Blade Run

aka: Jumping On Your Opponents Sword Always Works

"From here you can get an excellent view of my foot."

Two warriors are in the midst of a Sword Fight. One makes a flashy move with his conspicuously large sword that's guaranteed to reduce any mortal to tomorrow's worm feast. But as the dust clears, he is in for a nasty surprise: his enemy is balancing on the blade of his sword in an Ass Kicking Pose, which is the perfect place for him to run across the blade toward his unguarded opponent.

This should be impossible — one combatant cannot support or balance the other this way, especially by mistake — but that is ignored by Rule of Cool. This can characterize the runner as The Lightfooted, so agile and dexterous that they seem able to ignore gravity on a whim. It may further suggest that the nimble character is Just Toying With the other, teasing their opponent by how gracefully they can avoid an attack. It can be Justified if the weapon's wielder has a Super-Strength or is much larger than their enemy.

Compare Weapon Stomp, which is a more realistic result of trying this. Not to be confused with the notably blade-free Blade Runner, or the villain from Tensou Sentai Goseiger who is named for the film.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• In Soul Eater, Giroko runs along Chrona's sword.
• In the animated version of Ranma ½, female Ranma notably does this with Kuno's wooden bokken in their first encounter, leaping above his slash and then standing on the weapon for several seconds while Kuno gapes at her in disbelief, and then rushing up to kick him in the face. The manga version of the scene simply had her kick him and grasp the bokken with her toes simultaneously after the leap.
• Bleach:
  • Toshiro does this to Gin Ichimaru during their fight scene, though his weight does causes Gin's sword to drop to the ground.
  • Also, Ururu does this when Ichigo tries to punch her, leading to a face full of foot.
  • During her fight with Byakuya, Yoruichi shows that she's still faster than he is by leaping onto his outstretched arm. While carrying Ichigo over her shoulder.
• Rurouni Kenshin:
  • Hiko Seijuro of does one of these after a No One Could Survive That! moment while facing off with a giant. The fun part is that he's standing on the bottom of the sword, held there by his own katana that he stabbed through it.
  • Kenshin himself does this in his fight against Sanosuke, running down his Zanbato to hit him in the face. He even manages to do this in the movie, although not in the same way.
• Played RELATIVELY straight in Futaba-kun Change!, where a SUMO-WRESTLER does this. The owner of the sword couldn't hold for long.
• Not yet outdone by Katsuhiko Masaki, Tenchi's grandfather in the eponymous Tenchi Muyo!...by standing on a lightsaber.
• In Appleseed Ex Machina, Deunan runs upon an enemy's outstretched Humongous Mecha hand, taking the direct route to his cockpit. It's not the same as the blade but looks just as awesome.
• In Dragon Ball Z, little Goku has to save Master Roshi's Turtle from an evil monster trying to eat it. The huge monster takes an impossibly fast swing at Goku, and to his surprise, Goku is perched on the tip of his sword! Which of course leaves Goku free to punch the monster between the eyes, KO'ing it immediately.
• Devil Hunter Yohko: Yohko uses this, though she seems to have more of an "Eep!" reaction to the attack. Of course, she then uses it as a springboard to make a classic anime flying sword strike.
• Berserk:
  • In Guts and Griffith's duel on the hill to decide whether he will join the Hawks, Guts swings a mighty blow with his BFS only for Griffith to suddenly dodge, and then land with his feet balanced on Guts' blade and his saber pointed at Guts' face. Pointing out that Guts won't be able to lift his sword with the extra weight on it, Griffith invites him to surrender, but Guts responds by biting down on Griffith's sword point while using his own sword as a lever to send both of them tumbling down the hill, where they engage in fisticuffs.
  • Much later, Guts uses Azan's spiked staff as a ramp to get past him so that he can bull-rush Farnese.
• In One Piece, Captain Kuro moves fast enough to jump onto Luffy's stretched-out arm.
• Digimon Tamers: Vajramon has a lot of dialogue with Renamon while she's standing on his sword. Of course, it helps if you're as strong as he is (arm doesn't get tired, and you're totally unconcerned about losing). Unusual for this trope, he has his blade turned so she's on its flat, not its edge.
• Gintoki in Gintama does this in Benizakura arc while fighting Nizo's Benizakura, as seen above.
• A variation in Saint Seiya: when Shun was facing Shaina he attacked her with his Nebula Chain, only for her to leap onto the chain (which is attached to his gauntlet) and kick him in the face.
• Claire Stanfield from Baccano! puts his own spin on this by performing a blade handstand on the top of Graham's monkey wrench
• Done in a Case Closed episode where Heiji confronts a murderer while a Kendo competition is going on in the background. The man attacks Heiji while he has only a cellphone to protect him. The phone ends up being cut, Heiji lands on the blunt end of the blade with cat-like precision, and cue the killer's dumbfounded and fearful look when he not only recognizes him (Heiji is actually one of the best H.S. Kendoists and a famous detective) but could not save himself from the one-hit beatdown given to him.
• Happens in this Korean bootleg Gundam ripoff, in which the blade holder (definitely not Char) lifts the blade up and flinging the stander across the room.
  "Char Aznable": My God, she's standing on it.
• Subverted in the opposite manner in GUN×SWORD when Priscilla has her Armor Brownie stand on the edge of Dan's blade and tries to slide down in, but Van lets the blade drop and Brownie with it, which would have let Van punch her mech in the gut across the ring if she hadn't reached the ground and jumped back to lighten the impact.
• Negima! Magister Negi Magi:
  • Fate Averruncus does a variation where he briefly balances on Negi's fist.
  • Negi himself balances on Yue's sword/lance hybrid thing a couple chapters later.
• Naruto: One of the fillers (Land of Birds arc) has the baddy (a shinobi with a weight problem) standing on the very end of the goody's pike. As a bonus, the goody is a young woman and the baddy delivers his introduction speech without stepping off the end.
• The first episode of the All-Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku sees the title character do this, only it's a concrete pillar the enemy swings at her instead of a sword.
• Done twice in Claymore: the first one is a classical blade run executed by Theresa, the second one is a tongue run done by Clare.
• In Rental Magica, Sekiren manages to land on Daphne's foot and tell her to calm down when she tries to kick him. Her leg doesn't budge when he jumps off. She does calm down.
• Inuyasha: Juroumaru, a fairly nasty one-shot villain, managed to jump onto the Tessaiga, run up it and punch Inuyasha in the face. Justified in that the Tessaiga was absurdly heavy at the time, such that Inuyasha could barely move it.
• Gamaran did this twice, both times against huge weapons. First against Midou Shingo and his Onidachi spear (Demon Splitter), and later with Kibe Ryuho's club Kokusoso (Black Clawed Comb).
• In Hellsing, Seras forms her shadow-arm into a bunch of spears in an attempt to skewer the Captain. He dodges all of the blades and then stands on the tip of one of them. Seras' familiar Pip is amused by the fact that they're fighting a wolfman with a flare for the theatrical.
• A single Nichijou panel shows the school's Principal standing on the blade of a naginata that the Vice Principal had apparently been trying to slash him with, while a student looks on in shock. What led up to this is not explained, but that's par for the series.
• Optimus Prime has performed this in his Final Battle with Megatron in Transformers: Armada by running along a metal pole both had been using to trade blows beforehand.
• In The Animatrix, one of the short segments called "Program" feature 2 shipmates within a feudal era Japan simulation. In sparring one of the shipmates jumps to avoid her companions' polearm slashing at her, and she lands on the blade.
• In Tenchi Muyo!, Katsuhito does this during his battle with Kagato. Even more impressive is that Katsuhito is wearing sandals in the snow and is standing on a Laser Blade.

