Something in the air on the battlefield began to shift.
The weaker beasts felt it first. A tremor in their movements, a nearly imperceptible hesitation, like something far greater had just announced its approach.
The D-rank beasts didn't show fear, but they slowed nonetheless, and that alone was significant.
Then the trees of the forest began to move.
Not the wind. Not the pressure of beasts rushing through. Something was forcing them apart from within, pushing them from below, until one after another they began to bend and fall sideways, cleared away by something advancing through the forest as though the trees were nothing more than obstacles to be brushed aside.
It emerged at the edge of the woods.
Five meters tall, perhaps more.
