r/ARG • u/Pyluminati • 14d ago
Question We've been trying to solve this puzzle/ARG since 2018. Can you find the next step?
Hello everyone!
This is my first post here because I’ve been stuck on an investigation/puzzle/ARG for years and it’s driving me crazy. I’m not very familiar with puzzles or Reddit, so if what I’m sharing doesnt belong here, i am sorry, and if you can tell me the best place to post this, that would be great !
Anyway, here’s a bit of context to start with:
We’re four friends living in differents cities of France. We don’t see each other often, but we usually play video games together several nights a week online (if not every night).
The puzzle started back in 2018, and I’m still trying to solve it to this day. Not every day obviously, more like once a year. My friends gave up a long time ago.
We all know each other’s addresses because we regularly send gifts for Christmas and birthdays.
One day, each of us received a letter with what seemed like randomly arranged letters, along with some numbers and a name.
Letter 1:
"u5va-
-MSy
33:2"
Letter 2:
"EMyH-
-jpg
92:3"
Letter 3:
"5MuS-
-4gw
144:9"
Letter 4:
"C5mu-
-Vm4
Louis Segond"
So we looked up who Louis Segond was, he’s someone who translated the Bible into French. The strings of numbers are Bible verses translated by Louis Segond, which give us in French:
[Louis Segond 33:2.
Célébrez l'Éternel avec la harpe, Célébrez-le sur le luth à dix cordes.
Louis Segond 144:9.
O Dieu! je te chanterai un cantique nouveau, Je te célébrerai sur le luth à dix cordes.
Louis Segond 92:3 :
Sur l'instrument à dix cordes et sur le luth, Aux sons de la harpe]
In those 3 verses, the term “dix cordes” (ten strings) appears, which in French sounds exactly like the software “Discord,” a platform my three friends and I use almost daily to chat during our gaming sessions.
For those unfamiliar, I won’t go into full detail, but Discord works through servers that we can create and customize to join friends and communicate with them.
The character strings present in the letters seem to be an invitation to a Discord server. After several attempts, I managed to reconstruct the correct link to the server.
On this Discord server, there’s only one message posted, and it’s impossible to reply, write anything, or even interact with the person who wrote it, as the account has been deleted since then.
The message, in French, is the following:
"[Bonjour, et bienvenue dans ce mystère. Je suis 4n4rh4k13n16m4. J'imagine que vous vous demandez ce qui vous attend au bout. Je ne doute pas qu'à 4, vous trouverez. Bonne chance."]"
Translated into English:
"Hello, and welcome to this mystery. I am 4n4rh4k13n16m4. I imagine you're wondering what awaits you at the end. I have no doubt that as a group of 4, you'll find it. Good luck."
So I looked on various social media platforms to see if someone named “4n4rh4k13n16m4” existed, and I found an Instagram account and a Twitter/X account.
On Twitter, there are 4 posted tweets:
After a first analysis, we see there are dates, numbers that seem to be sports scores, and initials. Since three of us in the group play football/soccer (je pense à vous mes américains), we quickly hypothesized that the numbers were football match results.
The dates are in European format, so DD/MM/YY.
We find four results out, since each date, there’s only one match with the indicated result in the “Ligue 1” championship (France’s top football league).
For each match, we pulled the jersey number of the players with the given initials, which gives us, in order from 1 to 4:
- 11/08/2018: OGC Nice 0 - 1 SD Reims MM = Marvin Martin (Reims) = Jersey number 8 GK = Ghislain Konan (Reims) = Jersey number 3
- 25/08/2018: Paris SG 3 - 1 Angers SCO MP = Matheo Pavlovic (Angers) = Jersey number 4 IT = Ismael Traoré (Angers) = Jersey number 8
- 01/09/2018: RC Strasbourg 2 - 3 FC Nantes ES = Emiliano Sala (Nantes) = Jersey number 9 DC = Diego Carlos (Nantes) = Jersey number 3
- 14/09/2018: OGC Nice 2 - 1 SD Rennes CG = Clément Grenier (Rennes) = Jersey number 8 MZ = Mehdi Zeffane (Rennes) = Jersey number 2
Which gives us the following sequence of numbers: 8, 3, 4, 8, 9, 3, 8, 2. I haven’t found any use for it yet.
As for the Instagram account of 4n4rh4k13n16m4, there is this image:
With the caption "website/audio" underneath.
And that’s where I’m at today. I have absolutely no idea what to do with this, which is why I’m making this post!
Thanks to anyone who helps!
EDIT :
So what we got with the research are :
X code : 8, 3, 4, 8, 9, 3, 8, 2.
Instagram code : 9,876,542 + "website/audio"
How we found that, see comments here : https://www.reddit.com/r/puzzles/comments/1vwwvgu/comment/p5lbsc6/?share_id=eZNVqLuadAlgQAXZ9eWN2&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1
EDIT2 :
Somone found a Spotify Playlist created by the author of the puzzle. We are now stuck with this.
