Powers & Abilities Kaido's DF mysterious properties.

[Xione]

So Kaido we know is a person who can turn into a Dragon.. or a Dragon who can turn into a person. Based on him being an actual person back during the Rocks scenes that were shown in chapter 957, when he was much younger, I'm going with the assumption that he is a person of some species that can turn into a Dragon and.. I think at this point almost everyone seems to be of this consensus as well.

Then assuming that he's a person who ate the DF that allows him to turn into a Dragon, I find this situation with his durability very interesting/confusing:

We know that Luffy's training revolved around being able to bypass Kaido's tough scales, which is what Luffy credited Kaido's insane skin durability to, Dragon scales:

Spoiler

If we look at the fight between Kaido and Luffy, Kaido's Dragon form took on Luffy's G3, suffering no damage whatsoever from it:

Spoiler

And Kaido's "base form" took on Luffy's G4, with the strongest attack outside of King Kong Gun, with Kaido again suffering no damage whatsoever from them:

Spoiler

This implies that Kaido in his "base form" has the Dragon Scale properties activated, as he took no damage in his "base form" just like he didn't in his "dragon form".


Issue is though.. he has no visible scales on the surface in his so called "base form". The other thing that's interesting about his "base form" is the fact that he has horns that are a miniature copy of his Dragon form horns.
He had them during his rocks days as well:

Spoiler

SO from what I'm understanding, if Kaido is a person/being that ate the Dragon fruit then I believe his so called "base form" is his hybrid form or something along the lines of a hybrid form. Because not only does he have the Dragon scales in this form (we just don't see them on the surface), but he also has the Dragon's horns in this form. Is this the case? We've been confusing his hybrid form as his "base form"?? Because so far I don't recall any Zoan keeping the properties of the animal in their base forms, but only when they get into animal form or hybrid form.

Because the only other rational explanation that I can think of that allows him to keep two distinct traits of the Dragon (scales & horns) while looking like a human is if he himself is a Dragon, but ate a fruit that allows him to transform into a person.. which would be a plottwist on Kinemon "Kaido can transform into a Dragon".. when in reality it would be Kaido can transform into a person/human or w.e.



So for me it's between two choices, either that's his hybrid form that we're seeing or the dude is an actual Dragon... are you guys of the same mindset? Or not? Or you have other ideas or explanations on what allows him to retains key Dragon properties?

 

[Uncle Van]

It might have something to do with him being awakened. The Jailer Beasts were all awakened and never reverted by to their human forms no matter how many times they were knocked out. Queen and Kaku reverted back to human when they were incapacitated.

Lucci wasnt awakened, but he was so adept at his fruit that he had 2 man-beast forms. Maybe Kaido's prowess gives him dragon scales in base form.

 

[HA001]

So Kaido we know is a person who can turn into a Dragon.. or a Dragon who can turn into a person. Based on him being an actual person back during the Rocks scenes that were shown in chapter 957, when he was much younger, I'm going with the assumption that he is a person of some species that can turn into a Dragon and.. I think at this point almost everyone seems to be of this consensus as well.

Then assuming that he's a person who ate the DF that allows him to turn into a Dragon, I find this situation with his durability very interesting/confusing:

We know that Luffy's training revolved around being able to bypass Kaido's tough scales, which is what Luffy credited Kaido's insane skin durability to, Dragon scales:

Spoiler

If we look at the fight between Kaido and Luffy, Kaido's Dragon form took on Luffy's G3, suffering no damage whatsoever from it:

Spoiler

And Kaido's "base form" took on Luffy's G4, with the strongest attack outside of King Kong Gun, with Kaido again suffering no damage whatsoever from them:

Spoiler

This implies that Kaido in his "base form" has the Dragon Scale properties activated, as he took no damage in his "base form" just like he didn't in his "dragon form".


