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(No anagram is involved in that answer, nor is the symbol on the opal a necessary clue to solve it. Batsheva's insight came from saying the words aloud without worrying about punctuation between them.)
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Well, the vampires are a simple challenge (for someone who eats a lot of garlic anyway). But then again, vampires are devious creatures, so maybe there is something I'm missing here... But the simple maths are as such:
First hour, you've got the first one who makes three -> that's four. The four wish to confuse air traffic and all fly around so they make twelve. All in all -> 16 So 16 times three equals 48 (plus the old 16) -> 64 And then you have 64 who want an energy boost and can't settle for a banana, so you get 64*4 -> 256 Or simpler: 4^4=256 And I place a disclaimer of brains working at below-par capacity due to a cold. |
stepurhan believes Uptimist's timing may be a little off due to a misreading of the puzzle parameters, though he may be mistaken. He also considers the possibility that Mrs Ye is the owner of a spinning toy commonly known as a top, and rummages through the toy chest looking for such an item.
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Kenichi Nakamura's first attempt at the vampire puzzle appeared reasonable, a clear-cut case of exponential growth, and yet... that wasn't quite the answer. What was wrong with this reasoning?
As he mulled this over, Batsheva swept up to the toy chest in a flurry of bangles and flora. "MRS YE'S TOP!" L. V. watched, feigning incomprehension, as she affected a campy drag queen voice, pointed to an item in the toy chest, and said to Mrs. Ye, "Lemme borrow that top!" "Excuse me?" asked Margaret Ye. She'd always found Batsheva a bit exasperating. "That's a cute top! I wanna borrow it! Let me -" Batsheva stopped, seeing that her efforts at lightening the mood were falling flat, and said, "It's a YouTube thing." Ocean Zweidler sighed as Mrs. Ye handed over the toy. It was decorated with multicolored dots, but the part that immediately drew Ms. Ellis's attention was the handle. It unscrewed from the disc easily, revealing a metal cylinder that fit neatly into the lock. "It must be electronic," said Kenichi, noting the lack of notches on the key. "It has a chip inside the handle to signal the door." But when they opened the cabinet, the safe inside confronted them with yet another challenge! Inside was another locked door, with a combination lock that bore a compass rose around its dial, rather than numbers. And attached to this safe was a sheet of paper bearing the following maze of arrows: |
At the Banquet of 2021...
"You didn't really mean for that to happen, did you? When they found the ochre stone?" It was Cox who spoke, more than a little impertinently. She was a truly rigid and inflexible servant of the Witch, and was shocked that this minor heresy was being committed. But she definitely had a point. "You never expected the answer of 'Dante's Inferno!' You couldn't have... Could you?" "The Sapphire Witch is unpredictable! Who knows? Perhaps I anticipated this second answer from the start! After all, many of these riddles were forged with two answers in mind!" The Witch laughed, then added, airily waving at Miss Cox's garishly colored attire, "You ought to loosen your collar a little." "I'm sorry, but It's not right! Letting a wrong answer pass is wrong! Let's just strike that out and - " But fortunately, the pedantic argument proceeded no further, "It'll be fine," said Rathvon, another of the Witch's servants. Short and rubicund, and as flexible as Miss Cox was rigid, Rathvon frequently had to clean up after her mistakes when she spoke a little too quickly, which was often. "Try to see things from our Witch's position, sis. It's not a 'wrong answer'; it fits the clues and decodes neatly. It was just an unexpected move, that's all." The Witch nodded, and by illustration, made a chessboard diagram appear. ---- As the sky darkens, the magic of the Witch waxes in power. Shall we have a little music? (Theme: Witch's Chess) Though the pieces were the same as in normal play, they were arranged in a pattern that couldn't possibly have been achieved in any sane chess game. As they watched, black moved a pawn out of the way, revealing an unexpected attack from a bishop. The white king was being threatened. The Witch tapped on the figure to emphasize the threat. "You see? The Witch side must respond. We are in check." "Can't we ignore it -" "We cannot afford to. What if they invoke the Sphinx's Tenth Commandment? If any player's answer neatly fits every single clue of a riddle without breaking these rules, it is a correct answer." Cox stopped short, for the full depth of the Witch's insanity had finally become apparent to her. "You mean to play this whole game by Sphinx's rules? That means that you can't use red herrings! Every clue would have to either be a genuine clue to some earlier or later riddle, or a hint to someone's character, or a clue to what really happened that night, or all of those things!" Sphinx's rules were meant for short riddles and individual puzzles, but never for an entire game. Yet the Witch didn't seem daunted. "I never decreed in red that I was playing by Sphinx's rules. And no matter. We've moved out of check and lost little for it. Provided that we weave all these myriad details into our story without compromising the truth, we shall win." "A reasonable move indeed," added Dudeney. "Conservative and cautious." "Yeah. Great move," said the boy at the end of the table, rather impatiently. "But I don't care if you play easy on me. Okay? If I give you a wrong answer, I want to know! Don't talk down to me." The Witch looked saddened at this. "Is that really all you care about? The right answer?" "I care about the truth. It's okay if we play games," said the boy, "but I want to get an answer at the end. I feel like sometimes... you get close to showing me a fact, something that really happened that night, not just fake names and metaphors and riddles. But whenever you do, I bet you tell Cox to get rid of it. Just to keep me from seeing..." The Witch mulled this over in silence. Dudeney looked up expectantly, as this was the point where a Witch was duty-bound to rebuff the arrogant mortal. "Annabel?" said Dudeney. "Let me think!" Such a blunt demand was rare, and yet the boy had a right to ask. But a Witch needed to be firm in these matters, or else ruin would result. "Were the secrets of the Club's final meeting generally known," said the Witch, "I would be ruined. Why should I trust you?" The boy considered his answer carefully, but couldn't really come up with a reason that appealed to the Witch's self-interest. "Because I believed in you." "Well..." said the Witch, a little more softly. "We'll see. Let me speak to my mentor. When this Chapter's banquet arrives, and not before." |
This is a really gripping narrative, with puzzles as an added bonus.
