Hey guys! (and ladies :p). Hope y'all had a bless weekend ^^. Today I'm gonna be bringing you guys and girls another theory, that popped into my head when I was reading @Monkey D Theories's thread on Kaidou possible having an "Ace" amongst his ranks.
Background
At this point in the wano arc, I don't think there's any denying that the beast pirates are heavily themed around cards and card games. I mean we have characters named King, Queen and Jack who also just so happen to be Kaidou's strongest subordinates generally referred to as the "All Stars" and then the next level in the hierarchy in the "Headliners" who are based off of card games e.g. Page One, Old Maid, Solitaire etc and then there's Kaidou's ex. business partner in Doffy who had the alias "Joker". So given this trend, it's naturally to expect that beast pirates will also have some sort of Ace character. That said however, we are already closing in on the climax of the arc "Act 4" and there's still no sign of such a character. Plus, we got a glimpse of Kaidou's crew structure 20 years ago in the Oden flashback which featured King & Queen and still no Ace, so does this "Ace" character really exist? and if he/she did? how could this character possibly be introduced into the story at this point without it being forced, what, with it being so deep into the Wano arc already?
I'd be addressing the aforementioned questions as I go further into my theory. So now without further ado, let's get to it ^^.
Does Kaidou have an "Ace" Calamity?
Well I'd say there's a very high probability that there is one for the following reasons:
- Jack's attack on Zou
When Jack attacked Zou the second time, he was escorted by several ships with scorpion figureheads, all of which had the beast pirate's Jolly Roger indicating these ships are affiliated with the beast pirates.
I think the fact that these ships had a custom figurehead indicates that the commander of said ships is a prominent figure within the beast pirates. For example, Jack's ship has a mammoth figure head (as shown above) and Queen's ship has a branchiosarous figure head, themed after their devil fruit abilities. So it's very likely that the commander of those ships is some sort of scorpion zoan. Also the fact that this particular entity has not just one ship but several, makes it very unlikely that said character ranks below the rank of "All Star". So chances are that these ships belong to the "Ace" which is the only high ranking face card we are missing atm.
- OP Magazine
Very early on in the arc, when we got a glimpse of the tragedy that befell Wano 20 years ago through Kinemon, and got to see silhouettes of Kaidou's calamities when Oden's castle was set ablaze - silhouette which looked like Jack, and then two others which us readers assumed to be King and Queen and this turned out to be accurate for the most part. However, several weeks/months later, OP magazine featured an extended shot of that particular panel which appeared to have not just three but 4 silhouettes as opposed to the 3 we had in the earlier scans. So it's likely that this fourth entity is Kaidou's "Ace".
- Queen's ship
During the Udon subplot, when Queen set sail for Onigashima with Big mom, we got to see his ship and on it there was an inscription "Q 03"
The "Q" most likely referring to Queen of course and the "03" part potentially indicating that Queen is the 3rd commander of Kaidou's fleet and not the second making way for a potential "Ace" to be the first commander of Kaidou's fleet, so we'd have a scenario like this - "A 01", "K 02" and "Q 03" which conforms to how the cards rank in a regular deck of cards. It's also possible that the "03" in that inscription is simply referring to the ship being Queen's 3rd ship. I mean the scorpion zoan user seemed to have several ships as well, so it's possible. It's also possible that Oda is teasing a potential Queen v Sanji match up. However the initial bit of speculation is very interesting to think about.
So now with the aforementioned hints of Kaidou potentially having an "Ace" amongst his ranks, who could this character possibly be and how could Oda seemlessly integrate him/her into the plot?
At this point in the arc, adding an extra power house will only seem forced and unnecessary imo. However, that won't be the case if said character has already long since been introduced into the plot and with this I'm referring to the "traitor" figure that has been a hot topic of discussion even before the wano arc started. The reason why I think this "Ace" entity could be the notorious "traitor/spy" figure are as follows:
- The idea of having a traitor in the enemies ranks fits the very concept of an "Ace in the hole" or "having on Ace up your sleeve" and I don't think it'd be over estimation to say that said traitor served this purpose perfectly in giving Kaidou and advantage over Oden 20 years ago when Kaidou was able to prepare for Oden and the scabbards attack in advance.
- The fact that this "Ace" entity was present during that panel of Oden's castle burning even though he/she seemingly didn't make an appearance during the showdown between Oden & his scabbards vs Kaidou's forces could be explained by said entity being undercover at the time. (i..e I suspect that said traitor was the one who stabbed Ashura in the back in chapter 970).