Issue is though.. he has no visible scales on the surface in his so called "base form". The other thing that's interesting about his "base form" is the fact that he has horns that are a miniature copy of his Dragon form horns.
He had them during his rocks days as well:

Spoiler

SO from what I'm understanding, if Kaido is a person/being that ate the Dragon fruit then I believe his so called "base form" is his hybrid form or something along the lines of a hybrid form. Because not only does he have the Dragon scales in this form (we just don't see them on the surface), but he also has the Dragon's horns in this form. Is this the case? We've been confusing his hybrid form as his "base form"?? Because so far I don't recall any Zoan keeping the properties of the animal in their base forms, but only when they get into animal form or hybrid form.

Because the only other rational explanation that I can think of that allows him to keep two distinct traits of the Dragon (scales & horns) while looking like a human is if he himself is a Dragon, but ate a fruit that allows him to transform into a person.. which would be a plottwist on Kinemon "Kaido can transform into a Dragon".. when in reality it would be Kaido can transform into a person/human or w.e.



So for me it's between two choices, either that's his hybrid form that we're seeing or the dude is an actual Dragon... are you guys of the same mindset? Or not? Or you have other ideas or explanations on what allows him to retains key Dragon properties?

Yeah pretty much. Agreed on both conclusions.

We have a magic fox in gyukimaru who doesnt have a devil fruit that turns from fox to human form. Maybe kaido is the same. An actuak dragon with a human form.

 

[Finalbeta]

His hybrid form will be much different than anything we have seen so far since I guess Oda will play a lot with fantasy

 

[Paperchampion23]

His hybrid form will be much different than anything we have seen so far since I guess Oda will play a lot with fantasy

Not only that, I want to see what a real awakened Zoan is like. Tbh, I don't think Oda had the full concept of Awakening back at Impel down and I feel like those jailers will be retconned to "forced Awakening" or something. Jinbe was present when Crocodile explained it so maybe there is a bigger difference.

Hopefully his son and All Stars all have it too

 

[OmegaPsyche]

His hybrid will have scales all over his body & more dragon features

Awakened kaido will be like Frieza 100% full power, basically kaido hybrid gets buffed like crazy

 

[Warchief Sanji D Goat]

Kaido is a human who ate Dragon Fruit. But can we stop the Kaido is a dragon who ate the human fruit theory please?Anyway, I expect Hybrid Kaido to look like a human-looking dragon LOL

 

[Kurodiamondo]

He is something non-human who eat dragon devil fruit

 

[Sir WanKing]

when did it ever state that kaido is a df eater? if so, then the suicidal thing won't make any sense... (if he want to die, just jump to the sea, or eat another df)
i always believe that kaido is a non-df user since she is the strongest in the sky, land, and SEA
imo the dragon is something else

 

[TheAncientCenturion]

I really doubt that his human form is his hybrid. It doesn't feel grandiose or dragon enough for it to be anything but an abnormal type of person. We have Moriah and Magellen who are both human and odd, I'm guessing Kaido is in the same boat as them for his horns. As for the comments on the scales... I'm not entirely sure. Could just be that, despite doing zero damage to either form, Luffy knows that the scales / zoan form has greater durability? Punching both gave him some idea, so he's prepping to be able to injure Kaido at his best (scale-y / Hybrid)?

The dragon who ate a human fruit always felt weird, because he's too short to be a giant. Oda def isn't depicting Neanderthal's (the potential Ancient model for humans) as anything but their stereotypes from half a century ago, and the Mythical fruit is in Sengoku's possession.

 

[Guan Yu]

It might have something to do with him being awakened. The Jailer Beasts were all awakened and never reverted by to their human forms no matter how many times they were knocked out. Queen and Kaku reverted back to human when they were incapacitated.

Lucci wasnt awakened, but he was so adept at his fruit that he had 2 man-beast forms. Maybe Kaido's prowess gives him dragon scales in base form.

Lucci's 2 man-beast from was achievable due to using life returns

 

[Xione]

@Cinera's comments:

* Kaido's horns might be natural, and his dragon form emphasises/enhances them. If Kaido was a race that naturally had horns, there's no reason for him to lose them in Dragon form.

His dragon form has 4 horns vs the two of his base form, so. His base form doesn't preserve his dragon form horns.
Oars and Oars Jr. had horns despite not being zoans (and similar horns to Kaido). Those horns appear to be due to their race. Kaido's horns may very well be the same. There's not much reason to assume his horns are an effect of his dragon form.

