Video version: https://youtu.be/Gr_CnFvgdDo
Luffy’s Nickname Gallery
As the chapter begins, Luffy refers to Gaban as “Jijii” (ジジイ), which essentially translates to “gramps”. However, in the next bubble, he calls him “jijii no ossan” (ジジイのおっさん). The word “ossan” is generally a fairly casual term to refer to a middle aged or old man, and if you’ve payed enough attention to the anime, you may know this is a common word that Luffy uses to refer to a lot of the older characters. He’s often combined the word “ossan” with several other words as nicknames for other people. You can translate it casually as something like “old man”, or if you want it to make it sound more friendly, you could translate it as just “guy”, since Luffy isn’t exactly intending to be rude, even though he definitely comes off as such. If you wanted zero disregard for translation integrity and wanted to go full slang, you could even compare it to the English slang of “unc”.
He always combines it with some word, like “rhombus guy” for Cricket or “ice guy” for Iceburg as examples. On some occasions, he will just call some guys as simply “ossan” on its own though. This is one of the common nickname patterns Luffy uses, alongside “yatsu” (guy) or “otoko” (man). He also occasionally uses “jiji” (gramps) or “baasan” (granny) for nicknames too, though occasionally for people like Hyougorou he did just use “jijii” or “gramps”, in the same way he sometimes just uses “ossan”. In Gaban’s case, he’s used “ossan”, or “guy”, and “jijii” or “gramps”/”old man” for him. But in this case, on his second time calling him out, as mentioned he calls him “jijii no ossan”, which ultimately becomes “old man guy”, or “the gramps guy”, which really makes no sense, but it fits Luffy’s own mental pattern. The meaningful aspect is that “jijii” is usually slightly more rude (even if Luffy has used it for people he’s endeared to), while “ossan” sounds a bit more kind, so I guess it’s Luffy’s own way to show he’s worried.
Since there’s not as much to mention otherwise within this chapter, why not take the time to go over Luffy’s list of nicknames for others, so here’s all the occasions of unique nicknames I can recall. For starters, let’s begin with the times he’s used “ossan”:
Boodle was “chouchou no ossan” (町長のおっさん), or “the mayor guy”. Gaimon was “tawashi no ossan” (たわしのおっさん), or “the scrub guy”. Zeff was the “owner no ossan” (オーナーのおっさん), or “the owner guy”. Genzou was “kazaguruma no ossan” (風車のおっさん) or “the pinwheel guy”. Crocus was “hana no ossan” (花のおっさん) or “the flower guy”. Igaram was “chikuwa no ossan” (ちくわのおっさん) or “the chikuwa guy”, in reference to chikuwa, the Japanese roll, which is what Igaram’s hair looks like. Dorry and Brogy were “kyojin no ossan” (巨人のおっさん), or “the giant guys”, with Luffy also using “marui no ossan” (丸いおっさん) or “the round guy” to refer to how fat Brogy is. Dalton was “donguri no ossan” (どんぐりのおっさん), or “chestnut guy”, given the shape of his hair. Toto was “karakara no ossan” (カラカラのおっさん), or “dried up guy”, due to the fact he had been dehydrated by the lack of rain. Cricket was “hishigata no ossan” (ひし形のおっさん), or “the rhombus guy”, in reference to his face being shaped like a rhombus (some localizing it as “diamond face”). Gan Fall was simply “henna ossan” (変なおっさん) or “weirdo guy”. Tonjit was “takeuma no ossan” (竹馬のおっさん), or “the stilts guy”. Iceburg was “ice no ossan” (アイスのおっさん), or “the ice guy”. Spoil, the chairman of the victims association of Thriller Bark who worked with Lola, was called by Luffy as “zombie no ossan” (ゾンビのおっさん), or as you guessed, “the zombie guy”. Neptune was “moja moja no ossan” (もじゃもじゃのおっさん), or “the shaggy shaggy guy”. The Minister of the Left was “namazu no ossan” (なまずのおっさん) or “the catfish guy”. Fujitora was “tobaku no ossan” (賭博のおっさん), or “the gambling guy”. Kyros was briefly referred to as “douzou no ossan” (銅像のおっさん), or “the bronze statue guy”, in reference to recognizing him from the statue in the Colosseum. Riku Doldo III was “Ou no ossan” (王のおっさん), or “the king guy”. Vegapunk was “ringo no ossan” (リンゴのおっさん), or “the apple guy”. And even this arc Luffy didn’t just call Saul by his name, but “Saul no ossan” (サウロのおっさん), or “the Saul guy”.
