His skull screamed.
In the depths of Luka's inner space, the darkness solidified. The rusted iron ceiling of the Slaughterhouse shook hard. The bars composed of human bones cracked in unison, spilling black bile to the bottom of the carcass-scented puddle. Right at the edge of that filthy arena, a giant monolithic gate shifted. Its long-dead iron hinges creaked loud, cleaving the dense silence. The gate opened one inch wide.
Dense energy spurted from behind that narrow gap. Flooding his inner arena. Drowning the remnants of sanity.
In the real world, the Oesterian forest responded. The storm wind halted for a moment. The air froze.
Luka's single eye lost its original color. Pitch-black widened, swallowing his entire iris and sclera in a single blink.
The boiling heat at his solar plexus exploded, crawling wildly toward his right shoulder. He no longer felt the agony from his broken ulna bone. That pain burned to ash, replaced by a feral urge forcing his flesh to evolve through a compulsion defying natural laws.
The white bone tip protruding from his arm cracked, shattering into sharp fragments. The fresh blood pooling beneath his arm evaporated, creating a red fog smelling of scorched copper.
The blood vessels around his gaping wound swelled roughly, ruining the pale skin from the inside. Brick-red muscle fibers protruded from the torn flesh gap, crawling long like starving parasite tree roots. The raw muscles moved wildly to seek a host, twitching in the freezing air.
The flesh roots found their target.
The rusted sword hilt embedded in the mud dirt.
Luka's muscle fibers snatched the old metal, coiling around its hilt guards and piercing into the crevices of the rusted iron. Flesh and metal rubbed, producing a sickening hiss. Cartilage grew rapidly from his arm fracture, crawling to wrap the sword hilt and nailing the iron blade to merge with his veins.
Luka no longer held a weapon. The rusted sword was now a direct extension of his arm bone. Merged. Filthy. Lethal.
Ahead, the Amalgam opened its giant jaw wide. Broken teeth smeared in black slime ready to close, chewing Rhea's head sprawled helpless on the frozen dirt.
Luka shot forward.
The stone mud dirt beneath his footing shattered to pieces. The explosive power of his leg muscles exceeded the limits of normal humans. He pierced the red fog in a single breath. Lacking elegant stances and devoid of drawing steps taught by palace masters, he charged purely with the Butcher's instinct.
His mutated right arm swung from below.
The sword blade merged with his flesh sliced through the air. Red steam billowed from the rusted metal, heated by Luka's boiling blood temperature.
The flesh-sword struck the Amalgam's lower jaw.
Crack!
Iron clashed with the monster's jawbone. The destructive force shattered the rows of yellow teeth. Rotten bone fragments scattered into the air, mixing with a spurt of pitch-black blood.
The Amalgam's lower jaw tore severely. The giant meat lump pushed backward, losing its balance. Its arm limbs scratched the dirt seeking footing. The wails from the dozens of pale faces atop its shoulders turned into a piercing shriek that ruined the eardrums.
Luka landed with both knees bent low. His boots stood right between Rhea's unconscious body and the giant monster.
His mutated arm smoked. The red veins coiling the sword throbbed constant, pumping blood straight into the metal fibers. His pitch-black eye radiated no emotion staring at the crying human faces on the monster's body. His butcher instinct saw only a pile of meat that must be chopped.
The Amalgam recovered from the shock. Four medium-sized arms protruded from its side, extending forward, aiming for Luka's chest, neck, and legs in unison. A wild attack lacking gaps.
Luka did not retreat.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
He tilted his left shoulder. Letting the filthy claws of one monster arm tear the skin above his ribs. A long torn wound created. Fresh blood dripped. He muffled the sting with a hard grunt, planting his heel into the ice mud as a foothold for a counterattack.
Luka twisted his waist. His monster arm swung horizontal.
The rusted sword cleaved three of the Amalgam's arms at once. The filthy hand chunks fell thudding onto the pine needles. Black blood spurted drenching the dead trees around them.
The monster shrieked again. Its largest arm limb swung from above, intending to crush Luka into dust fragments.
Luka welcomed the blow. He raised his mutated arm straight up.
