You should first carefully review the contents of Chapter 1, then read Dr. Hildebrand’s journal. The journal will be key to many of the mysteries of Charbineaux Swamp.

Fair enough. There are five specific pieces of information you need to solve Chapter 1. Those are indicated throughout the journal.

You’re looking to solve five puzzles that will tell you the following, based on Hildebrand’s journal:

1. The direction from which the spectral music originates.

2. The location of the “witch’s lair.”

3. The time at which she can be summoned.

4. A specific plant needed for the summoning ritual.

5. A phrase, chanted fifteen times to bring forth the witch.

The coded phrases around the border of the map offer clues as to how you’ll solve these five puzzles. The clue for decoding those phrases is located in the first journal entry.

Below are step-by-step hints for solving each of the five puzzles.

There is a string of code around the border of the map. And the beginning of Hildebrand’s journal notes to begin at the star, with A and the icon that looks like a capital I with a circle in the middle. This indicates how to solve the string of coded text along the border. Set the Ananias Ring to A = [I and circle icon]. Doing so, you will be able to decode four phases.

The north border decodes to ‘The ancient arts, colored connections to a wicked heart.’

The east border decodes to ‘Their numbers grow in resting places.’

The south border decodes to ‘Creeping legs, buzzing wings; the watch and the compass.’

The west border decodes to ‘Symbols and verse guide the chanting tongue.’

The four lines are clues as to how you should solve the five puzzles.

These are references to the five puzzles to be solved in Chapter 1 - (1) the direction from the spectral music originates, (2) the time at which the summoning ritual should take place, (3) the witch’s supposed location, (4) the plant needed for the summoning ritual, and (5) the ritual phrase to be repeated until she appears. The lines represent the puzzles accordingly:

First and foremost, carefully read Hildebrand’s journal. In the July 12th entry, the indication of specimen boxes that are 5 X 5 is your clue here - is there a type of cipher that mirrors that structure?

The specimen boxes mirror Polybius squares.

Over the course of the journal, Hildebrand notes that they capture four different insects. And you have four individual boxes…

The four insects are a dragonfly, a water strider, a spider, and a moth.

You have four boxes for four insects. A standard polybius square would begin with A, but these are scientists after all, so maybe something more specific…

Label each polybius square to start with the first letter of the insect’s name. This will give you four unique polybius squares beginning with D, W, S, and M, respectively.

Now that we have four unique squares, what do you do with them?

The journal indicates that perhaps the insects arrived in camp deliberately. When did they arrive?

The dates upon which each insect arrived in the camp are the key here…

The dates that each insect arrived are the coordinates to apply to each square.

SPOILER: The next hint will reveal the dates.

DRAGONFLY, July 12th = 1,2 = E

WATER STRIDER, July 15th = 1,5 = A

SPIDER, August 11th = 1,1 = S

MOTH, August 23rd = 2,3 = T

The solution is EAST.

Follow the camp site pattern and connect the group’s path through the swamp, in order, by the clues offered in the journal entries. Pay attention to what you find in each campsite.

The next series of clues will address the campsite locations, in order.

1st camp, July 12th: ‘We made camp on a rather large piece of land rife with small, green tree frogs’ (G16/17)

2nd camp, July 15th: ‘…finally moving camp to a small island resplendent with white flowers.’ (D13)

3rd camp, July 21st: ‘…our new camp, where it would appear we’ve inherited an old canoe left behind by a previous explorer’ (L6/7)

4th camp, July 22nd: ‘Just south of our new camp this morning, Aspinall and I discovered something strange…A ritual site’ (P7)

5th camp, July 25th: ‘Our new camp’s land mass seems firm and earthy, more so than others we’ve camped on, and it’s big’ (U4/5)

6th camp, August 5th: ‘We made a new camp at last on the eastern side of a small area known as the Angel’s Cove’ (B4/5)

7th camp, August 11th: ‘…we finally moved camp again and made the choice to tackle a large land mass to the east of where we’d just camped’ (I/J3)

8th camp, August 13th: ‘Made it to a small island that had been marked by locals on one of our maps as ‘The Stump’ (I/J10)

9th camp, August 16th: ‘A massive, gnarled tree with limbs like twisted fingers overlooks our latest campsite’ (T15)

10th camp, August 18th: ‘…having traversed to a new campsite northeast of our first’ (M13)

11th camp, August 22nd - 26th: ‘We made a new camp on a little isle where someone had recently extinguished a campfire’ (V/W12)

Near each campsite, you’ll see that Hildebrand has marked sightings of the four insects captured in the specimen boxes (“insects continue to follow us, perhaps tracking the journey of their captured brethren”).  Each ‘sighting' corresponds, at the eleven camp sites, with a series of letters.

