I hope this letter finds you well. Though you are due all respect, my forte` is my extensive knowledge of Eastern culture and history, not social niceties, so for the sake of us both I will cut to the chase. I have endeavored to dispel the mysteries surrounding Cathayans, the ever present X-factors that have opposed our expansion into Asia. After years of study conducted through local Tremere, ghoul spies, spirit servants, personal research, and a Cathayan captive, I have compiled a wealth of information on these Kindred of the East. I hope you will find this information useful, and will see the necessity of supporting my request for assistance.

Cathayan Nature
The Eastern Kindred are not vampires like you and I. They are actually no less than damned souls, sent to Hell for karmic debt, that clawed their way back into their bodies. The purpose of their rebirth on earth is to mitigate their sins under heaven, and allow these devils-made-flesh to rejoin the great cycle of birth and rebirth.
Allow yourself time to stop laughing before continuing. While the very idea of this is ridiculous, and smacks of propaganda designed to frighten would-be-enemies (such as us), Cathayans themselves firmly believe it to be fact. To be fair, it is no less silly than any of the self-aggrandizing delusions entertained by many Western Kindred: Saviors of mankind, champions of the vampire race, children of gods, masters of information, and any number of secret manipulators and would-be rulers of the world. No, these creatures are Kindred, and though the Curse of Caine may manifest in odd ways through them, they are no more a new "species of vampire" than Asians are a new species of human, and no more "devils" than are Giovanni or Baali. Though I have little doubt that no few Cathayans, if not the bulk of them, are infernalists.
However, it is easy enough to see why some might assume that Cathayans are different. They do exhibit some characteristics not known among the familiar clans and bloodlines. For example, Chin Lo, my especially competent ghoul (and a candidate for Embrace) has seen a Cathayan staked with a metal saber. And they can obviously be staked with wood, as I do with my Cathayan captive when I am through with him. However, driving a sword through the chest of my subject only enrages him (and often provokes either frenzy or one of his apparent personality shifts). I therefore conclude that Eastern Kindred possess the same vitae-borne debilities evident in many clans and bloodlines (and notably absent in our own), and that this vulnerability to metal is a "clan weakness" of some sort. Other confirmed defects I have seen among the Cathayans include hideous countenance, insanity (such as the multiple personality disorder of my captive) and short temper. (Any of these sound familiar? "Different vampire species," indeed... it seems some Cathayan bloodlines are but variants of the familiar clans.)
A potentially disturbing trait of Cathayans is a seeming immunity to blood bonds. I have fed the captive Cathayan quite a bit of vitae, and have sent two other Eastern vampires enough of my vitae to create a bond. However, no Blood Bonds developed, and I find it difficult to believe I just lucked upon three anomalies. Rather accepting this as support of the "unique nature" theory, I see undead Darwinism as a possibility. Perhaps so many blood bonds riddled their society long ago that only those lines of vampires who were resistant to the Bonds were successful enough to continue their lines. To support this theory, I point to the phenomenon of "unbondable" Kindred. It is not inconceivable that such immunities might be inheritable, if Kindred with that trait propagated. (Which, on a related note, is why I have maintained that we must routinely screen Tremere and other Kindred for this aberration, and then quietly neutralize those resistant to the bond, lest the very fabric holding our society together fray.) Another, more disturbing, possibility is that Cathayans practice the Sabbat vaulderie, or some variation of that practice, which would also offer immunity to blood bonds.
Whether Cathayans are capable of creating blood bonds in others is unknown. If they are unable, this would discredit my inheritable immunity theory above. The vitae of my captive Cathayan is foul-smelling, and is alternately tarry and cold or scarlet and warm. When forced down a human subject's throat, this vitae causes the subject to violently regurgitate; doing this on successively on three nights did nothing to endear the mortal subject to the vampire. Whether this is a natural property of the vitae or is the effect of some vitae-transformative ability on the part of the donor is not clear.
Also, the comparative generations of Cathayans may be lower than the Kindred average. When I was searching for a subject for my experiments, I chose my captive because he was a loner ("Caitiff") who had no contact with other Cathayans, and that was not powerful enough to put up much of a fight. I held my captive for three full weeks without feeding him, hoping that starvation might loosen his tongue a bit. But other than acquiring a paler-than-normal pallor, the ordeal seemed not to weaken him at all. I shudder to consider his vitae reserves, as I have witnessed elders of the Eighth Generation cracking after a week and a half of blood deprivation. He often shakes off the effects of my Dominate (but not consistently), regardless of my blood potency when I use it. This further confirms my theory that he is lower generation than I. Of course, there is the possibility of his artificially lowering his generation, which is an elementary feat that most neonate Tremere can perform, though (if this is the case) the duration of his ability greatly exceeds that of our own power. More on disciplines momentarily.

