She nods as you enter, looking unsurprised, and gestures you to a seat. "You've come about your boss," she tells you before you can say anything. "I didn't tell him he was going to die, of course. Who wants bad news? I wonder if he could tell, though. Before he left, he gave me this and told me to keep it safe until someone came to ask for it." She hands you a small stack of paper, the top sheet of which has the following on it:
| 34 | 4 | 28 | 23 | 46 | 32 | 21 | 5 |
| 29 | 20 | 26 | 18 | 6 | 1 | 39 | 13 |
| 15 | 19 | 7 | 48 | 40 | 25 | 16 | 30 |
| 36 | 33 | 8 | 47 | 2 | 45 | 41 | 44 |
| 27 | 43 | 37 | 22 | 10 | 12 | 14 | 38 |
| 35 | 3 | 11 | 17 | 24 | 42 | 31 | 9 |
The puzzle answers are:
Filling in the puzzle answers in numerical order into the provided grid gives:
NUESITRE QOAMAPDA SWRMANHU XEGRIUYQ DSUMLTSS EQEAISAY
The first letters of the answers read "PATH WINDS," a hint to read a winding path starting from the shaded square. The path reads "Now graph y times x squared equals a squared times a minus y." Graphing the function yx2=a2(a-y) gives you a curve that looks a little like a witch's hat. As it happens, this curve has a name, which is the answer to the metapuzzle: WITCH OF AGNESI.