Welcome to New London

The year is 1857, and all that the American colonies were meant to be lies in ruins. In 1835, when I was just a boy, something happened in the village of Innsmouth. Dark... things came up out of the sea, and walked among the settlers as if they were human. That was when the Deep Ones first came to the colonies. In their wake, the people of the villages and towns became very ill, suffering from delusions and foaming at the mouth, along with discoloration of the pupils of the eyes. They all seemed to change red. The settlers of America had fallen victim to the Rage plague, reduced to screaming, raving, flesh-eating masses, killing everything in sight with their bare hands. Nowhere was safe.

It was during the outbreak of this plague that I, only 5 years old, was chased into the wilderness by my own bloodthirsty parents, who had become infected with the Rage plague. There I was miraculously saved by a pack of white wolves. I don't remember much of the experience myself, since I was wounded and bleeding badly, but every day after that, I learned to survive in the western wilderness, watched over by my new adoptive parents, the wolves.

I wandered and searched for years, looking for someone, anyone who wasn't infected. When my searching proved in vain, I despaired, but the wolves came and comforted me, drove me onward until I reached the western shore of the continent. There, I met Japanese sailors exploring the area, searching for survivors. I had to be cautious to prove to them that I wasn't infected, which was particularly difficult since my eyes are a bright red, even though my exposure to the plague was only momentary. Once they realized that I was sane, they took me aboard their ship and agreed to take me to London. The ship's captain, Captain Hasegawa, gave me his goggles to hide my eyes, so as not to raise suspicion or panic.

When we arrived at the port in London, I saw the sky open up, and a blackness fell over the city. Fire fell from the clouds, laying waste to the skyline. It was there that I was accosted by the great Doctor Agoston Kazimir Bathory, a founding member of the New London Guild of Science. He said that he and his colleagues were on a mission to build a new city, where neither politics nor financial class prevailed, but rather human ingenuity and the sweat of man's brow was the governing power. This utopia would be called New London, and it needed good men to help build it. I joined them on their mission, joined the crew of their massive steam-driven airship, and a few years later I was rewarded for my works with an upscale flat in the adventurers' district, captain status in the New London Airship Armada, and the SAS (Steam-driven Air Ship) Rapture, designed and constructed by the good Doctor Bathory himself.

New London itself is everything I've ever wanted. An island city in the middle of the Atlantic ocean, made of brass, iron, steel, and copper. Everything here runs on steam or clockwork, or eastern methods that are really more alchemy than science. I am surrounded by people like me, thinkers, inventors, scientists and adventurers. After all, they are the people for whom this city was built. Welcome to the new world.

Welcome to New London.