After killing the three remaining Manticores, the exhausted group decided to stop their hunt and return to Esta. They had pushed themselves hard enough for one day, and continuing would risk serious injury or worse.
But as they began collecting the valuable Manticore corpses, a deafening roar suddenly filled the clearing—so powerful that it made the air itself vibrate and caused nearby trees to shed leaves from the sheer force of the sound.
The whole group came to attention, their bodies darting towards the direction the sound was coming from.
A massive Manticore emerged from a concealed den entrance that none of them had noticed before. This creature dwarfed the master-rank specimens they'd just killed—easily twice their size, with muscles that rippled like coiled steel beneath a hide that seemed to shimmer with mana.
