Feeling a sense of profound unease watching the countless small scribbles that now covered everything in view, Scaly couldn’t stop herself from silently nudging the dwarf on her back who remained fully locked on the battle between the mist serpent and the leading necromancer whose bone construct had now emerged from the purple miasma that had shrouded its towering body so far. Revealing its hideous appearance to the world as it clashed with the mist serpent. Showing the purplish bones that made up its body with pulsing pieces of flesh clinging to it in different places.
"What is it?" Feeling the subtle nudging from the dragon below, Verdell felt something might be wrong as he quietly asked her in a manner that would avoid drawing any unwanted attention from the surrounding necromancers and adventurers who might be keeping an eye on the two of them.
Look down! The small golems scribbled something strange and now it’s spreading everywhere!
Silently voicing out what she wanted to say in her head even though she understood full well that Verdell had no way to understand what she was thinking, Scaly did her best to try and direct his gaze down towards the exposed ground below where the scribbles should be easy enough to notice if one looked hard enough. Especially with the enhanced eyesight of someone who had already reached the S Rank.
"Hm? You want me to look down?" Having grown familiar with Scaly and her movements, Verdell didn’t take long to understand what she wanted him to do and though it was a rather confusing thing for her to want him to do, he still obliged. "I don’t see any-" Freezing on the spot a second later upon discovering the strange scribble on the ground before his gaze slowly swept across the surrounding terrain. Seeing the same strange scribble everywhere.
"Get up immediately! As high up as possible!" Though different from Scaly who had no idea what this scribble on the ground meant, Verdell, as an experienced adventurer, understood what this scribble indicated. Even if it was only ever something he had seen when he had been a newbie adventurer still under training, it wasn’t something he would ever forget because of the danger it signified.
Whoosh-!
Not understanding why Verdell suddenly began to panic upon seeing the strange scribble on the ground, Scaly ultimately still decided to listen to him and immediately utilized her wind magic to rapidly ascend towards the gloomy grey clouds above as fast as possible. Not bothering to hide her sudden action in the slightest, as it was clear from the panic in Verdell’s voice that she couldn’t waste any time.
"Huh? What is the dwarf doing?"
"I don’t know? Such a sudden ascend... Did something happen?"
"No one launched an attack and those two are still busy fighting so- Ah!? T-t-t-the ground! LOOK AT THE GROUND!" As the adventurers were all wondering what Verdell was up to, one of them suddenly yelled out loud. Drawing everyone’s attention as they followed the gaze of their companion and similarly looked down towards the ground.
"AH!? T-T-THIS-!"
"DUNGEON EXPANSION SCRIPT! THE DUNGEON IS EXPANDING!? NOW!?
"I... Getting caught in the expansion of a dungeon is difficult to survive even if prepared, let alone caught off guard like-"
"CALM DOWN EVERYONE! REMEMBER THE TRAINING FROM THE NEWBIE TRAINING CAMP! GET AS HIGH AS POSSIBLE AND TRY TO CLING TO THE CEILING IF POSSIBLE! MAGES! CARRY THOSE WHO CAN’T FLY BEFORE ITS TOO LATE!"
Seeing how everyone was panicking, the leading adventurer in charge of the group took a step forward and loudly commanded the group, causing everyone to calm down as they quickly regained their former calm, though a hint of fear was now clearly visible in everyone’s eyes.
From what little they knew about this kind of rare event that was rarely ever witnessed given how most adventurers unlucky enough to witness it ended up perishing in the process, the expansion of a dungeon was a terrifying endeavor that could crush even those two terrifying beings locked in battle with each other, as it was the only time where adventurers or others had the opportunity to witness the full might of a dungeon without the countless restrictions that normally prevented the dungeon core from exerting its full power within the boundaries of the dungeon.
Still, everyone in their group was an SS Rank Adventurer with a lot of experience and after the initial panic died down, everyone began ascending towards the ceiling of the dungeon following the guidance from their early days as adventurers when this terrifying scenario had been mentioned. Amongst them, only two of them following a warrior adjacent class hadn’t learnt any unique abilities that allowed them to fly and had to be carried by two mages up towards the ceiling of the eighth floor.
Or... Three of them couldn’t fly, but the third had some unique ability that allowed him to jump hundreds of meters into the air before utilizing a secondary technique to step on air a few times. Taking him all the way to the ceiling of the eighth floor where he found a small nudge where he could grab on and hang from.
"What are those adventurers doing?"
"I don’t know..."
"Even that dragon riding dwarf is gone all of a sudden, something feels weird."
Unfortunately for the few necromancers who noticed the sudden odd movements of the adventurers, none of them managed to understand the meaning behind their sudden movements and even worse. Looking around attempting to figure out what might have happened to make the adventurers retreat in such haste, they were ultimately unable to see the ground around them where the scribbles were present because of the vast legions of undead and monsters blocking their view.
Not that spotting the scribble below and understanding the deadly situation they found themselves in would have made much of a difference given the simple fact that most of these necromancers had no ability to fly without the assistance of certain flying undead.
That is not to say that some necromancers didn’t look down and see the scribbles, it was just that upon seeing those scribbles, they conveniently forgot to inform their peers and set off to find a flying undead to save themselves before the others realized. After all, information on those scribbles and what they meant wasn’t some tightly guarded secret but was in fact well-known information across the world because of the Adventurers Guild.
"Wait! Look down below! Damnit! To think I would be caught up in a- Huh?! That is my undead! What do think you are doing! Come back down here! How dare you erase my mental seal!"
"Ah? My flying undead legion is all gone?! What happened!?"
"Stop, that is my only flying undead!"
And by the town the rest of the necromancers realized the situation, it was already too late, as others had already taken off with their flying undead while the ground beneath their feet had already started to visibly shake-
RUUUUUUUUUUMBLE-!
CRAAAAACK-!
Following which a terrifying sound could be heard throughout the eighth floor of the dungeon, as the ground beneath their feet suddenly split apart. Swallowing up hordes of undead, skeletons and monsters in the process, while also finally creating a disturbance large enough for the mist serpent and the leading necromancer to notice something was off.
"Huh?" Unfortunately, both were far too slow to react, as the ground beneath them gave way and both plunged down towards the abyss below, their fate unknown...
CRAAACK-!
And following the disappearance of the two main fighters, the ground that had only started to split suddenly developed countless cracks like an intricate spiderweb that spanned the entire floor-
"Aaaah!"
"Noooo-"
"Please let me land somewhere saaaaafe-!"
Giving the remaining necromancers, undead, skeletons, monsters and other living beings across the eighth floor of the dungeon, no time to react as they similarly found themselves plunging down towards the abyss below as the ground that made up the eighth floor of the dungeon seemingly cracked apart and vanished the next second. Leaving only the ceiling above behind as a testament to the existence of the eighth floor of the dungeon.
Speaking of which, this normally empty ceiling that had originally been hidden by the gloomy clouds of the eighth floor that had similarly vanished alongside the ground of the eighth floor was now fully visible... And looking up, one could see hundreds of figures huddling together against the ceiling. Trying their best to resist the pull that the abyss below had started subtly exerting towards them.
Most of these figures clinging to the ceiling were necromancers and their flying undead-
"I can’t hold on any longer!"
"Curse everything! Why am I this weak as an acolyte!"
"Nooo-!"
Of which, a few of the weaker ones found themselves unable to hold on as they were pulled off the ceiling and soon vanished into the abyss below while screaming in terror. Their screams lasted far longer than the visibility of their bodies. Indicating falling into the abyss didn’t mean an instantaneous death. Not that anyone clinging to the ceiling of the eighth floor was planning to test this out themselves.