Royal Flush Riddle



The Royal Flush Riddle is an optional puzzle in Silent Hill 3. After completing the game at least once, start an Extra New Game on Hard riddle difficulty. The clues are found in the chapel library in the bookshelves. Upon figuring out the solution to the riddle, the player will get a code to unlock Heather Mason's Royal Flush costume.

Clue
 A secret told before you awake: the start of a new transformation.

The first number is "the traveller to St. Ives." The second number is "the hare wear a crown of straw." The third number is "king of beasts and goddess of harvests." The fourth number is "representative of both knight and page." The fifth number is "lapis lazuli or turquoise."

There's no separating numbers from beginning to end. 14 buttons all told; therefore, one is always two. 

Solution

 * The first number is referring to the famous riddle "As I was going to St. Ives":


 * As I was going to St. Ives
 * I met a man with seven wives
 * Every wife had seven sacks
 * Every sack had seven cats
 * Every cat had seven kits
 * Kits, cats, sacks, wives
 * How many were going to St. Ives?




 * Only the narrator is going to St. Ives, because the narrator never mentioned that the man with seven wives was actually traveling to St. Ives. Thus the answer is 1.


 * The second number is "the hare wear a crown of straw". This is a reference to the March Hare from Alice in Wonderland, which in John Tenniel's original illustrations of the classic Lewis Carroll book is depicted wearing a straw crown. Its reference to the "March" Hare makes the answer 3, after the third month.


 * The third number is "king of beasts and goddess of harvests". August, the eighth month, crosses two signs of the zodiac: Leo (the lion) and Virgo (sign of the harvests). Thus the answer is 8.


 * The fourth number is "representative of both knight and page". Modern-day playing cards are descended from the tarot deck. The Knight and Page of the tarot were dropped and replaced with the Jack, which is the 11th playing card. Thus the answer is 11.


 * The fifth number is "lapis lazuli or turquoise". Lapis lazuli and turquoise are both birthstones for December, the 12th month of the year. Thus the answer is 12.

 "There's no separating numbers from beginning to end. 14 buttons all told; therefore, one is always two." 

This means that the final code has 14 characters; however, there are only five numbers given. As well, numbers aren't used to separate the numbers. If one looks at the typewriter, the only thing that can be used to separate the numbers which isn't a letter or a number is an underscore "_". "One is always two" means that every number must contain two digits, thus a zero is placed in front of any number from 1-9.

This means that the code must be in the format: 00_00_00_00_00

The final answer to the riddle is: 01_03_08_11_12

Input it into the costume typewriter to unlock the Royal Flush outfit.

Trivia

 * Due to a typo in the English localization, it says the hare "wear" a crown of straw instead of the correct "wears". A Silent Hill 3 guide written by Charlotte Chen in a Tips & Tricks magazine gave the incorrect reasoning "Hare Krishna wear their hair in three braids like straw." likely as a result of the typo and lacking the official explanation from Team Silent.