Vampires are scarier than I imagined. If vampires need 3 peoples blood per hour. They must be munching every 20 minutes. Assuming Drac doesn't need blood to start flying, his first snack is at 20 minutes. At 20 minutes there would be 2 vampires. At 40 minutes, Drac has his second snack, and Drac junior has his first. There are now 4 vampires. Carrying on in this fashion, the number of vampires doubles every 20 minutes, giving a total of 4,096 vampires at 240 minutes. Alternatively, Drac needs a snack to get started (so there are 2 vampires at 0 minutes rather than 20 minutes in) This adds another iteration, to an eye-watering 8,092 vampires. Based on the 2010 population figures (if Wikipedia is to be believed) the number of people in Manhattan is 1,585,873. Assuming the vampires only leave Manhattan when all the population are turned, the whole lot will be vampires by 7:00 am. On the plus side. that happens to coincide with dawn (approximately), which should thin out the numbers a bit. :) |
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Several years ago... Alicia Tressler had known of Ann Seaton by phone and electronic correspondence, but actually meeting her in person was quite another thing. Seaton's office was neat, save for one desk piled high with papers, but details hinted at its owner's eccentricity. One bookshelf held, next to the classic textbooks and protocol guides, a copy of The Hobbit, and brass figurines, some in the shapes of witches and giant mushrooms, stood on a filing cabinet in the corner. "Cup of tea?" asked Dr. Seaton, offering the clinician a mug labeled with a three-eyed smiley face. "Thanks," said Dr. Tressler. "Liked the introduction you gave me today. Very flattered!" Before her talk, Seaton had introduced her as a world-renowned diagnostician. Of course, that she was one of Seaton's several dozen collaborators on the Cancer Chip project, seeking to find molecular 'signals' to diagnose and treat tumors, probably contributed to the warm reception. "Only the best for you, Alicia," said Seaton, toying with a spring between her fingers. "But I actually wanted to talk to you about something else. Not business at all. My husband and I have started a kind of club." "A club?" Seaton shrugged, as if to say 'it's nothing serious', but her eyes were focused on Tressler's "Think of it as a puzzle and riddle club. I do know how you enjoy mysteries, so..." "Guess I'm up for a meeting! Couldn't hurt to try!" said Alicia, gamely. "Oh, good, good. You know Professor Rinaldi? He's on board, too..." And that was how Dr. Alicia Tressler took her first step toward becoming ALICE, the Witch of Connections. |
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Depending on whether the vampire feeds on 3 people after an hour, or on 1 person every 20 minutes, I agree with the 256 and 4096 answers.
The fact that it's noon doesn't mean anything. It was never stated that the vampires in this particular riddle can't stand sunlight, and besides, they could get by in the subway system alone... :P As for the compass lock thingie. I think the lock combination is NSWE (in that order). In the grid, if you start at the A and take the north arrow, then - at the box you just arrived at - the south arrow, then the west arrow and then the east arrow, you arrive at the R. Also: A + North + South + West + East + R = A+N+S+W+E+R = ANSWER. :D |
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The guests continued to discuss the vampire problem, and eventually reached a conclusion: at least two answers were possible, in keeping with the running themes of the night, depending on how they characterized the vampires' rate of reproduction.
