Don’t be fooled by its fools look.
Clue it contains if you know where to [Poetry Form]
I told you randomness
The ciphers are going to stop us
Possible mix with source C2D?
I’m still going to go down my numbers path on source C2C and see if it gives me anything else. But i think it’ll be best to keep in mind that
I don’t think it’ll be like the other ciphers that have been used so far, it might just be a string of words that you’ll have to cross examine between the two sources
Sources have all been published now, you have all the resources I will be giving you outside of hints and the occasional #Silly-goober lore drop
These two are related 100%.
Are the numbers in the box corresponding to the tiles in that exact order? (so POC goes in the column with G)
Sometimes we overthink things way, way too much that we ignore all the hints in front of us. Here is the long winded solution and story for the “cipher” of chapter 2
Initial clues from randomness
Clue 1
Clue 2
Clue 3
Socks assistance finding the original hint (Source C1D)
Solution
Now to get into the actual solving, due to randomness confirming the source from the first chapter we can guess that the second source would be something similar to that. The only one that first the bill would be source C2D, which is also a text conversation between Serena and Troy. (At first I was mislead that it could have been C2C since randomness said it was his favorite source, but that didn’t really lead anywhere.)
Chapter 2 Cipher source (C2D)
ITEM D: Serena’s message history with Troy.
C2D
Serena:
Tomorrow? The park down the road.
Troy:
Hi
I could make it tomorrow.
So how are you doing? Feeling better?
Serena:
I’m great! Though I’ve got to go now, so bye!
See you about.
Troy:
No Serena wait a sec
Serena:
Oh?
Troy are you still there?
Troy:
Mhm, just wanted to ask something. Have you like
You know felt like something’s off recently?
Serena:
Possibly? What do you mean by ‘off’?
Troy:
As though the world keeps changing in ways it shouldn’t, unnatural ways?
Serena:
I do have something, I wasn’t going to tell anyone
Nevermind don’t worry about it, it probably was nothing.
Troy:
Tell me, please
Serena:
Oh well it won’t hurt. Remember earlier walking back from school? I thought I saw a building which looked like it was on frie
*Fire
Eventually I convinced myself it was just the light or something, it couldn’t have been real especially because I thought the fire was bright white.
Troy:
Eerie, we can talk more tomorrow. I’ve just got something to do.
Love you.
At first I thought it could have been some sort of matching between the two sources considering the weird spacing in source C1D and that randomness has stated it’s not exactly a cipher, but that only made nonsensical sentences and left me at another dead end. However, Randomness placed the final nail in the coffin when he gave this final hint:
Could it be? There was a sentence hidden on the first letter of each message? Let’s check with our first source, C1D.
Solving C1D for a hint
First we remove the lines of “Serena:” and “You:” since it doesn’t contribute to the message
Then by using the letters of each word we get “ACROSTIC GG”
A quick google search reveals that acrostic, or acrostic poems are “poems or other word composition in which the first letter of each new line (or paragraph, or other recurring feature in the text) spells out a word, message or the alphabet.”
This confirms that reading the first letter of each line will yield a hidden message.
Applying the hint to source C2D
Now we apply the same logic to the other message source,
Putting all that together, we get the final hidden message of “This is not my pain to feel”
What a rabbit hole
3 Likes
I had to poke you TOO much for that.
Anyway, congrats. I’ll add your points in a bit.
I was expecting something much more complicated…
Except it was just hiding under my nose 
i’d like to make a conclusion with some theories
- typ will be a similar kind of entity to tavish, but inhabiting the axe that will had, or at least will be important to the story
- dr mahn is in danger due to having the steed of the headless horseman always around him, or dr mahn will help headless somehow
- taitc will go around distributing curse cubes to other people, sowing chaos within northern guapo, potentially accelerating the war
- the church of headless will become more important later in the story, perhaps dr mahn will get involved with them somehow
- william is named after typ’s willpower curse, william and strong being a synonym for power
Typ will have not much effect on the story from now on, what canonically happened to them after Prometheus’ Arena was the magic apocalypse brought on by the deaths of both of the gods. The axe however still has some of his willpower in it and may have a greater effect.
One of the few things I know for sure about FC: The Second Act is that the horse is vital to the plot. Read the end of chapter 5 to get some hints about it.
I think it will be interesting to see how the scales of the war in Guapo and minor character conflict will contrast.
