"Please relax. What are you afraid of?"

Translation: 请放心，你害怕什么？

[julykix]

请放心，你在害怕什么？ (what are you being afraid of) sounds more natural in Chinese

[FuCnSW]

Indeed. Sounds more nature. I'm native speaker, but the origin sentence confuses me. I never hear people say like that...cause behind 請放心 shouldn't be the question. It's always affirmative. For example, 請放心，我會處理 Don't worry, I'll take care of it.

"你害怕什麼" has 3 meanings. 1.What are you afraid of. 2.Why are you scared. 3.Don't be scared. In this sample, as native speaker, I think 2,3 are acceptable, but 3 is proper. 1 is incorrect certainly.

[soyunpenguino]

放 (release) + 心 (heart) =放心 (relax)

[momo-wuwen]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression "你怕什么?" is grammatical too?

[FuCnSW]

Positive. 害怕=怕