So my version of volume 62 wasn’t printed quite right. It’s not really an issue, but some of the sentences at the very bottom are a little bit cut off and there’s some extra space at the top. Let’s hope it’s just an issue with this particular volume and not with more of the upcoming ones. Either way, let’s submerge ourselves into this new volume full of deep sea adventures and strange folks.
As the Straw Hats continue their journey down towards the depths of the ocean they’re soon attacked by Caribou and his crew. Unfortunately for the muddy maniac, things go poorly quite fast. The sea cow – Moo Moo – that we met all the way back in Arlong Park is here and he’s been captured by Caribou and his crew to drag their ship towards Fishman Island. When he sees Luffy, Sanji and Zoro, his trauma comes back and about half a second after Caribou boards the Sunny, the sea cow takes the rest of the crew away, leaving the captain all alone in the midst of the Straw Hats. Not a great place to be. They quickly tie up the desperate doofus and continue with their journey downwards.
We get some deep sea lore and see how the currents and underwater volcanoes work as well as some of the fish and other seafaring creatures that live down here. During all of this, Luffy, Sanji and Zoro tame a kraken and get separated from the rest of the crew. They somehow make it to the edge of Fishman Island alive though. There they are harassed by members of the new Fishman Pirates. The crew leaves them behind quickly and go through the bubbles at full force, ending up at their destination.
When Luffy finally wakes up again, they’re in Caimie’s apartment. They meet Caimie once again as well as some of her friends. She explains that she lives in this women’s dormitory and there’s more districts like the dangerous Fishman district and Fishverly hills, where Pappagu lives, as he is a famous clothing designer. They encounter some mermaids and even the royal princes show up. Throughout the chaos, Sanji has been doing his best to keep his nose from bleeding but eventually things get too extreme for him and a large amount of blood starts bursting out of his nose, causing him to quickly go unconscious and lose a dangerous amount of blood. As annoying as this new quirk of Sanji is for the overall story of One Piece, it does a pretty decent job of introducing the extreme racism that will be central in this arc. Fishmen and humans not getting along is a racial topic that One Piece has been telling us about since the early chapters, so it’s not strange that it rears its ugly head here again. It turns out that humans have enacted a law that their blood shouldn’t mix with that of Fishmen, so now no one can help Sanji out with a blood transfusion. Foreshadowing is a literary device that-
While the crew is in town, they get invited to Ryugu castle. This is where a banquet will be held for them. The king and his sons know Jinbe quite well so they relay a message for him. Unfortunately during all of this, a well known future seer called Madam Sharley learns that Luffy will destroy Fishman Island. This causes concern and leads the royal army to try to arrest the Straw Hats to at the bare minimum avoid damage. Things quickly go topsy turvy as the crew takes King Neptune hostage and tells his sons to help them leave the island, which is probably a good deal for all parties involved since Luffy can’t destroy the city if he isn’t there.
In the meantime, Luffy has slipped away to Shirahoshi’s room. She’s the princess of the Ryugu Kingdom and a real coward. To be fair to her, she’s been targeted by an axe throwing creep for a decade already so it’s not weird that she’s very scared of everything. Luffy doesn’t seem too impressed by her but he feels bad that she’s so locked up in here so he tells her that they’ll go visit the outside together. She gets an axe thrown at her by Vander Decken, which Luffy blocks. We learn that the creepy captain of the Flying Dutchman is in league with a pirate called Hody Jones who is hiding out in the Fishman district. Hody and his gang are abusing steroids to be extra powerful and recruiting pirates under them to start a war and take over the seafloor before bringing humanity down a peg as the next step in their plan. Something is brewing in the dark depths and the Straw Hats are right in the middle of it all. Luffy is still very much oblivious to most of it and with Shirahoshi hiding in the mouth of her pet shark – because of course that’s the solution that Luffy would come up with – they’re headed towards a nearby underwater forest where Jinbe seems to be as well. Next volume we’ll see more of Hody Jones and his creepy crew and if you guys give this post enough likes I’ll stop with the awful alliteration and return to normal next week. I hope you all enjoyed and as usual, thanks for reading!
Opal Kaharis 