Lastly, who could this "Ace" entity possibly be?
Looking at the silhouette of this potential 4th calamity above, he/she doesn't seem to bear any resemblance to any of the scabbards, so the two things that came to mind are 1.) the clear clear fruit - the barrier barrier fruit and the copy copy fruit have already made an appearance in the fb, so I thought of the possibility that maybe said "spy" has the ability. However, the "spy" still exists in the current timeline and we know shiryu current has that fruit and absalom before him so I think we can safely exclude that possibility. 2.) some sort of shape-shifting ability - currently we know katarina devon possesses this fruit however, in one piece, devil fruits are not the only means of shape-shifting. We've seen Onimaru do something very similar by transforming into what appears to be a human known as "Gyukimaru" so what if this "Ace" figure is some sort of mythical creature like Onimaru? There's been a quite a few yokai references in this arc with Onimaru being one of them and we don't know whether Onimaru is the only one of it's kind. The Kitsune (fox) in japanase folklore are known to be very intelligent and powerful shape-shifters and also sometime posses other abilities like "possession" which brings another possibility (kitsune yokai). What's very interesting about this "Ace" entity being some sort of mythical creature tho is that it further allows the possibility of said "Ace" to possess a scorpion zoan :p. For example chopper was a reindeer that ate the human human fruit - model "human". The beast pirates are crew heavily consisting of zoan users, so it wouldn't surprise me if they had a chopper type zoan ^^.
Anyways back to this issue of the Kitsune, something else to note about the kitsune is that they often appear in the guise of beautiful young women :p. With regards to this, Kiku could potentially fit the bill as this supposed "Ace" shape-shifter entity. Moreover, something that has bugged me for a bit is, throughout the flashback, we never got any indication of Kiku being gay or anything about him having the heart of a woman which is a bit odd. So this particular character trait could be that of the "Ace" entity. Maybe Ace is actually a "woman". The hand that stabbed Ashura in chapter 970 did look like a woman's after all. It could be that Oda just thought that it was not important enough to add how Kiku came to the realization that he was a she into the flashback, which is a shame as I was very interested in it, but it's odd regardless.
Then there's Kinemon who has the name "Kitsunebi" which one could think could be a reference to the kind of fox I'm describing above.
Anyways that's all I have on this "Ace" character for now. Hope y'all enjoyed the read ^^.
Background
At this point in the wano arc, I don't think there's any denying that the beast pirates are heavily themed around cards and card games. I mean we have characters named King, Queen and Jack who also just so happen to be Kaidou's strongest subordinates generally referred to as the "All Stars" and then the next level in the hierarchy in the "Headliners" who are based off of card games e.g. Page One, Old Maid, Solitaire etc and then there's Kaidou's ex. business partner in Doffy who had the alias "Joker". So given this trend, it's naturally to expect that beast pirates will also have some sort of Ace character. That said however, we are already closing in on the climax of the arc "Act 4" and there's still no sign of such a character. Plus, we got a glimpse of Kaidou's crew structure 20 years ago in the Oden flashback which featured King & Queen and still no Ace, so does this "Ace" character really exist? and if he/she did? how could this character possibly be introduced into the story at this point without it being forced, what, with it being so deep into the Wano arc already?
I'd be addressing the aforementioned questions as I go further into my theory. So now without further ado, let's get to it ^^.
Does Kaidou have an "Ace" Calamity?
Well I'd say there's a very high probability that there is one for the following reasons:
- Jack's attack on Zou
When Jack attacked Zou the second time, he was escorted by several ships with scorpion figureheads, all of which had the beast pirate's Jolly Roger indicating these ships are affiliated with the beast pirates.
I think the fact that these ships had a custom figurehead indicates that the commander of said ships is a prominent figure within the beast pirates. For example, Jack's ship has a mammoth figure head (as shown above) and Queen's ship has a branchiosarous figure head, themed after their devil fruit abilities. So it's very likely that the commander of those ships is some sort of scorpion zoan. Also the fact that this particular entity has not just one ship but several, makes it very unlikely that said character ranks below the rank of "All Star". So chances are that these ships belong to the "Ace" which is the only high ranking face card we are missing atm.
- OP Magazine
Very early on in the arc, when we got a glimpse of the tragedy that befell Wano 20 years ago through Kinemon, and got to see silhouettes of Kaidou's calamities when Oden's castle was set ablaze - silhouette which looked like Jack, and then two others which us readers assumed to be King and Queen and this turned out to be accurate for the most part. However, several weeks/months later, OP magazine featured an extended shot of that particular panel which appeared to have not just three but 4 silhouettes as opposed to the 3 we had in the earlier scans. So it's likely that this fourth entity is Kaidou's "Ace".
