EPILOGUE: A REFLECTION FROM THE GOOD DEMON

The demon stood once more in the empty city, staring at the grey horizon that never changed.

The truth about his purpose was no longer clear, and for a moment, the weight of the lives that crossed paths with his made him doubt.

Sometimes he wondered if he was truly a demon—or if what he did was simply carry on the cycle of suffering humans created for themselves.

He had taken many souls over the centuries, but never one like Claribel.

She had been different from the start—not because of her illness, but because of the way she accepted her fate without fear, without resistance.

“Am I the demon, or is it the world that lets a child like you suffer?” he asked aloud, letting the words drift into the air. The answer never came.

He often reflected on human suffering.

He didn’t cause it, but he understood it—and somehow, that made him question his role in it all.

Perhaps, he thought, it wasn’t demons who caused suffering, but the human inability to accept the inevitable.

What Claribel had taught him in her short life was something he had never understood before:

Sometimes the most human thing you can do is to let go.

To release.

And in that act of acceptance, both she and those around her could find peace.

“Maybe, deep down, we’re all human,” he whispered, gazing into the emptiness around him. “Or maybe… humanity is everything.”

He stayed there for a while, watching the lifeless city, hoping that one day he might find his own answer.

He looked up at the grey sky of that lonely place.

And for the first time in centuries, a small flower bloomed among the ruins.