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Background: Monkey D. Luffy was born on Oushi Island. His older brother is Portgas D. Ace, who left to become a pirate. His father is Monkey D. Dragon, the famous revolutionary who dared to stand up against the World Government. His grandfather is Monkey D. Garp, a famous Vice-Admiral, who helped captured Gold Roger. Monkey D. Garp was also responsible for throwing his grandson into wild jungles, and leaving his grandson to fend for himself in dangerous situations, in hopes that Luffy would become an officer someday, like him. Luffy was born in the Golden Era of Pirates, sparked by Gold Roger’s last words at (Gold Roger)’s execution—the One Piece, which had all the wealth in the world, was hidden somewhere along the Grand Line. Luffy also aims to take the One Piece and become the Pirate King.

Luffy, in his childhood, greatly admired Red-Haired Shanks, a pirate who came with his pirate crew onto the island. Shanks nicknamed him “Anchor” because Luffy was a bad swimmer, but Luffy honestly looked up to them and the crew was fond of Luffy. Unfortunately, Luffy ate the fruit of their spoils, a Devil’s Fruit which granted him the Gomu Gomu, or rubber, powers, but only in exchange for his ability to swim. However, he angered the local bandits, in Shank’s defense, and was thrown out to sea. Shanks saved him from the local sea monster, but only at the cost of his arm. At the tearful farewell, Shanks gave Luffy his straw-hat, and Luffy promised to get a crew even better than Shanks’ and become the Pirate King.

Ten years later, Luffy set out on his mission. The first pirate leader he defeated was Iron Mace Alvida, who was ugly and carried around an iron mace, but constantly asked her crew “who was the fairest of them all” and if they answered incorrectly, she would smash their heads in. There, Luffy met Kody, a cabin boy whose real dream was to work for the Navy. So Luffy defeated Alvida and brings Kody to the navy base, where they find the people of the city are frightened of the navy captain, “Axe-hand” Morgan, who controlled a reign of terror. Morgan’s son, Helmeppo, had a famous swordsman Roronoa Zoro tied up, and though had promised to release him after a month, said that he was going to execute Zoro after three days.

After Luffy heard that Zoro, though formerly part of a pirate gang, was only imprisoned because he defended a little girl from Morgan’s wolf, Luffy tried to lure Zoro into his pirate crew after sneaking in to feed him the little girl’s gift of horrible sand-and-grit food (which Zoro accepted it and ate like a man, and even told Luffy to tell the girl that it was good). Zoro refused the offer in the beginning, but Luffy, who heard that Zoro wanted to become the best swordsman in the world, encouraged this dream because he was going to be the best pirate in the world and needed a best swordsman as first mate. Finally, in exchange for his three swords and his freedom, Zoro joined the crew, and then Morgan is defeated. They eventually leave on a boat, where they soon find a need for a navigator.

Luffy then tries to capture a bird, but the bird captures him instead. Luffy lands in a village where Nami, a thief, meets him, as she is running away. She plans to use him to get even more treasure. Luffy then helps Nami steal Buggy the Pirate’s treasure—Buggy, a pirate who had eaten the Chop Chop Fruit and could even wound Zoro. The Chop Chop Fruit enabled him to be chopped into pieces. Luffy was at first stuck in a cage, but then is released, and defeats a lion tamer. He then hears the story about the town in terror, and the mayor who finally decided to stand up against Buggy, and a dog named Chouchou who was protecting a pet food shop for his dead owner. Though the lion tamer destroys the shop, Luffy gets a box of dog food for Chouchou in keepsake. Then Luffy knocks out the elderly mayor, who had been planning to take on the pirates, and replaces the mayor in fighting Buggy. With some help from the quick-handed Nami, who ties up Buggy, Luffy defeats Buggy. Buggy tells him that he had once worked with Shanks, but was angry with him because he made Buggy accidentally swallow the Devil’s Fruit. But they are chased off the village, though the mayor tried to protest in the beginning that Luffy and his crew were actually trying to save them, but in the end, decided that pirates would be pirates. Nami joins as the crew’s navigator, though she is enraged to hear that Luffy left the treasure in the town so they could rebuild. But they get the map to the entrance of the Grand Line from Buggy, and begin their journey to there.

