The One Piece Manga just revealed something
that will change the course of story like nothing has, probably since Ace’s battle
with Blackbeard that lead to the war at marineford. And that’s because Eiichiro Oda has just
kicked off a battle between Trafalgar D. Water Law and, yup you guessed it, Blackbeard. Again. A development i think no one had on their
radar, especially since we just saw Marshal D. Teach being chased off Amazon Lily by Rayleigh
and Boa Hancock, kidnapping Luffy’s marine friend Koby as a little souvenir in the process. And now he has ambushed Law, another one of
Luffy’s friends, who was on his way to the next island after leaving Wano. Blackbeard has been obsessed with with getting
his hands on as many devil fruits and poneglyphs as possible in a very short time. We know this, because while he and Law are
preparing to clash, it seems that Aokiji, who has teamed up with Blackbeard for yet
unexplained reasons has invaded Big Mom’s territory and has not only taken her Poneglyph,
but also kidnapped Pudding, one of the selected few people who can actually decipher the Road
Poneglyphs and lead Blackbeard to Laugh Tale before Luffy. And now, should he successfully defeat Law,
Teach has to chance to not only add Kaido’s poneglyph on top, but also get his hands on
Law’s legendary devil fruit powers, that include the eternal youth surgery that Doflamingo
wanted above anything else. Has Aokiji truly become Luffy’s enemy? Is there any chance that Law could win this
fight? And what would it mean for Luffy and story
if he loses? Turns out, we might already know the answer
to all of these. To understand why this chapter and Law’s
battle with Blackbeard is such a big deal, we have to take a closer look at Blackbeard’s
actions in the story so far. Because even though the story tries really
hard to sell Teach as a impulsive and dangerous idiot, the truth as you well know, is that
Blackbeard is one of the most cunning characters in the story, that has carefully and patiently
planned to get where he is today. Luffy’s biggest rival for the title of Pirate
King and right nowI would say the top contender for reaching Laugh Tale first. As you’ll remember, Teach, who seems to
be connected to and inspired by the legendary and infamous pirate Rocks D. Xebec, joined
Whitebeard’s crew in the hope to get his hands on the Yami Yami no mi, according to
him the strongest devil fruit in existence, that seems to have been the core piece in
his plan to rise to the top of the pirate world. Once he got lucky and had the fruit in his
reach, instead of stealing the fruit, he chose to murder his crew mate, well knowing that
Ace would come after him. His goal from the start, as we now know was
to get his hands on Whitebeard’s Earthquake powers as well, which is why he joined his
crew in the first place. His plan was to start a war between the Marines
and Whitebeard, well knowing that he doesn’t have a chance against Whitebeard, yet. Despite his betrayal, he still fears and respects
the man. So he prepares everything for his big moment,
a calculated gamble with high risk, but immense reward. He makes sure to get on the good side of the
World Government to become a warlord and thus gain access to the high security prison Impel
Down. He hands over Ace to the Marines, telling
them about Ace’s heritage, well knowing that the government would want to turn the
execution of the pirate king’s son into a major publicity stunt. And he also knows, that Whitebeard would come
to save his son, because he used to be part of that very same family, that he never loved
in the first place. Once the war had begun, Teach used the commotion
to enter Impel Down and grabbed some of the most powerful and infamous pirates locked
away on level 6 into his crew. Now commanding a quite formidable force, he
grows confident, that he will be able to see his plan through all the way. He waits until both marines and pirates are
exhausted from the war. Then he sees his chance, he swoops in, and
even though he underestimated the power of a dying Whitebeard, is able to steal the Gura
Gura no mi and escapes, now with 3 essential pieces of his plan secure in his hands: Two
of the most powerful devil fruits in the world, a crew of monsters and Whitebeard’s vacant
place among the Yonko. While Luffy and the straw hats train over
the time skip, Blackbeard starts the third phase of his plan. He knows there are still people out there
strong enough to snuff out his ambitions. And that scares him. So he does what he does best, lay low and
wait. While all the other Yonko’s are being challenged
by the members of the worst generation, Blackbeard is happy securing his position and getting
