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The many fanmade horror legends of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise (specifically its game Knuckles Chaotix) have all gathered together in Illegal Instruction. And most of them (barring a few others) have one goal in common: kill the famous Boyfriend.


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    General Tropes 
  • Animalistic Abomination: Aside from the ones that are just horrifying versions of the classic Sonic characters, most of these guys are hiding their real forms in the shape of anthropomorphic animals.
  • Evil Is Bigger: Quite a number of characters are either naturally bigger than Boyfriend or can change into much larger forms.
  • Funny Animals: Most of these guys are based on Sonic the Hedgehog, a series known for its anthropomorphic characters.
  • Obviously Evil: The vast majority of the opponents are either deranged, undergoing Body Horror of some kind, or generally just have something wrong with them. Most of them are also trying to kill Boyfriend and Girlfriend.
  • Joke Character / Digital Abomination: There are 2 examples of this, namely, Ashura and ***.

Current

    Duke 

Duke

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled122_20231015113153.png
In due time then…I’ll be waiting for you.
Click here to see his true form 

"Your persistence if loyal…what a shame it has to be cut so short! HAHAHAHAHA!"
The overarching main antagonist of the mod, and a demon that takes on the form of Knuckles. He sings "Breakout", "Hellspawn", "Soulless Endeavors", "Apotheosis" and "Final Frontier", and would have been an opponent in "Our Horizon", where he joins Chaotix, and "Chimera" (and its Redux version), going against Kevin.
  • Red Is Violent: It's a given that Duke fits this trope, considering that he's a take on Sonic.EXE.
  • Original Generation: Yet another take on Sonic.EXE, albeit being entirely original.
  • Ax-Crazy: Like the original Sonic.EXE, Duke is sadistic, psychotic, and totally devoid of human compassion.
  • A God Am I: In a now-deleted tweet by one of the devs, Duke can be seen saying "Without a king, there are no gods."
  • Sadist: Fitting due to his ruthlessness. In the lore of the mod, Charmy Bee was shown to be crying and yelling for help before he was burned alive by Duke. In a similar manner, Vector would also suffer the same fate, breaking down crying before being impaled by Duke. Similar things also happened to Espio and Mighty.
  • Impostor Forgot One Detail: There are many things on Duke that make him seem…off. Firstly, his kneecaps are spiked at the tops and stick upwards like knee guards. Secondly, his tail is longer…and more kinked at that matter. His shoes are also colored differently, he has no metal studs on his shoes, and his gloves are covered with a metal band with 2 bolts on them.

    Soul Charmy, Vector, Espio, and Mighty 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled128_20231015192953.png
Pictured: Early concepts.
The four close friends of the strongest thing alive, who were claimed as Duke's victims. All four of them were brought back from the dead for Final Frontier... but it turns out that they aren't really willing to serve Duke as he would like them to be.
  • Back from the Dead: They were all killed by Duke throughout the mod, but now they're back! It's certainly not pretty, though, as they retain all of Sonic.EXE's defilements to their bodies.
  • Cruel and Unusual Death: All killed by Duke, like in the original Sonic.EXE canon, but in different ways. Charmy ended up as the first victim, being set on fire by Duke, burning him to death. Duke would go on to impale Vector to death with a stick, stab Espio with his fists, and finally murder Mighty.
  • Bloodless Carnage: Charmy and Mighty take the cake with this one, as the duo are surprisingly clean for reanimated corpses.
  • Body Horror: Not hard to assume considering they're all dead. Vector and Espio take the cake though; they look like their corpses were ripped to shreds.
  • Eye Scream: All four are missing their eyes. Espio in particular looks like he had his eyes messily torn out.
  • Ghostly Gape: Vector's mouth always hangs open, showing a black abyss devoid of detail.
  • Stripped to the Bone: Charmy is now a burning skeleton thanks to Duke who burned him alive only for nearly all of his flesh to be burnt off.
  • The Quiet One: Espio' part is quieter and more mellow than Mighty, Vector and Charmy's.
  • Undead Child: Charmy was killed at only 6 years old.
    Chaotix 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled127_20231015144906.png
Where are you, Tails?

