The Ripper's Shadow

The whispers in the reading room gradually merged into a stifled hum.

This latest murder had stirred the deepest fears in every Londoner's heart. Every word in the newspapers seemed to reek of blood, grating against people's frayed nerves.

People leaned close and whispered, using exaggerated tones and vivid imaginations to add layer upon layer of mystery and terror to the phantom killer known as "Jack the Ripper."

"Have you heard? When they found the body, the organs had been laid out neatly to one side, like... like a surgeon performing an operation!"

"My neighbor's cousin is a constable at Scotland Yard. He said the killer slit her throat with a single cut—the strength and precision were unbelievable!"

"No human could do something like that! He's a devil! A devil that crawled out of hell!"

Lin Jie sat in a corner. Outwardly, he remained impassive, but his ears were like radar, greedily gathering these fragments of information mixed with fact and rumor.

He quietly closed his diary and tucked it back into his coat. Then he picked up an old newspaper someone had already read, pretending, like everyone else, to be following this shocking case.

He was not infected by the panic of those around him.

After concluding that Jack the Ripper might be a UMA, he had instead become exceptionally calm.

Fear came from the unknown.

And now, at least for him, the greatest unknown had more or less been uncovered.

What remained was to use rigorous logic and analysis to identify and uncover that "devil's" pattern of activity from the known clues.

He carefully read every newspaper report about all the "Ripper" cases.

He found that the general public and Scotland Yard had focused on the killer's brutality and sympathy for the victims, overlooking details that seemed crucial to him.

First were the victims.

The newspapers collectively called them "unfortunate women," most of them prostitutes living at the very bottom of society.

But to Lin Jie, a deeper commonality lay behind that label: they were all homeless, lived extremely irregular lives, and often wandered alone through the dark alleys of the Whitechapel District late at night.

That meant they were perfect "isolated targets." If they disappeared for an hour or two, or even a day or two, no one would notice.

The UMA displayed a high degree of "predatory efficiency" when selecting its prey. It preferred targets that were easiest to take and posed the least risk.

Second was the murder weapon.

Everyone believed that the killer had used one or more sharp scalpels or dissecting knives, because the wounds were exceptionally smooth and precise.

But Lin Jie recalled the descriptions of various UMAs in that German diary. Many creatures possessed claws, fangs, or bone spurs that were naturally sharper than humanity's finest steel creations.

Equating "smooth wounds" directly with "human blades" was itself a fixed way of thinking.

What if the weapon was part of the UMA's body? That would explain why no discarded weapon had ever been found at the scenes, and why no witness had seen the killer carrying a knife.

The most critical point was the clue repeatedly mentioned yet dismissed by most people as nonsense—the smell of sulphur.

In nineteenth-century London, the stench of coal smoke and industrial fumes was everywhere. Strange odors occasionally appearing was nothing unusual.

Therefore, Scotland Yard had not given this clue sufficient attention.

Yet Lin Jie had learned from that diary that many creatures from the Underworld distorted or affected the physical environment around them simply by existing, producing strange lights, strange sounds, or "abnormal smells" like this one.

That sulphurous odor was very likely not an environmental remnant, but an impossible-to-conceal "body odor" inherent to the UMA itself—the most direct proof that it had been there!

A crime profile that could be called revolutionary gradually took shape in Lin Jie's mind:

The killer—or rather, the "predator"—was not human. It was a highly intelligent, stealthy UMA.

Its targets were a specific group of humans—individuals separated from the protection of mainstream society, isolated and helpless.

Its method was not to use tools, but to make use of its own natural "weapons," explaining both the clean efficiency of its methods and the cleanliness of the scenes.

Its movements were accompanied by a specific physical phenomenon—the smell of sulphur—which was the key beacon for tracking it.

It took the victims' organs not out of twisted psychology, but most likely because it was simply engaging in the most primitive act of "feeding."

Once this profile had been established, many seemingly unrelated clues were instantly connected, forming a clear yet horrifying picture.

Lin Jie could imagine how that monster lurking in London's thick fog calmly and efficiently selected its prey, then silently completed hunt after hunt.

He was immersed in his thoughts and failed to notice that, at the entrance to the reading room, an old constable in a badly worn uniform, his eyes weary yet still sharp, had been watching him for quite some time.

The old constable was named Arthur Weston. He was a veteran of Scotland Yard, but because of his stubborn nature and lack of skill at currying favor, he had spent his entire life circling around the most chaotic parishes, places like the Whitechapel District.

The recent "Ripper" cases had placed him under enormous pressure.

He had come here today only to temporarily escape the suffocating atmosphere at headquarters.

The reason he had noticed Lin Jie was that this Oriental man's demeanor was simply too unusual.

While everyone else gasped and exclaimed over the horror of the case, he alone sat as still as a stone.

His gaze was focused and calm, his fingers lightly tracing over the newspaper. He did not look like he was reading a sensational news story, but rather... a research report.

That focus reminded Weston of the finest detectives he had encountered in his youth, those with bloodhound-like instincts for a case.

Out of professional habit, Weston carried a cup of cheap coffee over and, as if by chance, sat in the seat beside Lin Jie.

"Another poor girl, isn't it?" Weston sighed and spoke first, sounding as though he were talking to himself while actually probing him.

Lin Jie jolted out of his thoughts. He looked up and saw the weathered face and police uniform.

His heart tightened, but he remained calm on the surface.

He knew his English was poor and that the more he spoke, the more mistakes he would make. So he merely imitated those around him, nodding with an expression of fearful pity.

Weston did not let it go. "Everyone says the devil did this. Young man, what do you think?" His sharp gaze fixed tightly on Lin Jie's eyes.

Lin Jie fell silent for a moment.

This was an opportunity, but also an enormous risk.

Getting involved with the authorities might expose him to I.A.R.C.'s attention, but it could also allow him to obtain intelligence inaccessible to ordinary people.

He decided to take the gamble.

Rather than answering directly, he picked up a pen and wrote a single word in the blank space of the newspaper:

Sulphur.

Then he tapped the word with his finger, pointed to the passage about the victims' organs being removed, and finally made a simple gesture of eating.

He offered no further explanation, because he could not explain it either. But those few simple gestures and symbols, connected together, conveyed an idea clearly enough.

Weston's pupils contracted.

He froze, staring fixedly at the word on the newspaper, then at the calm face of the Oriental man before him.

As one of the few officers who had personally visited every crime scene, he knew better than anyone how real that sulphurous smell was. He had also privately been baffled by the killer's "precise removal" of the organs.

But connecting those two things with "feeding"... the idea was simply too bold, too mad!

It had completely exceeded the bounds of traditional criminal psychology and entered a far older, darker realm.