Track the sightings for each creature, in order, following the campsite path, and combine the letter codes accordingly.

SPOILER: The next hint will provide the letter codes for the four insects.

DRAGONFLY = KFLQVA (KFL + QVA)

WATER STRIDER = XYZEHIKNSTU (XYZE + HIKN + STU)

SPIDER = TUVADEFLQPO (TUV + ADEF + LQPO)

MOTH - YXWRMNOTDJ (YXWR + MNO + TDJ)

Fill in these letter patterns on each respective square, in the order of insects found (“I have tried to trace my initial thoughts on the happenings here, from that first day and first dragonfly”).  Doing so will outline four numbers in the specimen boxes.

SPOILER: The next hint will show the four specimen box numbers.

When taken in order, you will have a 1 for the dragonfly, a 2 for the water strider, a 3 for the spider, and a 9 for the moth.

The solution is 12:39.

This requires the prism beacon mentioned in Hildebrand’s journal. First, note the symbols and the colors of the blades of the windmill landmark.

As you’ll notice, there are a series of partial symbols which Aspinall added to the map. What could they mean?

You’ll notice two things: one, the partial symbols do not correspond exactly to the shapes on the blades, and two, they also don’t correspond to the specific colors of the blades. So how do these fit together?

Upon careful inspection, notice that each map symbol is half of a symbol from the windmill. Further, you’ll notice that each half-symbol is also a color that, when combined with another color, makes the color of specific blades.

In his last moments before disappearing into the swamp, Aspinall provides the riddle needed to crack this.

Aspinall states the following:

Blood and sunset form two crosses at the corners.

Shades of day and night come together twice.

Power crosses paths with envy once, then does the same with cowardice,

And the latter two find each other somewhere in the middle.

She is rising at the center of the melting pot.

What could all of that mean, given the symbols and their locations on the map?

Read Aspinall’s riddle carefully.  He indicates a total of seven intersection points that matter - ‘all the rest are folly,’ i.e. any other intersection points are irrelevant.

The colors in Aspinall’s riddle correspond with commonly recognized meanings of certain colors.

Now that you know the symbols need to be joined together according to what appears on the beacon, along with Aspinall’s clues, you should be able to join all of the half-symbols together by using ONLY straight lines .

Below are the colors and the images in the riddle to which they correspond:

Blood - red

Sunset - orange

Day - light blue

Night - dark blue

Royalty - purple

Envy - green

Cowardice - yellow

As an example, at B2, we have a half-symbol that A) is red, and B) represents half of the symbol that aligns with the orange blade on the windmill.  Therefore, you’re looking for the other half of that complete orange symbol somewhere on the map in yellow (yellow + red = orange).  There are two of them that couldbe connected—one at roughly K12 and one at R16.  Join it with the one near K12.  (Bear in mind that you’ll have to decide, though trial and error, which connections make sense.)

Now, notice that the two half-symbols that are combined to complete the red symbol are located near A4 and near F2.  Those symbols also appear elsewhere, but remember that Aspinall said that ‘blood and sunset form two crosses at the corners’ - therefore, these must connect, because we then have red (blood) and orange (sunset) lines intersecting between C3 and D4.

SPOILER: The next hint will reveal all points of intersection.

‘Blood and sunset form two crosses at the corners’ (red and orange)

Red (near U5 and U16) and orange (near R16 and V15) intersect near U15

Red (near B2 and K12) and orange (near A4 and F2) intersect between C3 and D4

***

‘Shades of day and night come together twice’ (light blue and dark blue)

Light blue (I2 and O7) and dark blue (D7 and N3) intersect between K3 and L4

Light blue (near K15 and S15) and dark blue (R4 and O17) intersect near P15

***

‘Royalty crosses paths with envy’ (purple and green)

Purple (E8/F9 and Q8) and green (J7 and I/J15) intersect near J8

***

‘Then does the same with cowardice (purple and yellow)

Purple (F10 and K17) and yellow (F17 and S9) intersect at I/J15

***

‘And the latter two find each other somewhere in the middle’ (green and yellow)

Green (C11 and U/V11) and yellow (N/O3 and below J17) intersect at L/M11

Aspinall then mentions ‘she is rising on a small isle in the middle of the melting pot.’  There are many small isles, so where to start?  Remember that Hildebrand notes, near the end, that he believes alchemy to be the key to the entire thing.

