Im soooo excited to finally share my comic for @sanji-zine ! Been sitting on it since 2024 š³ If you missed your chance to scoop some goodies up, nows your chance- leftovers are open! Thank you again for your hard work guys āØš
When I started this, I was just starting to fall in love with cooking. I wanted to take a break from my typical gag comic format and focus on the process, which is deeply important to a fella deeply important to me! :]
The ASL brothers are so special to me, their dynamic is more than just ātrustingā but rather codependent, unintentionally unhealthy, and full of self loathing and guilt
As much as itās brushed off, I think being isolated from other kids and staying in the forest does count as trauma of some kind, as it did a number on their psyche and how they interact with eachother compared to other people..
Moving from that, heres my explanation on the relationship chart above ā¬ļø
Luffy -> Ace
āThe burden of lifeā
As Aceās struggle with self-worth, loneliness, and the question of whether he deserved to exist kept drilling, his main emotional stability soon came to depend on the presence and praise of/from Luffy. As a child, he could not understand the weight of this role, only that Ace became withdrawn or self-destructive when left alone with his thoughts. It was a cruel responsibility to bear, but Luffy will never resent Ace for this, afterall, it was just the both of them left.
Ace -> Luffy
āThe proof I deserve happinessā
Luffy's happiness became proof that Ace's existence had value. If Ace could make Luffy smile, protect him, or give him a home, then perhaps he wasn't the monster he feared himself to be. After Sabo's death, this belief intensified until Ace began valuing Luffy's happiness more than his own. Luffy became both the person keeping Ace alive and the evidence Ace used to justify living.
Sabo -> Luffy
āThe happiness worth protectingā
Luffy is the last living connection to the happiest period of Sabo's life. As children, Sabo found freedom, belonging, and joy alongside Ace and Luffy in a way he never could within the high town. After losing his memories and later recovering them, those childhood years became even more precious. With Ace gone, Luffy became the sole keeper of a happiness that can never be recreated.
Much like Ace before him, Sabo begins tying his emotional wellbeing to Luffy's life. Sabo does not mean to place this responsibility on him, but by being the only living brother, he is now Sabo's only connection to his personal happiness.
Luffy -> Sabo
āThe promise of lifeā
As children, Ace, Sabo, and Luffy swore that they would eventually become pirates and sail the seas together. Yet as they grew older, Luffy did come to acknowledge that the dream for Ace and Sabo was never truly about piracy but for living freely. When Sabo became a Revolutionary instead of a pirate, he technically broke the shape of their promise together but he did technically also fulfill the spirit of it as he lived and escaped the future others chose for him and soon enough found freedom on his own terms. To Luffy, Sabo's life is basically tells him that their childhood dream survived, even if it changed.
Sabo -> Ace
āmy greatest faultā
To Sabo, Ace is a forever lasting guilt he feels he can never correct. As children, Ace was one of the people Sabo trusted most, yet there were still parts of himself he withheld. He never fully revealed the depth of his fears about his family, his desperation to escape, or the danger he was truly in.
In Sabo's thoughts, everything that followed traces back to that choice. If he had confided in them, perhaps he would never have boarded the ship that day. If he had survived openly, perhaps Ace would never have carried the grief of losing him. If Ace had not spent years mourning him, perhaps some of the loneliness and self-destructive tendencies that followed would have been different.
But whether these beliefs are true or not is irrelevant, Sabo carries them anyway as Ace is no longer there to confirm or deny it.
Ace -> Sabo
āMy equalā
Sabo was the first person Ace chose for himself. Not a caretaker like Dadan, not a family member assigned to him like Luffy, but a friend. Sabo was the first person Ace viewed as an equal as neither stood above the other. It was a breath if fresh air for Ace as neither was responsible for the other.
While Luffy often looked to Ace for guidance and protection, Sabo always stood beside him and challenged him. It was like for the first time in his life, Ace found someone who understood his anger toward the world without needing an explanation. Even though Ace didnāt know Sabo fully, none of it changed how he saw him. He was simply Sabo, his friend, his brother and his equal.
Oh my god, naturally coming across a legacy post on my dash. Nobody gets Sanji the way that I, and also tumblr user ladysatoru, do. Not even oda himself.
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