Eh, whatever. Having too much fun, and Tails can wait for now.
A mysterious glitch-like entity who hails within Carnival Island's code, being a mistake that was never meant to be found by players. He takes the form of Sonic's first rival, Knuckles, but this form is nothing but a ruse to hide his true deformities. He seeks out Sonic's best friend, Tails, to fulfill his desire of fixing his broken code and becoming whole again. He was one of the characters who were planned for update 3.0, only for him to end up getting scrapped after his creator asked for him to be removed, and he was planned to appear in the revival of Illegal Instruction. He sings "My Horizon" and "Vista" and shares the song "Our Horizon" with Duke. He also would have been an opponent in "Chaotic Legends", going against Wechidna.
  • Ambiguously Evil: While a lot of the below information may make it seem clear cut that Chaotix is completely evil, his depiction in his own mod seems to show otherwise. His new song, “Our Horizon”, drops any aggression that “My Horizon” had and the line just after he transforms where he says, which is his listed quote, seems to indicate that he holds no ill will towards Boyfriend.
  • Art Shift: As revealed by Chaotix's creator, averyavary, My Horizon would also have a pixelated art style, though this one is more akin to the entity's console of origin, the SEGA 32X. This was going to be in the regular FNF art style before AnarackWarriors approached them with the concept. The pixel art style is retained in ILLEGAL INSTRUCTION, with the style shifting back to the standard FNF style after Chaotix transforms into his true form.
  • Baritone of Strength: Has quite the deep voice, befitting for an EXE based on the games' resident strongman, and only becomes deeper in his true form. Additionally, after his transformation, “My Horizon” becomes much more intense.
  • Cyclops: In his true form, he has only one large bulging eye. Also, his artwork for the finalized version of "My Horizon" and “Our Horizon” shows him having one black pupil in his Knuckles disguise.
  • Digital Abomination: It's a broken piece of code that happens to take on most of Knuckles' appearance, and it's currently on the hunt for Tails. If anyone crosses his sight, and he thinks they are the fox he's looking for, they're not gonna have fun.
  • Dramatic Irony: Despite his game-world spanning search for Tails so he can fix himself, Chaotix is completely unaware that in the world he inhabits, he is Tails, albeit with nothing but broken code and a twisted personality.
  • Expy:
    • For who else but Revie_03’s EXE, being a doppelganger of a Sonic character with a twisted larger form; hell, they even have similar voices in both of their true forms. Obviously, Chaotix isn’t disguising himself as Sonic, but rather Knuckles.
    • Alternatively, he can also be one for RightBurstUltra’s Wechidna (not to be confused with the Knuckles’ Chaotix glitch ***, also dubbed as "Wechnia" by fans), given that they share a similar concept of being a fake Knuckles with a twisted true form trying to trick others before they can go in for the kill.
  • Faux Affably Evil: Whenever he's not searching for Tails, Chaotix is calm and able to keep his cool, being able to comprehend the world around him, and he can even blend in with other Mobians and hold conversations with them (Though this is largely due to the other Mobians seeing his normal form as Tails), getting information when he needs it. If he believes someone to be Tails, however, they'd better start running.
  • Forced Perspective: In both of his forms. In his "normal" form, he hides the fact that he only has one eye by centering his pupil under his browline to make it appear as if he's just got two mildly dilated pupils. in his "true" form, his eye shifts to one side of his head, but he always keeps it turned towards the camera to appear as if the second one is just on the side not facing the camera.
  • Hell Is That Noise: If he catches the player, he screams this quote from the TV before making a large amount of deafening noise.
Chaotix: FOUND YOU, TAILS!
  • Imposter Forgot One Detail: In his disguised form, he has a single pupil (and a very manic-looking one at that), his fur is a washed-out red, his fingers can be seen through his gloves, he lacks a white crest on his chest, he wears more Sonic-like shoes rather than Knuckles’, and he has no mouth.
  • Insistent Terminology: In his game, he will always mistake the Chaotix crew for Tails.
  • Laughing Mad: He lets out a cavalcade of laughter when he transforms midway through "My Horizon" and “Our Horizon”.
  • Light Is Not Good: Chaotix's main color in his true form is white, and he's anything but heavenly.
  • One-Winged Angel: His true form bares a striking resemblance to the infamous Wechnia from Knuckles’ Chaotix.
  • Red Is Violent: Played with. Like the real Knuckles, his primary color is red in his fake form, which also applies to his true form's eye, teeth, and hands, and he has a short temper in regards to his search for Tails. Unlike Knuckles, however, he's more than happy to brutally kill anyone who sets him off. Otherwise, he's actually calm and collected when not hunting, even being able to talk normally with most Mobians.
  • Slasher Smile: His true form’s face is stuck in a permanent smile, showing off his bright-red teeth.
  • Suspiciously Similar Substitute: His reveal was announced very close to the time when Wechidna was leaked and removed, and the two just so happen to share the exact same song.
  • Voluntary Shapeshifting: Obviously, considering he’s hiding behind a facade of being the actual Knuckles.

