# End of the Maze

This the final installment of the Maze series. Here is Room 1 and here is the previous room.

After you enter the answer from Room 5, you wait for the door to de materialize as usual, but nothing happens. Your confusion turns to fear instantly as you contemplate the consequences. You prepare to rip off your taste buds, certain that you will be sent to the universe of B.L.L., but before you can, the door in front of you illuminates with a message:

Congratulations on making it through the Maze! You are truly a champion of your species! Given that you are the first of our many test subjects to succeed in the Maze, we feel certain using your results as the maximum potential of your species. Unfortunately, we found that humans rank quite low on the cosmic intelligence scale, falling in the EASILY_COLONIZABLE/POTENTIAL_FOOD_SUPPLY category. Thank you for your participation in our tests, which are taking place in your mind, while your body is still on Earth. You are free to leave the Maze now, simply proceed to the EXIT and you'll awaken back home. We'll be seeing you again quite soon...

As the door vanishes and the message along with it, your vacant march through it is slow and calm, but your heart rate is anything but. Food supply? You find yourself walking down a long corridor and you see the EXIT sign on your left about halway down. You reach the door and reach out to grab the doorknob (oh sweet doorknobs, how you had missed them) when you see at the far end of the hall, a door labelled CONTROL ROOM. You head to this new door and find that it opens quite easily. It seems that they never expected you to look past the exit.

The control room is empty except for an array of screens and keyboards. You see a big red button in the middle of a suspended table covered with a double-layered glass display. Even though you can't understand the language around it, you've seen enough movies to understand its approximate function. You break the glass and press the button. A giant screen in the front of the room illuminates with a wall of text. It looks like one of the puzzles from the rooms, but much more involved. This must be the type of challenges that this race gives itself, and it must be difficult if it's protecting this button. The display is clearly expecting some sort of input; you grab a nearby keyboard and see that it looks nothing like what you're used to. What input do you provide to the console and what keys do you press on the keyboard to enter this input?

This is going to take everything you have. Knowledge from various disciplines will be incorporated into this multi-faceted, over-the-top puzzle. But don't be dismayed, it's certainly possible. Cooperation is STRONGLY encouraged: contribute to whichever part you can to help eachother get through and to keep the question active so that others can see it and join in.

440

Key 1: ANSWER IS GIVEN BY THE (Sum of Xi) OF KEY 2 WITH P(GR(CMH(AfFR)))

WHERE:
Xi is the answer to riddle i, interpreted as a base 36 number (i.e. no spaces,symbols, etc), having length indicated by riddle i

CMH(6)= HELIBBBPANJ
CMH(60)= HELIBEBCNEMGPCAZNBBBCDBDGBABBEDPANJGACTMAVANCKYMSWI
CMH(165)= LIBNAPASCSBDBGBFEBNJCTNYKYOR
CMH(199)= (nothing)
CMH(792)= HELIBECOFNAMGARTICRASKRRUDYHFRAESBBBCDEFGABDGBABFABEDABCPANJGAMASCNHNYNCLAALMOORNVWY

GR(ABC) = A
GR(HELLO EARTH!) = HELLO E
GR(THIS IS AN EXAMPLE OF WHAT THE GR FUNCTION DOES) = THIS IS AN EXAMPLE OF WHAT TH
GR(LOREMIPSUMDOLORSITAMETCONSECTETURADIPISCINGELITSEDDOEIUSMODTEMPORINCIDIDUNTUTLABOREETDOLOREMAGNAALIQUA) = LOREMIPSUMDOLORSITAMETCONSECTETURADIPISCINGELITSEDDOEIUSMODTEMP

P(HELLO EARTH!) = LH ERO!HATEL
P(ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ) = CAFBINELKHOSURWJGPZTYMXVQD
P(THIS IS AN EXAMPLE OF WHAT THE P FUNCTION DOES) = ITIHAA E M FEWNSPTOAXTH FHLNI EN USSO ETOPDC
P(LOREMIPSUMDOLORSITAMETCONSECTETURADIPISCINGELITSEDDOEIUSMODTEMPORINCIDIDUNTUTLABOREETDOLOREMAGNAALIQUA) = RLIOUOMODSRAETCMPSSMNLCOTEATIISREINDEIETLDIOECDSUIOGEDUOSMMCTTIIPDIUPTTRBREOLNDNAODOELUETANLUQERAAMIGA

Riddles:
Subjects chosen are astrology, chemistry, biology, programming, history, philosophy, geography, gaming, computers, alchemy, and misc.

