One Piece: One of Luffy’s Strongest Crew Mates Knew His Secret Long Ago and Eiichiro Oda Already Hinted That Years Before the Big Reveal
One Piece is known for its unexpected twists and turns in the plot, and even after decades of serialization, the series still knows how to shock the fans. The latest episode not only gives fans the much-anticipated fight between Monkey D. Luffy and Rob Lucci, but also reveals Sun God Nika’s secret to the rest of the Straw Hat Pirates.
The existence of the Sun God Nika is a perilous secret that the World Government wants to keep tightly under wraps. Despite witnessing Luffy’s Gear 5 transformation earlier in Wano, most of the Straw Hats only seemed to learn the truth about Sun God Nika at Egghead. However, a notable figure did not show any reaction, which hints at a connection between Nika and the Sun Pirates.
Episode #1100 Confirms Jinbe Might Have Known About Sun God Nika
Episode #1100 of One Piece shows Luffy transforming into Gear 5 to battle Lucci. Although this scene is not shown in the manga, the anime shows Jinbe and Chopper’s reaction to the transformation. Chopper is rightly shocked by Luffy’s incredible transformation, but Jinbe immediately connects Luffy’s powers to the Sun God Nika, even though he was seeing it for the first time.
Jinbe’s instant recognition of Luffy as the Warrior of Liberation raises suspicion as it is not possible for him to join the dots so quickly based on the little information that Who’s Who told him about Nika. This suggests that Jinbe may have already known about the Sun God Nika and his abilities from the very beginning.
Until now, fans believed that Jinbe had first learned about Sun God Nika from Who’s Who in chapter #1018. However, Who’s Who only said that Nika was a warrior who liberated slaves since that was the only information he had. Apart from this information, Jinbe isn’t told anything about the mythical figure, how looks like, how he fights, or even about his powers.
Thus, it is a bit suspicious that he would take one look at Luffy’s Gear 5 transformation and immediately connect it to Sun God Nika. Meanwhile, Luffy himself is unaware of the truth behind his devil fruit powers or the existence of Nika. Hence, it is only logical that Jinbe must have already known about Nika even before Wano.
The Sun Pirates’ Connection To Sun God Nika
Chapter #1018 briefly teases the connection between the Sun Pirates and Sun God Nika through the dialogue between Jinbe and Who’s Who. Jinbe also gets visibly upset during the conversation, which could be due to Who’s Who bringing up the fishmen’s slavery, but in hindsight, his reaction could also be related to the mention of Nika.
Jinbe also seems furious even before Who’s Who mentions anything about the fishmen’s history and he doesn’t deny knowing about Nika. Jinbe says that he has nothing to say to Who’s Who and defeats him. It is possible that Jinbe knows about Sun God Nika since he was the second captain of the Sun Pirates. There is also a chance that they are connected to Nika as the Sun Pirates’ crew consisted of former slaves freed by Fisher Tiger.
It is entirely possible for Fisher Tiger to be inspired by the legend of Nika as the main goal of the Sun Pirates was to liberate the slaves who served the Celestial Dragons. The fact that Fisher Tiger chose the sun as the symbol of his crew also cannot be a coincidence. Hence, it can be said that Nika had a significant influence on the Sun Pirates.
It can be deduced that Jinbe was the first among the Straw Hats to learn about Luffy’s secret. Although this scene is not in the manga, it explains a lot of mysteries surrounding Jinbe and his reaction to Who’s Who.
One Piece is available to stream on Netflix and Crunchyroll.
