When von Rumpel gets introduced to us, we can't help but think that he's the biggest asshole to walk the face of planet Earth. But as the novel progresses, we see him in a whole different light and begin to pity him. This character was created to show us how easy it is for us to be prejudiced against people like the Nazi soldiers and how easy it is for us to forgive them once we see how similar they are compared to ourselves. At the beginning of the book we hated him for being a Nazi and for being so cruel and heartless. But once we see that he is a human who, like us, is susceptible to cancerous tumors and is also capable of being tempted by Greed, we reevaluate his actions. Even on his scary attempt at raiding Etienne's home and his search for the Sea of Flames, Doerr shows us that there is humanity in "bad" guys. When Doerr looks through Marie's room, he reminisces of the daughters he left at home. We connect this to the way Marie feels about her father not being there to protect her and the tears just won't stop coming.