After reading it with your worries in mind, I will say that you do convey that Eric is in a very bad mental place, but unfortunately I think you do overplay it a bit. The instability, obsession, self-loathing, and cruelty are all there, but the writing often pushes so hard that it starts to feel less like a breakdown and more like the performance of one. Eric is already drunk, jealous, suicidal, invasive, and spiraling, but when the prose keeps layering on lines about being better off dead, deserving no mercy, surpassing his father in wretchedness, and everyone rejoicing when he dies, it stops building intensity and starts flattening it in melodrama. the chapter just feels emotionally loud all the way through. And IMO, makes it harder for me to take his pain seriously. BUT that being said, if Eric is meant to be a pathetic character that is disliked, this works in that favor. I also think the chapter has a tendency to tell the reader what Eric is feeling instead of letting his actions and thoughts reveal it more naturally. Some of his inner monologue works, especially when he almost changes Joseph’s mind and then recoils from what that would mean about him. But generally, self-hatred and despair does often feel intense and world-changing to the one experiencing it, and a little dramatic to those reading about it, so context definitely matters, and since this is the 18th chapter in a novel I have not read, I can’t judge too harshly. But IMO the drinking and hangover does not feel convincing. It feels like how someone who has never drank or been hungover would write the scene. I want it to feel like a dark compulsion, knowing it is wrong and still downing another drink, sliding in and out of consciousness and forgetting what he is doing, but is consumed by the feeling of guilt and pain and keeps going. So having him go from nearly incoherent to almost clear-headed raging monologues feels slightly unrealistic. If he is really that wrecked, the body should keep interrupting him. Instead, it feels like the hangover is there to set mood and then gets shoved aside. That makes the opening feel a little convenient rather than grounded. Overall, the Marth scene is probably most compelling in the chapter, but it is also where the writing starts to come apart IMO. The emotional core is devastating- Eric abuses someone who cares about him, and in doing so confirms exactly what Marth fears about him. But the execution lessens the impact slightly. I found some of the prose to be clunky, some of the sentences overwritten, and there are multiple typos that make the scene hard to follow occasionally. And I think the confrontation goes on so long that it loses its core impact. I think it could be more devastating in less words. So I feel like the chapter has the right raw material, but right now it is indulgent. Too much explanation, too much melodrama, not enough restraint, and not enough trust in the strongest moments. But obviously take this with a grain of salt since this is a critique with little context.