Under Pressure

The qualities that enable people to perform well when facing heart-pounding fear or stress are courage, hatred, and death. When the stakes are high, people will arouse epinephrine which provides strength to overcome the difficulties. Courage gives people the power to confront the fear. Hatred ignites the determination of fighting against the fear, because it has overwhelmed the fear. Death is always the true unknown in people's heart, which is the motivation of courage. When people are afraid of death, they will arouse the courage and stand up for own lives. In Crescendo, when the protagonist Nora is almost trapped and "sacrificed" by Rixon due to the fallen-angel-turn-to-human scheme, she is facing death and thus encourages herself confront the malignant enemy, Rixon. "A honey tongue, a heart of gall" is definitely referring to Rixon. Rixon is an evil guy who betrays his best buddy, Patch, and kills Nora's father while casts the blame on Patch. He wishes that Nora breaks off with Patch entirely, and thus Patch can no longer protects Nora as her guardian angle. Therefore, Rixon has a chance to murder Nora and gets his precious human body, instead of being a homeless fallen-angle. However, the hatred in Nora's heart which arouses by the truth of her father's death doesn't allow Nora to stand still and wait for death. She does EVERYTHING which she finds a beam of hope. Since she is scared of death and doesn't want to die, she endeavors to live and eventually doesn't afraid of death when she faces the bullets. She find herself calm when facing death. Her courage is worth for us to learn from. Anyhow, breaking with Patch is definitely not a good choice because it's he who saves Nora last.