They reach an island with a man who has been stuck in a treasure chest because of a tragic fate where his crew reached the island to find the treasure, and then he himself had climbed to the top and peeked in to see chests, but rolled back down and into the chest, but would not call for help because he wanted the treasure for himself. However, he was unable to climb back up in his chest-stuck state, and instead tended the queer animals who roamed the land. Luffy climbs up the top easily, but then tells the man that he could not come up. He offers no explanation for his sudden selfishness, until Gaimon sobs and asks him if the treasure chests were really just empty, and Luffy confirmed it. Gaimon then decides to just stay on the island and tend the animals instead, but was glad that the Straw Hat Pirates had come.

They travel further into a land where Luffy meets the son of Yasopp. Yasopp was a sharpshooter on Shanks’s team. Usopp is actually a chronic liar who tells him that he is the captain of eighty thousand men, though in reality, he was captain of three little boys. Luffy learns that Usopp is a liar because he tells lies to Mistress Kaya, a sickly girl who is cheered up by these visits. By a tragic turn of events, Usopp learns of the evil butler’s plans to kill Mistress Kaya, but he is unable to tell the village because they know him for his lies. Kaya trusts deeply in the butler, who is actually Captain Kuro, who has diabolic plans to get the riches. But Luffy also hears, and decides to fight too. Luffy runs all the way around the island to meet a hyptnotist, to which he falls victim too extremely easily (and twice!), before defeating the henchmen and the evil butler. In return, they receive Usopp as a crewmate, as well as a new ship.

But they soon discover two of Zoro’s old friends, one who apparently was dying from scurvy, which convinced them of their need for a cook (but Luffy really wanted a musician.) But they are attacked by Marine Lieutenant Fullbody, but Luffy bounces the cannon back—to the restaurant ship Baratrie. The restraurant is ruled by the famous Head Chef Zeff, who Luffy gets into a large argument with because Zeff wants Luffy to work there for a year. Luffy spots Sanji, a skirt-chasing man who feeds a hungry person who has been kicked out of the restaurant because of lack of money. Luffy then persists and asks Sanji to join his crew, but is promptly rejected. Zeff then warns Luffy not to enter into the Grand Line. Then Luffy is put to work at the restaurant, where he ends up bringing more harm than good in the kitchen, and is set serving the other people in the restaurant. When he sees his crew relaxing, he tries to put his booger into Zoro’s water. The plot fails. But the person Sanji had fed was actually a member of Don Krieg’s group, and he brings Don Krieg to the restaurant. Once they are fed, they decide they want to take over the restaurant ship because they had gone to the Grand Line, and there, all their ships but one was destroyed by Mihawk. Unfortunately, Mihawk has been following them, and easily destroys their last ship.During this time, Nami takes the Going Merry and leaves them. Zoro is defeated by Mihawk, but then Mihawk leaves. Luffy decides to stay behind and help Sanji defend the Baratrie while the rest of the crew takes off to retrieve Nami.

Sanji refuses to fight because he does not want to be responsible for Zeff’s death, but refuses to give up the ship. There is confusion abound, when even Luffy tried to destroy the Baratrie so the pirates would not attack. Luffy then fights Don Krieg, who is equipped heavily with armor. Don Kreig is also capable of using bombs, like the poison gas bomb that nearly killed one of his crew, who had given up his gas mask to Luffy. But through his rubber powers, he defeats him, though he nearly drowned in his attempt, Sanji joins his crew, and then they both run off to find his navigator, Nami, who has turned traitor on them for Arlong.