- Queen's ship
During the Udon subplot, when Queen set sail for Onigashima with Big mom, we got to see his ship and on it there was an inscription "Q 03"
The "Q" most likely referring to Queen of course and the "03" part potentially indicating that Queen is the 3rd commander of Kaidou's fleet and not the second making way for a potential "Ace" to be the first commander of Kaidou's fleet, so we'd have a scenario like this - "A 01", "K 02" and "Q 03" which conforms to how the cards rank in a regular deck of cards. It's also possible that the "03" in that inscription is simply referring to the ship being Queen's 3rd ship. I mean the scorpion zoan user seemed to have several ships as well, so it's possible. It's also possible that Oda is teasing a potential Queen v Sanji match up. However the initial bit of speculation is very interesting to think about.
So now with the aforementioned hints of Kaidou potentially having an "Ace" amongst his ranks, who could this character possibly be and how could Oda seemlessly integrate him/her into the plot?
At this point in the arc, adding an extra power house will only seem forced and unnecessary imo. However, that won't be the case if said character has already long since been introduced into the plot and with this I'm referring to the "traitor" figure that has been a hot topic of discussion even before the wano arc started. The reason why I think this "Ace" entity could be the notorious "traitor/spy" figure are as follows:
- The idea of having a traitor in the enemies ranks fits the very concept of an "Ace in the hole" or "having on Ace up your sleeve" and I don't think it'd be over estimation to say that said traitor served this purpose perfectly in giving Kaidou and advantage over Oden 20 years ago when Kaidou was able to prepare for Oden and the scabbards attack in advance.
- The fact that this "Ace" entity was present during that panel of Oden's castle burning even though he/she seemingly didn't make an appearance during the showdown between Oden & his scabbards vs Kaidou's forces could be explained by said entity being undercover at the time. (i..e I suspect that said traitor was the one who stabbed Ashura in the back in chapter 970).
Lastly, who could this "Ace" entity possibly be?
Looking at the silhouette of this potential 4th calamity above, he/she doesn't seem to bear any resemblance to any of the scabbards, so the two things that came to mind are 1.) the clear clear fruit - the barrier barrier fruit and the copy copy fruit have already made an appearance in the fb, so I thought of the possibility that maybe said "spy" has the ability. However, the "spy" still exists in the current timeline and we know shiryu current has that fruit and absalom before him so I think we can safely exclude that possibility. 2.) some sort of shape-shifting ability - currently we know katarina devon possesses this fruit however, in one piece, devil fruits are not the only means of shape-shifting. We've seen Onimaru do something very similar by transforming into what appears to be a human known as "Gyukimaru" so what if this "Ace" figure is some sort of mythical creature like Onimaru? There's been a quite a few yokai references in this arc with Onimaru being one of them and we don't know whether Onimaru is the only one of it's kind. The Kitsune (fox) in japanase folklore are known to be very intelligent and powerful shape-shifters and also sometime posses other abilities like "possession" which brings another possibility (kitsune yokai). What's very interesting about this "Ace" entity being some sort of mythical creature tho is that it further allows the possibility of said "Ace" to possess a scorpion zoan :p. For example chopper was a reindeer that ate the human human fruit - model "human". The beast pirates are crew heavily consisting of zoan users, so it wouldn't surprise me if they had a chopper type zoan ^^.
Anyways back to this issue of the Kitsune, something else to note about the kitsune is that they often appear in the guise of beautiful young women :p. With regards to this, Kiku could potentially fit the bill as this supposed "Ace" shape-shifter entity. Moreover, something that has bugged me for a bit is, throughout the flashback, we never got any indication of Kiku being gay or anything about him having the heart of a woman which is a bit odd. So this particular character trait could be that of the "Ace" entity. Maybe Ace is actually a "woman". The hand that stabbed Ashura in chapter 970 did look like a woman's after all. It could be that Oda just thought that it was not important enough to add how Kiku came to the realization that he was a she into the flashback, which is a shame as I was very interested in it, but it's odd regardless.
Then there's Kinemon who has the name "Kitsunebi" which one could think could be a reference to the kind of fox I'm describing above.
Anyways that's all I have on this "Ace" character for now. Hope y'all enjoyed the read ^^.
Okay, you're just talking nonsense. Apoo can't even beat Spandam without Funkfreed. He couldn't solo the Ed Edd'n Eddy verse even if given "toonforce."