#ch 1086

What a great chapter to leave off on a break for! The theorizing will go wild…

First, Igaram's concern for Vivi is touching:

…while Pell and Chaka are looking out for their king, as the guardian deities of Arabasta should.

Something is in the air, if the faces of the other royals are anything to go by. They don't look like a happy bunch; rumours from the last leg of the Reverie?

Second, have I already said how much I love the WE HQ? It's a flying kettle! That shoots out News Coos!

I love it.

I wonder at what point Wapol caved and told Vivi what had happened to her dad. They said she'd been crying when they arrived at the WE HQ, so before current day events, but here he's still trying to deflect her questions. Maybe she figured it out from his denial? Maybe he just told her? Who knows (I want to know).

And then, totally unnecessary fandom speculation!

About a ship!

(Poor lil' Bonney. I'm sure being pint-sized helped her get aboard the ship easier, but it also underlines her quest: she is literally a child on her way to save her father.)

(By the way: in our universe, Tajine is a North African dish, also known as maraq or marqa.)

The drawing order and perspectives makes it look like Sabo is lying in the stem/front. Normally the sides mainly bulge outward from the keel, but here the planks curve distinctly up. However, when looking at traditional sailing ships, the shape doesn't work that way there:

(Link)

It can look like that in the aft:

(Link)

The other explanation might be an assistant's perspective mistake when drawing the bilge, or Lulusia's ship has a quite rare inward-bulging bow.

One of the few examples I found is the dhow, an Arabic ship:

(Link), although the 3D model can give a better view of the keel and curvature:

(Link)

So either Lulusia has a really, really cool royal ship, or there's some perspective shenanigans going on.

And now, back to our regularly scheduled analysis.

So.

…the floor is so horribly at odds with the rest of the room. Just sayin'.

Presenting: the SECOND tangent of the post.

During the 15th to 17th centuries, so covering reneissance, baroque and rococo, intricate decorations were the thing to have. The exact style and execution varied, of course, but you still were supposed to have so much detailing all over the place, both due to structural reasons (hiding those load-bearing columns and beams and servants and such) and style (look at all the money I have to put on this stuff).

Pangea Castle looks quite a bit like the Château de Chambord, so smack dab French reneissance architecture. Normally, you'd do parquet floors in the fancier parts of the castle, which means geometric and rectangular, like so:

(Link)

Of course, you could do circular, but then it'd probably be inspired by Roman mosaics, and thus geometric and repetitive, like so:

(Link 1, Link 2)

The floor in Pangea Castle is… just weird. I know there's probably art-related reasons for it (looks interesting, not as boring as a grid, etc), but the polka dot pattern really sticks out.

End of second tangent, s'il vous plaît.

Oda truly is a master storyteller.

The readers have been going bonkers for a few months now, trying to figure out what Devil Fruit powers Imu has based on the complete eradication of Lulusia. Is it star power? Is it nuclear? Is it pure light? Is it something completely different?

And then it turns out to be the One Piece-version of nuclear weapons, completing the parallells between Vegapunk and Einstein: both brilliant scientists who wanted to work for peace and the good of humanity, but whose insights were quickly weaponised.

It i also interesting to see how quick the Five Elders are to accept that Imu wants to eradicate a whole kingdom who is part of the World Government. I figure this might lead to more rebellion. After all, what is it worth to be a member of the WG if you're still not protected against horrible acts of violence? The only reason shown so far for people want to join the WG is based on pirates and the navy: they get protection and pay for the Celestial Dragons upkeep. I can't see this continuing much longer when the news about Lulusia get out – because at least Vegapunk will put two and two together. It was his invention being used, after all.

We have names!

Which might change when the official translation comes out!

But still. Interesting selections. Finance might comprise all financial activity, but why is then agriculture (food production) separate from environment (nature itself)? Mercantile activity is quite far from macroeconomic theories, which makes the lumping of all economic stuff under one heading quite interesting.

THERE IS A S-FLAMINGO!

My life is now complete.

I wonder why S-Croc looks so sad, though. S-Gecko and S-Flamingo looks like they're having the time of their lives, after all.

Also: what powers do they have? All the possibilities!

I wonder what Dragon is wondering about. He has a lot of ellipses this chapter and few words to spare. Does he agree with Sabo's decision to keep silent and live the lie? Does he disapprove? What does Iva-chan think about it all?

Ancient weapon, my old friend? The Arc Maxim 2.0? Something Completely Different?

(Also: traditional European-style ship depicted here as Lulucia's vessel. Yet the dream for a dhow still lives on!)

Jumping a bit, but Iva puts all our thoughts into words here so neatly:

In Egghead, Vegapunk says it's his dream to create the ultimate energy source. However, he doesn't say he's managed to do so yet: he's still working towards it. Therefore the thing Sabo saw probably wasn't an ancient weapon – or if it was, it wasn't at full power. Or then it was a "fire once and find another mother flame"-solution.

Whatever it was, it was horrible news for the people of Lulusia.

And then: the identity of Imu.

There's so many theories going on, tying Imu to the Roman emperor Nero or the city of Verona or the small coastal village of Nerano , also in Italy. From where we get to another Roman emperor, who is actually called Nerona: Tiberio Nerone, also known as Tiberius, an able politician who spent his last years on the island of Capri.

I'm sure we'll see where Oda draws his inspiration from sooner or later.

And the other big reveal of the chapter: the Figarland family.

(I don't think Oda will kill off Mjosgard. He is sentenced, he is not dead yet. Will the solution be banishment, a figurative death? We'll see, I'm sure.)

(I like the moon hair!)

(Edit: The cake line had me wheezing. Seriously. Scared the cat.)

I haven't seen Film Red yet, but as I gather from others, it's revealed that Shanks is a Figarland. He was also found on God Valley by Roger, so putting two and two together, we get a family connection.

However, what I'm interested in is the rankings of Celestial Dragons.

a) Saint Figarland Garling was a king

b) He is a Celestial Dragon

c) He has the power to be both judge, jury and probably executioner

How does it all fit together?

CDs are hitherto shown to just laze around in Mary Geoise and sometimes descend into the plebeian world for their own amusement. None of them is shown to be involved in the world as kings – that's the thing they specifically abdicated from 800 years ago. So why was Figarland a king? What was his role on God Valley – and what was God Valley?

So interesting! Much to think about.

Oh hello Shanks’ probable relative. You seem like a bit of an asshole. And while I always kind of figured Mjosgard was bluffing when he told Leo and Sai they could do whatever they wanted and he’d vouch for them, he was actually a decent guy despite being a Celestial Dragon so of course there was no way he’d get away with it…