Naturally, old Walter Sexton called foul. "Sphinx's Second and Third," he muttered. "Not a sound riddle. Framing's too vague." "On the contrary," said Ocean Zweidler, "At noon, the vampires should burn up. That's all the information we need... unless they were Twilight vampires, but those hardly count, do they?" Batsheva had a caveat. "Could've ridden the subway! Dracula would get the senior discount." "The riddle tells us that the vampires were flying," replied Ocean, a little coyly. Then, in a moment of terribly Batsheva-like insight, she added. "Of course, they could have had umbrellas to protect them from the sun." "That's true!" said Batsheva, nodding sagely. In the end, the guests settled on three answers: 256, 4096, and zero, with the third being most likely given Batsheva's nature. Would this vampire lore be relevant later on? Of course it would. ******* With a last careful click, Walter Sexton, one of the Club's more traditional puzzle solvers, spun the compass dial to the last position - E. "Rather like solving a crossword," he remarked. "Fill in the missing letters to find the 'ANSWER.'" As he spoke, the safe swung open, revealing yet another safe inside it - a safe within a safe. On that safe was taped a piece of paper - the very page you are reading right now - and on that piece of paper were two stories. The first story told how Walter opened the safe, but the second was an outrageous lie. According to the bottom half of the page, L. V. had opened the safe using his mother's name from her first marriage, a piece of information that would have been entirely inaccessible to anyone else! How absurd... but was it a clue of some kind? This was the second time that they had found two parallel stories inside a safe, and each time, L. V. had been the victor in the alternate story. "I imagine that whoever wrote these riddles thinks a great deal of you, Mr. Ford-Seaton," said Walter, drily. In the second story, what combination did L. V. use to open the safe? ******* Meet the Pieces (Part 6 of Many) Kenichi Nakamura Age: 48 Profession: Programmer Quote: "People call riddles 'difficult' or 'easy' in a way that sounds like saying 'good' or 'bad.' Lose, lose! Tell me if a riddle's 'clever' or 'crude.' If it's clever and easy, give it to children. If it's clever and difficult, give it to me. If it's crude, give it to nobody." Background: Born in Chiba Prefecture, Japan, Kenichi Nakamura grew up in a big city on the Boso Peninsula. From a young age, he loved tinkering in his father's electronics store, taking apart radios, soldering wires, and getting the odd shock from a charged capacitor. In his twenties, he attained international fame under the pseudonym "Ken Q." as the author of the acclaimed When they Call series of 'visual novels.' In pursuit of new ideas and puzzles he traveled the world, learning English and swapping hacker jargon with his western peers. Random Fact: Kenichi Nakamura can solve a difficult Playfair cipher in his head. Sample Riddle: Mark Ye was looking increasingly impatient with the guests' attempts to solve the riddles. "Mark, are you allowed to try to answer these?" asked Mr. Nakamura. "Staff and their families are only allowed to answer the Witch's Epigraph, not the safe riddles." recited Mark. "I'm bored." Kenichi filed the reference to a 'Witch's Epigraph' in his memory for later consideration. "Would you like to have a riddle of your own to solve?" asked Mr. Nakamura. "Yeah!" "Okay. There is a frog on that staircase with 39 steps. First it jumps up 5 steps. Then it jumps down 2 steps. Then it jumps up 5 steps. Then it jumps down 2 steps. And so it repeats, until it reaches the top. If -" "25 jumps!" said Mark. "I know this one! It's with a well!" "... no, not that one. Suppose you see the frog on top of the 38th step, and you know it started on top of one of the first ten steps. Which of those steps could it have started from?" |
When starting on the floor, it takes the frog 25 jumps to reach the top (like Mark said). On his 23rd jump, the frog reaches step 38.
Because of the +5/-2 iteration, every third step gives the same jumping sequence (each consecutive time requiring 2 jumps less to reach the top). That means that starting at steps 3, 6 and 9 would each result in the frog arriving at step 38. No other sequences have him arriving at step 38, since there are only 39 steps in total. If you don't count the ground floor (step 0, which the frog can hardly start "on top of"), then the frog could only have started from steps 3, 6 or 9. |
Even at his young age, Mark was thorough and clever. "There's a pattern. It's the same thing every three steps." He presented the correct three numbers in order, from lowest to highest. Unsurprisingly, they would prove to be useful later.
