Hacktoria | Klumgongyn Returns – Write-Up
Now this one is a fun little CTF created by Hacktoria. You can find the original CTF here: https://hacktoria.com/contracts/klumgongyn-returns/
Greetings Special Agent K. We have a very special assignment for you today. You might remember our old friend Klumgongyn. He’s recently turned up again and will be cooperating with us going forward. In what capacity that collaboration is, I cannot say right now.
All I can tell you, that below you’ll find a text written in ancient Klumgon. It’s up to you to translate the text, which will help you uncover the password for your Link File as well.
Everything else will become clear upon translating the text.
As always. Special Agent K, the contract is yours, if you choose to accept.
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Overview
As we can read from the briefing it is written in ancient Klumgon. Sadly I'm not an expert on ancient Klumgon or modern Klumgon at all, so I need to find a way to read that.
With a quick examination, I can recognize punctuation similar to English. So let's start with the low-hanging fruits.
Low-hanging fruits
The most obvious characters are the dot and comma. So I can assume that this 
is a dot and this character 
is a comma.
Awesome!
Skimming the text further to see possible patterns, I notice the following string 
. The small character is almost certainly an apostrophe. In English, I can think of only one combination that consists of 3 characters and contains an apostrophe: It's
With this, I guess that these characters are as follows
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
i |
 |
t |
 |
s |
I don't see other easily recognizable combinations. I now know that this is a literal translation into English. So I am now looking for striking words.
Mid-hanging fruits
Which words stand out in particular, from which you could derive further letters? The very first one looks interesting. 6 characters and 2 double in a row:
After a little research, I found the following words that fit the pattern:
- halloo
- coffee
- toffee
From the context, I assume that this is a greeting, so I take the halloo.
So with this assumption, I get the following characters
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
h |
 |
a |
 |
l |
 |
o |
Now I have some letters together to extract even more letters. So now I'll look for words, where I'm missing only one character.
The beginning makes this string:
With the current assumptions, the has to be written like this: th_t
So can it be that?
If this is so, then I have made a mistake with the halloo, because here have otherwise two different characters for an A.
Little correction
So now if I assume that the word above is that, halloo must be wrong.
Let me think here for a second...
What if this 
is not two letters, but one? Then I'd have h_llo and so the missing letter is an E.
With this correction, everything makes a lot more sense.
| character | letter |
|---|---|
|
e |
 |
a |
|
o |
Filling the gaps
Time to decipher the first sentence using the characters I have so far. Maybe I'll get something useful:
hello s_e_ial a_e_t.
This looks suspiciously like hello special agent to me. I'll keep working with that for now and see if the second sentence makes sense.
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
p |
 |
c |
 |
g |
 |
n |
it's nice to see _o_ again. than_s _o_
This already looks promising. So I can extract more characters from the context.
The sentence must therefore read:
It's nice to see you again
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
y |
 |
u |
first paragraph second line
sa_ing _y li_e ea_lie_ this yea_. that _as _ _ite the
Now I'm going to look at the individual words and see what can get out here. This set of characters:
has the same missing character as this word:
So if I assume the missing character is an R I'll get year for the first and earlier for the second word. This will get me the following result:
sa_ing _y li_e earlier this year. that _as _ _ite the
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
r |
I'm going to continue and see what else i can get from this paragraph.
first paragraph third line
a_ _ ent_re, e_er since getting o_ _ planet. I'_e _isse_
So here I have only one word that I could try: e_er
Again, I assume from the sentence structure that it must probably be ever.
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
v |
When I fill in this character in this sentence, I'll get:
a_ vent_re, ever since getting o_ _ planet. I've _isse_
Sounds logical. I'll keep it that way. On to the next line.
first paragraph fourth line
this planet greatly. even though your _in_ can _e cruel,
Interesting, but the sentence is not quite conclusive to me yet. So directly to the next line.
first paragraph fifth line
strange an_ violent, it provi_es a _on_erful ho_e fille_
I see there are some words here with the same character:
Let's try that one out:
strange and violent, it provides a _onderful ho_e filled
Interesting, so I can conclude the following sentence from the missing letters:
strange and violent, it provides a wonderful home filled
Once again noted in the table:
| character | letter |
|---|---|
|
d |
 |
w |
 |
m |
filling in the first paragraph
Ok, now I should have enough letters together to solve the first paragraph completely or at least for the most part.
hello special agent. it's nice to see you again. than_s _or
saving my li_e earlier this year. that was _uite the
adventure. ever since getting o_ _ your planet, i've missed
this planet greatly, even though your _ind can _e cruel,
strange and violent, it provides a wonderful home filled
with hope for the future.
