Guage Enigma

Not to be confused with the Gauge Enigma, the Guage Enigma is a complex system of metal gears covering the entire atmosphere. It is commonly accepted that the Guage Enigma was created by Atherton Guage for the sole purpose of preventing Kelorna the Extremely Confused from accessing the Great Secret. However, recent scholarship on the Codex Ingenuous has challenged this narrative, and at least from a textural criticism standpoint, their thesis is quite compelling.

The initial argument, known as the "Red Herring Thesis", comes from the character of the Wheelmind himself, as discussed by the anonymous author of CI #206:

Man or devil—it is not given to man to know the inner thoughts of the Wheelmind. Once you think you have grasped the scheme behind the scheme, you have but fallen into a third scheme, and yet none of those schemes had anything to do with his true purpose. (p. 89)

These sentiments are shared by many sources, apparently including Atherton Guage himself—the Guage family motto roughly translates to "Never do anything for only one reason." Thus, the scholars argue, the Guage Enigma likely served some purpose in addition to stalling Kelorna.

The Red Herring Thesis emerged around the same time as a concurrent development within the niche field of historical kleidiology. Careful analysis of the Index Ingenuous reveals that the production of keys actually predates the Guage Enigma. Indeed, between the keys' strange ontological and phenomenological properties, it is questionable why such advanced items would be needed to "unlock" a mere assembly of metal gears, especially when enigmonomers have yet to discover even one keyhole through telescopic observation.

Thus, we arrive at what is being termed the "Phylactery Hypothesis", which posits that the keys were actually designed as repositories for mortal souls. Though there are numerous references within the Codex to a relation between the keys and the Guage Enigma, they use the preposition "λεστ"; thus, the phrase "keys to the Guage Enigma" could also be translated "keys for the Guage Enigma." This rendering would make the keys a means of passage into or through the Enigma. By the relocation of the soul to an enduring apparatus, a mortal could theoretically avoid death indefinitely. And indeed, some immortals have hinted that this is in fact the case for some of the better-preserved keys.

The Phylactery Hypothesis also sheds new light on ambiguities in the Haiku of Keysmith Xemoniphon the Elder. Kleidiologists have long puzzled over his phrase "forge the seven keys", as over 500[1] keys are known to exist. But suppose that only seven keys functioned as phylacteries. The pattern "one by four by one by one" corresponds chronologically to Atherton Guage's known key-forging activity; Xemoniphon, greatest of the Keysmiths, may have been saying that "forging" (in the sense of "imitating" or "progressing along") Guage's journey of development is necessary to understand what he was doing—i.e., "Unlock the one Guage".

If that's the case, then it suddenly becomes clear why eyewitness accounts report that Xemoniphon vanished into thin air after waving around his masterwork

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Yedevek Ilron, Bardslayer 2nd class

[1] That is, more than seven.