Regardless of which guest managed to open the compass dial - LV or Walter - the safe inside was entirely different from any they had seen before. Behind the paper bearing the two stories was a second taped note and a microphone speaker. Some of the text on the note was blurred, but the following could be made out: "Maybe we ought to look at that collection of records," suggested Ocean. The group gathered around the box of records as Samuel wheeled a phonograph into the room. The singles in the box were, from front to back: * "Kaze wo Atsumete" * "I've Got Dreams to Remember" * "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic" * "Suspicious Minds" * "Hey Jude" * "Amor, No Gracias" * "People Get Ready" * "There Are Bad Times Just around the Corner" * "Rhapsody in Blue" * "Superstition" * "Respect" * "Breaking Up Is Hard to Do" * "Take on Me" * "The Riddle" * "Mamma Said" * "Here I Go Again" * "Twilight" * "Ruby Tuesday" The guests pooled their knowledge and considered the problem carefully. A combination of songs - most likely a pair of them - was required. "I was never good with songs," said Mr. Jackson, the tech guy. "But her taste was pretty broad, wasn't it?" "Think there's a message in these?" asked Samuel. Of course, knowing Ann, there had to be - probably more than one. Lana Rodriguez simply listened as the guests played through the songs, and reflected on all of the times that the Sapphire Witch had borrowed the scratched old discs. Foreman had brought a phonograph into her hospital room, in that last awful month. If he'd been so thoughtful about his little affair, mused Lana, bitterly, she might have let him win this. But you gave him just enough rope to hang himself, didn't you, Ann? Him and that flighty little woman. "Huh!" said Batsheva Ellis, flipping through the records as Foreman hovered near her shoulder. "She liked ELO! Good taste!" Turning away a shade apologetically, Dr. Rinaldi said, "I think I shall look for the other path through the arrow maze. I have no head for popular music." "Agreed," said Walter Sexton. |
About the blurred note:
Sodium11 --> Sodium has an atomic number of 11 If what's between brackets needs to be 17, then the blurred word should be Carbon (which has an atomic number of 6). That said, sodium carbonate is more commonly known as washing soda, so maybe we need the word 'SODA' here??? As for the records, there's a hidden message present if we add the artists who perform the songs: Happy End - Kare wo Atsumete Otis Redding - I've Got Dreams to Remember Police, The - Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic Elvis Presley - Suspicious Minds Beatles, The - Hey Jude Rocio Durcal - Amor, No Gracias Impressions, The - People Get Ready Noel Coward - There Are Bad Times Just around the Corner Gershwin - Rhapsody in Blue Stevie Wonder - Superstition Aretha Franklin - Respect Neil Sedaka - Breaking Up Is Hard to Do A-Ha - Take on Me Nik Kershaw - The Riddle Shirelles, The - Mamma Said Whitesnake - Here I Go Again ELO - Twilight Rolling Stones, The - Ruby Tuesday Looking at the first letters gives us: HOPE BRINGS AN ANSWER |
Kenichi Nakamura puzzled over the second clue, pulling out a periodic table from a chemistry book on the bookshelf. Sodium carbonate? Hmm... no, that didn't fit any of the songs. The records had to hold the secret to solving this.
It didn't seem like a cipher or cryptogram of any conventional kind, he reflected. It almost certainly had to do with the contents of the songs themselves. "Hey, dudes.... how'd we solve the bead puzzle? With the solder and all that?" thought L. V. aloud. The first clue was even trickier. Batsheva tried reading the lines aloud, ignoring the blurred-out text, to see if anything jumped out at her. They had already begun testing records, and the answer to that clue certainly was not one of the first nine songs. Ocean flipped back and forth through the singles, looking for any pattern, and then... it hit her. She pulled out a pencil and paper, and had it in seconds. HOPE BRINGS AN ANSWER "Could it mean...? No, of course not, that would be ridiculous." It was likely that they were not meant to use this clue just yet, but it would be helpful shortly. "Hope brings an answer..." Little did Ocean know that an uninvited guest, spying upon the proceedings from the landing above, had heard what she said, and had jotted down a hasty scribble in her notebook. "Weird," she muttered. But before this watcher - a girl of no more than twelve - could think further on this, she heard footsteps approaching, and swiftly ducked into the Club's computer room as two security guards turned the corner. It was Maria Brand and Sal Lucas, a set of new additions to the Club staff. "Man," said Sal, a portly but well-muscled man of about forty. "Boss's got us working long hours. Why they gotta do it at midnight?" "They don't want anybody to find out," replied Maria, coolly, adjusting the walkie-talkie at her waist. "Would you?" The girl furrowed her brow, pulled out her phone, and quietly set it to record the conversation for later. "Eh, gates locked," Sal smiled easily, reflecting on the last set of sacrifices. "Nobody's getting back there until it's time. Disappearances happen all the time 'round here, anyway." Ducking further into the shadows as the guards passed by, the girl wondered just who - or what - was going to disappear. Should she tell her mother? But the Witch said she absolutely couldn't be seen by anybody! The clock struck seven. Five hours to midnight. ---------------- (The second solution to the maze remains undiscovered; if you're stuck, remember that even if the Witch had a different last name in her second marriage, her first name was likely unchanged. This should give you the first two moves through the maze... The first clue to open this safe is a tricky one. One possible way to solve it would be for multiple posters to listen to different songs and use teamwork to find the answer. I've eliminated the first several songs, so it's got to be in the second half of the list.) |
(Note: By finding the hidden message in the records and solving the earlier puzzle involving Ocean's housekeys, you have unlocked the segments related to Hope.)