Along the way, Sanji tries to explain to Luffy about fishmen, but all Luffy can think about is how a fishman looks like. Then a sea creature named MohMoo tried to swallow them both, but was easily defeated by Luffy and used to drive their boat further to the island where Nami had gone. Luffy learns that Usopp had been captured and killed by Nami. When Nami suddenly appears, Luffy tries to convince her to join back, but she refuses and tells them to leave. Confused, he simply fell asleep in the middle of the road, until he discovers that Usopp was actually alive, and was rescued by Nami. Nami’s sister then comes to tell them about Nami’s past and true reasoning for her apparent betrayal, but Luffy refuses to listen because then he would have to leave. Instead, he goes to see a village, where he discovers Nami. But Nami hurriedly left instead. Finally, when Nami stabbed at her tattoo that signified her relations with Arlong, Luffy stops her from stbbing herself further. When she cried and asked him to help her, he put his straw hat on her head and gathered his crew to fight Arlong.

Initially, he fights by embedding his feet in the cement and twirling himself, but he is instead caught in the cement, and thrown into a pool, where he can only stretch his neck and breath until his crew breaks the cement block and he is then able to fight Arlong. They argue about the differences between fishmen and humans, and then Luffy takes Arlong’s extra set of teeth and tries to bite him that way. They eventually wind up in the highest room of the mansion, where Nami had been forced to work there and draw maps for him. When Luffy hears about this, he becomes enraged and starts destroying the tower until he finally defeats Arlong. He is later healed by the local doctor, inspiring him to find a doctor for his crew as well.

They travel to Loguetown, where Gol D. Roger was born and where he had been executed. As the rest of his crew were getting supplies, Luffy goes to see the scaffold, and was ambushed by Buggy and the now skinny Alvida, where he was sentenced to death. When Buffy asked him for his last words, he only declared that he would be the next Pirate King. Zoro and Sanji try to rescue him, but they are unable to get to him in time. Luffy, in return, only says that he is sorry. Then Buggy tries to decapitate him, but a lightning strikes and Luffy is freed, still smiling in the way that Gold Roger had smiled before he had died. He could not fight past the Marine, Smoker, but Dragon, Luffy’s father, helps him—though Luffy did not know about it.

In the beginning, they encounter dangerous weather, but eventually begin their journey into the Grand Line. They enter into the Twin Peaks, where a whale swallows them, but they are afterwards rescued by the keeper. The whale, Lamboon, was actually waiting for pirates who had went into the Grand Line but had never come back for it, though they had promised, and so from then on, suicidally bashed its head into the wall so he could break the Twin Peaks and find them. But Luffy, hearing that story, paints the Straw Hat symbol on the whale’s head and tells him that the whale should stop bashing its head, and instead keep the emblem intact, because Luffy and his crew would certainly return one day.

Their first island is with gigantic cacti that seemed to have little spikes on them. They are welcomed heartfully, and they are filled with food and whiskey. Luffy happily accepts all of the above and becomes extremely fat and goes to sleep contentedly, missing out on the fact that the members of the island were actually part of the Baroque who wanted to sell off the pirates for a profit, and Zoro was the one who defeated most of them. So Luffy, in anger, fights Zoro because he still considered them nice people who provided them hospitally. But during this time, it turns out that the Baroque actually had much darker plans concerning Princess Vivi’s homeland, and that she had been in disguise previously. But they are soon chased off with the promise to deliver Vivi to her homeland of Alabasta.

They are diverted to the island of Little Garden, where two giants have been battling for years for the eternal post (which would direct them to the next island). The required time for the post to set would be two years, otherwise. Luffy endorses this manly battle of the giants, but when one of the giants is poisoned in the beer, he blames Luffy and the crew, but still continues out to fight. He is then defeated and the other giant is captured. Two high-ranking Baroque members capture some of Luffy’s members, but he rushes out and saves them by using his rubbery skills once more, showing his dedication to his crew. After defeating the Baroque, they leave for Alabasta again.

However, along the way, Nami catches a deadly illness, indicating that they required a severe need for a doctor. The weather along the way was also cold and wintry, snowing heavily, indicating their nearness to Drum Island. Along the way, Luffy easily defeats an unknown enemy who had tried to stop them, who later turns out to be the previous dictator of Drum Island. Luffy and crew land on the island, where they discover there is a dearth of doctors in the land, because the previous dictator had driven them out. There was still one left, a mad witch-woman who was said to live at the top of the castle. So Luffy, Sanji, and Nami leave to go to the castle, while it turns out the Doctor was actually in the village. Along the way, Luffy, Sanji, and Nami are attacked by gigantic squirrels and other strange creatures, though they manage to fight their way to the top. However, a series of unfortunate incidents left both Sanji and Nami dangerously wounded, so Luffy clawed his way up the castle on his own, where the Doctor eventually came and took them all to be healed.

