Chronicle of the solution: The Testimony of the Court
Conspiracy Tier I
Whoever hatched the scheme in shadow now stands in the light. The chronicle below shows how they were drawn out of it.
The deed, as it was recorded
A plot hatched in the shadows threatens the crown, and whoever hatched it still sits at the court's table. Those caught in it swear they knew nothing; one of them swears falsely. Before you, one by one, will stand Mihu the Archer, Captain Vlaicu and Princess Smaranda. Rumor walks the deed through every corner: the salt market, the wharf and the merchant's house. Take up the quill, follow the thread of the clues, and set your seal upon the verdict.
Under suspicion stood Mihu the Archer, Captain Vlaicu and Princess Smaranda. One of them alone lied; the rest, without knowing it, spoke the truth that gave that one away.
The suspects
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Mihu the Archer
He hits a coin tossed on the wind from a hundred paces. At questions, though, he always misses.
1.76 m tall · brown eyes · brown hair · left-handed
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Captain Vlaicu
He has guarded the fortress gates for twenty years. Who enters and who leaves - he decides what the ledger records.
1.84 m tall · brown eyes · brown hair · right-handed
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Princess Smaranda
She has refused seven suitors and kept the gifts of all. She calls it practicality, not greed.
1.66 m tall · green eyes · chestnut hair · right-handed
Locations
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The salt market
Here anything is bargained for, from salt to silences. The price of silence keeps rising.
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The wharf
Moored boats, wet ropes, and goods that prefer to arrive in the fog.
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The merchant's house
Carpets brought from overseas and a desk with more secret drawers than drawers.
The evidence gathered on file
This much the investigation had at its disposal, not a line more. The set is minimal by construction — remove any of the rows below and the dossier becomes unsolvable again.
- Even the jester says it in earnest: the tallest suspect never set foot in the merchant's house.
- An honest-faced witness saw it plainly: Princess Smaranda was at the wharf.
- Every scout reports the same about the culprit: the culprit was at the salt market.
Reveal the Chancellery's reasoning — warning: past this line, the mystery ends
The road to the verdict
The Chancellery's method does not change from one dossier to the next: findings go into the grid as certainties, testimonies are weighed under the Supreme Law, and what survives every cut is the truth, however unwelcome.
A report from the watch brought clarity: “Even the jester says it in earnest: the tallest suspect never set foot in the merchant's house”. A cross in the grid seems little, but every cross brings the row nearer the moment when one cell alone is left free.
This page was stitched into the file too: “An honest-faced witness saw it plainly: Princess Smaranda was at the wharf”. The tick goes down without hesitation, and with it fall all the other cells on that row and that column.
From one word to the next, the investigation arrived here: “Every scout reports the same about the culprit: the culprit was at the salt market”. The Chancellery learned something about the culprit, but not who they were. The grid did the rest.
The verdict
The name the grid could no longer force out of the circle is Captain Vlaicu. The arrangement in the grid is this: Captain Vlaicu was at the salt market. The verdict stands on its own, out of the findings above.
The acquittal of the rest
The remaining suspects received their release from the grid too: Mihu the Archer was at the merchant's house; Princess Smaranda was at the wharf. Every one of these rows was necessary: take out a single one and the verdict can no longer be demonstrated.
The truth did not surface in a flash of insight but out of a run of small cuts, every one of them checkable.
Play this dossier All mysteries
Everything you read above rests on the dossier itself. The Chancellery's solver checked, at publication, that the given clues yield exactly one solution — no more, and not none. behind the scenes at the Chancellery.