Great! only a few letters are missing in the first paragraph and I think I can just guess them from the sentence.
than_s _or saving my li_e earlier this year.
I suppose that this must be read as follows:
thanks for saving my life earlier this year.
Thus I should have found K and F. If I fill in the K in the other set, where I still have gaps, I get:
even though your kind can _e cruel, strange and violent,
Ok, two more missing letters. Let's see:
that was _uite the adventure.
That hast to be quiet, so the missing letter here is Q.
From this, I conclude that the last missing character is a B. The following letters are added:
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
k |
 |
f |
 |
q |
 |
b |
This gives me a meaningful first paragraph:
hello special agent. it's nice to see you again. thanks for
saving my life earlier this year. that was quite the
adventure. ever since getting off your planet, i've missed
this planet greatly, even though your kind can be cruel,
strange and violent, it provides a wonderful home filled
with hope for the future.
Solving the second paragraph
This paragraph is the longest, but I don't see any new letters appearing in it at first glance, so I can probably solve that one directly.
It is therefore that I’ve decided too _oin your planet of
hairless apes, after consulting with the overseer, we have
reached an agreement that i will become your new council
leader, meaning there is now a direct link between the
gala_ies much stronger, mostly yours, since we are
absolute lightyears ahead of your steampunk technology
and “micro” chips.
Our anlien friend is a bit sassy here, but probably correct. Well, only two letters are missing and the paragraph makes sense. That's good.
It is therefore that I’ve decided too _oin your planet of
I strongly suspect that it must be join. The second missing letter is clearly an X.
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
j |
 |
x |
Alright, time to decipher the rest.
Solving the third paragraph
I am also pleased to learn that you are still the top
special agent, this task is designed to identify if you are
truly “the one”, upon completion, you shall receive the
files to use the ancient klumgen language, it was written
by xyntolyk, one of the first elders of our only tribe at
the time.
EZ, let's move on.
Solving the fourth paragraph
our language was founded _ _ _ _ _ _ _ years ago_ This makes it
very young in the grand scheme of things, but still quite as
ancient text, made long before your early hairless space
mice lived in what is now _imbabwe.
It looks like there are numbers involved now. If they appear in the password, I will probably have to find them out via a brute-force attack.
Two unknown characters. Is the last word in this paragraph Zimbabwe?
| character | letter |
|---|---|
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
 |
??? |
I'll skip all the characters here and see if I can figure them out later.
Solving the bottom part
Good luck special agent, it’s an honor working besides you
Agent.
I would say, live long and prosper, but given your lifespan...
Live fast and die young_
Password...
Very good, only one character is missing. As it looks it is a !. That would also fit in the previous place. But the password itself will confirm for me if my guess is correct, since there a couple of these characters.
| character | letter |
|---|---|
|
! |
Solving the puzzle
If everything is done correctly, the password should be as follows:
j!fqw'eu!itn!vx,cm'qw!re'ir,jl!d
So let me type that in and behold, I see a small gift and the link to the contract card, great!
Conclusion
This CFT was super exciting and demanded a lot from me.
Now that I have the font, I can solve the complete text:
hello special agent. it’s nice to see you again, thanks for
saving my life earlier this year, that was quite the
adventure, ever Since getting off your planet, I’ve missed
this planet greatly, even though your kind can be cruel,
strange and violent, it provides a wonderful home filled
with hope for the future.
it is therefore that I’ve decided too join your planet of
hairless apes, after consulting with the overseer, we have
reached an agreement that i will become your new council
leader, meaning there is now a direct link between the
galaxies much stronger, mostly yours, since we are
absolute lightyears ahead of your steampunk technology
and “micro” chips.
i am also pleased to learn that you are still the top
special agent, this task is designed to identify if yo are
truly “the one”, upon completion, you shall receive the
files to use the ancient kluogen language, it was written
by xyntolyk, one of the first elders of our only tribe at
the time.
our language was founded 105783 Years ago! This makes it
very young in the grand scheme of things, but still quite as
ancient text, made long before your early hairless space
mice lived in what is now zimbabwe.
good luck special agent, it’s an honor working besides you
agent.
I would say, live long and prosper, but given your lifespan...
live fast and die young!
password...
j!fqw'eu!itn!vx,cm'qw!re'ir,jl!d