#ch 1096

[ninhaoma-ya]

Chapter 1160 - The God Valley Incident

We are in it now, girls! The title says it all, really, so why wait any more?

According to the cover story, Yamato is back and is overlooking the capital from the new shrine to Oden and his comrades , having (presumably) completed his pilgrimage around Wano.

I haven't noticed them before, but not I am eyeing those stairs up to the palaca, that starts at the torii on the left, with a heavy side-eye. Does it start as a ladder, or how are people supposed to climb that?

(It's been nice following Yamato around, but I will be happy when he's done with his walking.)

And the chapter itself!

As usual, it starts with a bang, in this case, of a cell door closing on the Davy Clan. We don't get much more information on them han that, but from the scared face on a lil' 2-year old tot, I dare to predict horrible, terrible trauma (especially if we're going by those shadowy Celestial Dragons that he's seing).

"Dead Mum Count" goes brrrrrrrr this whole chapter, in the most horrific ways possible. We knew that Shanks and Shamrock's mum wouldn't make it, but her demise is now confirmed, as is Dragon's general goodness.

I think it's interesting how this chapter mirrors earlier chapters, in some cases almost panel for panel.

In chapter 1096 we have Kuma's flashback:

Compared ot this week:

I'm not going to put in anything else from the actual hunt, since it was all beyond cruel.

But once again, Oda shows us that he has read up on his history since human hunts have been practiced thorughout the ages (Wikipedia).

(On a lighter note, One Piece is referenced in the 'In fiction' section, specifically for chapter 1096!)

The Genocide Games seem to have two categories: clan and individual. It also looks like the winner of the individual category will get a special title, God's Steel (or Sword, depending on what the official translation goes for).

I'm not sure if it's just to introduce some tension into the games, but it's interesting that the Celestial Dragons are shown betting on others than the Figarlands, even though Garling is the one that's been propped up the most so far. Now I really want to see (not in this game, though, please) what Gunko can do, since they put their trust in her skills, and her family member also said that they're 'sure to win now Gunko's here' in the last chapter.

And Dragon shows that once again, doing the right thing and ignoring direct orders pays off as his whole platoon gets executed for their troubles.

Again, this is interesting to contrast with chapter 1096 and Kuma's point of view:

I really hope Oda pays whoever of his assistans keeps track of timelines and *actual sentences said* enough. Because I have no idea how they're keeping this flashback in such neat order.

Yes, Dragon, 'you just'. You did indeed just shoot a Celestial Dragon with a tranqualizer gun. Well done!

I wonder if this is where the three of them (Dragon, Iva and Kuma) meet for the first time, or if Dragon sneaks off before they see him?

Again, the whoever is in charge of continuity deserves a raise:

In this chapter, and:

In chapter 1096. Even Big Mom's clothes are the same!

I love her and Kaido's sibling-like bond. He's so concerned about that fruit <3

I hadn't thought about it before, but that's one huge boat. Look at it, compared to the itsy-bitsy marine ships it's just plowing through!

I guess it has to be sizeable with such a crew, but still.

Such a shame that you only manage to resque one of them :(

I wonder how Garling gets hold of Shamrock in the end, by mistake or by purpose?

I like the slight foreshadowing (flashback-shadowing? memory?) here where Roger tells his crew to focus on the treasure, since we know whom he found in a treasure chest on God Valley...

And again a similar picture to before, although this one mainly has the same spirit rather than size and layout:

The dark-haired lady and guy with a skull for a head seem to have been on the table for a while, since their designs were included already earlier. I wonder if Oda made the short Manmeyer woman a God's Knight retroactively, since her earlier words indicated that Gunko was the greater fighter.

I also wonder a bit about the giant fishman(?) in the back, since Celestial Dragons so far have always been shown as human(oid). Are the God's Knights a demotion from being a normal Celestial Dragon (they don't have the bubbles) and is just a gang of extremely strong fighters? Is it a promotion (Gunko and Summers seem to be invulnerable and Garling became an Elder Star)? Or is it a secret third thing (that we'll see at some point)?

With all this going on, we should see Devil Fruits next chapter, as well as maybe a glimps of Saturn and Kuma's confrontation. Such an interesting era in the lore of One Piece! I'm very glad to be reading along right now :)

I give this chapter all the mourning for the dead mothers in One Piece.

[kaizokuou-ni-naru]

as a child kuma calls ivankov iva-chan, which is the same way luffy refers to her in the present (which makes all her followers in impel down react to him with absolute HORROR).

[larkreadsop]

So we all used to make jokes about Marco never aging but at this point I think Bogard’s the one we should really be asking about…the man has looked the same for forty years…

[larkreadsop]

Honestly Ginny’s the MVP of this entire incident because thinking about how different things would be if she hadn’t put that radio transmission out…likely all of them would have died there and the Revolutionary Army might have never been formed, so she really had a major hand in pushing the story forward and leading to what eventually will likely become a huge shift in the power structure of the entire world.

[larkreadsop]

I know I said I was going to wait until the flashback was over but I’m already five chapters behind so…time to catch up…

That being said, I love that this whole conversation can be summed up as:

Kong: hey Garp there’s a bunch of dangerous pirates wreaking havoc

Garp: I sleep

Kong: hey Garp Roger’s with them

Garp: !!!!!!!!!!!

[larkreadsop]

And once more we get teased with God Valley only for the flashback to cut away before the actual story can take place, but seeing all of the Rocks Pirates together for the first time is pretty cool. I’m not…entirely surprised that Gloriosa is a member since all of the past Kuja empresses that we know of have been pretty significant figures within the storyline so it stands to reason that she would follow that trend.

Stussy hanging onto Whitebeard is interesting, too, given the…claims she’s made about Weevil…but more than that even from a couple of panels it’s obvious how expressive she is compared to her clone since the Stussy we’ve known has shown very limited emotional range and I’m fairly sure that’s intended at this point.

[larkreadsop]

Kuma is truly so kind and I really love the detail that these kids are still members of Bonney’s crew all those years later and I hope they’re out there somewhere even now…

[larkreadsop]

I swear every time we see young!Roger he looks more and more like Ace and like…yes, I know that should be obvious, but…it’s becoming increasingly obvious every time Oda draws him.