There, they meet Tony Tony Chopper, a reindeer with a strange nose who had also eaten a Devil’s Fruit that made him look like a man, and he also was well-trained in the arts of doctoring. Though Luffy continues to run around, and eventually borrows Nami’s jacket, he fights off the previous dictator who tried to attack again, and Chopper helps finish them off so the land would return back to normal. Luffy loudly proclaims himself as Chopper’s friend. They also manage to convince Chopper to join their crew, and they set off to sea again.

Along the way, Luffy accidentally eats all the food, so they set out a trap and capture Mr. 2 Bon Clay of the Baroque, who has the ability to take on the faces. Not recognizing them, he shows them his abilities and then leaves. But sensing the duplication might be dangerous, they decide to tie a white bandage around their wrist, with a black X underneath as the secret.

Alabasta is on the verge of a civil war, mostly due to the Baroque leader, Mr. 0, or Crocodile. Alabasta is a dried land, in part because of a powder that takes away precipitation from other parts of the country in return for a concentrated area of rain. Luffy and crew travel across the land, where Luffy teaches gains a following of kung-fu dugongs who follow their master if beaten. Unfortunately, Luffy obliviously beats most of them, but Chopper persuades them to leave by giving away half their food. Then Luffy loses part of the supplies to the tricky Warusagi Birds, and then he, Zoro, and Sanji defeat a gigantic lizard for meat. A camel named Eyelashes soon joins their group.

They go to Yuba Oasis, where supposedly the rebel troops have gathered, but only find somebody that Vivi once knew, the father of the rebel leader who was once Vivi’s childhood friend. The rebel group had apparently moved to Nanohana, and Vivi wanted to journey there. However, Luffy refused and argued that they should instead go to the Rainbase to defeat Sir Crocodile, where he would not intiate the war. After a long and difficult argument, Vivi finally agrees.

However, while Luffy and Usopp and taking a drink, they accidentally meet Smoker. Luffy is chased by Smoker and the group splits up. Luffy winds up being chased by Smoker, but they all manage to find themselves in front of the casino, where a trap quickly takes them to Sir Crocodile. Or, rather, mostly all, since Chopper was left behind and Sanji was unknown. But Luffy and crew are captured in a cage with Bananawanis in a water cage underneath, one of whom had eaten the key to their cage, and Princess Vivi struggles to defeat the Bananawani until the villains leave, and then Sanji comes and rescues them. They continue onwards for an extremely important mission to stop the rebellion because of a mistake, that the Dance Powder was not actually the use of King Cobra, or Vivi’s father.

Luffy fights Sir Crocodile alone later, while the rest of his crew try and trick the remaining members of the Baroque Works by getting Vivi to reach the rebellion leader in time to tell of him the misunderstandings. Unfortunately, Sir Crocodile had also eaten a Devil’s Fruit, that allowed him to turn into sand and manipulate sand to his bidding, which, in a desert scenario, was deadly. He defeated Luffy by sucking the liquid from him, and then leaving to group with Miss All-Sunday, or Nico Robin, to manipulate the King to show him the underground place.

Unfortunately, the rest of Luffy’s crew, though successful in defeating most of the Baroque Works (even Eyelashes the camel), Princess Vivi was unable to talk to the rebel leader in time. But they still held out firm hope and trust in Luffy, until in the end, Luffy does indeed appear to fight Sir Crocodile underneath the castle, where he had forced Miss All-Sunday to try and read the enscriptions on a rock, only to discover that it did not contain the information he wanted—of Pluton, the mysterious weapon. After a long fight, where Luffy had discovered that Sir Crocodile’s weakness was water, the castle eventually crumbles down and Luffy rescues Miss All-Sunday despite her best intentions. Though exhausted, the Straw Hat Pirates had finally managed to win.