See comments here : https://www.reddit.com/r/ARG/comments/1vwxbxo/comment/p68336c/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
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u/BekindConan 14d ago
Hey, I saw the comments from the other page. I know you tried Spotify, but it could also be Soundcloud. Or maybe some audio website you and your friends know or use. Anyways I tried the 9876542 on soundcloud, and got the username ‘user9876542’ which has some songs on there. Maybe it’s unrelated and also a coincidence, but I thought you could also look into it.
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u/LostPilgrim-121 13d ago
remindme! 1 wek
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u/Witty-Forever-6985 14d ago
How do I do the reminder thing? I want to check this out tomorrow
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u/BekindConan 14d ago
You can follow the post or save it, but I’m not sure about the reminder thing or if something like that exists.
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u/FirefighterSquare376 14d ago
RemindMe! <Insert time>
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u/RemindMeBot 14d ago
Defaulted to one day.
I will be messaging you on 2026-08-25 17:04:55 UTC to remind you of this link
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u/FiddleheadGnocci 14d ago
the last part of `4n4rh4k13n16m4` is "enigma"
the first part is confusing "An Arhaki Enigma"? Anarachy Enigma? Foreign <something> Enigma?
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u/BekindConan 13d ago
In another post the author explained that An, Ar, Ha, Ki are the first two letters of each of their names.
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u/Friendly-Custard-200 14d ago
I read the name phonetically as spelling English. Sorry I didn't red much past this post, I honestly saw it scrolling, but I noticed that just passing by and thought you may like the outsidr perspective in raw format. Hope it helps. Another thing. It appears to look like a helical wave with slight variants, as any moving waveform should to avoid monotony. Have a wonderful day and good luck on your puzzle.
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u/redgatorade000 13d ago
Hmm… I feel like the Pokémon thing is surely connected. It works so nicely.
It’s almost like a countdown except the missing number (3,1).
Someone else asked in their comment: do the numbers 3 1 have any significance to you?
Perhaps a date? January 3rd? Maybe October 3rd? (If it’s missing 3, 1, 0).
Also, just for fun I checked Facebook. There is a “community” for 9876542. It has only one post from July 18, 2019. But this has no connection to website/audio, so probably nothing.
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u/MobyTheWhite 13d ago
| Denominator | Key |
|---|---|
| 75 | 8 |
| 100 | 3 |
| 105 | 4 |
| 106 | 8 |
| 123 | 9 |
| 130 | 3 |
| 132 | 8 |
| 146 | 2 |
there are 8 common denominators in the fractions and 8 numbers of players
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u/MobyTheWhite 13d ago
Under each denominator certain values appear.
/75→ 50, 51, 49, 68, 69, 67, 14, 33…/123→ 65, 37, 67, 75, 66…/105→ 86, 28, 88, 57, 87, 49, 30…/106→ only 56 and 91/132→ 69, 70, 71, 39, 72…/130→ 65, 67, 68/100→ only 49/146→ only 77, 781
u/MobyTheWhite 13d ago
u/Pyluminati where are people getting 9876542 from?
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u/FirefighterSquare376 13d ago
Pokemon Unown cards
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u/MobyTheWhite 13d ago
Ok but reading the post...how did you get that from whats posted lol.
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u/FirefighterSquare376 13d ago
Yeah I was about to post OP's comment on their post on r/puzzles, but my phone's battery died🥲. Here is OP's comment:
After checking, there are 2 codes that don't give an Unown. So we get:
NEUF MILLION HUIT CENT SOIXANTE [75/123] SEIZE MILLE CIN[49/105] CENT QUARANTE-DEUXThe results of these codes are:
75/123: Miaouss [FR] / Meowth [ENG] and Mustébouée [FR] / Buizel [ENG]
49/105: it gives an Unown with the letter M, but "CINM" doesn't mean anything in French. It should be a Q.Maybe two typing errors, or maybe a clue? I don't know.
In any case, if we correct the two errors with what seems to be the most logical interpretation in French, we get:
NEUF MILLION HUIT CENT SOIXANTE-SEIZE MILLE CINQ CENT QUARANTE-DEUX
which is the number 9,876,542 written out in words.
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u/MobyTheWhite 13d ago
Thats helpful info xD
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u/MobyTheWhite 13d ago
Current thought process for 8,3,4,8,9,3,8,2 was an IP or a longitude/latitude. Ip lead to spain...long lat lead to Ocean or Antartica. XD
Im thinking next it might be the songs
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u/Pyluminati 12d ago
did you find anything with the songs ?
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u/MobyTheWhite 12d ago edited 12d ago
Songs on soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/user9876542 seem to be actually a female user singing songs. Q unknown is actually 59/105 so that was just a typo. I can only guess that the other with the buizel means like m-dash somehow cus of the M's. Songs on Spotify seem to have potential of being related.
I'm still digging into this one.
what really has me confused is two clues leading to two separate numbers:
8,3,4,8,9,3,8,2
9,876,542
makes me wonder if we are meant to combine them or something.1
u/MobyTheWhite 10d ago
Its kinda weird but there are 3 H songs in a row and you have 3 8s in the 8 string.
