[quote]A small taste should be given of what the focus character(s) was like before their second chance. They could stomp puppies for all I care(please don't describe them stomping puppies),...[/quote]

So don't actually describe it? Okay, good enough.

[hr]

So, here’s the thing; I’m not used to telling stories, especially my story. It’s not much. Just a story of redemption and change. A story of new beginnings. Of how I went from a very bad man to a hero.

Nah, not really. 

My name is Axel Blacksoul, and, as of two days ago, I was the edgiest edgelord on the wrong side of town. My heart was a black hole of self-loathing and hate. My mind was a pit of despair and rage. I lived in a rat’s nest by myself, with nothing but a mattress to sleep on. I didn’t need to eat. My body was fueled entirely by self-loathing and misery. I didn’t communicate with anyone except the evil voice in my head, who told me to do things. Awful things. Puppy-stomping things.

That’s right. I used to stomp puppies. 

It wasn’t a great job, but it had to be done. As long as there are two puppies in this world, one of them is going to need to be stomped on, and I was the meanest, toughest puppy-stomper of them all. No puppy was too cute to not be stomped. If someone needed a puppy stomped, I was the one they called. But it was worse than that. At first, I did it for the money (there’s good money in puppy stomping), but soon it became an obsession. It sustained me. Kept me alive.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Axel is some kind of monster, right? No one could ever stomp a puppy on purpose. But that’s where you’re wrong. You just have to let go of the horrible lie that any good exists in the world and accept that the only things worth doing are evil. It’s a whole new level of edginess that only the blackest of souls can reach, but it’s there. If you were as twisted up as I was, you’d understand. At the time, it just…[i]made sense[/i]. I wore black leather boots, and I wasn’t having a good day unless a puppy was under one of them.

But something happened yesterday. I was sitting in my room, in the dark, engulfed in wretchedness, when the evil voice said “[i]Hey, you know how you stomp puppies[/i]?”

“Yeah. It’s what I do,” I said, lighting a cigarette. 

“[i]Well[/i],” the voice said, “[i]What if you didn’t stomp puppies[/i]?”

“I have to stomp puppies,” I snarled, suddenly enraged. I threw the cigarette on the floor and crushed it with my leather boot.

“[i]No, you really don’t[/i],” said the voice.

“But it’s what I do. It’s what you TOLD me to do. YOU wanted me to stomp the puppies,” I growled in frustration, lighting another cigarette.

“[i]Yeah, and I’m having second thoughts. I was expecting it to be a one-time thing, but it’s gotten a little out of hand[/i].”

“What else is there to do besides stomp puppies?” I cried into the darkness, the bitterness in my soul clawing against my mind. I threw the second cigarette down and crushed it even harder that the first one.

“[i]Literally anything else. Just stop stomping puppies. It’s actually starting to creep me out, and I’m an evil voice[/i].”

Well, I never could win an argument with the evil voice, so that’s when everything changed. And by “everything,” I just mean the puppy stomping thing. I’m still the edgiest edgelord on the wrong side of town, I still don’t communicate with real people, and I still spend every night in torments and anguish. I’m still pretty twisted up and can’t see anything good in this world, but hey, you can’t just let the name “Axel Blacksoul” go to waste, and there’s something special about being on a whole new level of edginess. The important thing is, I’m not stomping puppies anymore. There’s been a real change in my life, and now I have something else to sustain me.

Kicking orphans.

There’s good money in that too.