1 Over thirty years old and still I dig; inflating the beasts until they're too big. (6)
2 Don't get lost in the existential mist; in the dead tongue's words, why must you exist? (6)
3 We two of the table pool on the floor; our siblings fly about or sit as ore. (7) (7)
4 To solvers you offered me in each room; by smarts or by me, one just made it through. (8)
5 Touted the year of the death of machines; in truth the year of LOVE from Philippines. (4)
6 Switzerland's chainsaw: that's what they call me; you could simply say I come from the C. (4)
7 I've had many names since I halved mankind; this one, most common, has been quite maligned. (6)
8 Felines north to west, the twins to the east; lurking down below, the many-headed beast. (6)
9 Few in the "land up above" even know: the diff'rence 'tween me and hopping big bro. (7)
10 Socialist republic, west of Taiwan; fought France for our own, fought u.s. for Saigon. (7)
11 Invisible in complex elixirs, I blush at the sight of basic mixtures. My name is long, my formula concise; what I indicate is in my name twice. (8)

Key 2:
NOQNE ACILC TCLAO IGHOZ NALKO JO.DG DWQNE HFMQW QNFAW TWOJV .YXBP NAHVF ALQNG PHJSY NYIIS CVBBA BXCAR WSCPG ODVWF MZYQP FPKLJ KFIYI IQWTG UPFSM DBATR AAZTV XMWEH ITTCO SOZWE FENHC RBZPU WBOQI PQ.CU ZOAOH ZLWIM AQADW SYNND YZLRP QNGGS HCBPJ UUTIA P:HIL AEMWC WJNRN BINWD GMMTA HFHVC NTC,H KQIPJ MUZUF XUJWS NRJWW A,MKM VMUIR SMDCR FLKKK DYRFP SALUY UEKU. VBWNW GH???

Keyboard:

AAA AAT ACT ATG ATT
CAA CAT CCT CGT GAA
GAT GCT GGT GTT TAT
TCT TGG TGT TTA TTT

EPILOGUE (for those who have completed the riddle)

After entering the answer to the final riddle into the peculiar keyboard, the screen goes blank. It returns with a large 29 on the screen, which then dissapears, followed by a 23, then a 19. You realize what's happening and don't have to stick around to see where it's going; you dash for the door, sprinting down the corridor for the exit. You twist the knob and force it open, and are blinded by a white light. When your vision clears, you find yourself sitting up in bed. Your pulse is through the roof--from the running, you tell yourself. But what if it was all just some crazy nightmare induced by too much time spent on the Puzzling StackExchange and your fear of Trump? You head to the balcony to get some much-needed air.
It's almost dawn, and you look up at the sky ponderously. Was any of that even real? How could it be? Maybe I should look into therapy... Some 14-15 minutes through your musings, as you consider going back to sleep, you see a twinkle, a small light, emanating from the pre-dawn sky. It lasts only for a moment, but you could swear you saw it flare up like a tiny nova. You can't help but crack a proud and triumphant smile as you turn to go back to bed.
Woo! Congratulations everybody on making it through the Maze series. I really hope that everyone enjoyed the puzzles. As always, I love feedback, so feel free to give any as a comment to this post.

Since this puzzle has so many facets, I've decided to try a sort of "community answer", a compilation of solvers' efforts. If you make a chunk of progress, simply edit this post and add it. This way the final result will be organized in a clear manner that is great for progeny's sake. Thanks and have fun!

