Video version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KSf2UyGJiwI

MORE cameos around the world

On the cover, Yamato observes Hiyori making bento boxed lunches, while Toko is preparing onigiri with her hands. As a neat detail, one of the bento includes a skewer filled with oden ingredients.

We seamlessly cut from this cover to the present Wano Country, where we see Momonosuke eating some dango with Kin’emon, Shinobu, and Tama. Kin’emon himself is now wearing a coat with a moon, the symbol of the Kouzuki clan, just like the one Momonosuke wears. On the castle itself, the large flag that Luffy gave Momo at the end of the arc can be seen, marking Wano as his territory. As they mention, the den den mushi they are listening through was one left behind by Orochi, as Wano otherwise has a local population of Tanishi, like the large one seen in the background, whose range is limited to the island itself. The fact this is Orochi’s den den mushi can be noticed from his own pattern on the shell, the crown, and the topknot.

Meanwhile we shift to G-4, the fourth Marine base on the Grand Line, which we actually had never seen before! After this, we have currently see all five of the Marine Grand Line bases, including G-1 on Marineford, previously Marine Headquarters, G-2 from Ace’s cover story, G-3 which appeared briefly in the Summit War Saga, G-4 now, and G-5 of course form Punk Hazard. Beyond those we know of up to G-14 which has appeared during Egghead, but we’ve only heard directly of G-9, unless you count the non-canon G-8 of course.

Trapped within this base are the crew of Demalo Black, the fake Straw Hats from Sabaody. In this case Black himself is cosplaying as Kid, with a tattoo on his arm instead of a mechanical arm, while Drip who posed as fake Sanji is Killer, Mountblutain who posed as Zoro is Heat, and Turco who posed as Franky is Wire. Also notice that we get a proper romanization of his name, which is “Demalo Black”, despite most fans incorrectly calling him “Demaro”. This fits, because “malo” is Spanish for “evil”, so his name is literally just “The Evil Black”.

Switching to Zou, not only is Zuensha listening to Vegapunk’s broadcast, but also Carrot, alongside Wanda, Shishilian, Giovanni, Yomo, and Concelot. As noted by her cape, it seems she’s already been enthroned as the new King of Zou. The city itself also appears to have been mostly repaired since the attack on Zou by Jack three months ago, thankfully.

Next is Foxy, who despite appearing in several anime specials and films, has finally returned to the manga after nearly two decades! In his new post-timeskip form, he is sporting quite the stylish beard and mustache now, though his crew of Porche and Hamburg don’t seem to be doing too well. They seem to be starving and left on nothing short of a tiny ship featuring the shape that was seen on the Foxy pins from the Davy Back Fight as its figurehead, a far cry from the grand might of his previous ship the Sexy Foxy.

In between these scenes, Nasujuro cuts the entire Labophase in half, splitting the cloud down the middle in an insane feat sure to make the biggest of Zoro fans salivate. This causes the lower side of the cloud to fall down towards the ground. The lower basement where the Cipher Pol agents and Seraphim were kept in, deep into the cloud, falls alongside it. It’s possible then that the Gorosei could order the Seraphim around, who are leagues stronger than the Pacifista, making them a massive threat to be unleashed, but this once again depends on if Bonney can override their orders, or if that only applied to the Kuma-looking Pacifistas.

Followingly we see Koushirou at the Isshin Dojo of Shimotsuki Village, Zoro’s hometown, followed by the Revolutionaries, and then Cocoyasi Village, where we see Genzo, Noko, Chabo, and Nojiko listening to the call on a little den den mushi that has a palm tree as decoration. Nojiko however walks away to tend to her tangerine crops, in a move perhaps similar to how Luffy did not show interest in Nami’s story either during Arlong Park.

Back at Mock Town again, as its pirates are seen mocking Vegapunk again, we get a brief cameo by Roshio, the character that first debuted in the Jaya arc as a powerful pirate only to be quickly defeated by Bellamy. We also get to see Dalton and Kureha at Drum Island, as well as Marianne, Drophy, and Mikita, also known by their former codenames of Miss Goldenweek, Miss Merrychristmas, and Miss Valentine, who all retired from the criminal life to live out honest jobs at a New Spiders’ Café on a wild west island of the Grand Line, which appears to be the same from this panel.