Films — Animation

• Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children: In duels, Kadaj or his companions frequently run on Cloud's sword which, to be fair, is the size of a gangplank.
• In Disney's Peter Pan, Peter likes to jump on Captain Hook's rapier while they are dueling, just to annoy him. Justified in the fact that Peter can fly, so his weight doesn't make the stunt impossible on the Captain's part.

Films — Live-Action

• Pai Mei does this to the Bride in Kill Bill: Part 2. Rather than attack her with his own sword, he simply makes a smartass remark and kicks her in the face.
• Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon practically introduced the mainstream west to this trope.
• Ant-Man and the Wasp: In the first battle of the film, a thug threw several knives at the Wasp (currently shrunk) and she briefly sprints the length of one of those knives to evade them.

Literature

• The Adventures of Samurai Cat: Miaowara Tomokato does this with a lance, during the Knights of the Round Table segment of More Adventures.

Live-Action TV

• Power Rangers Turbo: In "Bicycle Built for the Blues", Justin does this when fighting Big Burpa, landing on top of the monsters' sword and then use this new position to deliver a few kicks to the monsters' face.
  • The same scene also appears in its Super Sentai parent show Gekisou Sentai Carranger, where this is done by Naoki.
  • A similar scene with a blue ranger jumping on a monster's weapon and then attacking them while standing on it happens in Denshi Sentai Denziman when Denzi Blue lands on Kokelar's trident. In another episode the cat monster Noranekolar does the same thing in giant form to the Daidenzin, landing on top of the Denziken and breathing fire.

Tabletop Games

• Exalted: This can easily be done with stunts, or the correct Charms. (Seriously, you can stand on a spiderweb, you can stand on a sword.)

