Hello, I'm not completely done with this yet, but I think I'm close to solving the Epitaph with a little method of mine.
You see, the main thing I used is the map of Japan and a list of japanese letters. Looking at the Epitaph now that I have a good understanding of its contents, it seems more like a map than a riddle.
Quote:
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My beloved hometown, the bountiful river running through it. You who seek the Golden Land, follow it's path downstream and seek the key. If you follow the river downstream, you will find a village. In the village, look for the shore the two will tell you of. There sleeps the key to the Golden Land.
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One thing that I realized about this part of the Epitaph is that its mixed up. The hardest part about this is the "beloved hometown," which has only clue that follows after it: "the bountiful river." Concerning the meaning of the "bountiful river," Japan has very few rivers, if any at all, but it does have alot of expressways and roads. Still, its hard to pinpoint where the "hometown" is because there are plenty of places that crossover roads and expressways. However, the clues that follow after it- the "village" and "the two"-- actually help give a semi- exact location. In Japan, villages are pretty much sections of larger cities, which helps having to look into a large area. As to what the "two" refer to, well... there are only two places with the same: Hokkaido and Hokkaido. But Hokkaido is a large prefecture, so I looked into what "Shore" might reference to and there is a small peninsula between Hokkaido and Hokkaido named Moruran.
So I started from there and began with the twilights. After Moruran, there are six cities above it- Date, Noboritetsu, Tomakami, Chitose, Eniwa, and Sapporo. If you look at the twilights and compare them to the map, they are good references as to what the map says. First of all is the fact that there are six cities lined up in a row- I'm guessing that these are six sacrifices. Second, two of those cities are seperated by an expressway- the two that are seperated, but I'm not too sure about this either. Now as to what the third twilight stands for I have no idea except that those cities might have a link to Kinzo in some way.
Now, here's the most interesting part. If you look at the fifth through eighth twilights and trace gouges on your body, they form a path. If trace that same path on the map, it would lead you into Sapporo.
I would like to finish this by saying that I haven't figured out the rest yet, but I think its pretty interesting way of seeing it. I call this my "Dual Sapporo Viewpoint." "Dual" because if you look from the top of another city- Shibetsu- it leads you to the same place. Now I'm not saying that this is a theory more like just another way of seeing things since, according to the Game, an atlas is somehow put into the equation.