Furthermore we get to see Water 7 once again, as indicated by the Galley-La symbol on both the visual den den mushi and one of the jackets, where the feed is being projected onto a hanged sail of a ship in one of the docks by the foremen who are looking on. Curiously, among the crowd is also a member of the snakeneck race. And finally of course, we have Vivi, Wapol, and Morgans.

Vegapunk’s Message

Continuing with Vegapunk’s message from last week:

…Why was he called a “pirate”?
Well, I’ve only read a few poneglyphs…!!
…However, what was written on them was the record of an “immense battle” that once took place.
Joyboy’s opponent was… what is currently the World Government!!
Or to be more exact, the temporary union of 20 kingdoms prior to the establishment of the World Government… they were the “Allied Powers”!!
…You could say that the need for such an alliance proves how stalwart Joyboy’s group was…!!
…And since I don’t know what was the “spark” that ignited this conflict, I’ll simply refer to it as a “clash of two different ideologies” rather than good vs evil.
As I mentioned earlier, I discovered that the kingdom Joyboy was born in was a country with an incredibly advanced civilization, which is hard to believe could’ve existed 900 years ago.
Particularly given how the “weapons” that existed during the conflict of this century seem impossible to recreate even with modern scientific knowledge! Even for a genius like myself…!!
And therein… lies the issue.

In this case, Vegapunk specifically uses the term “immense” to refer to this battle, which was the same term that Clover used to refer to the kingdom itself, referring to it as an “immense” kingdom. Clover also mentioned that the Government likely feared the ideals of the ancient kingdom, which explains this clash of ideologies that Vegapunk speaks of. He also refers just like Clover to the prior name of the World Government, the “Allied Powers”, and refers to Joyboy’s faction as a “group”, though the term itself is not much detached from what one could consider a crew in Japanese.

Furthermore we get a small image of Joyboy seemingly fighting against three of the 20 kings, as indicated by the crowns in their heads. Crazy enough as it may be, when you think about it this is actually the very first time that Joyboy has visually appeared in the entire manga. While it was already plenty obvious by now, this is also undeniable proof that Joyboy was indeed the first user of the Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika, as he can be seen having awakened the fruit in this panel, leaving no room for doubt. However, in this panel he looks fairly human, with fairly average proportions. Saturn mentioned that the Buccaneer tribe’s crime was something connected with Kuma’s desire of wanting to become like Nika, which seemed to imply the possibility that the original Joyboy was a Buccaneer, but this panel would suggest otherwise, as this Joyboy doesn’t look very Buccaneerish, though it’s hard to draw any conclusions so far.

Joyboy’s defeat… closed the curtain on the Void Century…
And its conclusion… left in its wake immense and irreparable scars of war…!!!
The world as we know it is one that can only be crossed island to island.
Navigating these seas is difficult, to the point most people don’t ever get the chance to know cultures beyond their own…!!
But what we now take as common sense… was not how things were in the world of a thousand years ago.
Due to a “cataclysm” that occurred during the Void Century… the world already once sank under the sea!!!
What we are currently living on is at the top fragments that remain of past continents!!!
The world from 1000 years ago has now… sunk out of sight at the bottom of the sea!!!
It is conceivable that in ancient times… there were several continents in this world we don’t even know of today.
…If the world remained as it had been in the past, then it would’ve been impossible to erase 100 years of history from the world’s memory… but with this flood, it would make perfect sense.
In just the Void Century, the sea level rose… by 200 meters!!!

Though many of us already jumped to the conclusion a couple chapters ago, this is still an insane revelation, as it explains the very origin of the One Piece world as it is today. This is a theory that has existed in the fandom for decades, hell even I talked about it a lot a decade ago, and it’s because usually you don’t get a world this fully submerged in water without a specific flood having taken place.

But this confirms that indeed, the One Piece world is just like that of the Legend of Zelda, the Wind Waker, a world that has been mostly submerged by water, causing only the highest peaks of the highest mountains and plateaus to remain above water. It seems that during the Void Century Imu likely used his ancient weapon enough times to drive the sea level up to 200 meters, causing a lot of the lower land of continents to sink under the sea.

