This multi-stage cipher was considerably difficult to design; indeed, the encrypted message had several fortunate properties. Anyway, firstly we have a bunch of crossword-style clues:
Secondly, here is a grid of digits:
And here is the third and final stage:
sqrt(N) - 200616142791693995765451
You should now have sufficient information to determine the password, which is in lower-case. A link to the solvers’ area is available in the usual place.
The output of the third step is just a number. There isn’t any obvious direct transformation of it into text, and it’s not a number I recognize as having a name of its own. It doesn’t occur within the grid from step 2 either. Gur ahzore ybbxf yvxr vg *zvtug* rapbqr cneg bs n frdhrapr naq nfx sbe gur arkg grez, ohg vg’f abg bar va BRVF naq zl ehqvzragnel nggrzcgf ng pheir svggvat tvir ab zrnavatshy-ybbxvat arkg grez. How is it “sufficient information to determine the password”, then? Is there some step I’m missing?
That’s part of the cipher…
Touché.
I’m also stuck here, because I’m terrible at figuring out what to do with long strings of numbers. Cipher 7, that RSA one, still eludes me to this day.
There are lots of things you can do with numbers: base 36, 26…, or Hebrew gematria spring to mind. As ciiphers go, this one is tricky but not too bad.