I can't believe my plan actually worked! Well, it was more of one step forward, three steps back, but I'm still alive so I don't really care much about the details right now. My body still hurts quite a bit, the effects of that little concoction haven't quite worn off just yet. I figured I'd write some things down here to pass the time before leaving and doing what I need to do.
Samuel and I arrived at Dunwall Tower after sunset. The guards had changed shifts and were settling into things as we arrived at the water lock. Patrols on the Wrenhaven River were cut short, the Lord Regent couldn't afford to bring in more soldiers to guard him, how sad. It was rather strange coming up to the water lock again, though. The last time I was here was with Geoff Curnow when we were riding back from our trip across the isles. It feels like so much has changed in these last six months. But that's fine, tonight was the night that everything would go back to normal.
There was no other way for me to do, unfortunately, so I climbed up the water lock with a combination of a few well placed jumps and Blink. A few spots were a little precarious, but it worked out alright for me in the end. It got to be a little concerning when I reached a certain platform with a door on it. On the other side of the door was an Arc Pylon that would fry me alive if I stepped into its range, but I also couldn't see the guards patrolling above. So I decided to just Bend Time and Blink my way up there and duck into a hiding place as soon as I could, downing some of Piero's Remedy after I was sure I was safe. There weren't many guards there, I only had to take one of them out before I was able to pass through undetected.
The courtyard was a buzzing hive of the City Watch. There were two Tall Boys patrolling, one on the upper ring and the other on the lower. And there were guards all over the place, complete with a watchtower that scanned the area. I approached from the side, taking down a few more guards and swiping a Rune one of them had hidden in their quarters. There was a note there from the Lord Regent. It seems like these aren't actually members of the City Watch, but members of the military. General Tobias was leading the defense himself. An admirable man, or at least I thought. There was a chance that he was doing this simply because Hiram was in power, but I wasn't too sure about that. Questions for later, I suppose.
I disabled the watchtower and got up to a perch near the second floor of the tower itself. There's a tunnel for the air ducts around there that I would enter and exit from during important missions for Jessamine. I found it still unguarded and unchanged, so I slipped right on through and made my way to the interior of Dunwall Tower.
In the foyer, I saw a guard and General Tobias communicating with Hiram through some kind of screen. Hiram would be finishing up a few things and then he said that he'd be going back down to his bedroom to retire for the night. Tobias spoke up and said that it'd be best for him to stay in his Safe Room. Maybe that was a better choice after all. However, Hiram refused, saying that Tobias and his men were more than enough to keep him safe in the night. For such a paranoid man, he was acting pretty high and mighty then. A small smile crept onto my lips. This would be the perfect chance to take him down. The Safe Room atop the tower would be very difficult to get into if Hiram was there. I'm sure that there were supplies that I could get there that would make my day a bit nicer, but I didn't care much for that. All this mission was about to me was clearing the way for Emily to come in tomorrow. I could take care of the rest of the side things here then.
One thing that did interest me, though, was the Propaganda Officer. The announcer that would make citywide calls whenever the Lord Regent had passed some new law or some new kind of quarantine restriction. His office was on the other side of the tower, and that gave me an idea. I Blinked over to the side first to go deal with him. There was another Arc Pylon on the upper floors, but I just made my way downstairs instead to remove the tank of whale oil powering the thing. After all that was said and done, I simply made my way up the stairs to speak with the man in question.
To my surprise, the Propaganda Officer was just a normal man. He had been doing this more or less by force since the Lord Regent took power. He wasn't too happy with the situation, since he was being forced to stay in Dunwall Tower when he'd rather be out with his brother and family in a farm North of Dunwall. So, in order to set himself free from all of this, he decided to help me out, the kind man. He told me of an audiograph that I could find in Hiram's safe in his bedroom that contained a confession of sorts. I even got the combination from the officer. He had done his part and I told him to wait things out for a while before leaving. He returned to his quarters for the night and I went off to see what I could do about Hiram's safe.
The situation got a little hairy, I won't lie. Hiram arrived and his bedroom around the same time I did. My little excursion with the Propaganda Officer had cost me some precious time. I blinked atop the mantelpiece above the bed and looked down on him. It was a disgusting thing to think about. This was my Jessamine's bedroom, soon to be Emily's, and this idiotic man was sleeping here! My blood boiled as I watched Hiram pace back and forth across the room. I wanted to see if there would be a chance for me to get to the safe without him knowing, but I figured that it would be better to try something else instead. I wanted him to be awake for this next part, so I took out a sleep dart, drained it of some of its contents, and shot it into the Lord Regent's neck. When I got down and picked him up, it already felt like he was stirring a bit. Good. I pulled the dart out of him and threw him onto the bed. I quickly punched the combination into the safe, swiped the audiograph along with some interesting papers that I didn't have the time to look at, closed the safe and left the room, going back up to the propaganda room.