In the current One Piece world, as we know, the main continental landmass is of course the Red Line, a colossal continent which stretches around the world like a ring. It isn’t however the only continent, as for example, in Don Chinjao’s flashback we see what is referred to as the “Jewel Ice Sheet Continent”, which is referred to as an ice sheet continent, much like Antarctica in our world, that does qualify as a “continent” as it is referred to by that same word in Japanese. However, in spite of that, the Red Line is still the only major continent in the world.

Going by Oda’s maps and sketches of the world, we also know that there are some islands that are far larger than any others in some of the blues. As an example, we actually know the name of the largest island in East Blue, being Yotsuba Island, which is actually where Shells Town is located and where Luffy met Zoro. But in the example of something like Yotsuba Island, it is still referred to by Oda as an “island” rather than a continent, meaning that it is likely not big enough to be considered as one. And if you look at the map of Yotsuba and its surrounding islands, does it not look like a larger landmass that was submerged and only its tallest parts remain? It is quite likely that what became Yotsuba Island today was once part of a larger continent that encompassed its surrounding islands as well, such as Dawn Island where Luffy was born, and maybe even beyond the rest of the East Blue such as the Conomi Archipelago from where Nami originates, which are all gathered in the form of clusters showing the outline of what likely was one single original massive Western continent.

In fact the same can be said of other oceans, like the South Blue or West Blue, where it is evident from just a quick glance at Oda’s own map sketches that most of the landmasses are all gathered around specific spots that look as if they were once all part of a bigger continent, showing clusters of what likely were the former continents in ancient times.

To make it completely clear, the original One Piece world was likely already submerged in large part by water, in the same way that ours is, with planet Earth being 70% covered in water. But there’s a big difference between that and the entirety of the world living mostly in isolated islands, like it is in the present, which is where that 200 meter difference comes in.

However the sea always existed. The people of the Moon, who seemingly colonized it prior to the Void Century, referred to the lower planet in their murals by the name of “Bluestar”, or the “Blue Planet”, in reference to the seas that composed most of it already, confirming it was even over a thousand years ago still in large part covered by water, just with much larger continents connecting it much like our planet. For example, Fishman Island is located 10,000 meters under the sea, so a 200 raise in sea level would not really have changed much for them, meaning the island may have been founded prior to the Void Century eitherway.

However this could bring further context to the promise between Joyboy and Poseidon. It was implied in the story by Neptune that the promise was the same dream that Otohime had, being to emigrate fishmen to the surface through the ark. However it’s possible that after most of the world sank under water, the continental landmass where the Fishmen were supposed to emigrate to was not available anymore, and the strained relationship with the humans and Joyboy’s overall defeat after the war made a move to the surface too risky, so they had to await until a new Joyboy and a new Poseidon would reappear, the two kings the Sea Kings mentioned. Ironically enough, it seems the ark Noah could not be used in the face of a great flood.

This would further explain the elevation of a lot of islands in the current One Piece world. The prime example is of course, Wano. Wano already tried preventing this flood by erecting massive walls around the country. Which did prevent external flooding, as they were waterproof, but this also caused rainwater to accumulate within them, forcing the Wano Country to eventually be displaced higher up Mt. Fuji. Similarly the Minks may have elected to live atop Zunesha in case the world became further flooded, and the same could be said of sky islands, though this could depend based on how old sky islands really could be. Though if you ask me personally, I really believe that sky islands were created artificially through the advanced technology of the kingdom, just like how Vegapunk created the Labophase. And of course, this once again reinforces the idea that Impel Down may have been once built on ground as a grand tower, explaining how otherwise such a colossal edifice could have been constructed underwater, eventually however becoming the underwater prison. I’m sure there are many other connections we can make, but generally, it is evident some in the past took these floods as a word of advice.

Grand Line and Red Line

However this of course brings us to the two biggest elephants in the room, who surprisingly aren’t Zunesha, but rather I’m talking about the Grand Line and the Red Line. First of all, the Grand Line is a bit of a big mystery. Unlike the other four oceans of the world, where we can evidently see that most of the islands there are located around big clusters of what used to be large continents, the Grand Line is a uniform set of islands that are all scattered across this same line, incredibly linear for being a natural continent. And there’s also the fact that all of these islands have incredibly powerful magnetism to them, which again I wonder if that may have a reason tied to what led to the world becoming like this. Is the Grand Line a natural continent that was similar to the Red Line but built perpendicularly to it, with a lot of mountains that became the many dotted islands of the Grand Line, or did it come to be in some other form?

