The next section of the scan loaded with a faint delay, as though even the digital copy resisted being read. The handwriting had changed again, less elegant, more erratic, the lines slanting downward as if written by an unsteady hand. Ink pooled in small, uneven marks, betraying the tremor of exhaustion behind each word.
"You know, I've done anything to stop the calamities or others being exploited, but in the end, you have to let fate take the reins of life. Even if I know about events, I might not know the full story; I might do worse by intervening. I save a man, but his life could kill others. I've repeated the process for four lives, and in the fourth… I've given up on trying to save everyone. I chose my empire, my family, and my life over the others."
Trevor's eyes lingered on that line: 'I chose my empire, my family, and my life.' The phrasing was very specific. Not loved, but chosen. The mark of a man who had learned to define survival as love.
