Location: Machine Room

Solution to Beth

by Kris Ehinger and Christina Hawkes

Answer: PRINCE

As stated in the intro, the goal is to travel from room 1 to room 24 visiting every room exactly once. The only path that accomplishes this goes through the rooms in this order:

1, 11, 4, 3, 8, 6, 17, 19, 15, 12, 23, 10, 16, 5, 2, 9, 18, 20, 21, 22, 13, 14, 7, 24

The text and image for each room references an imaginary work of fiction (for example, the imaginary guidebook The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy) and each image is a “hidden pictures” puzzle containing letters that spell a short cluephrase relating to that work. The works, clues, and answers are:

Referenced workHidden clueAnswer
1The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism (from 1984)CH3 TITLE WORD 1WAR
11The King in YellowLAKEHALI
4An Imperial Affliction (from The Fault in Our Stars)HEROINEANNA
3The Princess BrideCOUNTRUGEN
8Necronomicon (from Lovecraft)ARABIC TITLE W/ ALAZIF
6Tsui Pên's novel from The Garden of Forking PathsAUTHORPEN
17Tales of the Black Freighter (comic book, from Watchmen)AUTHOR 1ST NAMEMAX
19"Pale Fire" (poem)POETSHADE
15The Red Book of Westmarch (from Tolkien)AUTHORS WORE ITRING
12The Unstrung HarpIMPALEDLIRP
23A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer (from The Diamond Age)12TH KINGCOYOTE
10The Hitchhiker's Guide to the GalaxyEARTH WRITERFORD
16The Big Board (from Slaughterhouse-Five)AUTHORTROUT
5Half Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery (from Cloud Atlas)HEROINEREY
2The infinite book (from The Book of Sand)PUBLISHER CITYBOMBAY
9Practical Handbook of Bee Culture, with Some Observations upon the
Segregation of the Queen
(from His Last Bow)
AUTHORHOLMES
18InkheartPET MARTENGWIN
20The Monster Book of Monsters (from Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban)AUTHORLIMA
21The Neverending StoryTALISMANAURYN
22The Navidson Record (from House of Leaves)BLIND AUTHORZAMPANO
13"The Entertainment" (film, from Infinite Jest)STAR W/ VANDYNE
14Encyclopedia Galactica (from Asimov's Foundation series)FOUNDER 1ST NAMEHARI
7Machine's Way (from The Dark Half)PEN NAMESTARK
The lengths of the answers are equal to the number of doors in each room. Indexing into the answers with the door taken out of that room gives:

WING IN MAGIC FOR BEGINNERS

This is a reference to Prince Wing in the book Magic For Beginners by Kelly Link; the answer is PRINCE.