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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/45484
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/45484
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

As Galastel says (+1), your character needs to be involved and want something connected to the problem.

If the empire has become an engine of conquest, perhaps your character is in danger of being conquered, or in the process of being conquered, or has been conquered, and their resources stolen. But you should write this as personal: The character may be a parent that has lost a child to slavery, and intends to get her/him back. Or wants revenge for the death of a spouse or child or whole family. Or the conqueror's rape of a spouse or daughter. Or wants to take back the stuff that was stolen from him, or all three.

The MC needs a good _reason_ to risk her life to infiltrate the Emperor's machine instead of just running away from it, and the only truly plausible reason is going to be a deeply emotional one. e.g. Saving Nemo is about a parent risking his life to save his child. It is written as a children's comical story, but it is a plot with serious resonance for adults with children.

A good story begins in the main character's "Normal World", and that is usually easy to start. It is 10% to 15% of the full length. Also the first half of Act I, usually about 25% of the whole story. This connects the reader to the MC, shows them solving everyday little problems, shows us the setting and time period, and shows us the stakes: Who the MC loves. Halfway through the first Act, we have an "inciting incident", the first hint of what will become a life-changing event. In the second half, the MC tries to deal with the inciting incident; first as a nuisance problem, but it gets increasingly worse (escalates) until, by the end of Act I, the MC is forced to LEAVE their "Normal World" and work on the problem full time.

In your story, I'd make that inciting incident the appearance of the Emperor's men, perhaps demanding taxes or tribute, and the escalation is increasing demands and violence until something horrific happens: A kidnapping, a murder, a seizing of ALL their property, or taking of the children as slaves.

THEN your MC has to abandon the world they knew, and really DO something about this crap. The adventure begins.

Original score: 4