## The Riddles

1 Over thirty years old and still I dig; inflating the beasts until they're too big. (6)

(gaming)
DIGDUG (Video game where you blow up beasts by inflating them) - (Jacob Shetler)

$X_1 =$ DIGDUG$_{36} = 817057816_{10}$

2 Don't get lost in the existential mist; in the dead tongue's words, why must you exist? (6)

(philosophy)
As the French philosopher Descartes said, I THINK therefore I am. (Lampost42), but the edit of the question refers to the Dead Language - Latin, so this now should be COGITO (from Cogito ergo sum) (Gordon K, Jacob Shetler, Lampost42)

$X_2 =$ COGITO$_{36} = 766675788_{10}$

3 We two of the table pool on the floor; our siblings fly about or sit as ore. (7) (7)

(chemistry)
The two elements of the periodic table that are liquids rather than solids or gasses are BROMINE and MERCURY. (f'')

$X_{3a} =$ BROMINE$_{36} = 25618553834_{10}$
$X_{3b} =$ MERCURY$_{36} = 48781687246_{10}$

4 To solvers you offered me in each room; by smarts or by me, one just made it through. (8)

(misc.)
GOOD LUCK - offered by the poser to the solvers in every room and by smarts or good luck one just made it through (Gordon K)

$X_4 =$ GOODLUCK$_{36} = 1307543443940_{10}$

5 Touted the year of the death of machines; in truth the year of LOVE from Philippines. (4)

(computers)
The year 2000 was widely believed to be the year that machines would cease to function, due to dates being recorded with only 2-digit years. Also in May, 2000, the ILOVEYOU computer virus hit the word hard, originating from the Philippines. (GentlePurpleRain)

$X_5 = 2000_{36} = 93312_{10}$

6 Switzerland's chainsaw: that's what they call me; you could simply say I come from the C. (4)

(programming)
PERL. It is called the "the Swiss Army chainsaw of scripting languages" and is based on the language C. (Jacob Shetler)

$X_6 =$ PERL$_{36} = 1185537_{10}$

7 I've had many names since I halved mankind; this one, most common, has been quite maligned. (6)

(biology)
PLAGUE - Bubonic Plague, also known as Black Plague or Black Death wiped out half the world's population. Plague is often used more widely to refer to any pandemic. (Gordon K)

$X_7 =$ PLAGUE$_{36} = 1547414726_{10}$

8 Felines north to west, the twins to the east; lurking down below, the many-headed beast. (6)

(astrology)
The constellation of CANCER has Leo Major and Minor to its northwest, Gemini to the east and Hydra below it. (Gordon K.)

$X_8 =$ CANCER$_{36} = 743479443_{10}$

9 Few in the "land up above" even know: the diff'rence 'tween me and hopping big bro. (7)

(geography)
The "land up above" is the opposite of the "land down under", Australia. Its most famous wildlife is the kangaroo, but a smaller marsupial often confused for it is the WALLABY. (Lampost42, Gordon K.)

$X_9 =$ WALLABY$_{36} = 70297961614_{10}$

10 Socialist republic, west of Taiwan; fought France for our own, fought u.s. for Saigon. (7)

(history)
VIETNAM (Lampost42)

$X_{10} =$ VIETNAM$_{36} = 68593541422_{10}$

11 Invisible in complex elixirs, I blush at the sight of basic mixtures. My name is long, my formula concise; what I indicate is in my name twice. (8)

(alchemy)
This is C20H14O4 or Phenolphthalein. It dissolves clear in alcohol, turns red in basic solutions and has pH in the name twice. (Lamppost42)

$X_{11} =$ C20H14O4$_{36} = 944752140004_{10}$

## The Functions

CMH($n$)

The function name is short for Chemistry, Music, History (Gordon K.) (see below).

First, you must determine all the factors of $n$, other than 1 and itself.
For example, the factors of 6 are 1, 2, 3, and 6, but we ignore 1 and 6 (1 and $n$), and just use 2 and 3.

The output of the function is three parts, concatenated together:

1. The elements of the periodic table corresponding to the factors of $n$ (e.g. 2 = He, 3 = Li, etc.). Factors greater than 118, the number of elements in the periodic table will be ignored. (Bailey M)
2. The notes of the chromatic scale, starting with A=1, Bb=2, B=3, etc., looping with each octave. Factors greater than 88, the number of keys on a piano keyboard, will be ignored. (Gordon K)
3. The states of the US, with their numerical order in which they became states corresponding to the factors of n (e.g. 2 = PA, 3 = NJ, etc.). Factors greater than 50, the number of states in the US, will be ignored. (Bailey M)

GR($n$)

