The Devil's Arrows
(Published on 19. June 2026, 00:00 by NXTMaster)
Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who has solved my puzzles. I have been posting weekly puzzles for almost a year now because I had tons of puzzles from 2021 onward I wanted to share with you all. However, this puzzle is the last puzzle from my backlog, meaning I won't be posting weekly puzzles anymore. This also means that any future puzzles are guaranteed to be fresh out of the oven.
Puzzle Background: I began solving puzzles regularly back in early 2019 but I didn't start setting puzzles until early 2021 because I wanted to be confident in my solving abilities before attempting to set my own. Phistomefel posted the puzzle Chaos Construction back in early 2020, and solving this puzzle is what gave me the confidence boost I needed. One of the very first puzzles I ever made was a tribute to Chaos Construction, but I didn't post it to LMD back then because I didn't want to intrude upon the community. I'm finally ready to share my tribute to the legend that inspired me to become a setter.
The rules are as follows:
- Divide the grid into nine regions of orthogonally connected cells.
- Place a digit from 1-9 in each cell such that no digit repeats in a row, column, or region.
- A digit X in an arrow cell indicates that an unbroken sequence of exactly X cells in the direction of the arrow — starting with the cell containing the arrow — belongs to the same region. If there is another cell after the sequence of X cells in the direction of the arrow, it must belong to a different region.
The puzzle is available on SudokuPad. Have fun constructing!
Solution code: Column 7 (Top to Bottom). Include a "-" to separate digits in different regions.
Comments
on 1. July 2026, 16:50 by War
Beautiful puzzle! The break in to the first half of the puzzle was smooth and quick. Spotting the edge trick for the bottom six rows was a tough break through, but afterwards the puzzle fell nicely. Thanks for posting!
on 23. June 2026, 22:11 by BG03
Thank you for sharing. It's the first time I have found my rating to be wildly different from the LMD rating. With a ~60 min solve time and not getting stuck anywhere, I would rate this 3* difficulty at worst. I've solved a few 5* puzzles and those have taken me 2-6 hours to get through. This is not that. Cheers!
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Impressive solve, thank you. This puzzle seems to click into place for some people.
on 22. June 2026, 08:19 by Piatato
Awesome!
on 21. June 2026, 13:18 by Myxo
Lovely!
on 20. June 2026, 21:46 by Exigus
Very nice but a bit tricky CC. Thanks!
on 20. June 2026, 20:04 by Thanos13
I had a blast solving this puzzle. Great work!
on 20. June 2026, 12:16 by Snookerfan
Brilliant and very impressive! Sublime region building logic. I had a great time solving, thanks!
on 19. June 2026, 21:02 by Douglass
Impeccable!
on 19. June 2026, 06:13 by Chaossudokusplease
Fantastic puzzle! I got stuck quite a few times, but whenever I figured out what to do next, it always felt satisfying and achievable. Despite my long solve time, I never had to trial-and-error (which does sometimes happen with CCs). I would love to play more of these!
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That is high praise. Thank you for your kind words.
on 19. June 2026, 02:27 by ArkansasJones
What a delightful solve! Well done!
I absolutely love the way the arrows interact to force the regions. Some of the most enjoyable region constructing I've done in a while.
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I'm glad to hear it. Thank you so much for the solve
