Sometimes you get this feeling that people are put to get you sometimes you jsut dont. After helping Connor with his project I was able to figure out what needed to be done with these people. I need to win these more often not less. I have found out that sometimes only one person can win and that is the problem. Only one can win everyone else gets basically nothing. The real shame here is that you cna do whatever it takes. I could have killed them all and still won. I have many fewer allies. But I would have won. The flip side is now I have a tattoo that can help me with lockpicking. I do need to start getting those items again. The louve does not wait for any person.

This whole game is starting to get to me. I dont get what we would have to really do to make it happen. Do we jsut keep going risking our lives for all this power? It really does not make sense.

I digress it is time to start planning for my future. I have the mansion set and the money moving but I need to protect myself. I am going to throw a part this will atleast get the word out. We will need to start looking for talent that can work toward our goals and not let it rest. Our next goal is now trying to figure what should be done with the rest and how to deal with them.

Amaryllis's journal has seen a bit of love by this point, and it’s beginning to show slight signs of wear on its edges as the cardboard covers begin to split very slightly. A new stain has been added on the top right of the cover, curtesy of a poorly-poured cup of coffee. She's close to the halfway mark of filling this notebook, and will likely be beyond that milestone next by week.

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I've never really wondered too much why I don't feel pain like other people. One would think that the cuts on my arms would make me scream almost every time that I moved, but I never remember them bothering me. These gunshot wounds didn't hurt almost at all either, even though they nearly killed me... The doctors are both terrified and amazed, especially with my hemophilia, how it's possible that I'm not completely dead right now, and how I am able to move my body without extreme pain. I'd venture to guess that my rate of improvement has something to do with the Infusion process of Contractors. Last month, it only took me a few consecutive sessions at the firing range to be able to consistently hit targets from 50 meters, an improvement in a skill I've never had experience with in the past that was absolutely unpreceded (though that certainly didn’t help me much in my last gig…). My wounds are already closing (other than the usual ones, of course), and the surgeons were able to operate on me without prescribing any post-procedure painkillers, yet another perplexing realization for the doctors here. Unfortunately, they told me that it's going to be quite difficult to walk going forward, as the spinal damage was severe. I’m lucky that I’m not totally paralyzed. They did everything that they could, but it appears as though I'm going to need a lot of physical therapy to even think about running again. [[In the margin is an anatomical drawing of a human spine and skull from profile]]

Thankfully, Cornelius came in to tell me that he manifested an ability to make my body good-as-new again. He'd just have to lay his hands on me for some time, and my spine should be good-as-new in about a week. Lucky me! He requested that I give him a little time to recover as best he can from his ordeal, as he was also quite injured from the rifle fire. Even though he has a real awful hole in his face, he's still a pretty-boy at heart. I hope that ability can help him get back to his old self. [[In the margin is a simplified, but still cute, drawing of Cornelius Valentine, sans terrible scarring]]

Brigwain and Mike visited me, too. They congratulated me on a successful surgery, and were looking forward to seeing where our plans took us next. Brigwain was about ready to go back home to Massachusetts, and I couldn't help but agree. It will be nice to sleep in my own bed once again.

As for “Mike”... Well, I know his true identity, but I'm just gonna respect what he wants to go by, let him leave that past behind him. Anyways, I think I need to talk to Mike about the book in private. He's been looking for a way to get back those years that he lost on his first couple of contracts. In giving History in Blood a brief skim, I’ve learned that the ritual would absolutely help him feel young again. However, for the effects to become permanent, he would need to find somewhere in the range of 120 to 360 individuals to sacrifice over the course of 1 to 10 years. Without a complex network, this might be an incredibly difficult feat to achieve. Might be a little too gruesome for him to perform, too. But I'll just let him know this option right now. Other than this recipe for immortality, there are many accounts of blood-orient cultural beliefs and religions from all around the world. Using this book, I might finally be able to pin down the source of The Curse that my family was so afraid of. [[In the margin is the start of a drawing, but it's been scribbled out multiple times. Underneath the skriblings is a shakily drawn visage, as if it were completed without looking at the page]]

Now that I've sat with it for some time, I've now just realized that I almost died a couple of days ago. Mom and dad were almost proven right... but this only redoubles my efforts to conquer my blood. As soon as I get back to Massachusetts, I'm going to begin my experimentation again, see if I can learn a little more control on my blood spike, perhaps learn even more about my curse using this book...

Cornelius' exploits in the job had netted him a lot of things. Friendship of a sort with the odd folk who'd worked with him, millions in diamonds, and a warm fuzzy feeling in his chest that was quite pleasant. For a while. Then he began to notice that it wasn't going away, and that he could, in fact, feel something similair but much weaker coming from other peoples chests if he got close enough. Real close, to the point he could almost touch them, but there was definitely something there that he hadn't been able to feel before. It felt... good, like a warm hug or a well-brewed cup of tea, and Cornelius really liked it. He felt irritated, somewhat, at how it always seemed just out of reach, even if he was right up next to someone, skin brushing against skin, as if there were a wall he could never overcome. Until he did. As Cornelius was walking the streets of Johannesburg, making plans to get back home, he came across an injured child sitting on the ground, a nasty looking scrape on their knee, and stopped to help. That was when he felt it. The warmth built up in his chest flowed down to his hands, and he could feel the warmth in the child respond. A pink aura, like mist in it's appearance, gently flowed from Cornelius' hands and wrapped around the childs knee, the warmth present in both of them seeming to diminish slightly as the wound was rapidly closed. Trying not to think about what happened, Cornelius raised a finger to his lips to shush the child and left, now somewhat more hurried in his attempts to leave Johannesburg.