In 2021... As the guests sat quietly at the table, a figure emerged from the shadows of the banquet hall. "Well," said the newcomer, her voice flat and even. She was sleek, graceful, and strangely ageless, and in her right hand, she carried a long obsidian rod. "It seems," she said, "that the Human Side is unwilling to find the second way out of that maze. Perhaps a little encouragement is in order." "You needn't need go that far!" snapped the Sapphire Witch, but the newcomer waved a hand, calling for silence. "Don't test my patience," said this new Witch. "Boy!" she said, turning to the youth opposite the Sapphire Witch. "Do you know who I am?" "Maybe," said the boy. "Are you the Witch of Secrets?" The Witch of Secrets smiled. "Indeed. Yes. I am. And I imagine that all of you have come to 'solve the story.'" She waved her rod, and a red scythe-blade sprung from the tip. "Be my guest. It amuses me when mortals seek to surpass the power of Witches." Although the implied threat filled the boy with dread, he concealed it as well as he was able. "Quit playing around and get to the point! I want the truth of what happened that night. Why was my mother disgraced? What was up with the disappearances? Do we even know who won that inheritance dispute?" The Witch of Secrets chuckled, low and cruel. "You have more pressing problems to consider. Every time the Human Side fails to solve a riddle, the power of the Witch Side grows." Miss Cox nodded. "It's true. In Witch's Chess, it is the duty of humans to provide a 'rational solution.' If the Human Side stops thinking, magic wins by default." "Now," said the Witch of Secrets. "It is time for you to see the true power of the Witch's Darkness." ---- After glancing left and right to make sure nobody was watching, Walter Sexton and L.V. Seaton-Ford stepped away from the rest of the crowd, into the darkness of the club's hallways. "Dude, what's up?" asked L. V. "You looked kinda angry there." Sexton faced him and sighed. "More disappointed. I know you object to Ms. Ellis on general principle. But there's no reason to snipe at her." L. V. grinned with his mouth, but not his eyes. "You think she even notices?" "I've known Ms. Ellis for some time," replied Sexton, sounding tired. "She pretends not to notice, but she does." They kept walking, losing track of their surroundings as they talked. "Do you blame her for what happened?" "She coulda waited until the body was cold." "That's not an answer, young man, and - where are we now?" They had reached an unfamiliar place in the Club - a small, square room with stone walls that they'd never seen before, lit by a flickering chandelier. On the floor was engraved a large letter "A" in Gothic script, and foreboding archways lay to the north, south, east, and west, with the letters "N," "S," "E", and "W", engraved over each arch, respectively. All opened into long, dark, curving tunnels. "What's this?" said Sexton, picking up an envelope from the floor. It bore a distinctive seal: Find a way out or die. You get a two-move head start. Signed, The Witch of Secrets From somewhere to the south, the two heard the sound of inhuman shrieks and hisses. Whatever they were, they were getting closer. But surely there was a rational explanation for this... Walter and L. V. have been trapped in the maze. Use compass directions to guide them through the labyrinth, one room at a time, and hurry! |
If L.V.'s solution to the maze was his mother's name from her first marriage, then we need to start with N-N (her name was Ann, so we start at the A and take the north arrow twice).
This path eventually leads to one single possibility (due to some combinations ending in a square with no outgoing arrows - a dead end), and that possibility is: ANN WESER. It's the only solution that starts with ANN and leads back to the R. This makes N-N-W-E-S-E the combination that L.V. used to open the safe. |
(Well-reasoned! You might wan to recheck the last two moves, though.)
"Run," suggested L. V., helpfully, and the two of them sprinted through the north door into a long tunnel that curved to the east. As they stepped into the room it led into, a stone block slammed down behind them. Walter stopped to catch his breath - whatever was chasing them should be caught behind that door. Then he heard the crashing footsteps from the east. Two demons stepped into the room and stared at the pair for a long moment through utterly black eyes. Snarling, one leapt at Walter, and he madly scrambled through the south door with the creature in pursuit. The other demon charged at L. V., who fled in terror through the north door. A - N - N - The tunnel curved around and left L. V. in a room entirely out of place - a laboratory? The air was was strangely calm; for the moment, the sound of demons had vanished. Busily, translucent figures sorted fruit flies with paintbrushes, ignoring L. V. entirely as he entered and the door clicked locked behind him. One of these scientists, a man in his thirties, gleefully squirted an undergraduate with a bottle of ethanol. He appeared to be a professor, and a familiar one at that. "Stop it, Dr. Rinaldi," said the student, looking a little put out. L. V craned his neck and saw that the young man's notebook was titled 'B. WESSER.' "Ah... Bruce, you've got to learn to enjoy yourself, eh?" replied the ghostly figure. "Work a puzzle! Kiss a girl! Listen to some music! There's a fun song out, you know. It goes -" Before L. V could think further about what he'd just seen, however, a pounding at the north door quickly diverted his attention to escape. The hinges wouldn't hold off the demon for very long. The west door looked promising. Keypad Lock To unlock the keypad, L. V. must enter a four-digit code. * No digit appears more than once in the code. * Three of the digits are three-letter words in English. * The last digit is twice the first digit. * The sum of the first two digits is 10. Solving this lock will provide a clue to the record safe puzzle. |
For single digit numbers, there are only three, 3-letter choices. One, Two and Six. No duplicates so all 3 must be in the code.