his hands on as many useful and powerful devil fruits as possible to boost his crew even
more. We have already seen that his commanders have
eaten some truly frightening devil fruits and 4 new ones are revealed by Oda here as
well. Jesus Burgess has eaten the Riki Riki no Mi
giving him abnormal strength so he’s easily able to lift a mountain. Doc Q has the Shiku Shiku no Mi, the sick
sick fruit, which is quite ironic. He can infect people with sickness. Van Augur can teleport people using the warp
warp fruit. And Doc Q’s horse Stronger has eaten the
mythical pegasus zoan fruit, that basically just gives him wings i guess. It looks like the devil fruit phase of Teaches
plan is now also complete. Which now brings him into the final stage
of his plan, that he needs to become pirate king: Getting his hands on the four road poneglyphs
and finding a way to decipher their contents. For that he has laid low and waited for the
right moment. He was too scared to challenge either Big
Mom or Kaido heads on, but now that they have been defeated by Luffy, Kid and Law and knowing
that they would get their hands on Kaido’s poneglyph, he waited in the waters around
Wano and tracked down the one out of the three that arguably poses the smallest threat to
him right now. And sadly that person is law. Blackbeard attacks his submarine and forces
Law to retreat to a nearby island, where he can now engage him in a one on one battle,
that he is very confident he can easily win. So it looks like while Luffy is learning more
about the true nature of Devil fruits from Doctor Vegapunk, Law, who’s a doctor might
get the chance to learn more about Blackbeards strange body. But even if Teach is able to defeat Law here
and get his copy of Kaido’s poneglyph, what about the rest? Well, turns out, he’s been on the move for
the rest of them all along. We have now gotten three covers in a row,
that strongly suggest that Aokiji is in Whole Cake island, Big Mom’s territory, that after
her defeat is pretty much defenseless. Where we know another road poneglyph is hidden
in this room. The first cover shows two mysterious figures
appearing in town. The second is chocolate town, where Luffy
first met Pudding, completely frozen over. And now, we see Cracker, one of Big Mom’s,
commanders, frozen over. And it looks exactly like this, where Aokiji
froze Robin or here with Luffy. And Brulee has realized that Pudding has vanished,
Big Mom’s daughter of the three eyed tribe that allegedly can naturally decipher the
inscription on the poneglyphs. This of course shouts Blackbeard, not only
because it’s the very same chapter as his attempt to get Law’s poneglyph, but also
because of this panel here, where one of the Gorosei reveals to us that Aokiji has teamed
up with Teach. Which feels strange, because as we know from
all these moments here, Aokiji always seemed to be a good guy, even sympmathizing with
Luffy. In his youth he was a big admirer of Garp
and his sense for what’s truly just and fair, representing a more gentle and human
side of the Marines and the government. He protected Robin, spared Luffy on Long ring
island AND during marineford and the last time we saw him he saved his friend smoker
from being sliced into salami by Doflamingo. But it also very much looks like he’s delivering
a road poneglyph, a crucial piece of information to get Blackbeard more power, directly to
him. What’s going on here? At first glance, you really have to wonder
if Aokiji didn’t actually just legitimately switch sides. Maybe he lost faith in the world government
so much after his battle with akainu, that he decided to tear it all down, even if it
meant joining hands with Blackbeard. And it’s definitely a real possibility that
would make for some truly interesting plot down the line. But I don’t think it’s very likely, Oda
has portrait Aokiji as a force of good on countless occasions, many of them where he
didn’t need to show any kindness. He also doesn’t seem like the type of person
who would hold a grudge or even be out for revenge against an organization that is full
with life long friends of his. Just look at Punk Hazard, where he went out
of his way to save Smoker from being killed. I don’t think that’s the type of person
who would want Blackbeard to burn all of the marines to the ground. There are 3 alternatives to Kuzan now having
gone Anakin Skywalker on us. First, and in my opinion the most likely option,
is that he is still with the Marines, an undercover agent for the secret marine unit sword, that
operates independently and without the knowledge of the government, which is why the Gorosei
didn’t know about it. He could also have teamed up with the revolutionaries. A force that wants to take down the celestial