Clans and Bloodlines
I hope it does not surprise or disappoint you when I say that I have not made much progress in this area. It serves to reason that one must be among the Cathayans to have any accurate understanding of their society and their interaction of clans. I am surprised your contemporaries in Venice do not realize this; certainly, as a reasonable Kindred, you must. Abilities, powers, magical aptitude --– these things are far easier to quantify than social nuances none of us are privy to.
What I have been able to piece together thus far is that most Cathayans, if not all of them, have no apparent direct lineage to any of the thirteen known "Antediluvians," and are therefore members of bloodlines rather than clans. I have not been able to successfully use Blood Walk on the revolting vitae of my captive, nor on the small sample of blackish ichor a ghoul retrieved from another Cathayan for me, to trace their lineage. As I've remarked previously Cathayan blood in and of itself is interesting (but disgusting), and is the subject of apprentice Kim's research. If we are to accept them as actual clans, then we must accept the possibility that the Second Generation had many more childer than the Book of Nod let on. (Which may well be the case; I never put much stock in mythology as a human being, and I do not as a vampire.) However, it is safer to assume Cathayans to be members of bloodlines rather than proper clans, at least until we acquire evidence to the contrary.
Cathayan bloodlines are based around the Paths of Enlightenment they follow, which they colloquially refer to as "dharmas." The Howling Tiger Devils have all the restraint and wisdom of Brujah, combined with the morality of Setites. Another is the Akuma, the line from which my captive hails; I pried this bit of information from his brain via Telepathy, as he would not tell me regardless of what coercion I applied. (Interestingly enough, though "akuma" is a Japanese word meaning "devil," my captive is Mandarin Chinese.) The only other "dharma" I have definite knowledge of is the Song of the Shadow, polite though condescending counterparts to the Giovanni. I have also overheard Cathayans refer to themselves as Redolent Cranes, Bone Devils, Que Jin, Victorious Whirlwinds, and Thrashing Dragons. I cannot say whether these are the names of their Paths of Enlightenment, bloodlines or coteries. Certainly many these titles are just self-important, flowery Asian pomp and circumstance.
(I understand the Tremere in Vancouver know something of the Bushi and Gaki bloodlines; judging from the name, I imagine them to be Japanese bloodlines, and thus it is not likely I will encounter them here. However, I would love to compare notes with Canadian clanmates who have compiled information on these Kindred. Perhaps if you are on good terms with Pontifex Meerlinda or any of her subordinates, you might ask her to pass my request along to the Vancouver chantries.)