And by the same token, how did the Red Line come to be? Did it always exist as an actual continent, or was it created during this flood by the ones who caused it? After all the Red Line was referred to as being a collection of islands, so was it somehow cobbled together? The confusing thing is that according to Whitebeard, before Mary Geoise, atop the Red Wall there was the “God Country”, the country of the Lunaria that was instrumental to the ancient kingdom. This would imply that the Red Line existed since times prior, but this statement is explained so vaguely that we also can’t say for sure. What if maybe the country was located in a sky island built around the Sun Tree Eve, that eventually got swallowed up by the Red Line when it was formed? It’s hard to say for sure with what we know so far whether the Red Line and Grand Line were naturally existing or were also manmade created after this manmade disaster.

…But why did the sea levels rise only during that span of 100 years?
It would be natural to think of this as an unexpected natural disaster, but… I assure you it was in reality a man-made disaster!!!
If it was nature that caused such a “natural disaster”… then it would only be natural that beyond its first impact, it would have left permanent damage to the world over centuries!!
But no matter which angle you look at it from, be it from Climatology, Geology, Enviromentology, or Atmospherology,
This isn’t the type of fluctuation that would simply happen and subside after just a century!!!
That means its cause lies elsewhere.
When I detected that the sea level was going to rise the other day, I became certain…
The cause of it is the “ancient weapon” that sank the world into the sea 800 years ago, and the reality is that it still exists today!!
It means someone’s been waiting to fire it again…!!
In other words… the “immense battle” that took place during the Void Century… is not over yet!!!

This finally answers a mystery that has been lingering for a very long while. In an SBS, Oda alluded that the name of “Pangaea Castle” had some deeper meaning behind it, and while we could assume, now this would make perfect sense. Pangaea is the name of a supercontinent that the Earth used to once have, at a time when the Earth only had one single massive continent, rather than the several continents of other periods. This would match with the world of One Piece, as Pangaea Castle stands as a symbol of how there are no more scattered continents like in the past, but instead a single united super-continent in the present.

Furthermore, “Pangaea”, which means “all the earth”, also includes the word “gaea”, which was the name for the Mother of Nature, what in One Piece has its equivalent in Umi, the Sea. And we’ve long since talked about the fact of how Imu may very well be this figure of the Sea Devil, the one that punished devil fruit users to drown underwater, but as this chapter confirms that Imu was the one that caused the flood all those years prior, suddenly it all begins to make sense. Why is it that Imu would’ve made devil fruit users weak to water? Well, now it just makes a lot more sense, doesn’t it? Because by flooding most of the world, Imu would drown all his enemies that ate devil fruits along with it. It just matches that the person who would make devil fruit users drown in water would also make the entire world drown alongside them.

However, it is evident that Imu could not complete his mission. After those 200 meters, the flooding stopped. And we currently also know why that is the case, as Imu lost the power source that alimented his ancient weapon to destroy the world, one that he hasn’t been able to reattain until Vegapunk reinvented it again in the present. The Gorosei even mentioned that if they were able to use the mother flame to power their ancient weapon once again, then, in their words, “they could finally bring this long war to an end”. Which matches what Vegapunk says in this chapter that the war of the Void Century has not yet ended, and that the Gorosei and Imu intend to bring it to its conclusion by powering their ancient weapon once again and flooding the world. Something that would cause, as the Gorosei put it, “a great cleansing” that would sink the world beneath the waves, aside from the Red Line where Imu and his chosen elites would survive.

This all also helps better explain a certain element, being how the formation of the World Government is a historical event that is referred to as the “creation of the world”, with it being stated the Celestial Dragons are those who “created our current world”. Now we realize that this may very well have been literally, as the world as it currently is was created by the hands of Imu.