However, though Princess Vivi gained back her place in Alabasta’s royal castle, they were still pirates, and many marines were coming to get them. The joyful feast, in where Luffy, after sleeping for three days straight, ate a humongous amount (which the cooks took as a challenge) ended with the Straw Hat Pirates trying to sneak out, though they left a message to Princess Vivi that she could join them on their ship as well. Though the marine ships were close to them, they did not leave the meeting spot until Vivi ran to them and over a snail, told them that she would not leave. The Straw Hat Pirates only responded with showing her their mark of friendship, and then sailed away to their next adventure.

Miss All-Sunday, or, rather, Nico Robin also comes along. Though some of the crew is hesitant at first, Luffy accepts her into the crew quickly and moves on. Along the way, they get into a dangerous storm, which was extremely mysterious, since there were shadows of giants on the waters. But they manage to get out of it safely, and though confused, continue on to the next island.

They travel to a dangerous island where Nami, who is fed up for once, makes Luffy and Zoro promise not to fight anyone while they are at that town. However, Luffy’s likes and dislikes of a certain type of food directly contradict with another pirate’s opinion, and they would have gotten into a fight if Luffy had not remembered his promise and refused to fight him, even when the pirate continuously insults him, and not even when Nami releases him of his promise.

They go off to the side of the island where they see half a house, run by a man who is apparently Norton the Liar’s descendent. Norton was a man who supposedly had found an island that was full of gold, but when he brought others there, there was actually no gold on the island. But Norton’s descendent had found evidence of gold near the original house. But he also helps them with the mysterious of the shadow giants, by saying there was supposedly a Sky Island in the sky, which deeply excited Luffy and crew, and Luffy insisted on journeying there. The man said that the storm was the best way to propel themselves up, which meant they needed to get there at a certain time. But before that, the pirates who had gotten into a fight with Luffy and had bragged loudly about their bounties had gone and stolen the gold. So, though they needed to leave by sunup, Luffy goes back to the village and beats up everybody to get the gold back, leaving them to find out for themselves that Luffy’s own bounty beat their leader’s.

They manage to get to Sky Island, with some additional help of the add-ons on the Going Merry (the ship gotten from Usopp’s island) and pass through the ‘tollbooth,’ where, though they didn’t pay, they still could mysterious journey in. The island was apparently made of cloud (which Luffy enthusiastically found out by being the first to throw himself off the ship) and the land was called Skypeia. They get rescued by a mysterious knight who gives them a whistle, and then meet a nice girl and her father on the land. They learn about new machines, like the tone dial, etc, but then find out they are being chased away by the guards.

Luffy takes some of his crew to the island where Vearth was—or, rather, earth, dirt, that was unknown to the cloud people—to see this person who claimed to be God and would deliver upon them punishment. They battled through the bubble-boy and continued to journey, until Luffy got swallowed by a snake. He was still oblivious to his situation even as the snake battled the other contestants as the “God” wished to take an exact amount of people onto his ship. At the very end, there are too many still remaining, and so takes down everyone except Nami, who accepts his plans almost unwillingly.

Luffy eventually escapes from the snake’s stomach and then decides that he wants to go and fight this God, and ring the bell, for the story of Norton the Liar had touched him deeply. Though he has to fight with his hands melded to a golden ball, he still carries the advantage of being rubber—since the God had the power of electricity—and wins the battle and rings the bell, casting his shadow onto the world below as a giant. After the defeat of the God, the people celebrate and wish to give the Straw Hat Pirates lots of gold—but the pirates, unknowingly, prefer to take away their own smaller amount of gold with the thoughts of them actually being ruthless pirates. They take the Going Merry, despite her being battered, and sail down into the world below again, where they continue onwards in their journey.