Playable:

    Boyfriend 
Bop Beep Be Be Skdoo Bep
The spunky blue-haired rapper himself, who's now up against the many horrors (And similar entities) of Knuckles Chaotix.
  • Adaptational Modesty: Boyfriend has entirely different clothes in this mod, instead having a red sweater and a pair of headphones.
  • Adaptational Wimp: In "Apothoesis", Boyfriend, despite being a very abnormal human being, ends up dying at the hands of Duke, being used as one of his puppets in said song.

    Girlfriend 
That's how you do it!
The blissful brown-haired demon herself, who's now up against the many horrors (And similar entities) of Knuckles Chaotix.
  • Adaptational Modesty: Girlfriend has entirely different clothes in this mod, instead having a red sweater, a pair of black tights and…uh…more ruffled hair.
  • O.O.C. Is Serious Business: While for the majority of the mod Girlfriend is her usual Fearless Fool self, her demeanor in "Final Frontier" and "Apotheosis" is the opposite of that, as she spends the whole song glaring at Duke. The reason for her taking Duke seriously unlike the rest of the mod's opponents seems to be that Duke took Boyfriend from her and turned him into another one of his soul slaves.

Removed

Opponents:

    Curse 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/thecurseofx.png
Something's wrong... You won't hide it from me.
Things are... okay. Then... can we... try again?
An OC currently owned by TheGlitchyWill and a version of Sonic who had been infected with the Curse of X, which resulted in the deaths of his universe's Knuckles, Sally, and Eggman. After being given a second chance in life by Metal Sonic, Curse has been dimension-hopping for a long time, trying to be a ray of sunshine for other EXEs to get over the hardships he faced. He was intially in the leaked V1 build, but was removed from V2 after the team decided to cut off association with TheGlitchyWill, given the latter was outed for pedophilia.
  • Adaptational Abomination: Inverted: instead of being some all-powerful deity, Curse is simply a version of Sonic that was... well, cursed.
  • Adaptational Gender Identity: Is a trans man, compared to the presumably cisgender Sonic and Sonic.exe.
  • Author Avatar: Downplayed in this case, though Curse's trans nature and self-harm scars have been revealed to be connected to Kenji himself, projecting what he himself had gone through in real life.
  • Bully Magnet: Curse became this after getting blamed for Knuckles's death, with only Sally and Eggman there to protect him until their deaths.
  • But Not Too Bi: Has been stated to be bisexual, but is also stated to prefer men over women.
  • Hated by All: Nearly everyone in his original world hated him for something he didn't do, with the only ones not doing so having died due to the Curse of X.
  • Medium Awareness: Curse is aware that he's simply a video game character, harboring knowledge of other Sonic games and media. It doesn't bother him that much, though.
  • Perpetual Smiler: According to his bio art, Curse can't frown, which means that his smile is basically struck on his face. He can still feel other emotions, thankfully.
  • Poor Communication Kills: Initially battles Boyfriend under the belief he was trying to harm Girlfriend, and Boyfriend, being the idiot he is, doesn't realize Curse's misconception until Curse himself realizes they're actually together.
  • Token Good Teammate: Doesn’t even want to harm anybody, with him battling Boyfriend solely out of a misconception that Boyfriend was trying to hurt Girlfriend.
  • Trans Tribulations: Tails has been purposefully deadnaming Curse in an attempt to get under his skin... despite this version of Tails being trans herself.
    Hog and Scorched 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/hjog_1.png
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/ouchoofivebeenscorched.png
I WILL NOT BE REPLACED!
A bootleg character and an EXE made by Jack Gore, and two beings sharing one body, Hog and Scorched are a pair of entities that resemble Sonic. They reside in a bootleg copy of Sonic the Hedgehog and were found after someone with a Genesis dev kit decided to dig around the files before Scorched scorched the cartridge to prevent them from digging deeper. Scorched is actually the real Sonic, having his data written over by the bootleg copy, which made him evil and now wants to kill Hog for replacing him.

