<span style="font-style: italic">"You have precisely 3 minutes to hold onto me. After that, I am going to run so quickly that you will fall off and I would be miles ahead of you."</span><br/><br/>Nyoko gasped, her eyes widening as she was suddenly picked up, but she clutched Blake as hard as she could. Her arms entwined around his neck and shoulders, her muscles tensing up to hold as hard as if he was a rope, holding her from drowning. The wind, blowing into her face, which swiftly appeared above Blake's shoulder, swept her hair back. "You can run now... If I held even a little bit tighter, I'd strangle you." she assured him, shutting her eyes tightly, and clenched her fists around his robe.<br/><br/>In the meantime...<br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">"Regardless... You know I don't want to fight you. Not just yet, anyhow... So where's the Mystic? You know he's the one I want."</span><br/><br/>Cold metal screeched as Haruki's hands clenched around his katana's blade. At the slightest sound, he unsheathed it, lightning-fast, just a flash of light, reflecting the quickly fading flames. Acting by sheer instinct, his feet spread into an battle-ready stance, back arched above the blade that he held straight before himself, a shield and a spike of death in one.<br/><br/>"Don't act like you don't know me!" he growled into the dark, at the figure that approached him. The sword wasn't shaking, and neither was his desire to fight. "It makes no difference to me what you want. An opponent without a will to fight is... Weak. And if you're weak... Then you aren't worth worrying about."<br/><br/>He drew a sharp breath in. He could feel every string of muscle in his body ready, as tense as steel wires. "I came to kill you. And if I can't kill you, then I'll at least make you stare Death into the face!" he growled.<br/><br/>Without warning, he sprang from the ground, like a bolt, fired from a crossbow. And his sword in his hands, aimed straight at the Black Samurai's head.