Nico and Yuri stared at intricate patterns of symbols on the floor of the treasure room.

The symbols themselves were something neither magicians recognized. Most puzzling of all, the symbols were constantly moving within a confined space. The speed at which they moved varied so much that even Measure couldn’t get any worthwhile information from it.

"This wasn't here before. What do you think this is?" Yuri asked in his completely normal American accent, with hints of Russian. Nico still had to get used to that.

Nico bent down closer to the door, careful not to touch the moving symbols lest it unleash something dangerous. He said to Yuri, “The fact that this door is here now tells me we are on the right track to finding Pullman.”

“He’s the only one who could have done this,” Yuri grunted in agreement. “With the treasure hunters gone, we’re the only living people here.”

He still arms crossed in that stoic way that made him look like one of those old Russian statues. At least that part of the Russian’s personality was real.

Nico kept to himself that Yuri sounded very confident in the fact no one else was here besides Yuri, Nico, and Pullman. That meant Yuri was acting on the fact he either wasn’t surprised about the treasure hunters or somehow knew they would be here. But something about how Yuri had acted so far told Nico the guy wasn’t the mastermind supplying all this information.

The revelation that Yuri did not have a thick Russian accent stunned Nico when he found out. According to Measure, Yuri was under a form of geas.

In magical terms, a geas meant an oath, usually secrecy, in exchange for more power. Maybe that was the reason Yuri had way more magical power than Nico. Or maybe not, and Nico was just as scrawny magically as he was physically.

Even if Yuri wanted to tell Nico more, he wasn’t able to without breaking the geas. Not much information came up with Measure aside from that. Measure divined Yuri’s physical attributes like height and weight.

Luckily, it was quickly able to determine that the guy had been using a fake Russian accent. Most importantly, Measure stated that the conditions of the geas were able to state that when Yuri told Nico he wasn’t here to hurt him but to protect him, he told the truth.

Measure couldn’t figure out any information about who Yuri could have represented. Maybe it was another party within the Union. Nico had other ideas, but he put them to the side as he studied the door on the floor. Something more important required his attention.

The symbols on the floor fascinated him. They reminded Nico of the magical moon door from Lord of the Rings, which required a sort of mystical password with the moon. Of course, there was no moon he could use here, or any kind of recognizable language to decipher.

“I know you’re under a geas, and I won’t pry too much unless it can help,” Nico said carefully,. “But you said Pullman was here to find something, something that he said belonged to him.”

Yuri pursed his lips and took a moment to think. “I don’t know what Pullman is looking for, but he got cagey whenever I mentioned it.”

“He never said what ‘it’ was?”

Yuri shook his head apologetically. “It’s something important.”

That something was important enough to manipulate events that all parties Nico encountered so far, including himself, were here at this very tower. Did that mean Pullman was somehow manipulated into this too?

Nico sidelined the thought.

No.

Pullman had willfully killed four people for the ritual sacrifice in order to open the portal. That took time and planning. There was no way he was able to create such a large spell formation all throughout the city without forethought. The man was guilty, and he had tried to shift the blame to someone else.

Nico willed some power toward the symbols, asking Measure to divine any information it could.

Lines glowed on the floor in the shape of a rectangle. Nico willed the glowing lines away, and focused his vision. Surprisingly, he could actually feel his vision sharpen, just like how his hearing improved when the Sentinels had shown up at his doorstep.

Right where the glowing lines had been were the barest traces of seams. Suddenly, Nico understood why the treasure hunters and Pullman were trying to find this room. It wasn’t because of the gold.

“It’s a door,” Nico said excitedly.

Yuri frowned. “To where?”

Nico noted Yuri hadn’t questioned him on the fact it was a door. He either trusted Nico completely, or more likely, was used to accepting information easily from other people. That implied hierarchy.

He shrugged. “I don’t know, but it’s important enough for Pullman to have triggered it and have left these symbols behind for others to find it. Once he activated it, he probably wasn’t able to hide it from others.”

Measure showed a window that it was eleven percent sure the door, when opened, would spring one of the many traps of the tower. Great.

But according to Nico's ability, the door did lead downward through the floor of the treasure room, rather than some other pocket dimension. If it had led to the latter, then Nico wouldn't have even tried to mess with it. The last thing he needed was to be transported to another dimension again within the same day.

Two trips to unknown interdimensional places. That was his mental limit.

The intricate patterns were simple shapes, constantly turning and moving to a design that Nico, even with is abilities powered by Measure, could not comprehend. Sometimes, the array looked like something recognizable, but as soon as he felt confident in what it was, it changed it to something else completely foreign to him.

He pulled his gaze away from the door, and scanned the surroundings, pouring more power into Measure than before.

