While Scaly was feeling a sense of immense disappointment watching the weak undead moving along the cobblestone road, Verdell was instead taking the opportunity to observe these undead in detail with an increasingly deep frown on his face.
"These undead... Did they establish a kingdom of some kind on the ninth floor of the dungeon? Or rather, did the dungeon core construct an undead kingdom on the ninth floor of the dungeon? If that is the case, it’s understandable why it would be lacking resources, but... Constructing a functioning monster kingdom beyond smaller settlements of trolls, gnolls and other similar intelligent monsters before the tenth floor is unheard of." And as he muttered silently to himself, his gaze slowly wandered towards a nearby necromancer in the wheat field slowly getting up before moving towards the two of them.
"Don’t tell me... The reason a monster kingdom could be created is because the Eternal Life Sanctum brought so many undead and skeletons along with them. Donating a vast quantity of dead bodies. Allowing the dungeon core to save a vast quantity of resources on creating its own undead in turn." Whispering the last part to himself as he slowly came to realize that this was most likely the case, Verdell could not help silently sighing to himself looking towards the approaching undead necromancer that had already drawn the attention of Scaly and was bound to not last for long.
In their wildest imagination, the necromancers from the Eternal Life Sanctum would never imagine that they would end up giving the dungeon core the chance to create an undead kingdom on the ninth floor of the dungeon, something that normally wouldn’t come into being before reaching the tenth floor of a dungeon.
The reason behind this was the fact that a fully functional monster kingdom spanned a vast territory that a normal dungeon floor below the tenth floor of a dungeon normally couldn’t fit.
That and a monster kingdom was generally called one because it was a functioning kingdom that had everything one would expect from a functioning kingdom. In most circumstances, when a monster kingdom emerged on a dungeon floor, there would be more than just one, but given this was the ninth floor and even a single monster kingdom was already a bit too much for a dungeon floor this size, he doubted that there was another monster kingdom beyond the undead kingdom that the two of them had just encountered.
Ptsh-!
Lost in his own thoughts thinking about how the two of them should handle this encounter with a monster kingdom before they ended up drawing the attention of the army belonging to this monster kingdom, Scaly happily cut down the approaching undead necromancer before glancing back towards Verdell. Unaware that the dwarf was already starting to worry about drawing out some undead as she casually flopped onto the ground next to him while he was in seemingly deep thought about something ever since they had stepped onto the cobblestone road. Constantly muttering strange things to himself about some undead kingdom and not wanting to draw the attention of some undead king.
Although there was a constant stream of undead moving along the cobblestone road without pause, none of these undead seemed to care about the two of them even after witnessing how she had killed an undead necromancer and in turn, Scaly didn’t care much about these weaker undead as she instead took the opportunity while waiting for Verdell to come to some kind of conclusion over what to do next to practice her magic for once.
Of course, outside of just practicing her magic, she also took the opportunity to try and come up with some new kinds of magic that were a bit more mana efficient for dealing with a large number of enemies at the same time. Feeling that while her circular wave spell was immensely useful, the amount of mana required to cast this spell was downright terrifying.
"Let’s go, try to avoid being spotted by the undead below and don’t recklessly attack them unless they see you." But just as she began immersing herself in magic practice while waiting around for Verdell to recover from the state of confusion faced with something as terrifying as a monster kingdom, he jumped back onto her back before commanding her forward. Startling her quite a bit as she almost threw him off by accident before silently nodding her head in response.
Even if she had no clue why she was being asked something like that, she could tell that whatever was going on inside that little head of his since the two of them had run into the cobblestone road with undead moving back and forth along it had startled him to him the point where he was now looking towards those weak undead with a hint of fear, something she couldn’t undead given how weak these undead were
It wasn’t that his mumblings about some undead kingdom had evaded her, it was just that this undead kingdom he referred to didn’t mean much to Scaly who had no clue what a monster kingdom even was in the first place. Only thinking it was the monster equivalent of the kingdoms she had ended up flying through during her escape from the Howling Caverns Dungeon.
In other words, nothing special. Only the humans and other sapient races were replaced with undead.
...
"This... A monster kingdom?! On a ninth floor!?" Much like Verdell, the group of adventurers who had similarly set off in the direction of the dungeon core discovered the traces of the undead kingdom, though different from the silent shock of Verdell, the reaction was far more visible.
To say it lightly, the entire group had their mouth hung open as they stared towards a nearby farmhouse located in the middle of the seemingly endless wheat field shrouded in black miasma where a group of undead farmers worked on harvesting the wheat by hand.
"How did a monster kingdom appear on the ninth floor of all places!? And not just any monster kingdom, but an undead one! Curse those necromancers of the Eternal Life Sanctum, this is undoubtedly their doing! If they didn’t sacrifice themselves to the dungeon core, there is no way a monster kingdom would have taken shape so close to the surface!"
"Even if this was unplanned on their part, an undead kingdom emerging withing the swirling sands dungeon is bound to draw the attention of those liches within the Eternal Life Sanctum. In the future, this place is bound to become another place those necromancers attempt to settle."
"True... An undead kingdom like this not only possesses the ability to continuously produce powerful SS Rank Undead but also has a chance to create undead and skeletons beyond the SS Rank from time to time, a goldmine in the eyes of those necromancers always looking for new powerful undead and skeletons to experiment with."
"The only positive is that the dungeon core won’t be targeted any longer. If anything, those necromancers will now defend the dungeon core with their lives."
"Don’t forget, this is still the final floor of the dungeon, meaning the normal staircases connecting the different dungeon floors are unlikely to emerge anytime soon before the dungeon core expands by another floor when necromancers start swarming the place..."
The exclamations of the group were all filled with despair. Not because they faced a monster kingdom, but because the monster kingdom just so happened to be an undead one. Meaning the place would soon enough draw the attention of the true upper echelons of the Eternal Life Sanctum. In turn, it would also draw the attention of the guild’s higher ups if it hadn’t already done so.
If things developed naturally, the swirling sands dungeon was bound to become another battlefield between the guild and the Eternal Life Sanctum. Forcing the city up above to shift away from its current identity as a neutral trade hub for adventurers to gather into a fortified fortress city tasked with the sole purpose of guarding the entrance to the swirling sands dungeon to avoid the necromancers taking advantage of the undead kingdom below to rapidly grow their strength.
In fact, the higher ups might even deem the swirling sands dungeon lost and decide to take the dungeon core themselves. Dooming the infrastructure built up over years and the constant stream of resources gathered from the depths of the dungeon.
Of course, there was one way out of this situation... And that was to ensure none of the necromancers that had managed to survive so far managed to make it out alive and inform the rest of the Eternal Life Sanctum about the situation, something that was simple enough to do for most of the necromancers. Only the leading necromancer in control of a bone construct surpassing the SS Rank posed a very real threat that couldn’t be ignored and had the ability to brute force her way out when the ninth floor was fully established and developed.