Hog and Scorched were placed in the V1 build, but were removed due to the devs wanting to respect Jack Gore's wishes regarding using his characters without consent.


  • Alternate Universe: Hog resides in a world similar to but not exactly like Sonic's due to being from a bootleg. As revealed by his creator, there are also alternate versions of Sonic's friends, like Prowler as Tails, Fists as Knuckles and Iron Hog in place of Metal Sonic.
  • Black Eyes of Evil: Scorched's eyes appear solid black because his pupils are extremely dilated, by choice at that. He does have sclera, but it's hard to tell unless he contracts his pupils or consciously glances in a different direction.
  • Bland-Name Product: Due to coming from a bootleg product, the names of Hog's equivalents to things in the Sonic world are only somewhat changed. As an example, Knuckles being the guardian of Angel Island and the Master Emerald is changed to Fists being the protector of Sky Island and the Chaos Ruby.
  • Children Are Innocent: Invoked: Hog is innocent, childlike, and friendly as bait to get people closer to him, after which Scorched would take over and kill them.
  • Clothing Appendage: The gloves that Hog wears, along with the cuffs of his shoes, bleed into his skin as Scorched.
  • Cross-Popping Veins: Scorched has several visible, perpetually pulsating veins on his head.
  • Expy: The two were heavily inspired by EXE, being a small mouthless Sonic lookalike with a disturbing larger form, though unlike EXE whose smaller form is a disguise, Hog is entirely an separate person from Scorched.
  • Face–Heel Turn: Due to his data being overwritten by Hog, Sonic became the evil Scorched and now wants to kill Hog for replacing him.
  • Four-Fingered Hands: Subverted with Scorched. His middle and ring fingers are actually fused together, making it look like he four fingers on each hand.
  • Glitch Entity: A lot of Scorched's abilities revolve around glitches, though they can be very unstable and have a chance to either do nothing or backfire on him if something goes wrong for him.
  • Killed Off for Real: The ultimate fate of both of them in their story, the destruction of their world as a result of their clash causing them to both perish, and the hardware with it. Though, not before Scorched undergoes a Heel Realization and breaks down, dying in sorrow.
  • Laughing Mad: Scorched lets out a cavalcade of laughs as he transforms from Hog in "Manual Blast".
  • Non-Indicative Name: Hog is neither a hedgehog nor a hog. He's a tenrec.
  • Original Generation: Hog and Scorched were actually created for Friday Night Funkin', though the pair will also be receiving their own game in the future.
  • Painful Transformation: Transforming into Scorched is implied to be incredibly painful for Hog if the noises he makes during "Manual Blast" are any indication.
  • Reference Overdosed: During the final stretch of "Manual Blast", one of Hog and Scorched’s songs, Scorched’s head was going to glitch out and show the faces of other .exes, such as Mighty.ZIP, EYX, Xenophanes, Lord X, X-Terion and Sally_ALT.
  • Super Gullible: Hog will believe literally anything you tell him, no matter how factually incorrect it is.
  • Tragic Monster: Both of them have shades of this. Hog is a well-meaning, innocent fellow who holds a malevolent entity inside of him without any knowledge or control over it. Scorched is Sonic himself after nearly being erased in a universal overlap, with his glitchy nature being a result of his data being corrupted and mostly overwritten by Hog's.
  • Token Good Teammate: Hog is genuinely well-meaning and innocent, in comparison to Scorched.
  • Two Beings, One Body: Hog and Scorched share the same body, which transforms depending on who's in control. Additionally, Hog is completely unaware of Scorched's existence, implying that whether or not he's in control is fully dependent on if Scorched wants him to be.
  • Voice of the Legion: Not normally, but during Scorched's voice lines, his voice is combined with various other exes to give this effect. The ending of "Manual Blast", where Scorched swaps between multiple different chromatic scales of other characters in the mod, may count as well.
    NormalCD 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled125_20231015144912.png
Knock knock! Guess whooo~?
Nice place you got here! Too bad it'll be the last place you'll ever see!
The son of Revived and part of Project: Glass Cannon, NormalCD eventually found his way into a timeline where Sonic CD took place. After injuring Sonic, it led to a near-endless fight between him and a drastically upgraded Metal Sonic, courtesy of a now tech-savvy Amy Rose. He was planned to have a place in Vs Sonic.EXE and this mod, but both mods got scrapped, and he was excluded from the revival of the latter, along with Normal!Metal and Normal!Amy.
  • Badass Boast: Before busting into Robotnik's headquarters to face Metal Sonic and Amy, NormalCD claims he's playing a game of hide-and-seek, except he's already found them both. Right after breaking inside, he proclaims that the place is nice, but that it'll be the last place they'll ever see.
  • Dual Boss: Inverted, you play as his universe's versions of Amy and Metal against him.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: After seeing NormalCD harm Sonic, Robotnik is immediately prompted to rescue him and get him to safety, not trusting the soul glass being. Likewise, later on, NormalCD is sent flying into a portal at the tail-end of his story's second act, trying to get free despite his best efforts.
  • Older Than They Look: Despite his appearance being the same size and stature as Sonic, NormalCD is actually over 50 years old.
  • Perpetual Smiler: His face always has a large grin filled with red teeth.