There’s other similar patterns Luffy has used for other nicknames though. Another common one is using “yatsu”, which would be more informally something like “dude”. Examples include:
Satori, one of Enel’s priests, was “玉のやつ” (tama no yatsu), or “the ball dude”. Wyper was “バズーカのやつ” (bazooka no yatsu), or “the bazooka dude”. Paulie was “ロープのやつ” (rope no yatsu), or “the rope dude”. Lucci was the iconic “ハトのやつ” (hato no yatsu), or “the pigeon dude”. Duval was “仮面のやつ” (kamen no yatsu), or “the mask dude”. Magellan was “毒のやつ” (doku no yatsu), or “the poison dude”. Vander Decken IX was the convolluted “色々投げるやつ” (iro iro nageru yatsu), or “the throws-a-lot-of-things dude”. Tashigi was “めがねのやつ” (megane no yatsu), or “the glasses girl” (in Japanese it’s the same gender neutral term, but you’d have to change it here in this translation). Burgess was “チャンピオンのやつ” (champion no yatsu), or “the champion dude”. Bartolomeo was “トサカの奴” (tosaka no yatsu), or “the rooster hair dude”. Pica was “石のやつ” (ishi no yatsu), or “the stone dude”. Cracker was “ビスケットの奴” (biscuit no yatsu), or “the biscuit dude”. And Killer was “マスクのやつ” (mask no yatsu), or “the mask dude”. Ironically Luffy already called Duval as “mask dude” but used the kanji “kamen” instead of the English word “mask”.
His third main pattern is the one of using “otoko”, or “man” (男), which can also be pronounced as “o” in some cases. For example, we have Mohji being “kigurumi otoko”, or “fursuit guy” (mistaking his hair as being a fursuit/animal costume), Fullbody as “taihou otoko” (大砲男), or “cannon man”, and of course the iconic “Torao” (トラ男) for Trafalgar Law, which has been translated in many ways, but accurately is meant to be “tiger man”. This is because “tora” means tiger in Japanese, but it’s derived from Torafarugaru, the katakana phonetic reading of Trafalgar, so Luffy just calls him tiger man because his name reminds him of that word. Funnily enough, he once calls Doflamingo “torio” (鳥男) once, quite similarly to Law’s nickname, which instead means “bird guy”, due to his feathered coat making him look like a flamingo, though later he just switches to “Mingo”. On one instance, he also called Monet “tori onna” (鳥女), or “bird woman”, the rare instance of using the woman version of this nickname. Of course, there’s the two other iconic versions of this nickname, one being reserved for Kid, which is “gizao” (ギザ男), or “jaggy man”, in reference to his spiked hair, and “yamao” (ヤマ男) for Yamato after he claims to Luffy to be Kaidou’s son, which in this case means “mountain man”, as “yama” is the Japanese word for “mountain”. Another hidden one is Luffy calling Bartolomeo “Romeo”, which isn’t just a reference to the name Romeo, but also is written as ロメ男 with the kanji for “otoko”, literally making it just “rome man”. He also once called Perospero “ameo” (アメ男), or “candy man”.
These are his three main nickname patterns, but he’s had a few more. For example, he uses “granny” for old women, such as calling Kureha “isha no baasan” (医者のばーさん), or “the doctor granny”, calling Kokoro the admittedly really rude “kaijuubaasan” (海獣ばーさん), or “sea beast granny”, and Gloriosa “mame baasan” (豆ばあさん), or “bean granny”, probably because she looks as wrinkly as a bean. He also used (イカついばさん) for Alvida as one of his first nicknames, which means “pissy-looking granny”. Similarly, he’s used “jijii”, or “gramps” for a few characters. Tenguyama Hitetsu (or rather, Sukiyaki) was “hana jijii” (鼻じじい), or “nose gramps”, while Yarul was “ken jijii” (剣じじい), or “sword gramps”. Interestingly he used just “jiji” with Hyougorou, but he first said it in katakana (ジジイ) while he later switched to hiragana (じじ～), perhaps to sound softer and more endearing after they became closer.