If we look at the seven intersection points, you’ll see right away that this doesn’t offer a specific location.  However, take another look at the alchemical symbols in the journal.

Hildebrand’s reference to a symbol that looks like a ‘broken martini glass,’ as well as Audrey’s scribblings and the group’s conversation about alchemy offers us the alchemical symbol for a crucible or cauldron, also known as a melting pot.

If you connect the seven points of intersection, they form the alchemical symbol for a crucible, which appears in the journal.  The center of the ‘pot’ part of that symbol is a small island.

The solution is G/H5.

To start, you’ll need to decode Leffler’s message in the newspaper clippings.

His message to his wife was ‘Martha, you are The One with a capital M.’  Setting M as equal to 1 on the Ananias Ring gives you the starting point. (NOTE: One of Audrey’s little notes in the journal indicates that when setting the wheel, any settings in between should move accordingly, and she gives a nudge with this by writing ‘X could = 1, for example.’  Therefore, M, 1, and X should all be aligned on the Ananias Ring.)

Now, look at the symbols on the stone coffins depicted in Hildebrand’s sketches and the photographs. Using M = 1 as your foundation, decode the words on the coffins.

SPOILER: hints 4-10 will indicate the names and the decoded phrases associated with each.

ANDERSON: Revive

GROSSMAN: Mothers of the swamp

WILLIAMS: Nameless, Faceless

PURCELL: The light, the malignant child

ROBINETTE: Protect him

BALLARD: Denizens of the first settlement

KENNEDY: Ever vigilant

Now that you’ve decoded the phrases, note Gary Leffler’s quote in the letter.  He says ‘Look to the lillies, for nature brings order.’

How might you connect Lillies with the decoded phrases?

This is a reference to the number of plants around each coffin in the closeup sketches and photos.  As you can see, each has a different number of spider lilies in it.   The number of lilies in the sketches and photos tells you the order in which to put the names, from 1 to 7.

SPOILER: The next hint will show the order of the names.

1. ANDERSON

2. WILLIAMS

3. BALLARD

4. KENNEDY

5. GROSSMAN

6. ROBINETTE

7. PURCELL

Now that the names are in order, you can put the decoded phrases in order.

SPOILER: The next hint will reveal the order of the phrases.

1. Revive

2. Nameless, faceless

3. Denizens of the First Settlement

4. Ever vigilant

5. Mothers of the swamp

6. Protect him

7. The light, the malignant child

Now that the phrase is in order, where else have you seen the names on the coffins?

The flipside of the Leffler clipping has a list of names in an auction announcement.  Now that you have the order of the names, you can reorder the list accordingly and connect the numbers represented in the auction ad.

SPOILER: The next hint will reveal the correct order of the names.

How can you use those numbers and the phrases together?

This is an indexing puzzle. Index these numbers into each name’s respective code phrase.

Correctly indexing the numbers into the decoded, ordered phrases will give you the following:

1. ANDERSON - V

2. WILLIAMS - E

3. BALLARD - R

4. KENNEDY - V

5. GROSSMAN - A

6. ROBINETTE - I

7. PURCELL - N

The solution is VERVAIN.

This final puzzle in Chapter I requires the envelope buried by Gary Leffler near the sacrificial site.  In it, you will find a letter from Gary Leffler to his wife Martha, along with three additional pieces of paper containing poems, a lined sheet covered in symbols, a coded scrap of paper, and a reproduction of the prism beacon discovered by Hildebrand’s group.  In his letter to Martha, Gary mentions having ‘visions’ after spending time near the prism beacon, and he mentions how the beacon ‘aligned with his dreams,’ which he captured in verse.  This is a clue as to how you’ll approach this puzzle.

The end goal here is to solve the coded phrase, which will tell you what Leffler plans to ‘scream over and over again.’  To do that, you’ll first need the symbol sheet and the prism beacon standee.

Note that the number of lines on the code sheet is the same as the colored blades of the beacon. 

If you notice the placement of the blades, you’ll see that they correspond to the number of lines on the page covered in symbols. 

