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Although the original question has been answered, I should qualify my earlier statement which was slightly misleading.

I autoskip prologues when I'm browsing for new books to buy. If the author is a fave, I will read their prologues, preface(s), dedications, even the table of contents so I can get a thrill off the chapter names.

If the author is untried or unknown to me (I try to keep this group at 90% of my purchases), I immediately head for chapter one because I want to know how the (rest of) the book is written and who I'll be spending the next few days of my leisure time with. Prologues can't tell me that. I've been tricked into a few lemons by ignoring this rule.

I'd be curious if other buyers use this approach. Library doesn't count because you're not out pocket money on a borrowed book that turns out little better than a dead frog. Also curious your approximate consumption. I hover around 10 books per month, so not huge, but enough I have no budget for lemons

prologue = auto skip

My characters move around a lot so I've got filtering all over the place. *shrug* Some of narrators do it less. I see it in best sellers all the time (not that this should be a guide)

In "Hard Sci-fi" the world is expected to conform to known physics. Any breach must be explained in context of the known (and generally kept to a minimum).

Soft Sci-fi allows more leeway (eg magic or time machines or space bees (Spider Robinson)) so that might be the group to target

Yours is a complicated world

Is this the group that has you questioning the deaths / market?

Ok... watched it. I can see nods to the books (people like me were complaining vociferously about this in the previous 2 movies). You could see them starting to realign with the books in the previous movie so maybe this'll close the gap

Why are you trying to tone it down? Has your target audience communicated unease?

Who is this audience? The promotion company I used would immediately ask me to rattle off books my audience reads. If I couldn't name at least a dozen, they're kind of giving me the Internet side-eye

Valid... but there are only so many ways to brutally murder an innocent priest. By about murder 7, it'll be death by crayon consumption. Ah, but what is "impact"? Is it not measured by how much pathos we have for the victims?

If we're meant to feel an impact then we must feel loss. If we're to feel loss, we must grow to care for the victim.This isn't possible if the victims are dropping off faster than we can learn their stories. Consider having 3 of those victims pop out of the chain and ask the detectives to save them. Them immediately kill one, so we can care for the remaining two. Bonus points if you can make 7 victims meaningful then kill 6 then the 7th gets killed anyway.

I would save that for a horror story

Agreed it's an improvement

Initial thoughts:

As Romano turned the final corner, he felt a chill in the air. He checked a vent. The heat still flowed. He heard rustling from his office. “Hello?”
--A lot of stage direction here; could be simpler / focused on the action rather than the reaction. "Rustle" is a very vague word, that I initially assumed meant paper
A shadowy figure shrouded in swirling fog rushed out, headed for the exit.
--IMO too specific for this early in the story. One wouldn't normally ell "stop" to a man-shaped cloud of fog-- most of us would be seeking an exit.
“You there. Stop!”
The intruder looked in Romano’s direction. More beast than man, it had curved horns and glowing red eyes. It let out a demonic howl that sent a chill down the father’s spine.
--Again, perhaps a bit strong for the early part. Specifically the horn. Use of sound is good, but you'd have just as much effect if it's just feral breathing
The end of the corridor filled with fog until the figure could no longer be seen. Romano summoned his courage and charged into the mist, but the intruder was gone. Only fog and ice-cold air remained, both of which dissipated quickly.
Romano’s heart pounded. He checked the doors, but they were locked, per usual at night. He ran into his office and grabbed a bottle of holy water from his desk, then rushed out and sprinkled it across the doors and floor while praying for protection of the orphanage.
He returned to his office to see what the intruder might have taken. Everything looked as he had left it except the Eucharistic Adoration schedule was missing — the one that showed which boys were assigned to the chapel and at what times. Romano dialed 113 for the Polizia di Stato. He would tell them it was someone in a costume to avoid sounding crazy, but he had to act. One or more of the boys might be at risk.
--His reactions to a ball of mist in his office seem practiced

"Duke" doesn't even satisfy the uniqueness rule in that world. "The duke..." heh

re exclamation marks, I've come to the realization that some writer's works are more sedate than others, and their characters frequently never have to yell. For example, some stories will never have two characters across the engine room of a sinking, burning ship, yelling instructions to each other. It's hard to get through a page of that and not have 4-5 exclamation marks