One Piece Every Day is a column where I read a chapter of One Piece every single day—more or less—and discuss my thoughts on it. Each entry will have spoilers up to the chapter covered in that day’s column.

Please keep in mind that many other readers are also first-timers. Do NOT spoil anything beyond this point in the comments!

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Today marks the start of a new chapter. Another instance where the placement feels kind of random, since it seems more like this arc is ending than beginning. Still, this is a pretty explosive way to kick things off, and the chapter does use the extra couple pages afforded to it here well. Lots of action in this one; so if you’re into that sort of thing (and hey, who isn’t?) you could do a lot worse than this.

If you’ve somehow lost track of things though, don’t worry, One Piece will happily get you up to speed with this character cheat sheet. (Honestly, these things are a godsend for critics like myself, too. I won’t pretend otherwise.)

We also get a particularly nasty glower from the Bad Butler as our chapter art. It makes him right mean looking, I’ll say that much.

The chapter itself opens with Usopp’s pirates running Kaya through the woods to the North of the slope on which Luffy, Zolo, and Kuro are still fighting. They keep a good pace, but Django is in hot pursuit the entire time, and as we eventually see at the end of the chapter, he does catch up to them. Partly by doing a bit of ad-hoc forestry with his chakrams as he pursues them.

There’s also some character building for Kuro. Do remember; developing a character does not necessarily imply developing them to be a better person. Sometimes, it means just revealing what an utter heel they’ve been the entire time.

Usopp gets more of the good kind, straining and determined even through the Black Cat Pirates’ insults and his own serious injuries as Zolo takes down Butchie for good.

(It helps that Usopp has Luffy on his side here. Not someone who takes disrespect toward his friends lightly.)

Kuro ultimately confronts Luffy head on once Zolo gets his past him, asking why, exactly, he’s standing up for a village that isn’t his and that he has no connection to. Cryptically, Luffy replies there’s someone there he doesn’t want to die. I imagine he means Kaya, given his newfound respect for Usopp. But he might also just mean the butcher in town, knowing the gum-gum pirate.

In any case, the chapter ends with the two of them about to face off, and with Django catching up to Kaya and Usopp’s little pirate friends.

Tomorrow: the fight continues.

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