Separate from the piles of gold treasure, Measure glowed five gold coins that seemed to have been moved into a particular order. They were so precisely and purposely positioned, that Measure saw that they were only half a millimeter off from being a near-perfect pentagon.

Nico walked over to them, and picked up each, one by one, noting their positions just in case he had to put them back in place.

On each of the coins were symbols similar to the ones on the ever-shifting door.

“Holy crap,” Nico whispered. He picked up other coins from piles nearby and saw that they, too, had their own unique symbols.

The hairs on his arm stood up. How had he not seen this before? Each of the coins in the room had their symbols on them as well.

A feeling of wonderment ran through him like electricity. This was what being a magician was about. Not power. But the thrill of new knowledge.

Without thinking, Nico placed the first five coins back into formation, but now as a perfect pentagon. As soon as they were aligned, power thrummed through him, similar to when the tower shifted. His body shook in tandem with the reverberation.

“Nico!” Yuri hollered to him, standing next to the shifting door on the floor.

With his slightly enhanced vision, Nico saw the symbols on the door slowed down almost to the pace of a crawl, but they did not stop. But now, the symbols on the perimeter of the door formed an ever shifting shape. First a hectagon, then an octagon, and then an octagon. It kept changing as soon as it settled into a new shape, but always, all the sides were equilateral.

The symbols inside kept moving as if unperturbed by the outer symbols taking and changing shape.

“What did you do?” Yuri asked, concerned. One of his feet were planted on the fire halberd spell formation Nico had modified.

“I think I triggered the code to open the door,” Nico answered. “I don’t think it’s dangerous, at least not right now.”

Yuri waved at the floor. “But it’s still closed.”

Nico nodded. “It might be some sort of magical mechanism that requires multiple steps. Think about it. This is a door within the so-called treasure room. The treasure room itself was a distraction for something else.”

Understanding dawned on Yuri’s face. “So, this could be the real treasure room?”

Nico shrugged. “Possibly. We can’t be sure until we open it. But I’m certain Pullman is through there.”

He moved the coins again. The symbols on the door shifted as if connected to the coins. Measure did not pick up anything about the coins that were special about them. Somehow, the connection between the symbols on the door and coins eluded Nico’s own divination abilities. He could have spent more or all of his MP to try to divine more information, but he had a feeling that would not go anywhere.

More importantly, someone had moved the coins in this particular way, most likely Pullman. There was no way that the death knight had a hand on this. It never displayed any sign it needed spell formations to cast its death aura blade thing. Even the thought of that powerful attack gave Nico the creeps.

Regardless, Pullman was the most likely one who moved these coins for this particular purpose.

“Pullman was probably confident that no one would make the connection between the door and the symbol on the coins,” Nico muttered to himself. He admitted that without Measure, he wouldn’t have noticed it either.

Even if someone had figured out the connection, there was no way to know what that connection was.

Yuri walked over to Nico, who was bent down, Twisting the coins on the floor. Nico had Measure passively analyzing the movements of the coins with the movements of the symbols on the door.

“Is it some sort of key?” Yuri asked.

“I think it's some sort of puzzle, like the one outside of the Tower,” the Nico said.

“Puzzle?”

Nico looked up. “Didn't you and Pullman have to configure a puzzle to get into the tower?”

“No. Pullman cut his finger and smeared a drop of his blood near the entrance way. It opened by itself after that.” Yuri replied.

Nico grew silent.

Pullman did not need to use his knowledge of spell formations to enter the Wizard's Tower. He employed another means of bypassing the entrance. That confirmed he had a more intimate knowledge of the tower than the treasure hunters. However, he was still confused about the tower shifting around, according to Yuri. So, there was a chance he didn’t know everything.

There was also a strong possibility that Pullman had used a similar method for getting the door on the floor to open.

Nico asked Measure to look for any signs of blood but got nothing.

He expected that. Pullman would not have moved the coins if all it took was blood to get past the door on the floor.

This required heavy knowledge on spell formations and the fundamentals of magical theory.

Pullman himself probably would have known the exact way to move the coins for the door to open. The door seemed to have locked itself after letting Pullman through.

But that would not stop Nico. He had Measure, a magical computer in the back of his brain. It was like having an Alfred to his Bruce Wayne.

After asking his ability to analyze how the patterns of the floor changed with how Nico moved the coins, he received a new window.

It revealed lines that the symbols moved in correspondence to the coins, and more importantly, which coins caused which symbols to move. The window also had words which explained that Nico would most likely need more than the five coins to unlock the door.

Pullman probably tossed the coins he needed. Nico asked Measure to see if he could divine the coins that Pullman might have cost. Obviously, he got nothing. His ability was broken, but not that broken.