The sword blade merged with flesh blocked the giant arm.
Metal and giant bone clashed hard. The dirt beneath Luka's boots sank two inches. His collarbone screamed. Yet, his sword and flesh did not break. The red muscles wrapping his arm hardened resembling steel pillars, absorbing the monster's entire destructive force lacking useless resistance.
Luka rotated his wrist. The sword blade shifted, slicing the thick flesh of the Amalgam's limb. A gap opened in the blink of an eye.
He pulled his right knee. Kicking the meat lump's gut hard. His steel boot embedded deep. Forcing the monster to hunch forward.
Without pause, Luka's mutated arm flashed.
Slash after slash descended. Brutal. Rough. Devoid of defensive techniques. Every time the monster scratched his shoulder or thigh, Luka retaliated by chopping one of its limbs. Black blood and red blood merged in the air, raining upon the Oesterian dirt with the fluid of death.
One by one, the Amalgam's defective arms fell.
The dozens of pale faces atop its shoulders cried harder. Their wails begged for mercy, begged for this torture to end. The sound struck the inside of Luka's head, trying to paralyze his muscles.
Luka ground his jaw until his gums bled, letting the roar of his own breath drown out the sickening wails. He stepped forward, keep pressing the meat lump backward striking a black pine trunk. The Amalgam was cornered. Its remaining arms thrashed desperate, unable to withstand the storm of slashes coming from the human-shaped monster before it.
Luka pulled his right arm far back. The red veins on his sword expanded, twitching greedily to absorb his body heat.
He swung the sword horizontally with all his inner strength.
The iron blade slashed right at the bottom of the pile of crying faces, slitting the mass neck in one straight pull.
The sound of dozens of neck bones severing rang in unison.
The pile of pale faces detached from its host body, flying through the air before thudding onto the frozen mud puddle. The deafening wails died in an instant. Silent.
The Amalgam's remaining body stood rigid for two seconds. Black blood fountained from the flat neck cut. The giant lump finally lost control. Its defective knees bent. The massive body collapsed striking the dirt, vibrating the ice surface beneath Luka's shoes.
Luka stood with his chest heaving rough. Dense white vapor spewed from his open mouth behind the bandages.
His entire leather clothing was soaked in black blood and his own slime. His mutated arm still dripped hot fluid. Sweat mixed with blood flowed down his temples. This fight had drained the contents of his lungs.
Yet, the feral urge in his gut had not quieted. His stomach kicked feral.
He twisted his body. Stepping slow approaching the Amalgam carcass piling before him. The carcass of a human-eating monster.
Luka stomped one of the pale faces lying near his feet. Crushing the defective nose and mouth to the mud bottom lacking hesitation. He stood right in front of the monster's chest, now partially cleaved.
He raised his mutated arm high. His pitch-black eye locked onto the center point of the meat lump.
The rusted sword merged with his veins plunged straight down.
Crack.
The iron blade pierced the defective ribs protecting the monster's internal organs. Luka pressed the hilt using his body weight, tearing through the thick fat layer and dead muscles. Both his hands ripped the Amalgam's chest wide open, ignoring the foul stench of rot that immediately struck his face.
Inside the dark chest cavity, protected behind the arrangement of shattered bones.
A giant core heart.
Its color pitch-black. Its surface covered in thick veins still throbbing slow, pumping the remaining spiritual energy not yet evaporated. Thick slime coated it. The metallic tang from the flesh was far stronger, yet to Luka's senses, it was the scent of life.
Luka's mutated arm crawled into the chest cage.
His fingers wrapped in red veins gripped the giant heart. Its texture slippery and solid. He wrenched the organ out of its nest. The sound of thick blood vessels severing echoed in the freezing forest silence.
The black heart rested in his hand. Throbbing for the last time.
Extremely dense spiritual energy radiated from the filthy flesh surface. Black smoke crawled up, touching the pores of Luka's arm.
Luka stared intent at the heart. His pitch-black pupil reflected the throb of death. Inside his head, the monolithic gate in the Slaughterhouse shook hard. The rusted hinges groaned, opening wider, demanding the soul intake resting in his grip. Inviting the darkness to enter fully into the king's veins.