The Church of Headless will only become important if you make it important. Consider this the same for almost everything other than a few major plot events.
The Second Act will be mainly driven by you. If you look carefully I have already shared what the act will be focused around, hopefully we can bring the name Forum Curses back to more relevance than a mark of past.
All names have a meaning. You can probably tell what Troy’s name means, and both the Doctor and William have already had their meanings discovered.
I will say this: Morock Thorne is named purely as both John Thorne and Morock Creed are greedy, power hungry characters.
Points have been added. You are now on cooldown,.
Everyone else, take this and build on it.
But remember, only about a week remains for task two (and an additional week for task 3)
I’ll give you more hints about the ciphers tomorrow, so perhaps you can use your cooldown today on a conclusion.
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Only one week remains for task two. If you want to solve the ciphers I’d start testing stuff out.
- The last two ciphers are for the last two chapters respectively
- Look carefully in chapter 4. There is an obscure mention of something which will bring you directly to the cipher. It only is mentioned for a few lines.
- The chapter 4 cipher is a manual cipher, used long before computers existed up until I believe about WWII
- The ciphertext is given quite obviously in C4, however it is not in the correct order. This was to prevent you using a cipher identifier program on it, but the order that it is supposed to be in should be quite easy to find.
- I’ll bolden something in C4 as clues.
I want you to be able to get this one quickly in order to move onto C5’s cipher
- For C5, the cipher will give 2x points to whomever helps solve it
- Check the sources, check the letters, check the table.
- CHECK THE PAST. THE PAST IS THE KEY. BOTH TIMES, BOTH OF THEM. THE PAST IS THE KEY… THE PAST IS THE
- If you need more help I’ll give you more clues in a few days
Tick tock.
@sock @Bio @sanek_1 @ImaLettuce
have fun (:
2 Likes
qwhar
oh wait it’s the nihilist cipher
i’m guessing the keyword for the cipher is error
Chat I’m no longer the top G 
(the axe however…)
I like the part where vetex screws up FC:E lore by giving more info on curses.
ANYWAY
moving on
- Sock is right with the nihilist cipher
- The nihilist cipher traditionally has 2 keys, one shift in the alphabet/polybius square and one additional encryption layer.
- You have the right ciphertext. Do not treat each part as a separate piece, put it together then look at it another way. Don’t look at it head on.
- If you don’t make any more progress on Cipher 5 this week I’ll extend the deadline. However eventually I’m just going to stop doing this.
have fun
everytime i come back here i end up with 8 more tabs open and a even deeper confusion on everything
Alright. I will lengthen the deadline by a single week
this means you have until Saturday 9th to finish Task 2. And then until Saturday 16th to submit all your final conclusions, before I’ll go back and tell you about all the main secrets I’ve hidden and announce the next game of Forum Curses.
If you’re truly stuck then I’ll tell you this.
To get to the ciphertext of Cipher 4, you must join up the segments in the order which they appear in, then reverse the order of the whole piece. This was so you couldn’t use a cipher identifier on it.
The Nihilist cipher typically uses two keys. The first is to change the alphabet of the polybius square (All letters other than J in a 5x5 grid) and the second will generate a set of numbers to add onto the text in order to get your ciphertext.
I’ll give you the Polybius square in full,
It’s key was UNRECOGNISED, meaning the whole encryption alphabet comes out to UNRECOGISDABFHKLMPQTVWXYZ
In a polybius square this would be.
You already know the second key.
Now for C5’s cipher, I’ll give you three names and three names only.
Eium, of the T hermo curse.
Percival, The Storm
Typ, Willpower Extreme
Aimee, Shining pioneer.
Sock, Pressurized glory.
I’m throwing these out as the last two names.
From left to right.
#4 cipher
- Method of Encryption: nihilist cipher and reversed text
- Ciphertext: 646384625525838554746685728672226445236462825763455453336376246585834336727495, 594727633438585642652826463254462736333545543672276827586647455838525526483646
- Plaintext: THEMOSTPOWERFULBEINGALIVEYETTHATDAMNKID
- Key (If applicable): unrecognised, error
- Methodology (How did you solve the puzzle): recognision plus hints
1 Like
Correct. Cooldown you are.
Points to everyone who helped.
oh i see, is it that the letter corresponds to the user’s past curse? typ has w(illpower) and eium has t(hermo)