<<---First clue
<---Previous clue
As you say the word, the floor starts rising. You are now able to reach the trapdoor.
You push it open and climb out. You blink in surprise. You appear to be in the same place you were for Clue Sixteen. When you take another glance, however, you notice that it's different. You see that there are six instead of four boxes, in both places. In addition, the words seem... quite odd. You look:
Continuing with your progress, I see. Onwards with your hunt! Until you solve this puzzle, however, you aren't going anywhere. No way to avoid it.
To solve this puzzle, it is mostly the same as the previous puzzle like it. Don't make the mistake of thinking this will be easy - it's really not. On the bottom part of this plaque, there are several types of puzzles. On your neck is your head. Kryptics, sudoku, enigmatic-puzzle - it's all there. Unless you want to stay here, you must solve it - and don't forget to go in deeper.
Group A - steganography
1.) 4,4,5 | 1,1,6 | 5,2,1 | 5,1,1
2.) 1,3,4 | 7,7,5 | 8,3,1
3.) 1,4,6 | 9,1,3 | 5,2,5
4.) 6,1,2 | 6,5,2 | 7,5,2
5.) 9,2,2 | 1,4,1 |
6.) 3,5,6 | 10,3,2 | 1,4,2 | 5,2,1
Group B1 - cryptic-clues
1.) Diamonds formed in lattices. (3)
2.) Broken bar within intelligence (5)
3.) Restriction pistol without exclamation (4)
4.) Finish that man's top (3)
5.) Angry mate's anger (5)
6.) Beginning a Christmas tree drive (5)
1Created by @TheGreatEscaper and @ChrisCudmore
Group C - enigmatic-puzzle
1-6.)
Group D - rebus
1.)
2.)
3.)
4.)
5.)
6.)
Group E - word-web
1.) Apple, brother, sister, deal, talk, time
2.) lose, cucumber, blow, heels, keep, off
3.) chew, grab, dust, bark, nails, tongue
4.) over, jump, false, scratch, out, running
5.) hit, raise, snow, live same, over, tile
6.) pull, wag, sting, bushy, chase, legs
Group F - cipher
1.) noo p q rssr
2.) vscgc
3.) Κάτω από
4.) ai/jws
5.) עוהש
6.) B38b 4C6G3B`B?7F` 7K?JJbJ32E` AG6AJC`
Answer
The initial message
Taking the first letter of each sentence (I spotted this because of the strange word "Kryptics") gives COUNT DOOKU. According to the OP, this is not relevant for this particular puzzle and will only be used later on in the series.
Group A
This is a steganography puzzle. Interpret each triple $(a,b,c)$ as
the $c$th letter of the $b$th word of the $a$th sentence.
This gives the following words:
DUST
RUN
EYE
OFF
UP
EARS
and the final solution
DRY (dry as dust, dry run, not a dry eye, dry off, dry up, dry behind the ears) - thanks @Volatility!
Group B
Diamonds formed in lattices. (3)
ICE (ice crystals are like diamonds, and the word is found in lattICEs)
Broken bar within intelligence (5)
BRAIN (bra is a "broken bar", with "in", and brains have intelligence) - thanks @Will!
Restriction pistol without exclamation (4)
LOCK, as found by Neil W.
Finish that man's top (3)
HAT (the finish of "that", and on top of a man) - thanks @Will!
Angry mate's anger (5)
STEAM (anagram of "mate's", "angry" being an anagram indicator and "anger" the definition) - thanks @Sid!
Beginning a Christmas tree drive (5)
FIRST ("beginning" as the definition, a Christmas tree is a fir, and drive and street are both words for types of road) - thanks @Will!
The final solution is
PICK (ice pick, pick your brains, lock pick, pick out of a hat, pick up steam, first pick).
Group C
I solved the Sudoku by first filling in all 9s, 4s, 7s, and 2s (in that order) and then catching the low-hanging fruit. The final solution is:
As Sconibulus discovered, there is a second image hidden behind the Sudoku: a square of letters instead of numbers. Sconibulus's answer details the rest of the solution for Group C: we find
the words HEART, COLD, DEAD, FOX, CROW, THROW, giving the final solution STONE.
Group D
1.
THIN
The rest are as found by Chris Cudmore:
POINT, UP, NOSE, SHORT, NECK,
and the final answer is
STICK (stick-thin, pointed stick, stick up, stick your nose in the air, short stick, stick your neck out) - thanks @Rubio!
Group E
Apple, brother, sister, deal, talk, time
BIG - solved by Sconibulus
lose, cucumber, blow, heels, keep, off
COOL - solved by Sconibulus
chew, grab, dust, bark, nails, tongue
BITE (bite and chew, grab a bite, bite the dust, bark worse than bite, bite your nails, bite your tongue)
over, jump, false, scratch, out, running
START (start over, jump start, false start, start from scratch, start out, running start) - thanks @Rubio!
hit, raise, snow, live same, over, tile
ROOF (hit the roof, raise the roof, snow on the roof, live under the same roof, roof over, roof tile)
pull, wag, sting, bushy, chase, leg
TAIL - solved by Sconibulus
The final solution, as found by Sconibulus, is
HEAD (bighead, cool head, bite your head off, head start, head to tail).
Group F
noo p q rssr
DEEP (Morse code with "n" and "s" being dashes and the other letters dots) - thanks @MOehm!
vscgc
THICK - if you go into the markup of the question, you'll find a hidden word "clues" next to this clue, which is the key for a Vigenere cipher.
Κάτω από
According to Google, this is Greek for UNDER.
ai/jws
SOAKED - shift each character one to the right on a qwerty keyboard, assuming / is next to A since that makes SO?KED a word.
עוהש
THIN (typing these Hebrew letters on a keyboard with both alphabets gives GUVA, which rot13's to THIN) - thanks @Will!
B38c F=4FC2aB38a 4C6G3B` B38bJG2Cc
SAVE. Rubio had the idea of applying ROT47, which turns
B38b 4C6G3B`B?7F` 7K?JJbJ32E` AG6AJC`intoqbg3 crevbq-1qnfu-1 fznyy3ybat-1 pvepyr-1. Then apply ROT13 to that, to getdot3 period-1dash-1 small3long-1 circle-1. This can be rewritten as... .- ...- ., which is Morse code for SAVE.
The final solution is
SKIN (skin-deep, thick skin, under the skin, soaked to the skin, thin skin, save your skin).
Final answer
The respective groups of puzzles yielded the following words:
DRY, PICK, STONE, STICK, HEAD, SKIN
giving the final solution
BONE (bone-dry, bone to pick, sticks and stones can break my bones, bonehead, skin and bone).
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