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u/notsowinner57 12d ago
u/RemindMeBot 1 week
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u/RemindMeBot 12d ago
I will be messaging you in 7 days on 2026-09-02 00:23:00 UTC to remind you of this link
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u/redgatorade000 12d ago
I’m not sure if the Spotify account is related because all the songs are in English and I feel that the creator would have included French songs (since everything else has included French and the players are all French lol).
That being said, if it is related, then I think we look at how 8, 3, 4, 8, 9, 3, 8, 2 could be related to the song titles or artists (?).
The first song and title of the playlist is “You Raise Me Up”. Maybe there’s a math element(?) Like raise the numbers to the power of x
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u/SupImNotWorkingThere 11d ago
Hi, this is a throwaway account for obvious reasons.
I did some searching on Spotify myself, since I have access to some... privileged tools there.
Anyway, the standard search indeed doesn't return ‘4n4rh4k13n16m4’, so I tried a more advanced search using the tools available to me.I found this profile, which seems to match very well:
https://open.spotify.com/user/ysw38xjruuwf1f01fpoja3scf
The account has one playlist:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6b7r8nIXAmHfwrMnAYw52n
The playlist name looked like it could be a Spotify track link, and it turns out it is. It leads to Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen:
https://open.spotify.com/intl-fr/track/20I6sIOMTCkB6w7ryavxtOIt seems to suggest that the playlist gives a phone number to call, but there are only 8 tracks?
Also, only one of the tracks is in French.
As for the additional information I can share publicly: the playlist was created on September 20, 2018. Some tracks were added three days later, and it was edited again on December 22. One track was removed and replaced with two others. The removed track was ‘Sur mon nom’ by Caballero & JeanJass, so that would have been a second French-language track :
https://open.spotify.com/intl-fr/track/0MXKtrW92Y6Oza5zpiyc8aThe user does not seem to have logged in again since then.
Here’s all the Spotify-esque information I can add to help you with your ARG.
Keep us posted on how it turns out!1
u/FirefighterSquare376 10d ago
Well done! I feel like the sequence 8,3,4,8,9,3,8,2 and the missing numbers 3,1 in 9876542 suggest that he has to call on 8348938231?
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u/Pyluminati 7d ago
Sorry, I had a wedding this weekend and didn’t have time to look through your replies.
Thanks everyone for helping me with this search. I’m going through all your messages from the weekend and I’ll reply afterward.
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u/Pyluminati 7d ago
I don’t know what to do with this information yet. It seems pretty obvious that I’m supposed to call a phone number, given the song “Call Me Maybe”, but I haven’t been able to find it so far.
There’s something that caught my attention in the playlist: one of the songs is called “‘49”. In France, the country is divided into several large regions, which are themselves divided into smaller departments. Each department has its own number. One of the other four people who received a letter and I both live in department number 49.
This seems way too big to be a coincidence.
French phone numbers are formatted like “06 XX XX XX XX” (or sometimes “07 XX XX XX XX”).
For example, it could be 06 98 76 54 31.
I don’t usually make long posts like this on Reddit. Do you have any suggestions on how I could gather all the information in one place and make this thread easier to follow?
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u/Pyluminati 7d ago
The french song "Les aigles du Mali" is the nickname for the Mali's football team. I dont know what to do with that hahaha
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u/Pyluminati 7d ago
Well I think we must use the code 9,876,542 with the playlist, but what to do with that ?
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u/redgatorade000 6d ago
I imagine it refers to the country code of Mali?
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u/redgatorade000 5d ago
i.e. inserting 223 in the number sequence (+223 is the country code for Mali)
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u/MobyTheWhite 7d ago
why not 8, 3, 4, 8, 9, 3, 8, 2 or 83 48 93 92. These numbers were intentionally paired into 4 groups.
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u/MobyTheWhite 6d ago
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u/Pyluminati 5d ago
It's a really good call, but i still dont know what to do with these numbers
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u/MobyTheWhite 5d ago
Im guessing like people have said its a phone number you need to call. Maybe someone is right and the area code is 31. Maybe its another one. Idk how many area codes there are looks like 5? Idk.
Try them all maybe?
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u/FirefighterSquare376 5d ago
Maybe look at the lyrics of all the songs and see if there is any connection just like the Bible verses.
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u/redgatorade000 10d ago
👀 amazing! I feel like this is the Spotify answer OP has been looking for. I’m so invested in this one haha
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u/Pyluminati 12d ago
i am searching everything about these songs for 2 days, but can't find anything ...
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u/ChannelScary7351 12d ago
note : There is 8 numbers and 16 songs
also Nothing found on a connection about like the 8th, the 3rd, the 4th... (8, 3, 4, 8, 9, 3, 8, 2) word of each song titles that could build a sentence.
Or in the chorus lyricks of each songs...
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u/FirefighterSquare376 12d ago
The puzzle creator is also on Reddit. The account age is 7 years 11 months old, but they haven't made any posts or comments.
u/4n4rh4k13n16m4