The Kaiju did not hurry.
That fact settled into the chests of the defenders first, ahead of any of the weaponry humanity had prepared for this coordinate. The Kaiju had crossed the horizon, and it should have crossed the rest of the distance in a breath. Mere hours ago on the mountain range, it had launched off a collapsed ridge like a warhead and cleared dozens of miles in a single leap, the shockwave of its departure folding a section of mountainside into a sinkhole the size of a city. The creature could move.
It was not moving like that now.
It strolled.
Each footfall landed with the weight of a continent reorganizing its priorities. Acres of forest folded flat under the pressure of its descending legs without the Kaiju ever needing to kick or strike, the trees simply giving up the argument as the mass came down on them. The earth sank beneath each print in long moon-crater impressions. The sky above its crown bent a shade further toward ruin with every stride.