As for durability, you assumed that Kaido's durability in "Base" must be a result of his Dragon form. This is despite Kaido's "Base" lacking the scales that are attributed to dragon form's durability. This is another case where your inference is not parsimonious.

Base Kaido may naturally be very durable (swords shattered when they tried to behead him, spears broke, etc). Base Kaido's durability doesn't have to be from his Dragon form, and given that he lacks scales it probably isn't.

Luffy's reference to the scales suggest that the Dragon form is more durable than the base form. It doesn't suggest that the Base form is durable because of the Dragon form. That Base Kaido lacks scales suggests this is not the case.

To recap, simpler explanations for the evidence you brought are:
* Kaido belongs to a race that is naturally horned.
* Kaido is naturally very durable.
* Dragon Kaido is even more durable than Base Kaido because of the scales.

Your hypothesis of a hybrid form is contradicted by the overt lack of dragon features (extra horns of the dragon form, scales), and the abject dissimilarity to every other dragon form we've seen in the series.

Your hypothesis that Kaido is a dragon transforming to a human is similarly wild and not really based on anything.


Both of your hypothesised scenarios greatly contradict Occam's razor.

To conclude, I think you are very likely to be wrong and made rudimentary mistakes in arriving at your conclusions.

Horns:

They can be hence my post ends with " Or you have other ideas or explanations on what allows him to retains key Dragon properties? "
Simply nothing right now supports that other than fans drawing connections between him and Oar's race/species. But this only addresses part of the problem not the whole problem.

-> King's most iconic feature is the wings on his back. When he transforms into a Zoan, guess what? His wings change completely as well he doesn't keep them. Kaido's horns similarly would not remain in his Dragon form as he's transforming into the dragon himself. The only property that remains from the Zoans we know of is just the hair.

"His base form doesn't preserve them"..yes if it was a base form it wouldn't reserve them, if it was a hybrid form it would reserve part of the properties of the Dragon, which is 2 horns. I'm not arguing for him having those properties in a "base form".

So yes there is valid reason to assume the horns do stem from his Dragon form.

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Dragon scales:

Drake in his hybrid form doesn't visible retain the Dinosaur skin except for above shoulders, and human skin for the Torso and has a mix of human & Dino legs. Do you believe he's going to lose the durability of the Dino skin simply because it's not showing? No. Lucci was the same way his torso in his hybrid form didn't have the leopard skin but rather his normal human muscles.

Spoiler

This can be credited to one's mastery of the Devil Fruit potentially or simply how different hybrid forms of diff DFs work. For example, Page One retains more Dino properties than Drake in hybrid form.


Your explanation is that he simply has natural durability like that.. which is based on what exactly?? There's not a single panel that would support your claim. This is a wild of a guess as you can make. Where as for somebody like Big mom & Oden, we know their natural human skin is what made them insanely strong, they were born abnormals. Do you have any such events about Kaido being mentioned? Any statements on his natural skin? None.

For Kaido we are given a reason for his insane durability in the manga, and it's his Dragon scales. This would also explain why Ryuuma long ago cutting a Dragon in the capital of Wano is regarded as such a huge feat, because damaging Dragons is hard thing to do.

Furthermore, as mentioned in the OT we have Kaido's fight vs Luffy to make an analysis from:
Dragon form Kaido - Is attacked by G3
Non-Dragon form Kaido - Is attacked by G4

This would imply that Oda is telling us Kaido's natural skin > Dragon scales.. Since if Dragon scales were the superior one then naturally you would have G4 attack them to show how Kaido's durability increase when he's in his Dragon form compared to normal. But that's not the case. Rather what he showecased is that even Kaido isn't in his Dragon form he retains his durability that he has in his Dragon form.

Luffy after G4 fails against Kaido's, what you call, "base form".. spends time training for Kaido's scales specifically.. and you're saying Kaido only has dragon scales when he's shown as a Dragon.. So Luffy is training for the Dragon scales that were undamaged by his G3 attacks, rather than Kaido's (according to you) naturally tough skin that made his G4 attacks useless?? That doesn't sound like Luffy at all, normally Luffy would want to aim for something that negated his strongest attacks rather than weaker attacks.