The function name is short for Golden Ratio. As that name suggests, it simply divides the length of a string by the golden ratio (approximately 1.618), rounds down, and then truncates the string to the number of characters indicated by the result. (Zandar)

P($n$)

This function uses the digits of PI to determine the order of the characters in the encoded string. 3.1415926535... Number the characters in the string, then take the 3rd character and renumber, take the 1st and renumber, take the 4th and renumber...(Gordon K)

## The Keyboard

There are 20 buttons on the keyboard. Each one is a codon that represents one of the 20 amino acids. The amino acids have one-letter abbreviations:
AAA- Lysine (K)
AAT- Asparagine (N)
ACT- Threonine (T)
ATG- Methionine (M)
ATT- Isoleucine (I)
CAA- Glutamine (Q)
CAT- Histidine (H)
CCT- Proline (P)
CGT- Arginine (R)
GAA- Glutamic acid (E)
GAT- Aspartic acid (D)
GCT- Alanine (A)
GGT- Glycine (G)
GTT- Valine (V)
TAT- Tyrosine (Y)
TCT- Serine (S)
TGG- Tryptophan (W)
TGT- Cysteine (C)
TTA- Leucine (L)
TTT- Phenylalanine (F)

## Putting it all together

### Sum of $X_i$

If we treat each of the answers to the riddles as a base 36 number, and add them, we get:

\begin{array}{r} &&&D&I&G&D&U&G_{36}&\\ &&&C&O&G&I&T&O_{36}&\\ &&B&R&O&M&I&N&E_{36}&\\ &&M&E&R&C&U&R&Y_{36}&\\ &G&O&O&D&L&U&C&K_{36}&\\ &&&&&2&0&0&0_{36}&\\ &&&&&P&E&R&L_{36}&\\ &&&P&L&A&G&U&E_{36}&\\ &&&C&A&N&C&E&R_{36}&\\ &&W&A&L&L&A&B&Y_{36}&\\ &&V&I&E&T&N&A&M_{36}&\\ +&C&2&0&H&1&4&O&4_{36}&\\ \hline &V&I&G&E&N&E&R&E_{36}& \end{array}

So we need to use a Vigenere cipher to decode KEY 2, using the result of P(GR(CMH(AfFR))) as the key.

### CMH

First, we calculate CMH($440$) ($440$ is the Answer from Final Room, indicated as AfFR).

The factors of $440$ are ${2, 4, 5, 8, 10, 11, 20, 22, 40, 44, 55, 88, 110, 220}$.

These correspond to the elements: HE BE B O NE NA CA TI ZR RU CS RA DS (220 is ignored)
They correspond to the notes: BB C DB E GB G E GB C E EB C (110 and 220 are ignored)
They correspond to the states: PA GA CT SC VA NY MS AL SD WY (88, 110, and 220 are ignored)

So CMH(440) is HEBEBONENACATIZRRUCSRADSBBCDBEGBGEGBCEEBCPAGACTSCVANYMSALSDWY

### GR

Next, we calculate GR(HEBEBONENACATIZRRUCSRADSBBCDBEGBGEGBCEEBCPAGACTSCVANYMSALSDWY)

The string is 61 characters long. $\frac{61}{1.618}$ is $37.700...$. We round that down to $37$. Thus we take the first 37 characters.

So GR(HEBEBONENACATIZRRUCSRADSBBCDBEGBGEGBCEEBCPAGACTSCVANYMSALSDWY) is HEBEBONENACATIZRRUCSRADSBBCDBEGBGEGBC

### P

Lastly, we calculate P(HEBEBONENACATIZRRUCSRADSBBCDBEGBGEGBC)

This is a little more complicated. We start by taking the 3rd character, then remove it, and take subsequent characters according to the digits of $\pi$.

So P(HEBEBONENACATIZRRUCSRADSBBCDBEGBGEGBCE) is BHOENIBACEZCRUDANRBSBTDSACEBRBGEGEGBC

So P(GR(CMH(AfFR))) is

BHOENIBACEZCRUDANRBSBTDSACEBRBGEGEGBC (this was copied incorrectly the first time)

Using this as the key for a vigenere cipher to encode key 2 two results in:

overr iding secur itypr otoco ls.ex ecuti ngord ersix tysix .prep aring toini tiate remot ewipe ofdat arega rding earth froma llmem oryun itsan ddest ructi onofa lltes tfaci litie sinth ecosm os.to confi rmple aseen terth eansw ertot hefol lowin g:iam thewe akest force inthe unive rse,y etica nmani pulat espac e,slo wtime andev enben dligh ttomy will. whata mi???

