Chapter One: In the Heart of the Fog
London, Autumn 1889.
The city slept under a dense shroud of fog, as if trying to hide its sins from the eyes of God.
The alleys narrowed, the lamps wavered in the wind, and passersby walked with bowed heads, as if afraid their gaze would meet mine.
I watched them from my window; the room on the third floor gave me a full view of Whitechapel— the place where people used to whisper about the killer who was never caught.
But I don't believe in the word "killer."
It's a word invented by humans to describe what they cannot understand.
I, Edgar Wilmore, am a simple writer, as they think.
I live among my books, and every night I ink my papers with a truth more honest than the confessions of priests.
Yet they do not know that the words I write are not woven from fiction… but from the flesh of reality.
Last night, I penned a new line in my upcoming novel:
"The corrupted soul must be purified, not by remorse… but by the knife."
I laughed as I wrote it, for the city had not yet realized that sometimes literature is truer than reality.
The chimes of the neighborhood clock were heavy.
From afar, the sound of a horse-drawn carriage faded into the fog, while the shadow of a woman passed before my window.
I stood, grabbed my black coat, and extinguished the candle.
It was time to write a new chapter…
But this time, not with ink.