The key thing to notice on this page is S’s release of the tradition.  S has been locked into sewing his lips together, his supplies, and so on.  In this instance he needs to react to how things are changing, breaking him away from his tradition.  The tradition, which gives S a sort of culture breaking for S has to be very hard for him.  S has spent months obtaining this tradition, which fills his void of identity.  This seems to be included to show how human identity does not depend on what tradition or culture one is born into, but rather it depends on actions.

The offset line with the italicized “dear” seems to draw a lot of attention to itself.  It seems as if while all this is going on, all that has truly resonated in S’s head was Sola referring to him as “dear” (406).  Even while doing all of this incredible work, S has still only had one goal and that is love with Sola.