Line comes from another room through the 4-way switch, and goes to another room after this 4-way switch. Line load are in the same box. I tried to rewire according to the diagram for a 4way using neutral with line and load in the same box, but no dice.
Here are the pics of the working config. Any assistance is much appreciated.
On the bottom switch it looks to me like it may be a 3-Way but they used the push-in for one wire and a screw for another wire to actually connect the two together and to the switch. Please see the two black I tried to hightlight.
Also whomever did this work was conscientious, they yellow taped the “load + traveler” so assuming they were consistent the line in is likely in the third photo (this one)