Campaign Themes, Any Suggestions?

[Mada]

I'm running a two-person game and they've said they want the #1 priority to be Character Growth.

I've given them a simple hook to start with, the setting is fairly typical dnd, medium-high fantasy and based off Forgotten Realms.

I figure the mechanics of the game aren't too important other than I'm setting it in Gritty Realism.

But one player is playing a Construct homebrew, essentially an Artifical Half-Elf who was a slave until the beginning of the campaign (or to be freed near the beginning).

He wants her to have some internal conflict about going from slavedom and being this literal robot to now having the freedom to live our lives and possibly have this thing where when she's set to "Kill" she's set to KILL.

I'm thinking I need the theme of the campaign to be Choice, perhaps using Undertale or BioWare games as examples, while adding in more shades of gray.

Though I'm thinking that (at least early on) these choices need to be a lot more personal and intimate, either for themselves or for characters they meet and perhaps choices that they can live with for the duration of the campaign, either being haunted or reminded of them in ways further down the line.

Any suggestions for a character who breaks out of autonomy to find themselves?
Any other interesting themes for character development?
I've mostly been running for Good-Natured Murder Hobo's for my Dming duration. They don't psychotically kill everyone who opposes them but a villain is made to be killed, I have two players who have played a LOT longer than I am and are a lot older and more mature than myself, so any help with running a more mature and more thoughtful campaign will be great.

[Bulhakov]

Choices in "gritty realism" and "morally grey" campaings usually are between the lesser of two evils and the players may not be too happy with the consequences. E.g. you can free some slaves, but you're going to have a bunch of strong, angry, unemployed and hungry men running about, leading to street gangs, bandit gangs, raping and pillaging, or in the best case scenario those ex-slaves will get exploited as cheap labour or hired thugs.

Another theme - Once you save a life are you responsible for it? Have the party save some civilians, but now be stuck with a bunch of women and children following them for protection and no easy "cop-out" solutions where you dump them at the nearest temple. For a twist, they could even be the wives and children of the bandits the PCs have killed.

A different choice is how much good can you realistically try to do. You can help one orphan/slave/beggar, but there are hundreds in need. Do you even start helping, if so, how do you say no to the growing number of people coming for help?

[Mada]

Choices in "gritty realism" and "morally grey" campaings usually are between the lesser of two evils and the players may not be too happy with the consequences. E.g. you can free some slaves, but you're going to have a bunch of strong, angry, unemployed and hungry men running about, leading to street gangs, bandit gangs, raping and pillaging, or in the best case scenario those ex-slaves will get exploited as cheap labour or hired thugs.

Another theme - Once you save a life are you responsible for it? Have the party save some civilians, but now be stuck with a bunch of women and children following them for protection and no easy "cop-out" solutions where you dump them at the nearest temple. For a twist, they could even be the wives and children of the bandits the PCs have killed.

A different choice is how much good can you realistically try to do. You can help one orphan/slave/beggar, but there are hundreds in need. Do you even start helping, if so, how do you say no to the growing number of people coming for help?

I do like that save a life = responsibility thing. It's often missed "You freed me from the slave driver" but where does a slave go once free? I guess the Construct character will have to ask that question themselves, but not everyone is a capable adventurer.

I guess my problem is I feel I'm going to have to run a very social game in comparison to what I'm used to. Which is good because I love playing games where the real "action" happens in conversations and the actual combat is more of a breather for social/emotional exhaustion, so I'd like to be able to provide games that give that same experience.
But it's often way too easy to slip back into the hack and slash.