The Officer there already showed me how the machine worked. All I had to do was put the piece of paper in and the work would be done for me. And how the work was done…
Hiram Burrows is single handedly responsible for wiping out over half of Dunwall. To him, the poor were unsightly and unnecessary. Hiram devised something that he liked to call the Poverty Eradication Plan. It was his own way of dealing with all of the poor people who were living in the streets and sewers. He brought over disease bearing rats from Pandyssia and let them loose in the slums of the city with full intention to catch them all once they had killed enough people. But things didn't quite go as planned. The rats were bigger, stronger, faster, and much quieter than he expected. Those who went to gather them up were killed and eaten on the spot and even members of the nobility were affected by the plague. Hiram's little plan had spun desperately out of control and there was nothing that he could do to stop it. All that was left was to sit back and watch events unfold. The Empress had started looking into it, and he knew that she would find an answer eventually, so he had her killed before she could find out the truth. I wasn't supposed to be there during the assassination, either. One of the notes that I had picked up in his office was sent by the assassin Daud himself, the man who Hiram hired to murder Jessamine. It was all coming together now. Daud hadn't been told that I would be present, and he demanded a higher payment from Hiram or else Hiram's head would roll. The poor fool had his back against the wall in more ways than one. It all came crumbling apart around him. And to think, this all started because he wanted to thin out the population a bit and make the citizens of Dunwall out to be better off than they actually were. A Poverty Eradication Plan of all things! What madness!
I crept back down to the tower and onto the balcony next to the Lord Regent's room. Guards were in there, along with General Tobias, with their weapons drawn. They told Hiram that he would rot in Coldridge Prison for what he had done and they took him away. Can you believe, the fool actually tried to pay them off! He said that he'd give them all money if they kept quiet about it, but they clarified his situation for him very well. That recording was just broadcast throughout the entire city, there would be no shortage of people looking for his head to roll now. Even if they were bribable after the senseless slaughter of half of Dunwall's population, Hiram would have bigger fish to fry. I'm happy to see that the military still had a good head on their shoulders. They were simply following the wrong man, and while they might have had their doubts, they still had to follow orders. I don't blame them at all for what they did. It's good to know that none of them died at my hand. I hope that they can bounce back from this and make Dunwall an honorable, proud city again after Emily takes the throne. Or, if not, then I suppose we could always leave and go to Serkonos or something, far from the plague.
With my business concluded, I left the Tower. There were other things for me to explore, more things to find and a Safe Room to plunder, but I decided against it. I would be back here by morning or so, so it wouldn't be that big of a problem to sort through it all then. Besides, I'd have help then, and Emily at my side. It made things much easier for us all to just wait it out and come back to the Tower as heroes of sorts to restore the proper heir. I didn't care much for theatrics, but I suppose that's something.
Even though Hiram was shown to be the fraudulent leader that he was, I still had to sneak my way out of the place. Nobody knew that I was innocent, after all. And if they saw some masked man creeping around the place, they'd kill me on sight. So I went out the same way I came in, through the air ducts leading outside. It was an easy climb out, down, and around back to the water lock. Then I Blinked myself down with a fair bit of caution and landed right on a mount next to Samuel's boat. The man had a great big smile on his face, I'd done him proud. He heard the message loud and clear, he said, and I smiled back at him and told him it was time to go home.
We arrived just after sunrise. Samuel went off to the side to have a smoke and enjoy the peace of the morning real quick while I went inside the Pub to attend a small celebration in my honor. Emily threw the door open as soon as I got close. She was happy to see me and said that everyone was excited for me to come back. I walked in to uproarious applause from everyone. There were drinks and food a plenty, at least as much as we could gather up between us all. It was to be our last day in the Hound Pits Pub before returning triumphantly to Dunwall Tower with Lady Emily Kaldwin in tow to place her on the throne and crown her as the rightful Empress.
But things never go according to plan.
It set in shortly after the toast. I felt a little lightheaded, a bit dizzy. The world around me started to shake oh so slightly. My drink was spiked, but I didn't let anyone know. I figured that something like this was about to happen, and my plans were already in motion. All I could do now was keep my cool as long as I could and pray and I would survive.
I stayed at the party for a bit, socializing with Havelock, Pendleton, Martin, Cecilia, Walter, Lydia, Callista, and of course Emily. As I was chatting with Havelock, he told me that with all of these things done, the only thing left to do was go to Dunwall Tower the next morning with Emily in tow. After that, he said that he would lend me all the resources he had available to start the hunt for Daud. I knew then and there that something was dreadfully wrong. There was never a chance for me to tell Havelock that I discovered Daud to be Jessamine's killer. Things were about to take a very sour turn, but I kept a smile on my face and played it off normally.