If you line up the prism beacon flat and centered above the coded page, you’ll notice in doing so that each colored blade lines up with a different line on the page. The color blades correspond, therefore, to the lines on the page.

How might you then use the poems?

Each poem outlines a path through the symbols by lining up with one of the blades on the prism beacon as a starting point—in doing so, you’ll end up with a string of letters for each of the three poems.

Start with the first poem, which begins with ‘a boat on a verdant shore.’  The ‘verdant shore’ refers to the color green, which is where this poem begins - the first icon in the ‘green’ line is a boat, so this begins with P.

NOTE: Hints 5-10 will explain how to navigate the first poem.

From there, follow the wording clues in the first poem down the green line:

The core of man - SKULL - A

The window to the soul - EYE - D

Now, note the mention of a ‘tangerine sun.’  This is a clue to skip over to the orange line and continue:

The passage of time, by hands - WATCH - A

And by sand - HOURGLASS - S

The boatman then turns toward the ‘yellow light.’  Skip from the orange line to the yellow line to continue.

Tooth to claw - TOOTH - M; CLAW - T

Continuing, ‘my mind turning back to that emerald path’ means—you guessed it—back to the green line to finish this first vision path.

Where night - MOON - O

Begat wishes - FALLING STAR - N

Which themselves begat sunrise - SUN - R

The complete path for the first ‘vision’ poem, then, is as follows:

From the Green line

BOAT - P

SKULL - A

EYE - D

Skip to orange line

WATCH - A

HOURGLASS - S

Skip to yellow line

TOOTH - M

CLAW - T

Skip to green line

MOON - O

FALLING STAR - N

SUN - R

The string of letters for this poem is P, A, D, A, S, M, T, O, N, R.

Now, look at Leffler’s cryptic note, the first line of which is ‘REMOVE THE PASTOR.’  Remove the letters P, A, S, T, O, and R from the string.

You’re left with M, N, D, and A, which unscrambles to ‘DAMN.’

The second vision poem begins with with dawn as rich as a ‘plum,’ as the boatman secures his vessel. In looking at the beacon and how it lines up with the code sheet, the far left line aligns with the purple blade and starts with an anchor—the way in which the boatman secures his vessel—making the first letter P.

From there, follow the wording clues as to the symbol in question as well as the skips to different color lines:

purple line

His vessel held fast - ANCHOR - P

unlock - KEY - E

robin’s-egg sky - skip to light blue line

the towering legacy of nature - TREE - R

dark visage - DEVIL - I

scarlet stream - skip to red line

I beheld - EYE - O

innocence on the wing - BIRD - R

see into the far distance - BINOCULARS - T

navy blue horizon - skip to dark blue line

the path to ashes and destruction - FIRE - H

carried on a celestial trail - STAR - Y

The string of letters for this poem is P, E, R, I, O, R, T, H, Y.

Back to Leffler’s final note.  The second line indicates removing the ‘PRIORY.’   Remove the letters P, R, I, O, R, and Y from the string.

You’re left with H, T, E, which unscrambles to ‘THE.’

The third and final vision poem is a long one.  It begins with a ‘vermilion sunset,’ so we begin on the red line beacon with the red line.

From there, follow the wording clues as to the symbol in question as well as the skips to different color lines:

on earth - GLOBE - S

I greeted a feathered friend - BIRD - R

the color of apricots - skip to orange line

beholding nature’s bounty there - CORNUCOPIA - I

a beast - BEAR - O

eyes in the swamp - ALLIGATOR - G

dark blue water - skip to dark blue line

it runneth over - CUP - D

violet morn - skip to purple line

devoid of flesh - SKULL - T

light and lilting song - BIRD - H

the prize of my eye - APPLE - E

the tempter in the garden - SNAKE - S

color of October’s bright face - skip to orange line

as if on wheels - BICYCLE - E

luminous petals - FLOWERS - D

measure the time - WATCH - A

golden horizon - skip to yellow line

what lived beneath my skin - SKULL - S

The string of letters for this poem is S, R, I, O, G, D, T, H, E, S, E, D, A, S.

Finally, to Leffler’s final note again.  The third line indicates removing the ‘GODHEAD.’   Remove the letters G, O, D, H, E, A, and D from the string.

You’re left with S, I, R, T, E, S, S, which unscrambles to ‘SISTERS.’

The solution is ‘DAMN THE SISTERS.’