On the other, there’s using “chan”, which is a Japanese suffix often used with female friends or people you’d really consider to be more effeminate. Luffy uses this for his three non-binary friends, Bon Kurei, Ivankov, and Inazuma, whom he refers exclusively to them as “Bon-chan” (ボンちゃん), “Iva-chan” (イヴァちゃん), and “Kani-chan” (カニちゃん), or “Crab-chan”, given Inazuma’s big scissors. Given how he calls Yamato as “Mountain Man” as well, it seems Luffy is shockingly conscious of how he uses nicknames for others.
Of course though, he’s also quite more creative with nicknames on occasions when he goes fully original. These include “baka musuko” (バカ息子) for Helmeppo, translating to “dumbson”, Buggy as “dekappana” (デカっ鼻), or “bignose”, Kuro as “warushitsuji” (わる執事), or “evil butler”, “Jamaguchi” (邪魔口) for Wapol, which is a pun on the Japanese name “Yamaguchi” instead meaning here “pain in the ass mouth”, Mr. 3 as just “san” (さん) or “three”, Karoo as “bird” (鳥, tori), Smoker as the very affectionate “Kemurin” (ケムリン), or “smokey”, Crocodile as “sunawani” (砂ワニ), or “sandcroc”, Enel as “mimitabu” (耳たぶ) or “earlobes”, Foxy as “wareatama” (割れ頭), or “split head”, Franky as “kaisui pantsu” (海水パンツ), or “swim trunks”, Moria as “dekarakkyo” (デカらっきょ), or “big leek”, Shirahoshi as “yowamushi” (弱虫), or “coward”, later evolved to “yowahoshi” よわほし, or “cowahoshi”, with her brother Fukaboshi as “anihoshi” (兄ほし), or “brohoshi”. Of course he calls the kraken as “surume” (スルメ), or “dried squid”, while he calls the brutal bull of the Colosseum as “Ucy”, a pun between “ushi” (cow/bull) and his nickname as “lucy”. Brownbeard is “chawani”, (茶ワニ), or “browncroc”, Caesar is just “gas” (ガス), Dagama from the Colosseum is “Daruma” (ダルマ), in reference to the round Japanese dolls, Cavendish is the iconic “Cabbage” (キャベツ), Trebol is “Hanamizu” (ハナミズ), or “snot”, Pekoms is both “kamemamushi” (カメマムシ), or “turtleviper”, and “pekomamushi” (ペコマムシ), or “pekoviper”, Shishilian is “shishimamushi” (シシマムシ), or “lionviper”, King Baum is just “tree” (木, ki), while Brûlée is “eda” (枝), literally “branch”, due to the fact she looks like a dried up tree branch. Opera, the cream son of Charlotte, is the quite rude “warts head” (ibo atama, イボ頭), due to the bumps coming out of his head, Speed was “Umami” (ウマ美), or “horse beauty”, although likely just a pun on the taste of umami, Queen is “balloon” (風船, fuusen), and Ulti is “zudzuki” (頭突き), or “headbutt”.
Finally, the most classic Luffy nicknames is when he just can’t pronounce them, or just shortens them for the sake of it. He first called Brook the weird Koropookkr, Hancock as Hammock, Kin’emon as Kin, Momonosuke as Momo, Kanjuurou as Kan, Doflamingo as Mingo, the announcer Gyatz as Kyatz, Pedro as peropero, or lickylick, Wadatsumi as Wadakichi (ワダ吉), Bonney was “Bogey” before she corrected him, and Belle-mere was Molly-mere.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed that tangent, but let’s go back to present!
1191
Imu transforms into yet a new form, which admittedly looks pretty goofy, but I’d assume it’s probably not his final form. Regardless, its shape is already more reminiscent of the demonic drawing we saw in the Harley, although I wouldn’t be surprised if he still has a third more final form. His seemingly white hair also begins to flow upward, more evoking of the way that Nika’s hair appears in Luffy’s Gear 5th awakened form, clearly drawing parallels between the two as both Imu and Nika appear to have red eyes and white hair. This also finally shows us his left eye, and the three skulls, the symbol of the Devil as we’ve spoke before, are now present on the chest instead. The covenant Mark can also be spotted on his left arm.
