenoblade Chronicles 2: This forms a big part of Amalthus's backstory and Start of Darkness. While he always had a deeply-rooted feeling of misanthropy stemming from the childhood trauma of fleeing for his life from enemy soldiers, his mother pushing him off a hill to help him escape and dying at their hands, and him proceeding to smash their sleeping heads in with a rock on finding her corpse, it was only amplified by growing up and witnessing further acts of people taking advantage of or being cruel to each other. One of his major breaking points was when he took pity on a wounded soldier and helped heal his wounds, only to later discover that same man robbing a home. By the time he intervened, the man had already killed the mother in the house and was about to kill her infant. In a cold fury he then kills the man, only able to then cradle the crying infant and wonder to himself if this world is hell and if it's somehow all part of The Architect's "grand design". This leads him to climbing the World Tree to seek out answers, and what he finds out or rather, what he interprets as an answer just sends him downhill.

    Visual Novels 
  • Slay the Princess: Attempting to free the Witch from her prison in Chapter II will always end with her betraying you, no matter how you go about it. This is because to even get to this point, the player must have already betrayed her trust in the previous chapter, leading her to conclude that betrayal is in both of your natures and that she's simply acting first. That and she, by her own admission, is spiteful enough that she'll gladly give up her one chance at freedom to make you suffer. There's even a pair of achievements, "The Scorpion" and "The Frog", you can get if you betray her first or she betrays you, respectively. You can also try to make amends by handing her your weapon as a show of good faith, which predictably results in her stabbing you with it— only to realise, to her horror, that you were being sincere.

    Web Animation 
  • In one episode of Nigel and Marmalade, Nigel stops Patricia from murdering a thief, then gets the thief to promise to never steal again in exchange for being freed. Upon being freed, said thief immediately grabs the knife the Patricia had been planning to kill him with, and uses it to take Nigel as his hostage.
  • Space King shows us the story from the perspective of the viper. The not-Tyranid makes a deal with the Psycho Warrior team in which both sides get what they want. She upholds her side of the bargain, and retreats peacefully back into her hole when they're done. Captain then chucks a grenade in after her.

    Webcomics 
  • Subverted in Bob and George, in the Mega Man 3 storyline, everyone is telling Dr. Light he's an idiot for trusting Dr. Wily. As expected, Dr. Wily betrays them and steals Gamma and the power crystals, only for Gamma to fail as Dr. Light had the power crystals replaced with faulty ones, and Dr. Light saying he wasn't stupid and took precautions.
    Dr. Light: Just because I gave Dr. Wily the benefit of the doubt doesn't mean I didn't have a back-up plan.
  • In Drowtales, Ven'nedia accepts the highly demon tainted Creepy Child Kharla'ggen into their "clan" (a loose conglomerate of tainted drow seeking mutual protection and understanding) to try and help her adapt to her condition and live a normal life. She and her daughter treat her like family and even normalize her enough that, while still incurable, she settles down. Then their clan is attacked and nearly destroyed, and she kills all the invaders singlehandedly. When rival Sene'kha proposes using Kharla'ggen as a figurehead leader she is opposed, and when voted down tries to run away with her daughter Kiel'ndia ... only to have Kharla'ggen turn her into a living puppet, put on display over their main entrance to scare enemies (and allies).
  • Another frog-and-scorpion version shows up in a Sunday special of Kevin & Kell where the scorpion subverts the tale and lampshades this by saying the story doesn't take into account ethics, moral compasses and free will firmly fitting the scorpion on the nurture side of the Nature Versus Nurture debate.
  • The parable is used as the basis of a weapon's backstory in Keychain of Creation. This is Exalted, even the swords have cool histories and vendettas. And since the Farmer here is called "The King of the Uncloaked Steel," it should come as no surprise that he basically finds eventual betrayal to simply be a bonus to their relationship. And they also fall in love, with the eventual betrayal still staying the same. They're just weird, crazy people/Exalted/Snake-swords.
  • The Scorpion and the Frog parable above inspired Vriska Serket in Homestuck (or rather, she inspired it), as her motif is arachnids and has a self-destructively malicious nature. Appropriately enough, she dies (again) by trusting her worst enemy, Terezi, not to kill her when her back is turned. Terezi, having foreseen the consequences, stabs her in the back.
  • The parable was implicitly referenced in this Penny Arcade strip (appropriately titled "Parabolic") about a developer and a games journalist, with the journalist represented by an actual scorpion. True to the trope, the developer makes the mistake of trusting the journalist in an unguarded moment and tells them the truth about their game, and is betrayed in response.
  • Played for Laughs in Wilde Life: Oscar tells this story to Hanyi the World-Eater, to explain why he's reluctant to trust her. However, she gets confused since she is a (giant, immortal) frog, and asks if Oscar is saying that he's really a scorpion.
  • Wonderlab: This is the backstory of the Servant of Wrath. She used to be a Magical Girl named the "Magical Girl of Courage", and she made friends with the Hermit of the Azure Forest, who was an enemy of her homeworld. The Hermit used this friendship to take advantage of her, and destroyed her homeworld. The Magical Girl of Courage was so filled with guilt over what she had done that she transformed into the Servant of Wrath.

    Web Original 
  • In Twig, Sylvester, a Child Soldier Human Weapon created by an Academy of Evil which is fighting against a rebellion, is trapped by advancing elite rebellion troops who use a new agony inducing bullet to drive Academy warbeasts mad with pain. Sylvester is captured but spared due to an enemy soldier seeing him as a child in pain, and is taken to a medical tent, where he and his companions receive treatment, but they promptly kill the medic and the soldier before going on to attack the rebellion forces from the rear using their own incendiaries.


 
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Alternative Title(s): Scorpion Dilemma, Frog And The Scorpion, The Scorpion And The Frog, Farmer And The Viper

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Amalthus

Despite how harsh and cruel both his life and the world of Alrest can be, Amalthus dedicated himself to spreading kindness and help others. However, after helping a soldier heal from the wounds of war, he finds the same man having murdered an innocent family to loot from them, and furiously revokes his former kindness, and begins to question what the god he worships intended and if humanity deserves any kindness.

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