Video version: https://youtu.be/A0prK85WXAA

Cover

On the cover, this time we get a color spread of all the Straw Hats riding atop a giant Franky robot. Though it may appear like a random choice, this cover does in fact carry a very significant message, which is the graduation of Kazuki Yao from the voice of Franky in the One Piece anime.

As you’ve likely heard, due to his old age, Kazuki Yao has decided to retire from voicing Franky during all these years of the One Piece anime, and so Oda offered this cover as a tribute to his graduation. Fitting is the message on his shoulder of “we are eternal”, paying tribute to the idea that even if Kazuki Yao may retire and one day leave us all together, his voice will forever live on within the anime of One Piece. As a neat detail, Robin sports her Elbaph haircut as well for consistency.

Saul and Vegapunk

Starting the chapter, Luffy thanks Saul for everything he did to Robin, but does so in an… incredibly overtly polite and weird way, sounding totally unlike him. The way he is speaking is similar to that of a yakuza, a dialect spoken by some characters like Fujitora for example, and the way he sounds makes him come off like a yakuza thanking someone else for helping out their son. It is also fairly similar to how Jinbe has expressed himself at some points, having done the exact same gesture when he returned to the Straw Hats, which is fitting as it is Jinbe who calls out Luffy here. But at the same time it’s also possible he may have gotten it from the yakuza of Wano such as Hyogoro, and is just trying to imitate them.

Saul then mentions the fact that Robin has finally found a crew of friends she can trust, which of course in Japanese here is the word “nakama”, with Saul telling Robin that one day she would definitely find “nakama” that would care for her and protect her. No matter how long it took, she finally found them, which is a positive reminder that no matter how alone you are, it is never too late to find true friends.

Saul continues to offer his thanks to Luffy and the crew, you can spot in the background both Bonney and Lilith hanging on the edge of the ship. Speaking of the latter, she comes down to Saul and re-introduces herself. Saul is confused, asking “why did you become a woman”, but Lilith just replies with an expression that basically can mean “why not?”. She also explains that she has brought a package from Egghead. As you might remember, during the crisis of Egghead, particularly in Chapter 1093 among others, Vegapunk Stella asked Jinbe to bring a certain piece of luggage onto the Sunny. This luggage now turns out to be, as Lilith explains, a clone replica of Stella’s body, as a way to “restore” the original Vegapunk. Though some may cry foul at yet another fake death, we don’t yet know if this body would actually hold the memories and will of the original Vegapunk body, and instead might actually be inhabitable by the other Satellites, or perhaps be its own distinct cloned aspect, as the way it’s presented does make it seem that the original body and will did die, but the aspects in the brain lived on. Interestingly though, she seems to claim this is the Vegapunk body that came to Elbaph 20 years ago in order to avoid suspicion from the Government.

Lilith thus decides to remain at Elbaph, a safe place where she can be protected from the clutches of the Government, and build a new laboratory here, where eventually she’ll be able to get this other Stella body out once she has the technology for it, marking it as her spot where she gets down, despite the cries of Lilith for nakama from some fans.

Responding to this, Bonney asks her if she can also “make her dad well”, which is a very vague child-like term, so it’s hard to say what that will involve. But it’s possible that Vegapunk might find a way to take Kuma’s will and actually restore it in some form of clone body that he is actually able to move, thus being able to bring back his will. Though his will was “killed”, his body is technically still alive, so it’s possible he may have somehow survived and thus might ultimately come back, for the better or the worse depending on who you ask. This may however suggest that Bonney and Kuma might stay at Elbaph with Vegapunk until Kuma can be fully restored.

The Walrus School

The woman who warned about Saul having collapsed is properly given a name. Saul first mentions her earlier in the chapter but she’s then fully introduced as “Ange” (pronounced as “an-jeh”, who is a librarian at the Owl Library and assistant to Saul. Her name might be derived from the nordic mythical figure of Angel, the ancestor of the people whose land would later be called England after them. Her speech pattern is very well behaved, as is evident from her body language.

We are introduced to yet ANOTHER stunning location, being “Seiuchi no Gakkou”, translating to the “Walrus School”, as evident by the walrus figurehead with a graduate’s hat on top of it. It is composed by several round structures, some of them being held aloft, all built atop a branch of the Adam Tree. A small dam seems to either keep a confine or the water in place from fully spilling, and several swings are hanged at different points for the children to play around (a total of five or six in fact). Gerd and Ange decide to show the likes of Luffy, Usopp, and Zoro around the Walrus School, while Saul takes Robin, Nami, and Chopper, to the Owl Library. Brook comments that it’s nostalgic going back to school, which is funny since of course for him it must have been like 70 to 80 years ago. At the same time, it’s a small detail that indicates Brook received an education in the kingdom he was a knight of. Perhaps that is how he learned to play so many different instruments.

Meanwhile, in the background, Franky wonders about the colossal tree that Elbaph is made of, which of course is him already cottoning on the fact that this is the very same Treasure Tree Adam of which the Sunny is made of.

