Mystical Shadows of Foggy Alley

To be honest, this is an unusual horror story.

I have a strong interest in many horror and supernatural stories and games. The opportunity to create this story was actually in the Games 3035 class, which required us to create a game book based on myths or urban legends. There are many themes that can be used, but I finally chose the current one - a new urban legend inspired by "Jack the Ripper" and "Sweeney Todd", "Eerie Mist Shadow".

Compared with the original urban legend full of evil, blood and violence, I want to make some different changes in my game story. In my story, horror is not just about death and killing, but about losing oneself. Scissors are no longer just a tool for the razor killer, but a kind of existence beyond physical damage - it cuts not only people's hair, but also people's memories, and even their "troubles". When a person's troubles are cut off, will they still be themselves? If a person completely forgets the past, does it mean that they are dead?

Similarly, compared to the purely evil behavior of the protagonist in the original urban legend, there is no pure evil in my story, and even the "horror" itself has a hint of gentleness. The fog shrouds the city, and people are afraid of the "Eerie Mist Shadow", the sound of the scissors, and fear that they will become its next target. But they don't know that the stories circulating in the fog are just one-sided rumors - the real it, no, "she", is a tragic hairdresser.

She is a gentle person. It can even be said that she is almost morbidly gentle. She likes a quiet life and "loves" every customer she has served equally like a god. She is not only a hairdresser, but also a listener. She listens to people's troubles and understands their pain. When customers sit in her chair, she cuts ordinary hair; and when the fog rises, she will use the scissors that belong to her alone to wander around the streets and alleys to cut off their troubles. For her, this is not only a haircut process, but also a ritual of redemption. She doesn't want anyone to be entangled by those weird "hair" like her.

In my setting, people's troubles will not disappear. They will accumulate, entangle, and decay like living things, and eventually become some invisible monsters in the city, wandering in the fog. The barber is the only one who can see these "trouble monsters", and the only thing she can do is to try her best to get rid of them. She cuts off not only the hair, but also the pain that people don't want to recall, the lingering anxiety, and the heavy burden that is suffocating. She can't change the world, but she hopes to at least share some of the pain for people.

She is not a bloodthirsty ghost, nor a monster that hunts people. She is just a person who keeps listening and giving, but unknowingly loses herself in the fog. Just like a doctor cannot heal himself, she gave birth to this power because she couldn't face her past memories, and she also wanted to find herself because of her past memories. Her past, her troubles, her pain. She cut off everyone's troubles, including her own, just to seek a trace of peace in her life.

The detective played by the player should be a role that reveals the truth and stops the shadow. But as the memory is restored, the player will find that he is not a bystander, but a part of the story - the barber tried to cut off the player's troubles, but what did they say? What was their original relationship? What made them finally go on the road of mutual opposition?

In the creation of this game book, I tried to break the narrative mode of traditional horror stories. I don't want to simply create a terrifying "urban legend", I hope to build a character that makes people feel sorry, resonate, and even feel a little heartbroken at the end. The barber is not evil, in fact, she is the gentlest person in the story. But sometimes, gentleness itself can be a destructive thing. When a person bears all the pain, what is left in the end?

This is not a horror story about revenge or hunting, but a story about "forgetting" and "remembering". People can choose to forget the pain of the past, but they will still be shaped by the past. In the end, where the story goes will depend on the player's choice - are they willing to pick up the fragments of memory, find themselves, and redeem themselves with the barber, or choose to let everything stay in the fog and dissipate with time?