Prologue. Night. A time of fears, hatred, pain and pleasure. My working hours. Port area. Slums. I glide through dark streets - I watch the darkness fall in a muddy rain from low clouds swirling with gloom, mixed with dirty whitish fog rising from the oily surface of the river, squeezed by cramped mossy stones of embankments, with smoke and soot of rare torches, with stuffy and cloying fumes of sewage from garbage heaps. This nasty sticky suspension is eventually soaked in the fear, envy and malice of the creatures living here - mostly people, or those who were once them. Everyone who gets here, if they are not strong enough, becomes infected with this substance and eventually becomes part of it....