The Straw Hats at the Walrus School get briefly bullied by some giant kids, but the girls put them in their place, forcing them to apologize. They also ask them not to call them “chibi ningen”, or “little humans” as it’s seen as a pejorative term. It turns out these giants are much more well-behaved and polite than one might expect, being educated on the idea of being pacifist than warriors.

Elbaph History Lesson

They get a better explanation from the person they accidentally ran on, being Ripley-sensei, or Professor Ripley. This was the mysterious Ripley mentioned a couple chapters back, whom the bartender asked Collon to bring food to. It makes sense, as Collon would have reason to come all the way to the school, being a kid and all. Her specification as a teacher is “living creatures”, what we’d call “Biology”.

She’s got quite the viking design, featuring the same braids that Gerd, Loki, Ange, and several others have, and a tattoo running over her left eye and all the way through her body. This tattoo is traditionally associated with the image of vikings, despite the fact that there isn’t much historical evidence to suggest this may have really been the case, but it’s survived as such in their public image. Unlike the children, she actually speaks fairly rudely, saying “Sorry our brats won’t shut up”, which even the kids point out that it’s really rude, but she tells them to just “not follow her example”. She uses the fairly casual feminine pronoun of “atashi”.

Going back to what she was saying, she explains that unlike the fierce Giant Warrior Pirates of 100 years ago, the giants have changed with the eras. She explains that the previous king, Harald, had tried to change and reform Warland, into a country where, in his words, he wanted to favor trade over war. He faced a lot of opposition from more traditional elders, but it seems he was on his way to bring about this change, until he was eventually killed by Loki in order to seize that legendary fruit, before he could fully achieve his dream. Ripley even calls herself part of the last generation of warriors, which puts into question how Usopp will further react to that concept and his personal growth.

We already saw hints of this in Big Mom’s flashback over 60 years ago, where Jarul and Jorul talked about Carmel wanting to bring about “trade over war”, even using those exact same words in Chapter 866. So perhaps it really may have been Carmel that inspired a younger Harold to start bringing about this change, all of them unaware of her true nature and how those were all lies, ironically enough. It does make you wonder however if Loki had some grander purpose in wanting to kill Harold, and if he disagreed with his values being someone who seemingly likes violence, or maybe even seeing it as a doomed future for Warland given the dangers of the Government if they softened up.

Next, Saul shows us inside the Owl Library itself. In this beautiful sprawling location, giant books are dotted all around, with intertwining vines and staircases to access them all. A giant owl watches from above, which is unclear if it’s actually alive or some sort of statue or whatnot, next to which is a lone chair. Mysteriously, this library has the power to enlarge any book it enters instantly, which most likely has to be some sort of devil fruit having effect over the area, but I wonder what type of fruit it is specifically and who is using it, perhaps even the owl itself?

Also, as we know, Saul was able to preserve the books of Ohara thanks to Harjudin’s help. Robin recalls her first time stepping into the library, which is a memory that already appeared within her flashback. However, this should also hopefully include the poneglyph research that the scholars of Ohara did, which Vegapunk had studied and learned about, detailing in his broadcast. Supposedly, this should include the elusive name of the ancient kingdom which should serve as a key to its people’s identity and values, but unfortunately we don’t get to it here quite yet. Hopefully this isn’t something that will take another one or two hundred chapters to get to and we get to read it soon!

Loki and Mosa

Switching to Elbaph’s underworld, Loki is having a call with someone via den den mushi. This is a new snail type, being a yuki den den mushi, or snow den den mushi, adapted to cold and with voice recognition, meaning Loki doesn’t need to use his hands to use it. Because of that, it’s hard to understand if the fur around it is meant to be a beard of the person speaking, or just its natural fur, as it appears to have a beard and a mustache, but it’s unclear if it’s just native to this species so it can survive the cold better.

Loki is speaking with a friend, whom he addresses as “Mosa”. Particularly, he calls this person with the suffix “-kou” as “Mosa-kou”, which is a very old honorific used for high ranking people, something similar to “Lord”. A modern example you may know of is the dog Hachi-kou, the one that inspired Chou Chou’s story, which was affectionately given this honorific to honor its incredible service waiting its owner. It is odd however to hear Loki address someone like this.

Their identity, or gender for that matter, is fairly vague, particularly as they speak extremely politely. They seem to have a very delicate voice however, such as saying “oh please don’t raise your voice”, one that would sound more female, but it could also be a more delicate-sounding man. However, the den den mushi seems to have long eyelashes, once again suggesting it could be a female. Loki seems to be quite close with them, so maybe it’s even someone Loki has fallen again after all this time. After all, despite how delicate they sound, they believe Loki is someone who is kind deep down, potentially twisting the idea that he is some evil villain around and he actually ends up becoming an ally during this arc.

Obviously, he’s still quite the violent and brute type, as he still offered to massacre all the people that were attacking Mosa, and even earlier mentioned wanting to kill Luffy, but he does seem to have friends with both the animals of the mountains and Mosa personally. Mosa appears to have gone through some traumatic event, but the details of it are all completely vague at the moment, particularly odd as Loki and Mosa don’t seem to have ever even met each other, making one wonder if Mosa is even from Elbaph to begin with.