Playable:

    Normal!Metal 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/normalmetalsonic.png
Metal Sonic in NormalCD's universe, having been upgraded by Normal!Amy in order to stop NormalCD. He's one of the 2 player characters of "Found You", alongside Amy. The two, along with NormalCD, were transferred to ILLEGAL INSTRUCTION V1 following the cancellation of Vs. Sonic.exe, but were scrapped later.
  • And Now for Someone Completely Different: One of the two playable characters in "Found You", and has no relation to the mod's main story mode.
  • Good Counterpart: To the original Metal Sonic. The original Metal Sonic opposes the blue blur, while Normal!Metal Sonic's duty is to protect him, along with his friends.
  • Power Crystal: Has a Time Stone imbedded in his forehead.
  • Scarf of Asskicking: A robot reprogrammed to protect Amy against NormalCD, who has the ability to break through metal walls by the way, and he just so happens to be wearing a yellow scarf.
    Normal!Amy 
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/normalamy.png
Amy Rose in NormalCD's universe. This version of the pink hedgehog is tech-savvy, having upgraded Metal Sonic in order to protect the original Sonic and his friends (Including her) from threats such as NormalCD. She's one of the 2 player characters of "Found You", alongside Metal Sonic. The two, along with NormalCD, were transferred to ILLEGAL INSTRUCTION V1 following the cancellation of Vs. Sonic.exe, but were scrapped later.
  • Adaptational Diversity: Amy's skin has significantly darker compared to her mainstream counterpart, and she's quite a bit chubbier than the original as well.
  • And Now for Someone Completely Different: One of the two playable characters in "Found You", and has no relation to the mod's main story mode.
  • Gadgeteer Genius: Reprogrammed Metal Sonic to protect her from NormalCD.
  • The Smurfette Principle: The only female playable character.
  • You Don't Look Like You: The pink quills and red headband are the only giveaways that she's Amy Rose, as otherwise her look is drastically different than that of her original counterpart.