Imu attempts to skewer Gaban with Honebami again, once more showing multiple omen snakes jutting out of it, but is stopped by Hajrudin, who uses Gungnir. This is the same move that Hajrudin used to finish off Machvise in Dress Rosa, with its kanji, “eiyuu no yari” (英雄の槍), reading as “the hero’s spear”. This is in reference to Gungnir being the spear of Odin, a spear said to always hit its target no matter what. The reason for this name is because Hajrudin’s name is a wordplay of on Odin, the major god of Norse mythology.
To help him out, Loki joins in, as he, Hajrudin, and Luffy unleash the three-way version of Hakoku, being Goukoku. As we’ve mentioned before, the one man version of the attack is called Ikoku (威国) or “mighty nation”, first shown by Big Mom, the two man version is called Hakoku (覇国), or “conqueror nation”, first shown all the way back in Little Garden by Dorry and Brogy, and the three man version is called “Goukoku” (轟国), first recently shown by Gerd, Goldberg, and Road. This latter version is usually preceeded by “sanshou” (三将) or three generals. Luffy seems to have been roped into it though, because before the attack he goes “Gomu Gomu no” but then once they start chanting out their attack Luffy just rolls with it and allows himself to be part of the Sanshou Goukoku.
1192
Luffy continues the onslaught by launching an attack called “Gomu Gomu no Dawn Kraken Gatling” (ゴムゴムの白い怪物蛸/ドーンクラーケンガトリング). As you know, Dawn here is written with the kanji for “white”, while “kraken” is written with the kanji for “kaibutsu tako”, or “octopus monster”, which is a bit of a childish way to refer to the kraken. This attack of course is referencing the kraken’s shape, because since it’s often referred to as a great octopus, Luffy’s limbs here are flailing around like octopi tentacles. The name is more fitting in the world of One Piece as Luffy has met a kraken, the specimen from the North Pole that Luffy met at Fish-Man Island which he calls “Surume”.
Imu responds by summong both Toufuu, Blade of Chaos, and Boufuu, Blade of Nothingness, to unleash an attack called “Toufuu wa boufuu” (トーフ・ワー・ボーフー/空虚の盾). Its kanji reading is that of “kuukyo no tate”, or “shield of emptiness”. On the other hand, as you might remember, the phonetic reading is the Japanese reading of “tohu wa-bohu”, the Biblical Hebrew expression which refers to the state of the world before God said “let there be light”, which of course is the original namesake of both blades. The attack takes the form of a shield of total darkness, which engulfs all of Luffy’s attacks and doesn’t let any of them push through, which is fitting of the concept of the complete darkness that existed before light. The depiction of it as a round circle is even similar to the way that the tohu wa-bohu is depicted in some Christian iconography. Though as seen later we see the shield shattering, so clearly it is not all that unbreakable and absolute.
This is also the first time we see the Toufuu proper, and as we expected it appears to be a counterpart to the Boufuu, though it seems to be just as much of a cutlass, looking almost identical. Given the omen on both of Imu’s wrists, it makes sense that he can now pull the weapons directly around his hands to immediately grab them. With this, we only have yet to see the Muramasa as well as nine other blades!
During the brief speech Usopp gives to Gaban, he puts up a brave face, but you can clearly tell he’s a bit nervous. His dialogue in Japanese reflects that a bit, though more than anything you can literally see his legs shaking, as indicated by the shaking sound effects around them or the woobly lineart.
Loki charges an attack with Ragnir and Luffy has an idea to combine himself with it. The idea comes in the form of a light bulb illuminating within his speech bubble, wihch reminds me of something Oda said during his interview talking about Gear 5th where he used the example of the idea lightbulb to show how he wanted to reintegrate the concept of traditional rubberhose cartoons into Gear 5th. The combined attack then becomes Gomu Gomu no Dawn Thor Bullet (ゴムゴムドーントールブレット/白い雷神弾丸), an upgrade of his usual bullet attack with the Dawn variant, indicative of Gear 5th, and the Thor variant, indicative of a lightning attack, but it’s yet to see how much damage this really will be able to inflict on Imu. In a sense, there’s something quite poetic about seeing Luffy land an attack named after Thor together with Loki, bringing that Norse mythology all the closer.