The Rat Descends

Back to the West Village, as the giants prepare for the party, suddenly a massive black bolt falls upon the royal castle. A bolt that we should be quite familiar with, as it is one we saw at Egghead. We see a large chamber within the palace, what appears to be the throne room given the giant throne. Oddly enough, it seems to be in damage and disrepair, though likely not by this bolt, but rather the conflict between Loki and Harald. Not having been used since then, it makes sense this room has sort of fallen into abandon.

From the flash appears a demonic circle, the exact same from which the Gorosei spawned, including the bizarre script written around the circle. The only difference is that the Gorosei’s circles had a number on each of the star edges, from one to five, starting from Ju Peter all the way to Saturn. However, these have no number, as the ones coming here aren’t the Gorosei. We now have a better understanding of how these circles work, being the powers that Imu conferred to the Gorosei, thus meaning that the Gorosei can spawn each other within their vicinity. We had originally assumed the condition is that the Gorosei could only teleport each other to one of the five’s vicinity, but could the demonic circle be able to be cast… anywhere in the world? Or were there special conditions that let it work here? It does appear that both robed figures came at the same time, but just how exactly did this work? It also brings into question if Imu can teleport anyone or if it is only people who have made a pact with Imu. As such, do the two of them perhaps also have demonic powers?

Either way, far juicier is the identity of the two robed figures, because while one of them is more mysterious, the other one is… none other that Red-Haired Shanks??? That appearance is indistinguishable after all, the red toned hair, the beard, and those eyes… but then again… what if this wasn’t Shanks?

We’ve had a similar case of a figure appearing exactly like this, and it was during the Levely in Chapter 907, where Shanks appeared in front of the Gorosei, or at least… that’s what it looked like at first. As a result of this interaction, Shanks had to bear years of mocking and harassment for being a “rat”, with all the memes that even I’ve gladly taken part of it. But perhaps our man was unjustly accused and framed by someone else… an evil doppelgänger! Your honor, I present my case!

In reality, this figure was never called “Shanks”, so we are simply assuming from appearance. Furthermore, said figure was only seen from a side profile on their right side of their face, not showing the Blackbeard scar that would indeed be unique to Shanks. At the same time, this figure was fully covered in a cloak, also not showing what would be an otherwise telling cut left arm. The same thing is valid here: we cannot see the left side of their face, and the cloak fully covers his arms as well. His speech pattern too, although incredibly brief, was also quite more polite.

The Gorosei told this man that a man of his standing shouldn’t be involved in politics, which many assumed to be because he’s Shanks the Yonko, but what if they were referring to him being of a different standing?

Let’s get straight into it: for a while now, a theory has proliferated that Shanks does in fact have an evil twin. At first thought, this theory sounded absurd, but over time, it’s just made more and more sense. When Dragon showed the silhouette of the God Knights, one of them looked a lot like Shanks. There’s also all the things with this weird Shanks that we mentioned earlier, emphasized once again in this chapter. And there’s also the silhouette at the end of Vegapunk’s speech bearing a sword similar to Shanks’s gryphon.

And we have to think of the background as well: Shanks was originally a member of the Figarland family, being related in some form to St. Figarland Garling. However during God Valley, he accidentally ended on the Oro Jackson, and was thus raised by his adoptive father Gold Roger. Which, uh, weirdly enough makes him Ace’s stepbrother, but let’s not get into that can of worms.

So if that’s the case, there’s the possibility there was another twin Shanks who did remain a celestial dragon and thus decided to follow the path of being a god knight, making everything fit together. A knight like him should have no place in politics, for he is only a knight, but still wanted to warn about a certain pirate he had his eye on. And a member of the god knights could be summoned by Imu to do his bidding.

The girl too that he is summoned with, or at least we are assuming from her incredibly feminine eye, is likely a God Knight as well. We can’t really recognize her face, but she appears to be wearing a bandage over her mouth and nose, as well as some form of armor in front of it. On the side of her head, beneath the robe, she appears to wear a slanted cap, which is hard to see but you can see it’s slightly glossy. She’s likely to be a new character, but weirdly enough she does slightly resemble Lilith. It’s also possible she might be one of the children of the God Knights we saw during God Valley’s Genocide Tournament, and she might even give us the name of a new celestial dragon family of the remaining unnamed ten if we are lucky. I also wonder if the God Knight wearing a moose skull is in any way related to Elbaph, which is why Road wore a similar skull too, or if it was just Oda playfully teasing the possible arrival of the God Knights in the future.

No matter how you think about it, it doesn’t make sense for Shanks to be the one being summoned here for Imu like this, especially when he could easily roll into Elbaph as an ally and secretly betray the giants, so it feels almost certain that this is indeed a different person. Meaning that Shanks does indeed have some form of evil twin or doppelgänger, meaning that, at last… Shanks has beaten the rat allegations!!