Kenji’s death marks a turning point for Sadako. Up until this point, she has seen her illness as something she must overcome. Even though she was in constant pain, she could not understand why Kenji could not see things in the optimistic way that she herself saw them. But now Sadako must face the fact that leukemia might not, in fact, be beatable—that Kenji’s pessimism might actually be realism, and her own optimism might be unfounded. And she begins to think differently about death. She has until now seen freedom as only possibly by beating death. But now, as Nurse Yasunaga explains that Kenji’s illness was so terrible that death was the only thing that would bring him freedom and peace, Sadako understands that there are many different kinds of freedom. She continues folding cranes, though, and remains steadfast in her plans to make a wish for her own recovery.