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!
Did you think we were done with our big emotional climax after last chapter? Well, we mostly are, but not quite yet.
Two things happen in this chapter; for one, Kaya gifts Luffy’s crew a caravel, which I and any other former Civilization III players reading this will recognize as a mid-sized vessel common in the 16th century. It’s hardly the Queen Anne’s Revenge, but this ship, the Merry Go, is the first proper vessel our heroes have ever had. 41 chapters in, we’ve already covered a lot of ground (even if we’re still very early on in the greater scope of things), so it’s nice to see them tangibly upgrading to something bigger and better.
Secondly, Usopp says his last goodbyes to Kaya. Granted, not before overpacking to the extent that his comically large backpack causes him to topple over and role down a hill in true slapstick fashion.
Other than a few other jokes (including a great bit where Luffy has to be told not to eat the entire bones of a fish), the main takeaway here is that Kaya will be just fine, and that Usopp’s chronic lying actually has a reason behind it. A pretty sad one! Although you could probably guess that much.
To be honest, this strikes me as a little unnecessary? The simple fact that Usopp’s mom isn’t around kind of makes it obvious from the start that something’s happened to her. That said; the target audience for this manga is, or at least was at the time, kids, so maybe being a little obvious is fine.
As the chapter ends, Kaya talks to Merry—her actually loyal butler—about her dreams for the future, while Usopp’s former “crew” gallavant through the town, continuing his, ahem, sacred work.
Usopp himself and the rest of Luffy’s crew? They’re gone, back on the deep blue sea.
Tomorrow: new adventures.
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