He could no longer think straight, enthralled by the boiling anger. It coated his mind with a fiery hatred that couldn't be quelled by himself. But he couldn't care less if he was caught in madness's cold hands. It meant he could fight with no holds barred.
The world seemed to beckon his call, the rain picked up, and the winds thrashed and bellowed. The sky split and tore open with every crack of lightning. The thunder boomed like drums to the song of Lukas' ire.
He held his tachi with his left hand, and the kusarigama with his right. In his mouth was a piece of cloth wrapped around his head. He needed something to soak his anger with when the pain would become unbearable.
The ghast continued its onslaught, but with Lukas' mind clear yet full of rage, he managed to redirect nearly all of its strikes. Every time he would furiously thrash at the hasty fiend. When he hit, it would coat his face in the blood of his opponent. When he didn't, it was his own.
He revelled in the chaos, unchained by thought and reason. He let his worries go, and for a moment he became just as mindless as the ghast. Focused solely on killing the other, they both became as deadly as the storm around them.
Every clash he caught another glimpse of the wicked beast. Every time his eyes locked onto its frail withered rip cage. Behind its delicate interlocking web of bones, was a single beating heart. He tried so desperately to rend it in two, yet never could. The ghast left no opening.
So their fight continued, with neither side gaining an edge over the other. It all blended in Lukas' mind, and his attention slowly began to wander.
With each ringing of steel and cut of flesh, the world seemed to fall silent for just a spell. When it did, something seemed to speak to him. Not a voice, nor a sound. But a small whisper that had no meaning at all. Yet, when he listened to it, something about the world around him seemed to change.
The ghast paid no attention to Lukas' strange fascination with the nothing that existed around them. Instead, it took its chance to kill Lukas. But, he saw it aimed its claws towards his skull. And moved his tachi to block it.
But when the flat of his blade was hit by the claws, it slammed into his head. It was then, as the dizzying and spinning cleared, the world fell into place around Lukas, everything moved with a certain rhythm. The ebb and flow was clear to him and it sang like a song. One he had heard once before.
Perhaps it was a dream, a nightmare, a memory, or even a lifetime ago. But he smiled at the sound of the world, the sight of something so clear was a beauty he had never seen. He needed the ringing of steel and clearing of his head to see the world in such a way.
Or he had gone insane.
The ghast saw an opportunity to strike, but it fell short of Lukas' feint. He fell backwards out of the way, catching his back foot and spinning back around. Cutting a few of the ghast's fingers clean off.
It resembled a dance, one macabre and elegant. He stumbled as he slashed, exposing his blind spots as he whipped the chain around. It was an amateur performance, yet it worked to confuse and beguile the ghast.
It failed to get more than a small nick on his skin. All the while, Lukas screamed to the heavens with a wicked laugh that threatened to surpass the madness of the ghast's alien mind. But he wasn't mad, not yet anyway. No, he was enraptured in this newfound lens of the world.
As the sky cracked with light, he saw himself reflected in the steel of his blades. There he saw his face was dirty, it had plenty of small scars that drenched him with that oh-so-yellow blood. But he also saw his eyes, they glowed with the light of his soul. A raging fire that boiled to the surface.
But he paid it no mind, as he was focused on the sweet melody that played so softly in his ear. Dancing along, spinning in the mud and combining his weapons in a way he hadn't done since he first started training.
How long had it been since he used his Frequency? A minute? Two? He had lost track of time for once, but it did not matter now. He couldn't care about those things, all that existed was right now. This moment was all that existed in Lukas' mind.
The future was a myth, the past a facade. The present was all that flowed through him. He became part of time itself, and thus an echo of its absurdity.
It was nauseating, like a hard liquor or drug. It was nauseating to exist in a single moment of time with these half-time steps and cuts and whips that rang out in time like a twisted melody.
He tried so hard to recreate the song he heard so quietly now. It was fading now, and soon prosimed to disperse like the wind. But while it was still clear in his head, he danced along.
Every step caused another cut on the ghast. Every ring resonated with the cracks of thunder. Slowly, he was gaining the edge. Quietly, he was learning the rhythm of the distant melody. Soon, however, it was gone and he was left surrounded by the sound of rain and wind.