cryptogram puzzle post | artwork, games & storytelling by jack fallows

Page (i)

There are 256 words in the first two paragraphs of text. The solution is seven words.
The textbook’s scrawled notes provide a system of symbols cumulatively representing numbers.
The seven beds have symbols representing seven numbers. Find the words at those positions in the text (e.g. number 224—find 224th word).
The number system sums the symbols. X: 1; circle with a dot: 50; dot: 5; circle: 10. The beds represent 62, 72, 36, 74, 50, 30 and 32, so the solution is “one step forwards is two steps backwards”.

please note: a certain number of the Stormlamp Rituals 03 zine were printed with an older version of the textbook pages at the start of this issue, if you think yours are incorrect, please email cryptogrampuzzlepost@gmail.com for digital versions of the corrected pages.

Page (ii)

The prior solution refers to letters.
Decode the message written around the edges of the tapestry by substituting each letter for the one that appears two spaces before it in the alphabet.
This provides an instruction to interpret the tapestry images—note that one image is connected to several others.
The message around the edge (“speak the names of the symbols to hear a voice from the cosmos”) instructs you to phonetically interpret the eye plus rose, saw, sword and eight as “I rose, I saw, I soared, I ate.”

Your prior answer guides your choice of three.
Your chosen constellation relates to the letters.
The solution is a word you’ll use at the end of the three trials.
The constellation of the Hunting Owl is the correct choice. Starting at the white circle and following the shape of the constellation, the word KNOTWEED is formed.

There is no prior information needed to solve this. Sister Lammas describes what to do.
Five words have been mistranslated—each a synonym for another word with a homonym (i.e. a word with two different meanings or two different words spelled the same) that would make sense in those places in the text.
For example, “stalk” could have been mistranslated as “prowl.” The solution in the highlighted spaces will be used at the end of the trials.
The five mistranslations are: prowl/stalk, pause/hold, cheat/burn, awake/stir and pale/light. Placing the correct words in the boxes results in SOUTH in the shaded spaces.

There is no prior information needed to solve this. Sister Lammas describes what to do.
Stairs can only be followed by ladders (no ropes after stairs, and stairs can only be used after ropes).
The five-letter solution is a colour.
The only possible route that follows the logical requirements, and where the letters passed make a word, spells the word AMBER.

Anna must cut the correct plants using all she has learned from her trials.
The solution is a pattern of six spaces based on selecting particular images. The plants are shown in the key oriented north.
Select the correct type of plant, orientation and color, and cut out those six spaces.
The prior three solutions instruct you to select SOUTH-oriented (upside-down) AMBER-colored KNOTWEED spaces.

The pattern of letters here may seem familiar.
The letters correspond to the plant images on the previous page.
Placing the previous page with spaces cut out over the letters (or carefully noting the correct positions) will create a six-letter word.
The six correct letters form the final answer WITHIN.