Before long, I went back upstairs and into the offices of our dear leaders. There were notes of uncertainty with the next step of the plan. Paranoia was at an all time high among our own leaders. This wasn't over yet, but my life might be coming to a close here soon. I thought of running up to them and slitting their throats during the party, but ultimately decided against it. With the drink they gave me, I was uncoordinated to say the least and with all of my willpower I was only able to slowly walk upright. There was no chance for me to take them down like this. But that was alright, I had faith that things would turn out perfectly fine in the end. I made my way up to my room and let the poison run its course. I collapsed just a few feet from my bed.
The next thing I remember was being partially awake for a conversation that took place between the three leaders and Samuel. Apparently they had Samuel put a rare poison of sorts into my drink in hopes that it would kill me. Havelock, Pendleton, and Martin would all arrive at Dunwall Tower the following day with Lady Emily along with the man who murdered the Empress. They had no intention of helping me track Daud down. They were in it for themselves all along. And the first thought that came to mind was a question of how long it would take for one of them to betray the others. My guess was that they wouldn't even make it a week. The men told Samuel to take me and to have me ready for their trip tomorrow morning. He agreed, and they all left the room, leaving Samuel behind with me.
Samuel crouched down next to me and checked me out. He saw that I was alive and smiled bright. He had made his choice, he said, and now the next phase of the plan was up to him.
I should explain.
After reading over Havelock's notes, I had a sinking suspicion that his betrayal was inevitable. But I knew that I couldn't make a move against him myself. That was too much above my head, you understand. So I decided to leave this up to someone else entirely. I knew that the leaders trusted Samuel the most because they thought the least of him. If there was going to be some kind of assassination attempt made on my own life, he would be the one to pull it off. The other servants would never do anything like that, even if it cost them their lives, and while I doubted Samuel would ever kill me out of mere orders, he might have felt a different way about it if he thought that I was just the serial murder that Havelock made me out to be in this journals and in his speeches.
So I took a great risk with Samuel and gave him this journal you're holding now before heading out to Dunwall Tower. I told him to sift through the pages a bit if he got bored during the mission. He did, and I can find a few tear stains on certain pages to prove it. Samuel learned the ins and outs of who I am thanks to this book. He now knows things that even the highest ranking officials aren't allowed to know. He respects the level of trust I've shown him, I suppose, and he paid it back in full tonight.
While I was lying there on the floor, he told me not to worry about a thing. He put my journal back in my jacket pocket for safekeeping and told me that he only gave me half the poison, that wonderful man! He was the one they had pouring the glass and giving me half the dose and passing it off as full was the only thing that he could think of. While I was in dire straits thanks to it now, he told me that he had faith that I'd be strong enough to survive and fight back against Havelock and the rest of them. But for now, I needed to rest, recover, and make my comeback when I had fully recuperated. I couldn't do that at the Hound Pits, seeing as they wanted me dead. So instead Samuel put me on a raft and sent me down to the Flooded District to see if I could hold up somewhere a while before making my return via the sewers just like at Coldridge Prison.
The Flooded District seemed like a risky place to put me, but there were no more safe moves left on our part. Samuel would have to disappear as well thanks to saving me. Those men would want him burned alive for sparing my life. And so I came to, floating down the Flooded District until I was greeted by a few men in gas masks. I forgot that this place was the supposed home of Daud and his assassins. It was a shame, but I guess that I shouldn't have been too surprised by it all. This would give me the chance to bring Daud down before returning and settling the score with Havelock and his boys. I saw this as a win-win scenario, if I managed to make it out of this alive.
The assassins took me up to visit Daud. He spoke to me, face to face, for the very first time. Bunting's portrait had been spot on, though there seemed to be more lines in his face now. It looks like he's been through quite a lot recently in these past six months. He made a comment that didn't surprise me at all after what I've seen. Daud's been visited by the Outsider as well, which explains all of his band's supernatural abilities and the like. They've been running rampant with their use of their powers, and I would very much like the opportunity to put a stop to that.
And so they threw me here in a hole in the ground. The poison has been running its course and I'd say that I'm about ready to get up and start moving now. With any luck, Daud will be taken down tonight and I'll be off to see Emily tomorrow. Who knows what Havelock, Pendleton, and Martin are up to now that Samuel and I have disappeared. All that I can hope for now is making it out of this mess alive, returning to the Hound Pits Pub, and making my way out from there. They wouldn't dare harm Emily at this point in time. Now that they know that I survived their attempt on my life, they should be well aware that I'm coming for them. And after all we've been through in these past few weeks, they also know that there's no stopping this. I just hope that they don't do anything stupid before I get there.
Off I go. It's time to fight another man who bears the Mark of the Outsider.
May the best man win, Daud.