dragons, but not the Marines themselves. Or he could be out there doing his own thing,
gathering intel on Blackbeard independently and delivering it to whoever he finds worthy
in the end, which would then most likely be Luffy. But right now it doesn’t really matter whether
Kuzan is friend or enemy or spy. He is still working with Blackbeard and it
looks like he will bring him not only a second poneglyph, but someone who can translate the
ancient language on it for Teach. That would give him 2 Poneglyphs really quick. Unless law is able to actually win. But is that even possible? Law has now a bounty of 3 billion berries
for a reason. Why he teamed up with kid to take down Big
Mom, he is still one of the strongest pirates out there. Law not only has an incredibly versatile and
powerful devil fruit, but maybe even more importantly the brains to get the most out
of it. Blackbeard is a schemer, but so is Law, it’s
no coincidence that both of them benefited from the Rocky port incident, which Law orchestrated. He can absolutely match Teach when it comes
to strategy and maneuvering. And since his devil fruit allows him teleportation,
he could get close to Blackbeard without giving him the chance to nullify his powers. His gamma knife was one of the keys in bringing
down Big Mom and since he has awakened his fruit, it is more powerful than ever. Law also has an incredibly high level understanding
of Haki, confirming something in this chapter that we have only speculated so far: Powerful
haki allows the nullification of devil fruit powers. Which could be a real game changer against
Blackbeard. Teach on the other hand is ridiculously powerful
at this point. Not only did he easily defeat ace with his
darkness fruit, which power you can see on these panels here, but now wielding Whitebeard’s
Gura Gura no mi, he has maybe the strongest offensive power in the world as well. Just look at what whitebeard did to the ocean
with it. On top of that, Blackbeard has Doc Q with
him, while Law’s crew has yet to prove their worth. They didn’t really shine all too much during
the raid on Onigashima. I think that even though Law would at least
have a decent chance against most people in the world, I just don’t see him taking down
Blackbeard. Teach has been built up throughout the story
to be luffy’s main rival for the one piece. He is bound to be one of the, if not THE main
villain of the story. he just kidnapped Koby and was responsible for ace’s capture and
death. Don’t you think it would be a bit anticlimactic
if he could be stopped by Law? No offense to Law fans. Law beating Teach makes absolutely no sense,
neither power wise nor plot wise. I only see 2 options for law to not get captured
or killed by blackbeard here and hand over his poneglyph plus possibly his devil fruit:
I think law is capable enough to try and get away from the fight and maybe warn Luffy and
co about his powers. Or, and this would be very dark, but it’s
possible, he could sacrifice himself and remotely perform the immortality surgery on Luffy to
not have to perform it on Blackbeard. We don’t actually know what the conditions
for this ultimate ability are, so it’s definitely an option. Because if Law actually ends up losing this
fight, it would truly change the projective of the entire story. Here’s why. Again Law has a road poneglyph, he has one
of the most valuable fruits with the ability to make someone immortal, but there is also
this (Beppo). And you know where the third road poneglyph
is right now? Exactly. here. If blackbeard captures Law, he will have 2
poneglpyhs and a mink, that could lead him to the 3rd one hidden in the whale tree on
Zou, the home of the minks. Not only will that put Blackbeard on Luffy’s
level, with 3 red stones and someone to decipher them, but he would have 2 of luffy’s best
friends as hostages. Luffy was so traumatize by losing ace, he
would not hesitate a second to come for them if he finds out that Blackbeard might kill
two other people who are close to him. And Teach is smart enough to draw people he
wants something from out with their loved ones. We already saw that with Whitebeard and Ace. SO he might wait for Luffy to get his hands
on the 4th poneglyph and then bait him with law and koby to take it from him. and then, with the road to laugh tale, a crew
of monsters and 2 or maybe even 3 powerful devil fruits, what is going to stop Teach
from becoming Pirate king before luffy? Where will he get a third fruit and how is
he able to eat more than one devil friuit in the first place? We don’t know yet, but I have a pretty interesting
theory that you can watch here next.