The first two digits adding up to 10 must therefore include at least one of these. The other digit must be either 9, 8 or 4. Given we don't have any of these yet, whichever is correct must be the missing fourth digit. That means the last digit being twice the first can only be achieved using 1,2 and 6. The only combination that works is 1 and 2. The combination is therefore 1962. |
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That makes it N-N-W-E-S-S-E instead. I fully endorse Stepurhan's solution of 1962 for the padlock. If it's a clue towards the records, then I assume we're looking for a song released in 1962. The first 9 have already been ruled out, so that leaves: Neil Sedaka - Breaking Up Is Hard to Do The Shirelles - Mamma Said was close, though. 1961. |
Fantasy spontaneously combusts. :crazy:
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For a brief moment, the spell of the Witch of Secrets flickered, and with it, the world flickered as well. The reality of Humans asserted itself over the reality of Witches, and L. V. and Walter were standing in front of the safe with the rest of the group, as if nothing had happened.
"Woah! Listen to this!" said L. V., playing the record of "Breaking Up Is Hard to Do": "Down, dooby-doo down down, Come-a, come-a down, dooby-doo down down, Comma, comma down, dooby-doo down down..." The backup singers repeated that refrain again and again, subtly matching the first part of the clue: Then the spell of the Witch of Secrets snapped back into place. L. V. was inside a ghostly laboratory, unaware of what had just happened, frantically punching in the four-digit combination to the western door. As he punched in the last digit, the pursuing demon burst into the laboratory, roaring with terrible anger, the door slid open with a metallic swish, and L. V. leapt through, the monster in close pursuit. The tunnel took L. V. to a new set of ghostly surroundings - a bustling bistro, staffed by ghostly waiters. Again, the door slammed shut behind him, giving him valuable moments to solve the riddle of this room. As he looked for the exit, his attention was drawn to a table where three people sat, both of whom he recognized. One was his mother, far younger than he had ever known her. The second was a very familiar man, a businessman - Nat Foreman. And the third was the undergraduate he'd seen in the laboratory, Bruce. It was with a start that L. V. realized that this Bruce could have been none other than his father - his mother's first husband, who'd died when he was only a boy. Yet although he had more to say than he could possibly put into words, a voice in the back of his mind warned him that the ghosts before him were nothing more than illusions. Tricks. L. V. shot a contemptuous look at Nat before moving to the east door. It was sealed tight with no visible means of opening it, but on the table next to it sat an eight-by-eight chessboard and a box of pieces. Although these pieces resembled ordinary chess-pieces in outline, each was topped with a witch's cap. Spurred by the sounds of scratching at the door he had come from, L. V. hurriedly read the note on the exit: A Witch in a chess game’s a powerful thing; It can move like a bishop or move like a king. How many such Witches, one way or another, Can fit on this board without threatening each other? |
Best I can achieve is 10, though I've found several combinations for that. Any advance on 10?
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Since they move like a bishop, you can use both the white and black diagonals to "almost" their full potential. The max number of bishops you can place on a chess board is 14.
Because witches also move like a king, they can reach one square horizontally or vertically as well. This hinders the bishop solution by forcing us to have at least one single square between them (horizontally or vertically, that is). I managed to fit 13 on a chess board. I'm convinced this is the maximum amount. Like so: http://users.telenet.be/TimovieMan/I...WitchChess.gif |
(Fantastically done! Double update today.
