Excerpt:

The high school courtyard felt unusually loud that day. Angélica and Pamela sat beneath the jacaranda tree, but the air between them was tense.

Angélica couldn’t shake off Sol’s reprimand. She felt embarrassed, responsible for the chaos she had nearly unleashed.

“I don’t know, Pamela… Sol’s right. I’m too… impulsive,” Angélica murmured, tracing circles in the dirt with her toe. My rage almost broke your restraint and nearly doomed that poor soul forever. If I keep making these mistakes, I’ll be more of a danger than a help.

Pamela set aside her idealism and focused on friendship, leaning toward Angélica.

“Listen. That cat—or angel, or whatever it is—is being hard on you. But we’re just getting started. We’re nothing more than ordinary high school students.

It’s normal to make mistakes. I couldn’t stop Estefanía’s monster, and you had to take the risk.

And even though you failed to contain it, in the end, you healed. You’re not a perfect warrior—you’re a person with a big heart. And that’s what matters.”

“But I can’t let my anger become a weapon of evil,” Angélica replied, her eyes brimming with sorrow. “I don’t want to become like the monsters I fight.”

Their conversation stretched over the last hours of the school day, unresolved. When they left, they decided to buy ice cream at a nearby stand, seeking something sweet to escape reality for a while.

As they walked, enjoying their ice cream, a poignant scene unfolded. A middle-aged man, his eyes heavy with sorrow, walked beside his teenage daughter.

The girl, about fifteen, hid her arms inside a red hoodie, and Angélica noticed she had no arms at all. The father spoke gently, trying to lift her spirits.

“Look, sweetheart. Today we’re getting your favorite ice cream. Cheer up! In fact, today you can have as many scoops as you want. How does that sound?” he said, his voice tender but tinged with barely contained guilt.

At that moment, Angélica and Pamela felt a chilling shiver.

The air thickened, and a gray-ash hue blanketed the sky. High above, on a building, a female demonic figure appeared, smiling cruelly, her eyes bloodshot with malice.

She unleashed a bolt of dark energy aimed straight at the father.

The man froze, his face twisting into a mask of despair and pain. His body grotesquely expanded, his skin turned into tree bark, and his limbs morphed into gnarled branches. Within seconds, he had become a three-meter-tall wooden monster. The wooden beast roared, a guttural sound full of self-loathing. The daughter screamed, terrified, reaching for her father.

Sol, materialized atop Angélica’s head, shouted an alert: “The Affliction Demon! It feeds on guilt. Quick, Angélica, Pamela—stop it before it destroys itself!”

Angélica and Pamela sprang into action. The wooden monster, its branches like iron clubs, crushed a delivery truck and slammed the pavement with its bark-covered fists, screaming, “It was me! It was my fault!”

Pamela, manifesting her light staff, shouted, “Containment! We need to surround it!”

But Angélica, seeing the man’s despair and guilt, felt overwhelmed. Memories of her own guilt over last night’s rage mixed with the father’s desperation, and her emotional control shattered.

“I can’t fail again!” Angélica yelled, raising her hands in a torrent of fury and fear. “Light!”

The beam she released wasn’t compassionate—it was pure desperate rage.

On impact, the wooden monster ignited, its anguished screams multiplied, and its strength became monstrous. It hurled a car that smashed into a house, collapsing a wall. The destruction was unstoppable.

“Angélica, no! Your fear is feeding his guilt!” Sol scolded.

Realizing her mistake, Angélica froze, paralyzed by terror and sorrow. Tears streamed down her face.

“I can’t! I can’t control myself!” she sobbed, collapsing to her knees.

Pamela, her face slick with sweat, held her staff steady, but her containment net failed. The monster was too powerful. It began running down the street, screaming in desperation.

While Angélica froze in her failure, Pamela refused to give up. With incredible will, she cast a net of light over the monster’s legs, bringing it down. It fell with a thunderous crash, struggling to rise.

At that moment, the daughter, chasing the creature, screamed, “Dad! Dad, it’s me! Please, wake up!”

The wooden monster paused, the scream of anguish fading. The memory of his daughter had stopped him. Pamela saw the opportunity.

“Yes! Call him! Tell him you’re his daughter!” Pamela urged the girl, struggling to maintain the net on the creature’s legs.

The daughter, tears streaming, kept calling to him, not understanding what was happening or why her father had turned into that monster. For a moment, it seemed the man might return to human form. But the Affliction Demon wouldn’t allow it.

The monster, renewed in strength, extended its branch-like arms, snatched the girl, and absorbed her into its wooden body, encasing her in bark. Her terrified scream was drowned out by the monster’s victorious roar.

Seeing the horror, Angélica felt an icy terror surpassing her sorrow. She leapt to her feet and unleashed a beam of pure light into the monster. Inside the wooden body, she saw the unconscious girl clutching a red crystal pulsating with dark guilt energy.

“Angélica! That crystal holds your father’s soul! Extract him and the girl safely!” Sol commanded.

With a precision she hadn’t known she possessed, Angélica used her golden light like a surgical tool. With extreme care, she enveloped the girl and the crystal in a bubble of light, extracting them from the wooden monster. The bubble floated to Pamela.

“Shatter the crystal!” Angélica shouted, maintaining the healing light on the father.

Pamela, manifesting her Sword of Purity once more, struck the red crystal. It shattered, releasing a gray light. The wooden monster disintegrated, revealing the naked, weeping man.

“My daughter! I took your hands! I’m a monster!” he sobbed, guilt etched into every word.

The girl, now safe, awoke and hugged her father. “No, Dad. It wasn’t your fault. It was an accident. Don’t cry.”

That night, Sol perched on Angélica’s shoulder.

“The Affliction Demon feeds on the weakness of the human heart and its suffering. Guilt is its most powerful meal,” Sol explained softly...

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