A high school girl named Yagen has a deep love for poetry and forms an unlikely friendship with her classmate Shinonome, who possesses a unique and supernatural ability. Shinonome can visualize the words people speak, perceiving them as imaginative animals that embody the essence of each utterance. Fascinated by this power, Yagen wishes she could see words the same way. Her wish is mysteriously granted in a disorienting and profound manner: she suddenly finds herself transported to a strange, vast forest and has been transformed into a tiger. Shinonome explains that this forest is a metaphysical space where the images of countless spoken words are given physical form, and every creature roaming it is a wild beast of words, born from a real person's speech. The two friends then embark on a surreal quest to find the most beautiful word in the world. As they journey through this allegorical wilderness, they observe the diverse animals that appear, ranging from gentle to ferocious. The beast representing the word slander is a notable example of the malicious creatures that lurk in this space. The forest itself serves as a powerful allegory for the public square of social media, a chaotic environment packed with an infinite number of words colliding at once. The manga is a modern variation on Atsushi Nakajima's classic short novel The Moon Over the Mountain, which features a poet who transforms into a tiger. Unlike that tragic literary predecessor who loses his humanity, Yagen retains her rationality because she has Shinonome by her side. Kotoba no Kemono is the first full-length work by author Kujiraba, who originally gained attention for posting original poems on Twitter in 2014 before debuting as a mangaka in 2018.