I encourage readers to speculate as to what's going on, who the boy in the 2021 banquet is, and what the Sapphire Witch is trying to do. There's more of a mystery here than simply the puzzles that are presented explicitly, and even readers who have trouble with number/word/code puzzles can still try to understand the heart of this story.) As L. V. placed the last Witch piece on the board, the door slid open. He wasted no time in running through, even though the demon had given up trying to follow him. Something else was driving him forward now... A - N - N - W - E - (Theme - Chess in the Rain) http://www.lovelylovesayings.com/ima...e-and-rain.jpg The next chamber was not a chamber at all. L. V. stepped out of the tunnel into a gazebo surrounded by a verdant rose garden. Rain hammered out a rhythm on the roof, while his mother and Nat Foreman sat by a glass table, huddled in long raincoats and playing a curious variant of chess. In this variant, captured pieces could be returned to an opponent in exchange for certain advantages, such as the ability to convert a Bishop into a Witch. It was a wild and unbalanced game, so Nat and Ann found themselves changing the rules quite often. They never missed a match, no matter what, much to a young L. V.'s displeasure. "Your son hasn't really taken a shine to me," said Nat, moving his Witch forward one square to allow it to jump on the white diagonals. "Not what I'd expect... I'd think Bruce'd be the jealous one." Ann laughed. Jealousy was no more in Bruce's nature than social grace was. "He's your best friend, Nat. He knows we wouldn't - oh, check! L. V. just doesn't like businessmen; he sees them as the bad guys on TV. I think he's going to be a Communist spy when he grows up." All of this ghostly conversation barely distracted L. V. as he sought a way out. Outside, red and blue roses, bright in their natural colors, dripped with rain. But although they were within reach, he couldn't touch them, blocked by what felt like invisible glass, cold and unyielding. Finally, he found an opening in the south side of the gazebo and rushed through. As he left, he failed to notice the two children hiding in the bushes and spying on Nat and his mother. This spared him the uncomfortable sensation of looking into his own eyes. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...y_coloured.jpg An image of the Witch of Secrets, summoned by the presence of her Human counterpart in this scene, barred L. V.'s exit for a moment. However, he solved her riddle - a mere trick of language - and she stepped aside. Can you do the same? Scythe-Blade I abide with the Dear and departed above, At the start of a breath, and the closing of Love. I've the power to separate heart, soul, and mind -- Beware! As you meet me, Death follows behind! - - - - - A - N - N - W - E - S - (Theme - The Funeral Smile) As soon as L. V. crossed the threshold of the gazebo, he heard the sound of organ music. As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he recognized the scene in front of him - the funeral of his father, his real father. Something was wrong with this memory, though. The man reading the eulogy wore a long robe that concealed his face. That hadn't really happened, had it? His words were halting with grief, filled with pain and loss. Driven by an instinct he could not fathom - morbid curiosity? - L. V. hurried to the coffin at the south end of the room. But as he passed by on the way to the south end of the room, L. V. saw undehood. And even while the eulogy, the robed man smiled. Was mere acting, a scripted grief, a play put on for his mother's benefit? A riddle was set into the lid of the coffin: The Heir Apparent He speaks in foreign voice, And thinks in spoken thought; His famous choice is not a choice -- He is, and he is not. - - - - - - |
*bump*
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In 2021...
"Shall we take this as a sign that the Human Side has lost?" sneered the Witch of Secrets. "But you said that the Human Side couldn't lose unless they stopped thinking!" said the boy at the end of the table, leaping angrily to his feet. "How could you know we've stopped trying?" With a sigh, the Sapphire Witch replied. "In the absence of even incorrect guesses, the game must draw to a close. The tale of Witches shall overwrite the tale of Humans, and the events of that night will remain shrouded in darkness." The boy couldn't accept this. But the Human Side had stopped guessing... so what argument could he possibly raise? A clock ticked quietly in the background. "Hold it! I call Sphinx's Second! 'II. Any fair riddle must contain the information needed to solve it, and no "false clues" that mislead.' But there's no way that L. V. was really chased by demons." The boy tried to rally the others at the table to an act of defiance. "How's the Human Side supposed to figure this out if you lie? It's... it's like reading a mystery novel where the answer could be magic and the narrator is insane." Slowly, Dudeney, that genteel Animate of the Witch, began to speak. There was something at once harsh and jarring, yet familiar and comforting, in the rhythms of his voice. "The Human Side's final answer cannot involve the supernatural," he explained. "If the Witch side is playing fairly, it follows that there must be an explanation without magic." "There are no false clues in this account," said the Sapphire Witch. "Only metaphors, illusions, and outright lies. When all of the clues have been seen, it will be possible to solve this story." "Wait, what? How's an 'outright lie' not a fake clue?" said the boy, but some of the anger was out of his voice, replaced by a mixture of confusion and curiosity. "Think about it this way," said Dudeney gently, pinching the ribbon at his chest as he spoke. "If a man says 'I am not the one who stole the ring,' you learn nothing, for he may be lying. But if he says, 'I am not the one who stole the ring; it was Luke Skywalker,' you know that he's either lying or crazy. A lie can point to the truth." Miss Cox spoke next, her voice a scratchy whisper. "You ought to ask yourselves: 'Who reported these events? Who is the viewpoint character right now? Can I trust the narrator at this time?' There is at least one character whose story is reliable." "And," said the Sapphire Witch, "the words in Red speak only the truth." The boy resumed his seat and sighed. Never stop thinking. At length, he said: "The answer to the first riddle is 'Death.'" The Sapphire Witch laughed. That was more like it. "Ha ha! It is nothing like that - not Death, not a funeral, not a wound, not Saint Peter, neither Heaven nor Hell! The answer to the first riddle can be found within the riddle itself. Come, mortals, guess again!" |
Intense Degree awoke suddenly feeling a sharp pain in his ribs and found himself under the baleful glare of Timovieman!