Scrapped

Opponents:

     Wechidna 

Wechidna

"I AM WECHIDNA."
https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled126_20231015144902.png
A bootleg character and EXE by Rightburst_Ultra initially supposed to appear in Vs Sonic.exe 3.0 before Rightburst was kicked off the team for pedophilia. He was originally gonna be moved to another mod known as Friday Night Funkin: Parallax, but after that mod was cancelled, he was instead moved to the revival of Illegal Instruction, only for that to be cancelled as well. He was eventually moved to Daredevil Funkin before that mod was cancelled, leading to the character being permanently shelved. He was intended to be an opponent in "My Horizon (H0nkish Mix)" and would have been a playable character in "Chaotic Legends", going against Chaotix.
  • Red Is Violent: Another iteration of this, being similar to Duke.
  • Body Horror: In his true form, Wechidna’s limbs are ripped off with muscle flesh underneath. His eyes are also completely gone in this stage.
  • Expy: More than likely to Faker, both are fakes of existing Sonic characters that trick others before going in for the kill, obviously, Wechidna here impersonates Knuckles instead of Sonic to set himself apart from EXE. On top of this, his poses seem to be directly inspired from EXE’s, as shown with his idle, down and up poses.
  • Eye Scream: He has a scar on his right eye and, in his true form, his eyes rip open to reveal red innards where a skull should be.
  • Imposter Forgot One Detail: His fur and skin are darker, his eyes are black rather than purple, his shoes are red and gold rather than red, green, and white, his crest matches his skin color rather than being white, his gloves are yellow, he doesn’t have knuckle spikes, he has a scar on his right eye, his eyes are conjoined, and he lacks a mouth when not singing. His face is also outright stoic in his redesign's disguise, completely unmoving aside from the monster mouth inside the neck.
     Ashura 

Ashura

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled131_20231016065521.png
A glitched entity that takes on the form of Sonic as a result of a bug from Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Decades later, his design would later be used as the basis for the design of Surge, a character from the official Sonic IDW comics. In this mod, Ashura was planned for the remake, but was scrapped after the mod's permanent cancellation. He has 1 song, "Cascade".
  • Digital Abomination: He is a glitched entity that takes on the form of a Green and Black Sonic
  • Distressed Dude: Apparently loves being a normal Sonic rather than being glitched, as implied by his facial expression once he glitches into his true self.
  • Foil: An Expy who else but Chaotix? Both are glitchy entities, but they have opposite personalities. Ashura doesn’t want to hurt anyone, but Chaotix will ruthlessly kill anyone who sets him off.
  • Expy of Chaotix, and also subsequently ***
  • Joke Character: Ashura was never considered an EXE and was only added to the mod to add some extra joke characters.
     *** 

***

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled132_20231016065515.png
"HELP ME MIGHTY!"
Also dubbed as Wechnia by fans, *** is a glitch character from Knuckles Chaotix that is seen in the game as a bug. In this mod, he sings "Color Crash" against Mighty, as if it was some sort of reenactment.
  • Digital Abomination: He is a glitched entity that takes on the form of a Green and Black Sonic
  • Distressed Dude: *** always spawns in floors and walls, causing him to always get stuck to his dismay, and *** is also fed up with this.
  • Expy: Of Ashura, as both are good glitched entities.
  • Joke Character: *** was never considered an EXE and was only added to the mod to add some extra joke characters.

     LOCK-ON 
Once two separate entites, during the fight with Knuckles, Sonic and Knuckles collided into each other and fused body parts and stuff. LOCK-ON has the abilities of Sonic and Knuckles and regrets what he is. But LOCK-ON is two different beings there’s Sonic, and Knuckles and both bodies are part of LOCK-ON.

Playable:

     Kevin 

Kevin

https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/untitled124_20231015123742.png
A brand new variation of the famous hedgehog, this incarnation takes on the form of a perfect replica of the Blue Blur…only to be tortured by Duke.

He was initially set to be in V1 before being scrapped, and was also set to be in V2 before it too was scrapped. In the mod, he would have been the opponent of "Chimera" (and its Redux version), going against Duke. However, there is 1 concept on how his song would have played out.


  • The Unfought: Kevin was scrapped from the mod twice: one that nearly scrapped him and one that resulted in his permanent shelving.
  • Original Generation: This Sonic is the former lead director's interpretation of the creepypasta victim, although being taken from an existing version.

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