Finding a measure of inner peace!

"I'm curious... How have you been trying to address it so far?" Azazel questioned Issei. "I know it hasn't been a full day yet, but have you done anything in particular to cope?"

Issei didn't respond immediately, simply staring out at the pond. "... honestly... I'm just going to try to keep busy. It's better not to think about it."

"Ah, distractions then..." Azazel hummed thoughtfully, reeling in his line slightly, as if to use motion of his bait to entice a fish to bite. "Not the worst approach. But not particularly helpful either. Distractions are all well and good, but that's all they are. Distractions. They neither help, nor hinder the issue. Merely stall it."

"...I shouldn't be feeling like this..." Issei grumbled. "I'm just being stupid..."

"Not at all," Azazel denied, surprising Issei. "Why would you think that it's foolish to feel as you do? As any decent person would?"

"Because I had to do it, didn't I?" Issei demanded, his grip on the pole tightening. "I had to take his life to save my own, and the lives of my friends... And he was a bastard who deserved it, wasn't he? Out of pride, he was going to start a war that would have killed thousands, maybe millions, and he didn't care! And he also wanted to **** Rias and Sona! The world is objectively better off without him! So why do I feel this guilt!?" he demanded, his voice having gradually risen during his questioning.

"Because, unlike Kokabiel, you understand the value of life," Azazel replied. "Even Kokabiel's life had value. To him, if no one else. And you ended it."

Issei slumped slightly. "...I feel like a murderer..."

"Murderer?" Azazel snorted. "No. The furthest thing from it, well, at least as far from it you can get as a killer. You're a killer, but not a murderer. There's a difference. Killing in of itself is not a sin. What separates killing from **** is the intent. Did you kill Kokabiel because you wanted to? Because you hated him? Or did you do it because he had every intention of killing you and those you cared about? Because you had to. That's what separates killers from murderers at the end of the day. Killers take lives only when they have to. Murderers do it because they want to. Do not mistake having empathy for your victim, regardless of how undeserved it is, as a weakness, Red Dragon Emperor. It is a sign of decency."

"...does the guilt ever go away?" Issei questioned. "Does it ever get any easier?"

"...the guilt only goes away if your empathy, even for your enemies, does," Azazel replied. "As for whether taking life gets any easier... It depends on the person, really," he added, a wistful look on his face. "Some gain a stronger and stronger aversion to killing the more they have to do it. Others get better at desensitizing themselves to it." Azazel himself was a bit closer to the first category. In his younger days, he had been one of the most bloodthirsty and ruthless of the Fallen, and only gained his distaste for needless **** later in life when it got too much, even for him. Oh he wouldn't shy away from taking life if push came to shove, and he would let that side of him back out in such scenarios, but he had grown to understand the value of life, to grasp why taking it should never be done on a whim.

Issei sighed and relaxed a bit... Just talking about it had made him feel a bit better about it. He wasn't exactly "over it," the feeling was still there, but... It somehow seemed more... Manageable, once he had gotten it off his chest to someone, even someone who was technically his enemy. "...Vali mentioned that you had a different fate in mind if Kokabiel was captured alive..." Issei finally brought up.

"Ah yes, that. Frankly, you kind of did Kokabiel a favor by killing him actually, though I doubt that makes you feel much better. I planned to freeze him in ice eternally, with him still conscious, and seal him in Cocytus, the deepest level of Hell. It's a fate reserved for those who commit, or intend, the worst crimes among the supernatural society," Azazel noted. Issei shivered at that thought. He could scarcely imagine the utter, literal hell that kind of punishment would be. Maybe killing Kokabiel actually had been an unintentional kindness.