How had he fallen asleep? Certainly not through boring subject matter, clearly preoccupation with other things had caused him to doze. He frowned at the present riddles... Quote:
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The answer might be Hobson, but the title of the riddle, heir apparent, may suggest Will Mossop, a character who, according to wikipedia, marries Hobson's daughter and takes over his cobblers business. Maybe that is the answer, although lines 1 and 4 are enough to make Intense Degree doubt that he is on the right track? Maybe others will help him. |
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The 18-year old boy at the 2021 banquet is most likely Mark, the young boy at Mrs. Ye's side in 2011. He's probably the son of one of the participants from 2011, my guess would be Dr. Alicia Tressler, who became Alice, the Witch of Connections. We know that something happened in 2011, with people disappearing, and the Sapphire Witch being ruined if the events went public. Somehow I feel that the Sapphire Witch was set up in 2011. Most likely culprit is L.V., but that's what you'd want us to think, so I'll guess Batsheva Ellis instead (the least suspicious of the three without a fire alarm alibi). Unless of course there's two culprits... :D We just don't have enough info yet. As for now, perhaps Mark was supposed to "win" in 2011 and the Sapphire Witch is trying to play the same game again, again with Mark as winner. But in the meantime the events of 2011 should be revealed, also revealing who set her up in 2011 and exacting revenge on them. But I could be well off, of course... :D As for the Heir Apparent, another 6-lettered person with a famous choice is Kafka's Josef K. (from The Trial). Doesn't really fit the rest, though... |
(TimovieMan: Interesting thoughts! I think you're starting to think about this in the right way, at the very least - looking for patterns in the relationships between characters and thinking about motivations.)
"Then we are done." said the Witch of Secrets. The chessboard of the Witches materialized before her, floating at waist-height. "These pieces have been amusing, but..." "Come, now," said the Sapphire Witch, fingers knotted together. "Give them a little more time." Ignoring the request entirely, the Witch of Secrets raised her crimson scythe high to reap the board of 2011 and claim it forever. And then - Quote:
For a second, the Witch of Secrets gaped with shock. Shock gave way to anger, and then to a sneer, and finally to an unreadable frown. "Do you know how long it takes to create such an intricate spell?" she said, with a blandness worse than obvious malice. "I'm impressed." She did not sound impressed. It was now obvious, in light of Intense Degree's answer, that the comma separated the words 'heart', 'soul', and 'mind,' but Miss Cox took it upon herself to explain the remainder of the solution: In a letter, the 'Dear' and departed above Have a comma, and so does the closing of 'Love'. In speaking, a comma's a pause for a breath, And in those very lines, one is followed by 'Death.' But Intense Degree wasn't done yet. He began a second line of attack against the other spell of the Witch of Secrets. Quote:
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Upon further consideration (not least of all of plays beginning with "H"!) Intense Degree remembers HAMLET. The famous soliloquy of the "choice" between madness and death, "To be, or not to be."
Also as son of the previous king and nephew of the present one, Heir Apparent seems to fit too. Still a trick or two up human sleeves (at least after extra clues!) |
@ Intense Degree: nicely done! Hamlet fits the bill perfectly. Good thing you came through, because I was stumped...
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Just as the Human Side seemed defeated yet again, Intense Degree made another guess!
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He wanders through a castle That is and isn't his; He almost always is a Dane, But almost never is. A - N - N - W - E - S - S - The coffin slid open and then, without hesitation, L. V. leapt inside -- and fell through an endless void. Images flickered past him like shards of broken mirrors, until he landed in the bedroom he grew up in as a child. The ceiling was covered with glowing stars, a full moon haunted the window, and a tape deck played a familiar song - one that his late father had recorded for him. He felt a shiver as he looked down at his own sleeping form, small and translucent under the sheets, and turned away from the sight of the tear-stained pillow to peer into the room's darkness. Serpents of darkness flickered and waved their forked tongues from the shadows of an elm outside the window. In the corner, a skeletal figure stared out at him from the dark. Had these things always watched him while he slept? In bed, for the seventh night in a row, the ghostly boy distracted his mind with a puzzle. Quietly, L. V. tried excuse himself through the bedroom doorway to the east, only to find that it was somehow locked with a keypad. A note was crudely scribbled on the wall in red marker: FOUR DIGITS HINT: Yes, get in NE exit! |
I don't know about Intense Degree (or any others), but this particular human side is losing... :frown:
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I'm with you, I just can't seem to make head or tail of that somehow
Four digits: presumably numerical. In the last paragraph, 7(th) is mentioned and L and V in roman numerals are 50 and 5 respectively. Therefore my “guess” is 7505! :D |
Lol, best I can come up with is "get in NE" = "N in E" = nine = 9
And because NE = any, my four digits are 9999. :D Seriously, "clutching at straws" is an overstatement... :P |
I tell you what though, anagrams are the way forward! You can get:
Eight Nine Six -ty -teen Add to that that the last two "Human Counterattack" tunes were posted by Umineko Anime and googling that leads to a Wikipedia page which talks about a Japanese visual novel which "takes place primarily in the year 1986"... I'm going for 1-9-8-6 Firstly, I would never have got that without your "N in E" Timovieman. Secondly, I am astounded at how well thought out and clever that riddle is - much more so that the answering process was in my case! |
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