In this chapter, Vegapunk even confirms to us that what Imu used to accomplish this, being one of the three ancient weapons, which Ivankov already basically guessed for us, but some fans said that wasn’t conclusive enough evidence. However, there’s really no room for doubt about it here, Imu possesses one of the three ancient weapons. And the thing is, since we already know that Pluton currently sleeps under Wano, and that Poseidon is Shirahoshi at Fishman Island, by process of elimination this means that Imu’s ancient weapon can only be… Uranus. The god of the skies, which fittingly enough flies in the skies and blasts enemies below, leaving a massive hole in its wake, causing earthquakes and tremors that led to a rise in sea levels. We already saw when it was used during the Void Century in the hole at Enies Lobby, and perhaps other holes may exist in other places as well, and now it is once again being used to further sink the world beneath the waves.

Fittingly, this answers another mystery as well, as it was mentioned by Sengoku that Whitebeard’s power has the power to “destroy the world”. This terminology has only been used to refer to the ancient weapons, so Sengoku was comparing Whitebeard’s power to one of the ancient weapons. Why? Well, now it makes perfect sense: Whitebeard was literally able to create earthquakes and tsunami, causing effects similar to those of Uranus. And now that power is in the hands of Blackbeard, someone who specifically planned to steal that power, and similarly seeks the ambition of attaining the world.

The All Blue

But all this also brings into question a bigger question: What about the All Blue? What is it really? Some previous theories believed the possibility of the One Piece world having been divided by the Red Line, and while that could still be the case, it wouldn’t make sense for the All Blue to have been the world prior if it was… well, less “blue”. But perhaps the “All Blue” could’ve still been the hypothetical world that would exist after the destruction of the Red Line, assuming that the seas could not be drained anymore, but to do the best in a unified world into one ocean once again.

This does make us wonder though what exactly the general objective here is. What is the point of the Dawn of the World, is it destroying the Red Line and thus unifying the seas? Or is it perhaps draining the world? Or how about… both? See, the thing is, if you were to destroy the Red Line through conventional means, then all the rocks that form it would fall and collapse onto the sea below, which would only raise the sea levels further by displacing the water. But what if the ancient weapons are so powerful that the Red Line could very well be completely evaporated. Disintegrated and vanished without a trace from top to bottom, even if this would cause the destruction of Fishman Island, just as Shyarly prophesized Luffy would one day too, though that would be offset by the Fishmen emigrating to the surface.

If that happened, then suddenly all the empty space where the Red Line once was underwater could then be filled by the seas, resulting in the sea levels around the world actually draining a little, potentially reversing the damage that Imu did during the Void Century. That still would result in a planet where all the oceans are united as one, becoming an “All Blue” of sorts, but where the world is more connected as one large ocean with several continents just like our world.

Perhaps that may be what Roger, Toki, and many others told us all along… the day that the Dawn of the World happens is the day that the “world is turned upside down”. Where the waters are drained and the world below resurfaces once more.

And this brings us to our final question for today… what about Laugh Tale? If the world sank beneath the waves… did Laugh Tale sink beneath it too? See, there’s something that’s been bothering me all this time and it’s the fact that Crocus mentioned that Laugh Tale should still be located at the end of the Grand Line close to Lode Star, a fact that Inuarashi seemed to support. But evidently on Lode Star there is no Laugh Tale, the two islands are separate. But what if Laugh Tale is a part of Lode Star that is… deep under water? Or maybe somewhere else but still has sunk to the depths of the sea. That’s why it can’t be accessed through traditional means because without a chart of where exactly it is located, it would be impossible to know where exactly to look underwater, it’s not a place you can just randomly stumble upon, and would still be incredibly difficult even from below water for fishmen without any navigation.

Roger could’ve gotten to the island by just coating his ship again and heading to the coordinates that he got, getting to find that treasure. But maybe if Luffy does lower the sea levels by destroying the Red Line, the island would naturally emerge on its own. Though of course, there is still a possibility that Laugh Tale could be elsewhere as we have countless guesses for where it could really be, but still, this would make sense. Particularly as Roger’s final words would make even more sense. “Kono yo no subete wo soko ni oitekita”. “I left everything in this world down there”. The expression of “down there” in Japanese can simply refer to something that is simply placed far, hence why it’s often translated as just “there”, but in this case perhaps it could be quite literal… showing that the One Piece may actually still be sleeping… at the bottom of the sea.