Overriding security protocols. Executing order sixty six. Preparing to initiate remote wipe of data regarding earth from all memory units and destruction of all test facilities in the cosmos. To confirm please enter the answer to the following:
I am the weakest force in the universe, yet I can manipulate space, slow time and even bend light to my will. What am I???

The answer to this is GRAVITY, since it is the weakest of the four fundamental forces. But immense gravitational pull, like that of the sun or a black hole, can bend light and manipulate space-time.

We should enter this into the keyboard by pressing the buttons:

GGT(G) CGT(R) GCT(A) GTT(V) ATT(I) ACT(T) TAT(Y)

I don't have enough reputation to add a comment to the community wiki, so I'll just post my partial answer(s) here.

Riddle #1 is:

DIG DUG (1982 Video Game. Player can inflate underground beasts until they explode.)

Riddle #2 is (based on OP's edit):

COGITO (According to Descartes: I think, there I am. Cogito is "I think" in Latin, the dead tongue)

Riddle #6 is definitely:

PERL. It is called the "the Swiss Army chainsaw of scripting languages" and is based on the language C.

• Welcome to the site Jacob. I rejected your edit because it was based off of an older version of the post; had I accepted it, it would have reverted someone else's changes. But I went ahead and added your answer to community post. – NeedAName Aug 10 '15 at 15:34

Some working thoughts on the last 2 functions:

GR($n$) obviously truncates the text after a certain number of characters, but the difficult part is determining how many.

Here are the corresponding lengths of the original and truncated strings:

1. (3, 1)
2. (12, 7)
3. (47, 29)
4. (102, 63)

The truncated length might not be related to the original length at all, but instead might have to do with the actual content of the string.

P($n$) obviously scrambles the text according to some predetermined order. It looks like the same characters end up in the same relative positions for each string. It's hard to determine for the long strings, since there are many repeated characters, and it's hard to know which one ends up in which location.

Here are the orders of the first two scrambles (the numbers indicate the ouput character's location in the input string):

1. HELLO EARTH!LH ERO!HATEL
• (3 1 6 2 9 5 12 11 8 10 7 4)
2. ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZCAFBINELKHOSURWJGPZTYMXVQD
• (3 1 6 2 9 14 5 12 11 8 15 19 21 18 23 10 7 16 26 20 25 13 24 22 17 4)
3. THIS IS AN EXAMPLE OF WHAT THE P FUNCTION DOESITIHAA E M FEWNSPTOAXTH FHLNI EN USSO ETOPDC
• (3 1 6 2 9 14 5 12 11 8 15 19 21 18 23 10 7 16 26 20 25 13 A 24 B B 34 29 17 C 39 B D C 35 E E F B D A F 32 43 37)
• A = 28 or 38
• B = 22, 27, 31, 33, or 42 (one of the bold Bs is 22)
• C = 36 or 41
• D = 30 or 45
• E = 4 or 46
• F = 40 or 44

Note how the order of the numbers is consistent between all the strings, and in fact they all start with the same sequence. The larger numbers (corresponding to characters near the end of the string) are mostly clustered near the end of the function's output.

• The missing spaces are the result of the way the site formats multiple consecutive spaces (ignores them). If you go into edit mode, you can find the two spaces. Any ideas for fixing this mistake would be appreciated and nice catch! – NeedAName Aug 10 '15 at 19:03
• @NeedAName You can use the HTML &nbsp; for spaces that won't be compressed. – Zandar Aug 10 '15 at 19:17
• @NeedAName I edited the question to put the input and output strings for the functions in  (backquotes). This will make the extra spaces apparent. – GentlePurpleRain Aug 10 '15 at 19:18
• GR divides the length by the golden ratio, edited it into the answer. – Zandar Aug 10 '15 at 19:29
• I've added the description of the P function to the main answer - it's related to the digits of PI. – Gordon K Aug 10 '15 at 20:06