Disciplines
Many that have fought Cathayans, or have otherwise seen them perform remarkable feats, claim their powers are essentially different from ours. I do not think this is the case. From what I have seen of Eastern Kindred powers, they can be approximated or duplicated through the disciplines of Western Kindred. And while there are certain Cathayan powers that seem to have no Western counterparts, deviant bloodlines such as Samedi and Baali, and even the odd Caitiff, often display unique aptitudes. Do they, then, follow different "laws" than other vampires? Of course not. The demonic fires reportedly summoned by the Baali are the effects of a discipline, not dissimilar to our Lure of the Flames. And the flesh-shaping abilities of the revolting Samedi are eerily reminiscent of Vicissitude. Any discipline, no matter how powerful or well-guarded, can be learned, duplicated or approximated by Kindred – at least, by us Tremere.
Many Cathayans possess vulgar supernatural strength and speed similar to that so gratuitously displayed by Brujah and Lasombra. And no doubt, some Cathayans possess the unnatural resilience of Gangrel and Ventrue as well; these are basic Kindred gifts, and they come instinctively to us. It seems that Heightened Senses, Aura Perception and other extrasensory abilities are also common among Cathayans, as more than one spy of mine using Obfuscate was spotted (and summarily chased away or killed), and even I was spotted once while astrally projecting. I have seen skilled use of Vicissitude from my captive, who is fond of stretching his limbs and neck to escape bonds (which is why I must keep him staked until I need him). The shape-shifting prowess attributed to Eastern Kindred are very likely due to the aforementioned Vicissitude, some variant of Protean, or the ever-possible "unreliable accounts." Flame-conjuring and similar demonic powers attributed to Baali have also been witnessed in Cathayans. My spirit servants have seen Asian Kindred moving around in the spirit-worlds and compelling the spirits that dwell there. A Path that both you and I have mastered allows this, so while this would no doubt terrify most ignorant Kindred (most of whom have no knowledge of the spirit world in the first place), it holds no mystery for us.
In fact, it seems likely that many of Eastern Kindred possess some form of blood magic, though not Thaumaturgy proper. We are well aware of the imperfect arts of other Kindred, such as the anachronistic "kuldonic sorcery" practiced by the Tzimisce, and the supposed "magic" the Assassins apparently used to counter the blood curse we levied on them. On more than one occasion, I have seen effects created through the trappings of ritual and ceremony. In addition, the sheer range of effects that even neonate Cathayans are able to produce suggests a more open-ended discipline system like ours, rather than the limited range of effects available to our less fortunate kin. I think it is folly to underestimate the range of abilities at their disposal.
But I have personally seen a most remarkable feature on two Cathayans: a third eye! The permutations of this are exiting, as well as disturbing. It might seem at first that our clan was not as thorough as it should have been, and that several Salubri made their way to the East and began propagating here. But I think it is equally possible that Saulot either learned his infernal powers from native Kindred during his travels in the Orient, or that the dead clan's discipline survives their extinction through non-clan practitioners or a deviant bloodline. If the latter possibilities are the case, then we have little reason to be concerned (of course, other than the normal fears one might have of Kindred with access to such powers). The only possibility we need worry about, then, is the first. We must gather enough information to either confirm surviving Salubri as fact, or to rule it out. If it is confirmed as fact, then we must inform the Council of Seven at once and await their appraisal of the situation.

In Closing
Cathayans are powerful, well-organized, and are not nearly as inept as we would probably like them to be. It is dangerous for us to underestimate the capabilities and knowledge of our foes. However, they are not invincible demons, they are not an impenetrable monolith, and they are not immune to the fundamental laws that bind all Kindred. They are quantifiable, and therefore they can be bested.
However, we should do everything we can to foster ignorance and superstition among other Camarilla Kindred. We should keep any intelligence regarding Cathayans from them, and share our secrets only with other trustworthy Tremere. We will let leak morsels of useful information here and there to make ourselves indispensable to our allies, but we must hide much of what we know from them... for now. For the more information we alone have on the Eastern Kindred, and the quicker we act decisively on that information, the greater foothold we will have in Asia before our Camarilla brethren realize what is going on.
Though I believe I have proven myself capable of the task of "cracking the Cathayan code," as it is, I am only one Kindred, and it is difficult for me and my modest entourage to do everything. I have lost two apprentice-level Tremere and four ghouls to Cathayans and their mortal servants; not long after this, apprentices Remstead and Wain Mei transferred to other chantries. I especially miss the presence of the latter, and would greatly appreciate her return. I do not personally blame my former students, as they must heed to the will of the Council. But their departure has left the chantry in a precarious position. There are less than a dozen of us here now, including the ghouls, and a total of only four competent practitioners of Thaumaturgy. And there is so much work still to be done. Which is why, I hope, you will understand the importance of our having other skilled thaumaturges here in Taiwan.
I await your reply.

-- James Chayse, Regent of the Lightning Dragon Chantry in Taiwan