1193
As he finishes the attack though, Luffy begins to lose energy as he feels like he’s fading out of Gear 5th, claiming his wounds will return. This seems to imply that the reason he was able to stop his wounds was due to the absurdist powers of Gear 5th, but showing that those powers are limited simply to his transformation and are only more like temporary illusions rather than a complete change of reality. However, just as he begins to despair, he lets out a “hm”, showing he’s noticed or realized something, but sadly the scene cuts away.
Similarly, we get a few cutaways of a few more things, such as the shadowed hybrid Loki, the waking Shuri, or the mystery of the library. This one’s slightly more interesting as there’s some scant details we get: we are told that within this large chest there is a “tegami” (手紙) or “letter”, and a “dougu” (道具), or “tool”. The letter is pretty straightforward, as it’s clearly some message from the past, but it’s yet to be seen just what kind of tool this is. Biblo at the very least believes that it is important to open the chest now, suggesting it might prove useful for this battle. The chest looks large enough to potentially harbor a poneglyph, which might be the “letter” Biblo speaks of, perhaps serving as a message the same way that Joyboy’s poneglyph on Fish-Man Island did. On the other, the tool could perhaps be something akin to another haki knot like the one Emet had, or something similar that can hopefully help drive away Imu faster.
Back to the fight between Zoro and Sommers, Sommers deploys invisible thorns that he can make appear and disappear at will, in an attempt to trap Zoro. He refers to Zoro as being like a “frog frozen by a snake’s eyes” (蛇に睨まれたカエル), which is a Japanese expression akin to the English “deer in the headlights”, when an animal freezes up due to fear in the face of danger. This expression gains more significance though as it likely parallels Mihawk’s expression of calling Zoro a frog, referring to the proverb of “The Frog in the Well does not know the vastness of the sea”, an old proverb from all across Asia that encapsulates someone who believes themselves much stronger than they really are due to their limited knowledge, what we’d call the Dunning-Kruger effect in English. As such, Sommers calling Zoro a frog can be seen as a way to demean him, but Zoro doesn’t let himself get phased by such petty bait.
The whole time Zoro understands that the key to defeating the God Knights isn’t just Conqueror’s haki, but to let that hit those bizarre steel mechanical hearts to the point they shatter. Which is why we’ve seen the likes of Gunko having her whole torso blown apart by Usopp but then having it regrow, because the heart was blown up here, but without Conqueror’s haki it just regenerates and grows back with the whole body. This also recontextualizes why Harald pointed to his heart with his finger, which was a scene we actually saw in Chapter 1170 but wasn’t explained back then.
1994
As the fight between Zoro and Sommers continues, Sommers uses his Ibarancha (イバランチャー, once again, a pun between “ibara”, or thorns, and “launcher”), while Zoro fights back with a traditional move of his, Hyoukindama (豹琴玉). To remind of the pun, the kanji reads as “Leopard Koto Spheres” (koto as in the instrument), which doesn’t make much sense on its own, but is likely meant to be some variant of pun on “hyou kotodama”, or “commentary on the power of words”, harkening to the concept of kotodama 言霊, the shintoist belief that words can affect the environment and souls around us. In reality though, as the phonetic reading indicates this can be read as “Hyoukindama”, which just means “leopard balls”, which follows Zoro’s long pattern of attack names harkening to shintoist or buddhist beliefs while also being puns on the most random silly words. Similarly to the past, the motif of a leopard can be seen drawn alongside Zoro.
The same pattern applies to his later attack of 1080 Pondo Hou (千八十煩悩鳳), whose kanji reading means 1080 Worldly Desires Phoenix, referring to the 180 worldly desires of Buddhist belief but multiplied times ten for this stronger version of the attack, although it can be similarly read as “1080 Pound Cannon”.
