In the far distance, Damian could also see the figure of the Holy Daughter looking at him with an extrely calm but shining gaze. Her wing-shaped pupils seed entirely focused on him, tracking his every movent with an intensity that spoke of questions she had not yet asked.
But he ignored all of this for now.
He wanted to test out the extent and the limitations of his new doctrine.
He had completely diverged from whatever path Warriors normally took in the Lands of Stone. Everything he had to figure out by himself. There were no masters to teach him, no texts to guide him, no traditions to follow.
Just his own instincts and his own ingenuity.
But just as he was about to get started...
HUUUM!
He began to feel faint vibrations traveling through the stones beneath him.
The sensation ran up through his feet and into his bones, a trembling in the earth that was almost too subtle to notice. But his senses had been heightened by cultivation, and his connection to the wall made him even more aware of disturbances in his surroundings.
He was the first to feel it.
A few seconds later, Uncle Adam and Grandmother Essun also felt it. The old warrior’s hand went to his spear. The wise woman’s face shifted from fervor to wariness.
And monts later, the vibrations beca shaking.
As if the Lands of Stone themselves were quaking.
Damian frowned.
This was not happening naturally. He could feel that the vibrations were coming from a certain direction, a specific source that was moving toward them rather than radiating outward from so distant event.
And not too long after the shaking, he began to hear faint roars.
Roars?
His eyes flashed with a somber light.
He got up and jumped, his legs carrying him upward with force that cracked the stone where he had been sitting. He ca to stand on top of the crimson-blue wall, its thickness being more than two ters as the top could support many people standing shoulder to shoulder.
A mont after he jumped on it, the figures of Uncle Adam and Grandmother Essun did the sa. The old warrior landed with the practiced ease of soone who had made such jumps countless tis. The wise woman was assisted by strength that seed to appear from nowhere, her thighs pulsing with ridiculous hidden power as who knew where she got it.
They were followed by the injured Chieftain, who made the jump with an unstable posture. He almost fell off, his wounded side screaming in protest at the sudden movent, and he had to reach with his hands to pull himself up the rest of the way.
Silently, without many of them apart from Damian realizing it, Serala had also appeared on top of the wall.
She arrived like a flash of brilliant white-blue light, her figure maintaining extraordinary grace and an imperial bearing even as she landed on the transford logs. Her wing-shaped pupils imdiately turned toward the direction of the disturbance.
And what they all saw as they stood atop the wall...
Caused the blood of many to drain from their faces.
Damian had a heavy expression.
He could see much more than others.
Others were seeing a cloud coming toward them, a mass of dust and debris filled with the roars of Primal Beasts that grew louder with each passing mont. They saw shapes moving within that cloud, indistinct forms that promised violence and death.
But with his enhanced vision, Damian could see the Primal Beasts rushing over with a sense of rage and madness that went beyond normal predatory behavior. Their eyes were wild. Their movents were erratic. They were not hunting.
They were fleeing and angry.
And they were destroying everything in their path as they fled.
"A Primal Surge?"
Serala said the words with a sharp gaze, and Damian saw her eyes shift with a sense of guilt that she couldn’t quite hide.
Right.
A Primal Surge!
A tide of beasts was an extrely rare thing. In the years that he had been here, he had never co across one. If anything, there were incidents over the years where a few roving beasts attacked the tribe, but they were repelled by the Warriors without too much difficulty.
But a tide of beasts like this...
It was a truly rare occurrence.
And one of the few possible reasons why it could be happening, the reason for the guilt in the eyes of the Holy Daughter, was that she suspected this was sothing not entirely natural.
It was artificial.
Done for the sake of drawing her out!
Damian’s eyes were heavy.
Uncle Adam spoke with a cold voice that held no hope.
"A Surge of Primal Beasts like this... no Unbound Tribe can survive it."
His weathered face was grim.
"Bone Tempering Warriors would get trampled alongside everything else. Even Blood Ignition Warriors would be overwheld by the numbers. Maybe Organ Sanctification Warriors working together could overco it."
He gripped his spear with white knuckles.
"Maybe-"
ROOOAAARRR!
In the midst of his words, a booming roar stopped him in his tracks.
It ca from far behind the coming onslaught of Primal Beasts, a sound so deep and powerful that it vibrated in their chests and made their teeth ache. The air itself seed to recoil from the force of it.
And from behind the tide of lesser beasts...
Sothing rose.
It looked like a moving mountain at first. A mass of darkness that blotted out the horizon, that seed to swallow the morning light wherever it passed. But it was not a mountain.
It was a Primal Beast.
A Behemoth!
Those on the walls beca ashen when they heard its roar reverberate across their bodies. The Chieftain took a step backward, his injured side forgotten in the face of terror that transcended pain. Grandmother Essun made a sign against evil with trembling fingers. Even Uncle Adam, veteran of countless battles, looked upon the approaching colossus with an expression that bordered on rage despair!
They...were not ready for this! They would not survive this!
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