Faced with the simple problem that the local monsters of the ninth floor were far too difficult to find, Scaly could only grit her teeth and try to look more closely at the ground below hoping to spot another monster along the way with her inspection ability. After all, though her eyesight was great, the hiding ability of the ninth-floor locals was simply far too strong for someone like her to pick up on while flying past. If anything, without the assistance of her inspection ability, she doubted that she would even be able to spot a single monster along the way as they were simply far too good at hiding themselves.
If not for the fact that the dwarf on her back had truly ended up burning himself out and had little to no strength left for another battle like the one earlier, she would have already landed on the ground again and attempted to make full use of him to try and bait out another group of monsters into attacking them- or rather, attacking him. Having found out since the battle with the armadillos and spiders had come to an end that the local monsters didn’t seem to care much about her and only really seemed intent on targeting Verdell.
The reason behind this kind of targeted attack wasn’t yet known to her and wasn’t something Verdell himself seemed to have picked up on, but from what she guessed, it might have something to do with the ninth floor still being a floor in development. Maybe something that caused the local monsters to ignore other monsters and instead target any non-monsters present on the floor unless they were attacked by other monsters, a kind of defensive mechanism set up by the dungeon core to try and deal with the different people it undoubtedly knew had managed to enter the ninth floor of the dungeon and hadn’t yet had the opportunity to deal with.
If anything, the targeting might not be so much an attempt to kill Verdell and the others, but instead a way to create a large enough disturbance for the dungeon core to notice and personally jump in to deal with the opponents that were too powerful for it to deal with on its own after the development of the ninth floor of the dungeon concluded.
Keeping this in mind, Scaly also began to make sure that the battle she ended up participating in didn’t end up creating a large disturbance and ended in a short time to avoid drawing the attention of the dungeon core.
Even if she and Verdell might not be the original target, given the value of her dragon bloodline, Scaly had a feeling that the dungeon core wouldn’t hesitate to grind her down into building material for its newly established floor if it had the opportunity to do so.
Because of this, her original hunting of the monsters passing by below along their continued journey towards the dungeon core slowed down significantly as she also had to make sure she didn’t cause too much of a disturbance in the process. For one, her circular wave spell had to be banned, as that kind of spell affected a far too large area and would undoubtedly be sensed by the dungeon core.
[*Ding* Reached level 45]
Still, it didn’t take her long to reach level 45, as the monsters on the ninth floor were simply far too abundant once she began looking for them and knew where to look. Even if quite a few weaker ones emerged in the process, numbers alone made up for the lack in quality and helped push her forward. Bringing her closer to the limits of her current evolution.
The hope she originally had for reaching level 50 before being forced out of the swirling sands dungeon reignited, as she once again saw hope for her next evolution before this dungeon came to an end and she had to leave to avoid being caught by the far stronger adventurers that would undoubtedly already be on their way according to what Verdell had told her about the future development of the dungeon.
Although Verdell told her that they should be fine if she pretended to be a tamed monster, she understood that there was little chance of that working in the face of those experienced adventurers. After all, Verdell had already explained to her that tamed monsters all caried some kind of unique mark from their tamer, one she didn’t have... And even more than that, Verdell wasn’t a tamer but a mage. If those senior figures investigated it, it wouldn’t take them long to realize she wasn’t a tamed monster.
For this reason alone, she didn’t dare to stay behind and wait for those terrifying figures to show up and intended to leave before they arrived.
As for why she felt a deep sense of dread towards a group of adventurers she hadn’t even had the chance to encounter herself? That was because Verdell had clearly explained to her that even the powerful mist serpent and bone construct were fragile and easily defeatable before those adventurers who were about to show up. Trusting he wouldn’t lie to her about something like that and given how it soon enough became clear he also wanted to avoid a confrontation with those powerful adventurers, she had already silently decided they were going to escape the dungeon before those people could show up.
The path was clear and all they had to do to escape safely was find the exit located on the final floor. Problem with this being the fact that finding such an exit was easier said than done. Not to mention. According to Verdell, the exit in question wouldn’t emerge before the ninth floor of the dungeon had fully formed. Meaning they couldn’t even start searching for it for now and could only wait for the dungeon core to finish the development of the ninth floor of the dungeon before they could start their search.
The one positive to this situation was the fact that Verdell had once learnt that final floor exits tended to appear near the center of the floor where the dungeon core was located. Giving them another clear reason to seek out the dungeon core that wasn’t just about ensuring their own safety during the development of the dungeon floor.
In fact, Verdell had even shared that the yet to be formed exit leading out of the dungeon core could be sensed taking shape by someone especially attuned with the flow of mana surrounding the dungeon. The problem with this being the fact that anyone attuned to that degree with the flow of mana would be a terrifying existence that had already exceeded the SS Rank according to him.
Still, upon hearing this, Scaly felt confident that she would be able to do this attuning with mana and find the exit leading out of the ninth floor of the dungeon before it had the opportunity to fully form.
After all, if there was one thing Scaly was confident in, it was her magic and in turn also her mana.
Just from what she had observed from Verdell and other adventurers along with those necromancers, it had become clear to her that the mana within her body far exceeded that of even the SS Rank Necromancer capable of controlling the bone construct that had exceeded the SS Rank.
From this fact alone, she felt confident that she was far closer to the mana and should be able to attune herself to the mana of the dungeon core and find this exit leading out of the ninth floor of the dungeon.
Of course, before she could even attempt this, they first had to get to the dungeon core that still seemed to elude the two of them.
The only reason why they could even tell they were getting closer wasn’t because the strength of the sneaky monsters all around increased like the two had expected, but instead because the surrounding terrain and environment became far more complex and complete compared to what they had travelled through in the past.
If at the start most of what they traversed through was large and small forest made up of the same kind of trees with large grass plains and tall mountains that looked barren separating the small and large forests, then now, the forests were filled with countless unique plants along with small ruins hiding both treasures and unique monsters, while the grass plain were no longer barren and even had small settlements established by intelligent monsters inhabiting the ninth floor.
As for the mountains... They were the most unique of the bunch, as some transformed into towering mountain fortresses home to powerful groups of monsters that even Scaly had to fly around, while others look barren on the surface but had large settlements established deep within by monsters. Making it difficult for someone like Scaly to get anywhere near the entrance of these settlements teeming with life.