You then also state that Luffy's statement implies Dragon scales > his normal skin. But how would luffy know that? He didn't use G4 on Kaido's Dragon form.. and he made no damage on Kaido's "base form".

Also, Kaido is the one and only actual Dragon that we know of in the entire series... not sure where you saw other Dragons like Kaido flying around. Unless you mean Vegapunk's failed experiments.


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An actual Dragon who can turn into a human (Due to DF or even not related to DF):

-> Oda has yet to categorize him under any species, Giants/Humans/Minks/etc.. No other person in the OP world has gone through this. Oars himself was introduced as a Giant. So Oda is being secretive about what he actually is.
-> This is also intensified by Big Mom calling him " That Thing" where as she doesn't call Giants or other species "things"..
-> His epithet "King of the Beasts" or also "Hundred Beast Kaido", Dragon is considered the supreme beast in many different mythos whether it be western or eastern.
-> Oda's mention of "Amongst all things that live on land, in sea or in air". This has more relation to the fact that he's not a DF user at all though, which would actually make him the strongest creature in the sea if he was capable of going into the sea in his Dragon form. And you can also assume that he can breathe in water simply off of the fact that he likes to commit suicide, if he couldn't breath under water and was a DF user.. jumping into the water would make for a perfect easy suicide rather than jumping from 20,000 meters.
-> In Wano we're introduced to a fox who can turn into a human, with no DF being mentioned for that fox so far. But even if it was a DF that'd mean there are DFs that can turn animals into actually looking like Humans... which could then also be used to back up Kaido being a Dragon who ate a fruit that gives him the giant like appearance.

So there's substantial amounts of things that are there for one to make an assumption that he's a Dragon himself. And also few more to assume he's a Dragon with no Df correlation.


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You mentioned Occam's Razor which is the principle that one should pick the solution with the fewest assumptions (from my understanding atleast, feel free to correct me if i'm wrong). In this case your claim of Kaido simply belonging to a species that has Horns like that naturally is baseless assumption derived off of two entities that have no known relation to Kaido so far, where as the claim that he's retaining the horns from his Dragon form is something that is acquired from how Zoan users work where they can retain the properties of their animal in non-full animal forms. Out of the two your claim would be going against Occam's Razor. Your explanation of Kaido's natural skin being responsible for being able to handle G4 luffy with no damage is derived off basically what? nothing at all. Where as my explanation of Kaido's durability in his "base form" is because he has Dragon scales activated is derived off of the fact that Luffy credits Dragon scales for Kaido's insane durability as well as visual representation during Kaido vs Luffy, and with the fact mentioned about hybrid form above.

Though I'm not sure why you would even bring up Occam's Razor in a discussion about people with superpowers though.. considering the origin of Occam's Razor is to counter fantasy explanations of natural things. Especially when we're talking about somebody as mysterious and rare as Kaido.

 

[Lunaria]

We saw Kaido fight only twice so far and both times, something strange occured : he got hit by his opponent (Luffy/Oden) in his dragon form then he defeated them with his human form. The logical conclusion is that he just reverts back to his base form when he’s hurt, but do you really believe Luffy managed to hurt Kaido ? He obviously didn’t, so why did he revert back to his "human" form after Luffy hit him ? Why did he look tougher than before in this form ? Why did Big Mom call him "a thing" ?

My guess is he’s either a dragon that ate the Oni DF or he’s the same species as the Numbers, who I believe are oni. But maybe both options aren’t mutually exclusive. The Numbers don’t all look the same, they’re physically very different from each other so if they’re oni, we could assume there are subspecies : wolf-oni, rabbit-oni, dog-oni, etc. In which case, Kaido could be a dragon-oni.

Why Kaido looks human, then ? Well, oni have the ability to look human to trick their preys.

He could have 4 different forms :

- dragon form (weakest one)
- human-like oni form
- full oni form
- hybrid dragon-oni (strongest one)