[Complete] Unscheduled Server Maintenance - December 7, 2013

I don't know much about database junk, but if it works anything like most search queries it'll have to look at each and every character that exists, compare a map id, and then change that and the respawn point if a match is found.
Taking a while is likely the result of having so many dang characters that need looked at.

Edit: There are approximately 21,486,244 characters, and that's only counting the ones that show up in the rankings.
Yeesh.