Video Games

• An unlockable video in Prince of Persia: Warrior Within features the Prince doing this on the handle of a halberd, after a Sand Monster struck at him, and missed (naturally).
• In Kingdom Hearts II, when fighting Captain Barbossa, Sora stomps down on Barbossa's sword, pinning it to the ground. Barbossa goes for his gun, and Sora goes for his Keyblade. Rather a cool moment.
• Dark Link is capable of doing this in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time if you use the stab move to attack him by freezing Link in place somehow and jumping onto the blade. This can be used to your advantage, however; if you use the broken "Giant's Knife" or the Biggoron Sword, he falls off. The other way to bypass this ability is to use a weapon other than a sword. What makes it worse is that, as the fight goes on, he'll stab you whenever he does this. This becomes incredibly annoying, given that most players will at this time be conditioned to stab a fleeing enemy.
• In the PlayStation 2 game Shadow of the Colossus, the third Colossus is a giant humanoid whose weak points can be reached only by running up his sword after he embeds it in the ground following an attack. This particular example isn't really physics-defying though — being the blade of a Colossus, it's pretty much a highway.
• Soul Series:
  • Maxi does this to Astaroth's axe in the opening video for Soul Calibur II, after Astaroth misses and gets it stuck in the ground. He proceeds to run up the axe to nunchaku Astaroth in the face.
  • Yoda also does the same thing to Astaroth in the opening video for Soul Calibur IV, minus the nunchaku.
• Metal Gear:
  • In Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, Vamp does this to Raiden in their fight in South America at the end of Act II.
  • Raiden gets to pull this off in the next game, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance... only with the tutorial boss. Which is a modified Metal Gear Ray.
• A variant in the first battle of Lost Odyssey against the Magic Tank. After Kaim takes out both its cannon units, the tank tries to lift it's blade arm, only to have it crash ineffectually to the ground due to lack of balance. Kaim uses the fallen blade as a convenient ramp to stab the tank's core, destroying it.
• Devil May Cry: The Shadow demons will sometimes attack by extending a long spike from their body, which then stays out for a few moments. While it's out, Dante can optionally jump and stand on it to shoot at the Shadow's now-exposed core, potentially reducing it to critical health right away if you're quick enough.
• Devil May Cry 4: In a cutscene, Nero does it on a giant sword that was originally attached to a statue of Sparda when he first battles Dante.
• Devil May Cry 5: Shadow's Skewer ability creates a long needle which V can jump and stand onto. He can then run across this needle for as long as it's active, which is useful if there's an enemy impaled at the endpoint. When Shadow is fought as a boss in Mission 18, the playable character can similarly run across the needle when it's used against you. It's a reference to a mechanic in DMC1 wherein Dante can optionally stand on top of a Shadow demon's spike attack, and then shoot at its exposed core.
• Done briefly in Dynasty Warriors 5:XL at the Battle of Jia Meng Gate. Zhang Fei engages Ma Chao, and goes all in on a big slashing swing of his snake spear... only for Ma Chao to leap off his horse, land on the spear shaft and blade, point his own spear at Zhang Fei, and leap back onto his passing horse. Even Zhang Fei is impressed by this feat.
• Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice: In a more realistic variant, the Mikiri Counter lets Wolf stomp down enemy weapons being used to stab, doing enough Posture damage to open most enemies up to a death blow.

Visual Novels

• Fate/hollow ataraxia: Bazett's attempt to fight the Third Holy Grail War's Assassin Servant ends badly because of this. With her legs paralyzed by poison needles, she lures him into attacking her from the left and counters with a Megaton Punch which she's sure he can't dodge or block. Assassin responds by landing on her outstretched fist and uses his Noble Phantasm on her.

Web Animation

• Weiss does it in her trailer for RWBY, though the fact that the blade is bigger than she is and being wielded by a 12 foot tall suit of armor helps a bit.
  • Her older sister Winter pulls off the technique in her debut fight. It may be a family trick. Like Weiss's example, its justified because the person she does this to is strong enough to create a crater in the pavement with his swing.
• In Bunnykill 4, Flint does this to Ruby's double-sided polearm.

Webcomics

• Kareem runs along Noor's fist constructs in Project 0 this way.
• Justified in No Need for Bushido: the main character Yori leaps onto Ken's sword — which is absolutely massive. That entire fight is a Shout-Out to Kenshin's fight with Sanosuke mentioned above, after all.
• As with so much else, parodied in Adventurers!!
• A strip of The Dreamland Chronicles is a rare case where the character jumping onto the sword happens on screen. Vaguely justified as this is dreamworld, so regular physics don't necessarily apply.
• Ada in The Story of Anima does this with someone's fist.
• Allison in Kill Six Billion Demons eventually learns this move. She learned the move from her mentor 82 White Chain, who did it on someone's fist. Incubus also knows how to do this, using it in a battle against Jagganoth — helped by the blade in question being at least twelve feet long and as broad as a decently sized footpath.

Western Animation

• A variant appears in Castlevania, where the mage Sypha tries to skewer a vampire by conjuring a thin wall of sharpened ice at him. The vampire decides to run along the top of it towards her. Sypha demonstrates one of the reasons why this trope is a bad idea by pushing the wall upwards, bisecting him vertically.

Real Life

• Some martial arts have techniques involving stepping on an opponent's weapon after a low thrust. The goal (and actual effect) is to pin the weapon to the ground. This is also typically done on shafted weapons (i.e. spears, staffs) not by stepping on the bladed part. Though if the flat of the blade is facing up, it could still be done to a sword.

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