Nico silently twisted the coins until the lines in the window looked like something he recognized. Once he realized what it was he let out a gasp.

Yuri, “What is it?”

“I think I have it,” Nico answered in a tone of someone who was deeply focused and did not want to be interrupted. Yuri kept silent.

These weren't just random symbols. They were parts of modifications for a spell formation. Of course. It made total sense. The puzzle to the entrance of the tower also relied on knowledge spell formations.

Nico grabbed a handful of coins and rifled through them, tossing ones he didn't like.

Yuri grunted, “How do you know which coins you need and which ones you don’t?”

“When you’ve gone through as many test-arrays as I have, you kind of develop a second sense as to what works and what doesn’t,” Nico answered. “But it isn’t just guess work.”

He pointed to one of the coins, and explained, “These lines delineate the inward power flow to make sure the magic separates into each modification. Since the lines are of different sizes and angles, it implies that the modifications require different amounts of power.”

Yuri looked unconvinced. “All I see are lines.”

Nico sighed. It’s all anyone ever saw when he tried to explain it. He focused back on the movement of the coins with the symbols on the floor.

This new door was also a puzzle, but a million times more complicated than the entrance. It was like trying to find the pieces to a single puzzle in a room littered with hundreds of other puzzle pieces that did not belong to the original puzzle.

If it were actual puzzle pieces, Nico would have spent a lifetime rifling through the room’s coins to find the right pieces. But this involved spell formations. And when it came to those, they always involved a pattern, an intent.

Some of these patterns, Nico recognized. If there was anyone in the world who could solve this, it would be him.

“You look like you’re having fun,” Yuri said.

“Uh huh,” Nico replied absently, totally focused on the patterns.

Finally, he found enough coins that he thought would work. He laid them out in front of him in a line, and willed Measure to analyze each of the remaining coins to see if they could create a spell formation with the original five coins.

Before Measure, Nico would have had to spend days testing out each new spell formation simply because he didn't have enough magical power to supply his efforts. Now, Measure could simply analyze based off previous knowledge and whatever was in front of him. He didn't have to invest magical power into each formation.

Eventually, Nico would have to test the formation to see if it actually did anything. But, until then, his ability whittled down the possibility so he had a higher rate of success. Without Measure, they might have been stuck in the tower until they died of starvation.

Windows appeared, revealing different formations that could work.

Nico couldn’t grasp an underlying intent between them, but moved the coins together until they connected and formed the first formation.

The tower shook.

Nico's Windows vanished, replaced by a new window. But this one was not translucent blue like his others. Instead, it was golden and completely opaque.

He could instantly sense that the demon window was not his ability. it was as if someone had hacked his computer.

The window read:

You have one chance to identify the change.

The golden window vanished. Nico looked up at Yuri, who seemed unperturbed. Was Nico the only one who experienced what just happened?

Nico kept it to himself. He felt on edge.

Something or someone had not only given him a message, but done it through his ability. He needed to tread very carefully.

He couldn't just brute force this puzzle like he had the others. At least, that was what the conditions of opening the door were.

But what did the window mean that he had only one chance to identify the change? Why those words specifically? It would have just said he only had one chance or he would fail.

Let me realize that the message wasn’t just a rule, but a hint. So, all he had to do was identify a sort of change. But, all Nico could see was change. The symbols were constantly moving along with the coins. The door would not stop changing.

Then, it came to him in a flash of insight. The idea was so simple, that he could barely believe it. If it was true, then…Well, he put the implications of that aside. It was too much to handle for now.

He understood now what the purpose of the door was. and possibly why Nico himself was here. This wasn’t just a door that prevented others from entering. It was a test.

His heartbeat raced as the memories of the day locked into place. He didn’t have the whole picture, but he felt confident now he was in the right place at the right time.

He took two coins from the line and placed them in the center of the five original coins. There was no need for calculating percentages.

Without using Measure, Nico twisted each of the coins one by one until they created the simplest spell formation he could think of. In an instant, the coins separated once more in their original locations. The two additional coins flew back into the pile.

Nico felt something release inside himself.

“Get behind me!” Yuri yelled, stepping in front of him.

The symbols on the floor lifted in unison, twisting and changing like it had before, but slower now. They flew around Yuri in a liquid motion, and slammed into Nico.

For a second, he could only see white. But then, he saw the symbols had embedded on the back of his hand in the form of a single spell array he could draw with his eyes closed. The array was his oldest friend. It vanished instantly.

Yuri whipped around, worried. “Are you okay?”

Nico grinned. “Yes. For the first time today, I think I know what I’m doing.”