ABOUT THIS CACHE
GUTS MAN
Wilderness Reclamation Robot
The strongest robot ever made to date, the mighty Guts Man uses his Super Arm to lift, carry, and throw objects of over two tons with absolute ease. Built by Dr. Light to be a civil engineering robot in charge of land reclamation and construction, Guts Man is both passionate about his work and more intelligent than his appearance and demeanor would suggest. In fact, when the day's work is done he's happiest spending his free time on a good crossword - especially one with a sneaky twist or two that requires a little extra "managing" to fit answers into the grid. But such diversions won't keep him from his appointed tasks: pushing stones, digging pits, pushing stones into pits, and anything else that only his sheer strength can handle. Since Dr. Wily reprogrammed him though, that constructive power has turned purely destructive. His domain is a veritable maze of grid-based tunnels dug between rows and columns of heavy brownish yellow stones, designed to challenge Mega Man in both brawn and brain. Can Mega Man prove his might, or will he end up buried like the "weak" robot Wily expects him to be?
Assume North 40 and West 74. You're looking for the ten strongest letters in the puzzle below.
Once discovered, convert those letters into digits as follows, in relevant clue order:
A, K, U = 1
B, L, V = 2
C, M, W = 3
D, N, X = 4
E, O, Y = 5
F, P, Z = 6
G, Q = 7
H, R = 8
I, S = 9
J, T = 0
CLUES
FROM THE WEST
1. Hamlet's backwards-walker
2. Core, crux, heart, or essence
3. Oilseed of opening
4. Slightly leavened flatbreads
5. Nada, jack, zip, zero
6. Tool an angry mob might use to get its "point" across? (singular)
7. Bipedal dead droppers, perhaps
8. River's source of water
9. Promotional spot
10. Set against or hollowed
11. State tree genus (common name)
12. Notwithstanding
13. Disturb, trouble, or shake
14. Inflationary 1980 role for Otto (as himself)?
15. In a manner evoking or deserving contempt
16. Deliberately offends, annoys, injures, or wrongs
17. Multiple mental illnesses (or cliffs?)
18. dollarbell cache (two words)
19. Underground holding tank for waste
20. Chigger bite symptom
21. "Indian Town," ca. 1746
22. Radioactive ores
FROM THE NORTH
1. Along with your eyes, you're using this now
2. Workplace that left Mel Smith role pale? (four words)
3. One of a group of tautologically named mammal fossil troves (four words)
4. River demon, or letter
5. Prepared whitefish, especially in Boston (variant spelling)
6. When caching here, use utmost respect
7. Seedy but low-maintenance pet?
8. 1982 Atari platformer video game, and its hero's moniker (in part)
9. Common T5 conveyance method
10. Material for a homemade hat to "protect" #1 from the North?
11. Without mercy
12. How to place a Lame Guardrail Cache?
13. Infomercial hawkers
14. The answer to this clue
15. Your ultimate "prize" for finding this, perhaps
16. High card
17. Dark or off-key
18. Safety tools for another kind of T5
19. Frozen
REMEMBER TO PHOTOGRAPH THE INSIDE OF THE CACHE LID!
The information there will help you solve the final challenge!
You can validate your puzzle solution with certitude.
MUSIC TO HELP YOU THINK
The Mega Man games are well known for their classic soundtracks, many of which have received remixes. Here's one for Guts Man's stage!
Congrats to knuckles77 for FTS and FTF!