merge solution
Answer: sentence
In this puzzle we are given 2 sets of clues. While clue set 2 is too ambiguous to start solving, all of the clues in clue set 1 can be solved. To help with solving, the answer to the clues are in alphabetical order. The following are the answers to the clues.
| Clue | Answer |
|---|---|
| Before and __ (5) | After |
| Non-digital as technology (6) | Analog |
| Surface for chess or checkers (5) | Board |
| In accordance with (2) | By |
| It has hands and numbers (5) | Clock |
| Knitting or crochet, e.g. (5) | Craft |
| Item to open a lock (3) | Key⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ |
| Belong to me (4) | Mine |
| Friend, buddy (3) | Pal |
| "I'll forfeit my turn" (4) | Pass |
| Writing device (3) | Pen |
| Group of one or more words (6) | Phrase |
| Origin or source (4) | Root |
| In __; stunned (5) | Shock |
| Regular 4-gon (6) | Square |
| Hot dog vendor (5) | Stand |
There are 16 clue set 1 clues and 8 clue set 2 clues, and combined with the title of this puzzle, they might suggest combining the answer to the clues where two clue set 1 answers combines to one clue set 2 answer. Specifically, we are concatenating the clues together; for example, stand+by=standby, which is the answer to readiness. The following is the list of answers to the clues.
| Clue | Answer | combined words | indexed letter |
|---|---|---|---|
| readiness (1) | standby | stand+by | S |
| popular game (4) | minecraft | mine+craft | E |
| type of time telling device (2) | analog clock | analog+clock | N |
| mathematical operation (10) | square root | square+root | T |
| object that's needed to use a PC (2) | keyboard | key+board | E |
| type of relationship (3) | penpal | pen+pal | N |
| thing that follows a larger thing (9) | aftershock | after+shock | C |
| type of thing to be kept a secret (10) | passphrase | pass+phrase | E |
Indexing the numbers into the answers gives us the final answer sentence