Sommers retaliates with a move he calls “Ibagram” (イバ憤怒剣/イバグラム) where he mixes his spikes with the Gram blade, which similarly to the Ibarancha, combines “ibara” with “gram”, just with an extra g in between. He then uses an attack called “Ibaran” (イバ乱) which once again is a pun between “ibara” and “ran”, which means “chaos”, “disorder”, or “revolt”, essentially unleashing a chaotic attack. Following it up though is a distinct attack which is called “kiryuu” (牙竜/キリュウ), which as its kanji indicates simply means “fanged dragon”. As we see, he seems to create some kind of fanged serpentine dragon with his Omen, perhaps in this case unique to Gram. The usual phonetic reading for these kanji of “garyuu” is changed to the more specific “kiryuu” here, perhaps because “kiryuu” means “demonic dragon”, fitting the demonic appearance it has as an omen-spawn. Interestingly, here Sommers explicitly states that Omen is the counterpart to haki, which confirms our suspicion that Omen is an opposite of haki, given how its kanji reading of “maki” (魔気), or “demonic energy”, is really similar to that of “haki”, or “ambition energy” (覇気).
Zoro harkens to a flashback with Mihawk where Mihawk references the concept that also doubles as the chapter title of “all things are in constant change”. This is reminiscent of the Buddhist concept that all things are ever changing and transientary, and that essentially all things are bound by the ever changing flow of time and mortality. But Mihawk dares to assume that a conqueror is one standing so much above the rest that their very sense of self remains unchanging and unflinching, as if above all other mortal life. Part of the reason why Zoro seems to struggle so much though is because one thing is being able to possess conqueror king’s haki, and the other is to actually imbue it into your attacks, which as Kaidou told us way back when in Chapter 1010, it’s something that only a few conquerors are able to do.
In the scene where he keeps explaning this concept at the table, he brings up the one trait possessed by all conqueror kings, and Perona chimes in by claiming it’s facial hair (specifically she uses the word “hige” (髭), which can mean either a mustache or a beard). Right above her we see an expression going “haaai” (ハーイ), which is meant to be the sound a kid would make when raising their arm to answer their teacher in class. On a random note, in this image Zoro still appears to have both his eyes, so it would seem he had not yet lost his left one.
Funnily enough 18 of the current 30 conqueror’s haki users do have some kind of facial hair one way or another, and that will go up by one if we include Sanji soon enough too. As mentioned before, we are assuming among that number that Juu Peter has conqueror’s considering all other four Gorosei do, and Dragon seemingly has it too given how Ivankov claimed he wasn’t surprised Luffy had conqueror’s haki since he was Dragon’s son, which makes it quite apparent what that means through basic reading comprehension. Similarly, though this chapter technically does not confirm Mihawk as a conqueror’s haki user, basic reading comprehension once more makes it clear that he wouldn’t be explaining this concept to Zoro if he himself wasn’t a conqueror (although the slander would be pretty funny if he wasn’t). With this, it seems that both of the wings of the Pirate King might finally get their chance to awaken their Conqueror’s haki… although I suppose Zoro will have to do it without the need to grow a beard.
The interesting thing is that the term Mihawk uses here in Japanes is the kanji “onore” (己). This might be familiar to some Japanese readers but will likely be lost on most of us reading translated: the term “onore”, in this context at least, represents the concept of “self”, but it’s acutally been used by Mihawk a few times before. For example, when Zoro recalled Mihawk teaching him about coating his blades with armament, Mihawk stated “Think of even a single chip to your blade as bringing shame on your very concept of ‘self'”. This line in turn referenced the line Zoro gave to Mihawk that “A wound on the back is a swordsman’s shame”, with Mihawk extending this concept to the chippings of a sword. Similarly though, if you recall, when Mihawk encouraged Zoro to surpass him he told him “onore wo shiri” (己を知り), which means “learn your self” or more correctly “discover your self”. But in this case he isn’t asking to discover himself, but rather his “self”, that same concept of “onore” which is mentioned this chapter. As such, while this chapter is stating a concept we generally already understood about conqueror’s haki, it’s a much more meaningful moment for Zoro, as this essentially means that this chapter is when he finally discovers his own sense of “self”, what Mihawk had encouraged him to do all that time ago when they first dueled. In other words, Zoro is now that much closer to finally achieving his ultimate goal: to become the world’s greatest swordsman.
