The puzzle was set for one of Scojo's Setting Saturday puzzle prompts. The theme suggested by aqjhs was a region building puzzle using pairrows.
solve in Penpa+(answer check on edge-green and shading-black/grey as well as numbers-green/blue)
or SudokuPad (answer check on numbers only)
Sudoku:
Place the digits 1-9 once each into every row and column.
Digits may not repeat in the outlined 3x3 boxes.
Heyawake:
Shade some cells such that no shaded cells are orthogonally connected, the unshaded cells all form one single orthogonally connected area and no horizontal or vertical run of unshaded cells passes through more than one region border. The position of the region borders must be determined.
Every region is a square or rectangular group of orthogonally connected cells. Regions do not overlap and every cell in the grid is part of exactly one region.
Note that the sudoku box outlines are not necessarily Heyawake region borders.
Parity:
Digits in shaded cells must all have the same parity. i.e. either all odd or all even.
Pairrows:
A digit D in a cell containing two arrows is equal to the number of shaded cells in its region.
The two cells a distance of D away in the direction of the arrows are the target cells.
The size of the region is equal to the sum of the two digits in the target cells.
If the cell with the arrows is shaded, both target cells are also shaded.
If the cell with the arrows is unshaded, both target cells are also unshaded.
The cell with the arrows and it’s two target cells are either all in the same region or all in different regions.
X:
Cells separated by X are in separate regions and sum to 10.
Black dot:
Cells separated by a black dot are unshaded and one is double the other.
N:
The two cells separated by N sum to the number of regions in the grid.
Solution code: digits in shaded cells in column 3
on 21. January 2026, 19:37 by aqjhs
that was epic!
on 17. January 2026, 17:15 by mellowrobinson
Truly inspired selection of rules, many intricate (but still not terribly difficult) deductions that all interact in such a cohesive way, it made for a super enjoyable solve! Masterful setting thanks for sharing