[SPOILER] Plot Discussion Thread *Spoiler Alert*

[kirkmegna]

Also the passage:

"I am an angel of death, descending to smother the firstborn for the death of the two that came after"

Is probably just a metaphor, as have been said and pointed the biblical reference before, but I can't help but feel that there is more to it that meets the eye. Who would be the firstborn in this case, if this is to be taken literally? The machine? No, can't be. Was there another child? And I realize this contradicts the game, but I thought of it anyway, maybe Mandus dark side already existed before and it is that the "firstborn"? Just pure speculation, I know.

I definitely think it's the machine. You can see several signs posted with the company name and the year it was founded - 1828. He would have inherited it from his father and was definitely involved with it prior to the birth of his children in 1890.

Again about Jack the Ripper, in the passage: "Perhaps I should show him the tripery. See whether his stomach, so trained by rummaging in the innards of clumsily vivisected whores, is strong enough to stare into the real engines of his golden age. I may even introduce him to Jack, or his sons at least. We have stronger locks on the windows now, and we bring their toys to them."

Could it mean that Mandus itself was Jack the Ripper, and he is referencing his own sons? And he means that in the way that, he will introduce "Jack" to the Professor by killing him? And that the locks in the windows aren't meant to keep outside people/things from entering, but to keep people from leaving? ... But then I think of the part of "clumsily vivisected whores", and I think that, if Mandus was the Ripper, he would not call his own work clumsy, I guess. But maybe he is, and Jack the Ripper is his dark side/ the firstborn!!! Ehh, probaly no, quite a leap of faith, but this game left my imagination run wild.

Mandus could be Jack the Ripper, as it was speculated that the killer had experience as a butcher based on how the bodies were found and in fact many butchers were interviewed as suspects.

This could be the case if we factor in the whole schizophrenia/split personality disorder mentioned earlier since he would have performed those Jack Ripper killings prior to his wife's death (so he would have needed to be ill prior to her death, which we don't really have any evidence for).

Ultimately, I don't think this is the case.