Rebellion: Prince of Dawn

Chapter 14.3: Ray of Light

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JOHN

The Vigenere Cipher was a simple cipher that was quite unbreakable.

There were two things that were needed to crack it. The coded message itself and the keyword.

You would first draw a table with the letters of the alphabet on the rows and columns. The table consisted of the alphabet written out twenty-six times in different rows. Each alphabet had a letter shifted cyclically to the left compared to the previous alphabet, corresponding to the twenty-six possible.

Now came the keyword. In this instance the word was coal. You would write down the word repeatedly to match the coded message.

Coalcoalcoalcoalcoalcoal would match with the coded message of vvertsaeuvuqhzehcgoc.

You would then match the first letter of the keyword with the first letter of the coded message by putting either letter on the row and column. The letter the row and column intersected on was the true letter.

In this case, the first letters of C and V hid the letter T. O and V hid the letter H. And if I were to continue doing this until I got the first twenty letters I would get—THEGREATSHUFFLEWASOR...

This can then be edited to—THE GREAT SHUFFLE WAS OR...

Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.

I spent about three days decoding the notes and the rest memorizing them by heart.

I couldn't believe what I was reading—the Great Shuffle being orchestrated by hundreds of jynxists under the command of the king, Ilias and Dr Payne being their targets for some reason, Scar being a good man all this time—there was so much information here that I found absurd, but it was the truth.

When the one-week deadline came around, the notes had become my idol. It was all I could think about when my mind was wandering. It was all I heard when I listened. When I slept, I dreamt of the notes.

Just as promised, Camaro came that night. I handed back the novel through the bars.

"How much do you know?" he asked.

"Everything. You can test me if you want."

He nodded with acceptance. "Approximately how many jynxists were needed to use the teleportation spell on Gilead?"

"Two hundred and fifty."

"Why was there a sudden state of emergency called to raid the Maze Labyrinth?"

"Because according to the pattern, that's where Trisha Payne would've been sent to."

"How do you draw the incantation circle?"

I took a piece of chalk he offered and drew it on the floor.

"Erase it, you're good." Camaro took out the coded notes from the novel and burned them using a nearby torch. "It's currently morning. You will break out at night at exactly midnight. I'll leave a clock down here so you know the time. I will leave behind a key as well and you will dispose of it in a potted plant right by the northern stairwell."

"I got everything so far."

"You will see guards posted outside the entrance to the dungeons. You will walk past them and pay them no mind."

"Pay them no mind?"

"Yes, I'll deal with them. The Iron Keep was built by King LaFleur. He had his many architects build secret passageways within for emergencies. After it was built, LaFleur had them executed so only he knew of their existence. Their secret was buried when King Diablo usurped LaFleur. To this day, there are still many undiscovered passageways. You will use one to escape."