Professor Vargas blinks backwards, out of the Hall. A strange floating metal creature wearing an amulet is in his place. It speaks a command word.

The constellation fades away as one of the doors slowly opens.

The crowd roars! The wizards are cheering.

Sheeee has absolutely no idea what that was. Using a construct to deal with the Symbol of Death is clever — did he find an actual command word for the Doors of Night? No, that must have been a triggered item which did something clever, she just doesn't know what it could be. And this is a remarkably strong year! That's two reaching the Doors of Night, and he's gotten through, and that's as many as the whole past decade put together. Plus the wall-smasher, who also got farther than anyone she's seen!

She claps along with the crowd.

The seventh set of doors is made of smoking black vines, covered in tiny needles. They slowly shift and twist.

... although calling them a "set" of "doors" is inaccurate. There's no lock or handle or dividing line between them.

Professor Vargas casts two spells, one on himself and one forward toward the doors.

It's unclear if his second spell did anything! A glowing symbol burns itself into the vines.

The Professor ceases to be made of ice. He leaps back—

Four acorns sprout from the vines, flying at him. They explode in a brilliant firestorm.

—which he is completely unaffected by.

The crowd cringes back from the explosion, cheering when Professor Vargas reappears.

She hasn't seen this one before! It really is an impressive year. Dispelling is one of the more obvious uses of abjuration, so really it should be more a surprise that it wasn't more common in the previous doors. Still neat to see now, and this time with someone who it really matters for. It would have been rather disappointing with the non-casters.

Another four acorn begin to form on the vin—

He is already moving. In one motion, he pulls a scroll from his bag and reads it. His body flows through the vines like water.

The vines recede behind him.

The announcer is shouting. "He's through the Door of Flames! How far will he get!?"

Is one of the doors really a bunch of plants which grow fire acorns. Why would they do that. Wouldn't it burn itself? Doesn't that kind of ruin the point? Why is that even a thing? Why is that a wizard things instead of a druid thing?

Whatever. What's up next? She doesn't actually know, this is neat!

The eighth set of doors are a deep, rippling black, as though someone tore a hole in the world. Dozens of red eyes flow across their surface. A single glowing lock is faintly visible.

He holds his right hand in the air, and his ring flashes as he casts a spell. His body is ice once more.

A dozen dark faces burst from the door screaming. The pour over him, clawing with their terrible fingers.

Professor Vargas stumbles forward, pushing through them. The dread touch of a dozen greater shadows doesn't seem to affect him at all.

He casts a spell, and one of the shadowy doors creaks open. This is all becoming a pattern.

The wizards are cheering louder than ever! So is the rest of the crowd!

"The Doors of Shadow are defeated! The first time in almost fifty years!"

Shadows are dangerous! Actually dangerous! Impressive that they have them here at all. Also impressive that he got past them, but that looks like it was just some form of immunity — ice, so maybe he's turning into a construct so he can ignore the touch of the undead? A golem made of ice could do it, maybe he can as well. Mother has still seen better than this, but she certainly hasn't. Clap clap!

Also whatever he's using to open the doors is still working, which is good, it would be kind of disappointing for him to be stopped by that.

The ninth set of doors glow a blinding, incredible white. Each door has a dark black handle, and a black keyhole is present on the right one.

On the walls surrounding the doors are two portraits of old men in elaborate wizarding wear.

Professor Vargas pauses in front of this room for a long moment. He turns to face the exit, shadows still clawing at him.

The crowd waits with bated breath.

"This is down to luck! Either I shall be the first in over a hundred years to pass the Doors of Scouring, or I shall not. There is nothing else to it."

He draws a scroll from his pouch and reads it.