It’s definitely being under extruded. As to what’s causing that, my first guess would have been a clogged nozzle… but if it’s happening not-at-random, it’s probably not that.

is there a way to see a log of hot end temps across the prior prints? it could be that something is causing the the machine to speed up putting out more plastic and the hot end struggling to keep up, though I’m just spitballing here.

It looks to me like those clips that come inward a bit are under-supported and it’s leading to poor adhesion of the whole layer. You may try again without the “ignore or remove minor overhangs” equivalent option ticked.

Either your slicer is failing: try shifting the object a little or rotating it and slicing it again.

Or your Z axis has something happening at that spot. Try cleaning and lubing it and see what happens when you jog through that spot a couple times.

Is your fillament dry? I have horrible prints like this and tried everything until I decided to dry the fillament, solved it.

Looks like a clogged nozzle to me. You can try a cold-pull procedure to clear it: help.prusa3d.com/…/cold-pull-mk3-s-mk2-5-s-mk3-5-… (maybe Creality has specific instructions for your printer)

Error persists on entire layer where a new retraction pattern is used, therefore it is very unlikely to be filament humidity or a gcode issue, but filament settings.

What is your retraction length and speed? Do a cold pull to rule out debris. Reduce your retraction until stringing occures, observe if the error repeats. Temperature could be playing a role, but if your layer adhesion is up to expectations, I wouldn’t change. Also observe your nozzle and make sure it’s taught, I’ve been surprised how fast some of my brass nozzles have worn out even with non-abrasives, and causes a similar symptom of randomhish failures, especially if loose.

I suspect the retraction settings and or the extruder gear clamping on the filament to be the main issue. I upgraded my ender 3 pro to direct drive for a similar issue. Essentially what happens is that the extrusion goes smoothly when printing long uninterrupted sections, but these under extrusions would appear near or after areas that required a lot of retractions. If your retraction distance is set too small (5-10 mm) the filament gripping gears on the extruder end up going back and forth a lot on the same section of filament in order to start and stop quickly. This wears down the filament itself and suddenly the gears don’t have any traction on the filament to push it, and hence the under extrusion. This is fairly easy to diagnose however. You should check if there is a lot of filament dust around your extruder gears. That was the smoking gun in my instance. I fixed it by reducing the tension in the spring loaded arm and reducing the retraction speed while upping the retraction length to 15mm. I ran with those “fixes” for quite a while before upgrading to a direct drive. Hope this helps.