" I've traced the wires enough times to confidently say they aren't connected as they should be. The bell will not work. We are in the trap so there is no assistance available. The guide doesn't want us to press the button because then we will... "

" Room 8 is the tilted room (that leads here) and the support beam is tilted. Thus, room 8 is above, up the ladder. The "rain" could be the water from one of the bowls that broke. "

" The fish and water references lead me to think it's Neptune's trident. While this is not a bad place that one could spend some time in, the god has abandoned it. "

" The boot is losing its sole (soul). "

" What about "Keep a part of yourself?" The other is obviously trap. "

" Do you mean to suggest that Manson followed such a thought process? "

" The comedy mask has S on its ear and W in its hat. It is next to 36. This is referring to William Shakespeare's First Folio which contains 36 plays; 14 of them comedy. Orson from Valentine&Orson is opposite in the room. Therefore look for... "

" No, sorry, I didn't mean to suggest that we had been handed that fact by the publishers. The determination of where the words and letters of "like Atlas you bear it upon your shoulders" can be largely discerned simply by knowing the answer, but there... "

" The first lyre (chelys) was created out of Tortoise/Turtle shell by Hermes. The room uses words Tortoise/Turtle interchangeably despite them being different animals. In Greek/Latin they use the same word for turtle/tortoise AND the instrument of Chelys. (Greek: χέλυς, Latin: testudo). The border of the... "

" Did the official contest solutions specify which room the E is supposed to be in? Some things on this site say room 37, but I don't see it. I do see the one in room 8 though. "

" It means the letter L. This is part of the contest solutions. "

" We know what they each refer to, but it's not completely clear how exactly they're meant to tell us that. It's hard to imagine knowing what 4 is referring to without already knowing the answer, and it doesn't seem to help us choose between the... "

" So, has anyone deciphered what all these cryptic clues mean? Are any still unclear what they're referring to? "

" The million dollar question would seem to be whether "ELL" is meant to be read as one letter (spelling out L) or three letters (which would mean one L has to be discarded, or as one might say, "thrown out"). "

" On a related note: doesn't it only actually start raining if the group goes to Room 6, by which point they're permanently stuck in the Trap? "

" Very good point. I hadn't even noticed that the umbrella in room 10 is the only one in the whole Maze that explicitly gets picked up! I will say, going to 10 from 37, while not the fastest, is far from a terrible move; it's... "

" Those connections all seem plausible, though I would note that the same clues would support going to 10 from 37: an umbrella in 10, and text clues linking the narrative in 37 to that of 10. These connections are real, but, as is often the... "

" 90 degrees, you mean? The E in E L L? "

" Oh my, that's such an interesting theory, I'll even add more to it. See the wires coming out of the bell and into the hole on the floor? They look as if someone messed them up on purpose to stop the bell from working as... "

" This is almost certainly true, and it's a real dastardly thing for Manson to have done! But he did drop a very real clue to help metagamers too: the mention of the "coat room with the animal" lets the reader know that you must have... "

" There are umbrellas or mentions of umbrellas in rooms 42, 23, and 8, all of which are on the shortest path, and the narrative in each of these rooms calls attention to the umbrellas. I am 100% convinced in my mind that the "we should... "

" Hey, I actually tried the eyes things and they DO look better, how interesting! Also I remember at some point the guide mentioning his guests splitting in half but I forget which page, so I always assumed the group was even numbered, particularly 4 guests... "

" Hey, I think the location of the letter 'E' isn't actually in room 37 but rather in room 4, specifically the door leading to room 43 where there's half a picture of a maze. If you look at the bottom of said maze you'll find... "

" You have 39 "left" because you ignored the clear references to it! If "dark" is enough to shoo us away, it's a problem that the passage to 39 is literally in the dark and described as being so. "

" You are correct. That was an extremely confusing error for me to make. 42, not 4. "

" Can you elaborate? "

" Also, the tops of six-sided dice are always the faces that count, so the dice steer us away from 15, not towards it. "

" The door being rattled is definitely 10, not 15, as evidenced by the description in room 10 of trying a door which wont open, causing the voices, which "sounds like us", to stop. I would argue that this is more like Many Worlds than a... "

" Yes, the umbrellas do seem to indicate a path. "

" room 42 leads to 25, not 4 "

" the locked door comes from 37, a path room, so it could be them arguing in there. More towards the time loop theme "

" "...one of the doors was shaken from the other side." There's a time loop theme. The door being rattled is 15 since that's where we just came from and we are rattling the door coming in. Also, the dice from the front say 1 +... "

" From the text: "Too dark" (2, dark) an indication of wrongness "...they had been here before" (room 8) pointless to go back "It would have been a relief to get outside" if the guide wants room 21, it's wrong That leaves 39 "

" err... "you can never tell..." "

" In the previous room, a guest mentions he should have taken a "bumbershoot," which is an obscure word for umbrella. There is an umbrella on the floor. The guide says that "you never know when you might need it," perhaps indicating that they are on... "

" The fact that it indicates a bad door doesn't mean that is isn't intentional. "

" Never mind; The Guide (Manson) says right, left, and leaving a lot, often indicating the wrong door. I should've checked some more rooms. "

" "Leaving the pictures ..." After leaving something, that something is "left"? "

" The Psalm 46 of this comment is sending me "

" It's close to impossible that Christopher Manson ever made such a series of arbitrary and tangential connections, but given the ideas expressed and endorsed by Maze people I can understand why you're offering these suggestions here. "

" The characters on this page have theatrical masks. The riddle of the path is about the Globe. Room 45 uses Shakespeare's globe. 36 is the number of plays in Shakespeare's first folio. The famous speech "All the worlds a stage" is about the 7 ages... "

" The longest route of unique rooms I can see is 32 rooms long: 1 - 20 - 5 - 30 - 15 - 37 - 42 - 4 - 29 - 17 - 45 - 23 - 28 - 32 - 16 - 36 -... "

" Renall, I have indeed wondered this! Having read, with great fascination, the comments on the Room 22 and Identity of the Guide threads, I speculate that there may be a "canon route" that reveals all there is to know about the guide. My (very poorly... "

" All been said before, but: As vewatkin suggested years ago couldn't the 1st syllable of poor Fortunato's name also be an indicator? And to rephrase what DG said even earlier, I only see 10 bottles on the rack, but one of the bottles is turned... "

" Does anyone else find this room unbearably creepy with all those people staring at you? Also, the mirror with horns intrigues me to no end. "