The 12 Nine Tails' puzzle boxes: where they are and how to open them

All twelve are in the same region

Trickster Fox asks you to find and solve all 12 Nine Tails' puzzle boxes, and the first thing worth knowing is that they are not spread across the map: all twelve are in Teshio Ridge, the snowy northern region. If you are hunting them anywhere else, you are wasting your time.

They break down like this:

- 1 on an enemy's body, with no marker of any kind. - 4 at Kitsune altars, which do get marked on the map as you approach. - 7 in Yōtei Six camps, always on the ground in front of the Altar of Reflection at the back. Four of those seven are hidden hideouts you have to open by solving a fox-statue puzzle.

Nothing is missable: all twelve are still there after the story.

The twelve locations

The only one with no marker and no hint is the Sakura Woods box. If you are missing one and do not know which, start there.

The four hidden hideouts, door by door

These four camps do not show on the map: there is a locked door at a shrine and a fox puzzle in front of it. The general rule is that the correct foxes are the ones depicted by the statues or carvings behind the lanterns, but each door has its own trick.

Snow Drift Springs Hideout (Snow Drift Springs Shrine, in Crimson Forest). Take a torch from the braziers at the door. Facing the door there are three foxes on the left and three on the right: light the leftmost one of the left row — the one sitting upright with a stick in its mouth — and the rightmost one of the right row, also with a stick in its mouth. The third set is across from the door, up the rock wall: there is another brazier there and the correct one is the middle one, sitting down. The door opens. Inside, kill everyone; a cutscene triggers where you rescue a settler, and at the back of the camp — upstairs — one last puzzle remains: light the leftmost fox facing forward and the second from the right, crouching with its tail up. A rope appears; climb the ladder beside it and cross to the altar.

Snow's Blight Hideout (Snow's Blight Shrine, north-west Teshio Ridge). Clear the shrine and untie the settler they were holding. On the left, with a torch, light the two braziers that have a lit lantern above them. On the right, turn the fox statues to face the same way as the stone foxes carved into the wall above them: that releases two fox statuettes from their pedestals. Carry both to the locked door. The door stays shut, but a crawlspace opens in the wall, to the right of where you placed the foxes. Go through there. Clear the whole camp and the far gate opens; kill the leader and climb to the altar.

Nakajima Ice Cave Hideout (Nakajima Ice Cave, north-west of Sarobetsu Lake). Two fox statues at the entrance: turn the right one to face right and the left one to face left, both facing away from the door. A crawlspace opens. Inside the cave there is a jump where you must grapple mid-air: look up in the middle of the cave and you will see the R2 prompt. Keep climbing to another fox statue, turn it twice to make ropes appear, cross them, then turn the next one once to bring a ladder down. The camp is at the top. After clearing it, in the back right corner there are two more statues: turn the left one once, so it faces right, and the right one three times, so it faces left — the two facing each other. The rope to the altar appears.

Cape Inari Hideout (Cape Inari Shrine, northernmost edge of the map). Here you must light the fox lanterns with the trident icon; the ones marked "!" damage you. Start by squeezing through the gap to the right of the gate, where a blue symbol marks the wall: you enter a small room — turn right immediately to take the torch from the brazier and light that room's fox. Go back out, squeeze through the gap to the left of the door and light the trident lantern in there too. You will hear a click and an opening appears under the gate. On the other side there are more lanterns: grab a torch and light the two with the trident, one on the cliff and one inside the building. A rope releases; cross it, jump to the wooden platform and climb the handholds on the wall — there are more at the top, half-buried in snow. You reach the camp. After killing the enemies, on the right there is a broken bridge with a brazier and a fox lantern: light it to release a rope to the next mountain. Clear that area, light the last lantern on the cliff and cross the final rope to the altar.

The twelve solutions, move by move

Here is the part that actually stalls people. Boxes open from Inventory > Puzzle Boxes and consist of sliding stripes and panels until you can bring the lid down.

The key point: which box you get does not depend on where you find it, but on the order you pick them up. The first one you collect is always the simplest, the second the next one up, and so on to the twelfth. That is why the table is numbered 1 to 12 by pickup order, not by zone.

Difficulty climbs sharply: the first three take two or three moves, and the twelfth makes you work all four faces.