Along the way, they stop at Long Island, where a short man has been stuck by a growing bamboo trees for many years, and his horse had waited patiently behind, though the rest of his troops encircled the island, several years ahead. Luffy accidentally rescues him, and they are, at first, happy, until the horse is shot. Luffy is then challenged by another captain to a game where in each mini-game, the winner may take the opposing team’s crew member or their flag. Luffy agrees immediately, to the anger of Nami. After Nami, Usopp, and Robin lose the first challenge (losing Chopper) and Sanji and Zoro winning the next (winning back Chopper), Luffy battles with the captain, Foxy, in the final match, where according to Usopp, if he is dressed up in an afro and boxing gloves, he would be extremely strong. Luffy does so and feels so accordingly, but it is through his wit from Foxy’s (the opposing captain) attacks and winning the battle, despite being bombarded with bombs. At his win, he does not claim a mechanic, like he had wished, but instead takes Foxy’s flag, and drags a horrible one in its stead.

Though it seems peaceful at first, a Navy officer arrives on Long Island—an extremely powerful, high-ranked one, who is hunting after Nico Robin, and warns them of her danger. However, Luffy stands firm in defending Robin, and does not believe him when he claims that she betrayed her former friends. He challenges the officer to a one-on-one fight, cleverly ensuring that even if Luffy lost, the man could not go after his crew. He sent his crew away and battled the man, only to lose in the end, being completely frozen by the man’s Devil Fruit power. However, Akoji does not kill him, and instead leaves him for his crew members to rescue him.

Luffy does not seem to learn anything from the experience at first, even playfully imitating the event again when flour, but he develops a yearning to become stronger for a reason that is not yet spoken. Instead, with their battered ship, they move to Water 7. Along the way, they see a frog try to fight against a sea train, and meet a mysterious grandmother. But they move further into the Water 7, home of the Galley-La. They took some water horse and set about selling the gold, to Luffy’s immense joy (and fright when Nami expertly battles the bankers). He swings his briefcase carelessly, fending off successfully against a Frank House member, until a Galley-La member apparently takes it. They manage to chase it down and recover it, thanks a bit to Iceberg, the beloved mayor who united everyone under Water 7.

But there, they learn, heartbrokenly, that Going Merry can never be fixed. Only Usopp is not there to here, since the Franky House members kidnapped him and the gold. But Luffy is angry and at first demands for them to fix it, but the ship members only tell him that to sail it anymore would just break the Going Merry into pieces, and it was no longer possible to do so. Luffy and the gang eventually find Usopp, who had tried to fight the Franky House, but they beat him up. In anger, Luffy takes the most powerful of his crew and tears down the House, to Franky’s immense anger as well. He chases after Luffy in town, but Franky is the least of their troubles.

Usopp and Luffy get into an argument. Usopp is tearful that he could not get the gold back to fix Going Merry, but refuses to listen to them about how the Going Merry could no longer be fixed, since he has emotional ties to the ship since the Skypeia incident. Though Usopp is injured, he challenges Luffy to a fight—which Zoro says that they would follow the victor as the captain. Luffy and Usopp do indeed battle, and Usopp manages to hold out for a while, even gaining the upper hands at times with his ingenius usage of dials, but loses in the end. Luffy, with his hat drawn over his eyes, leaves Usopp the boat and goes away.

However, Nico Robin is seen at Iceberg’s near-assassination, casting a dark suspicion over all the Straw Hats for being assassins. They are hated and hunted, but they manage to escape the scene and try to figure out what’s going on and who are the real assassins. Luffy manages to sneak in, only to be nailed by the enemy, a secret organization by the World Government to take down Nico Robin, and had superpowers beyond imagination. Luffy cannot deal with them and is literally nailed down, but using rubber powers, he manages to squirm out and rescue the rest. They are really after Franky, who has a dark past, and has the blueprints to a machine that could destroy the world—and Nico Robin, the power to make it.

Unfortunately, Luffy gets stuck between walls while a giant tidal wave is coming, and has to be rescued. But afterwards, after they miss the train with Sanji, they take Rocket-Man, a dangerous sea-train that cannot be stopped once started. They continue onward and onward, Luffy even more determined after learning from Iceberg himself (after the second assassination attempt) that Nico Robin was actually doing this so that the World Government would not come after the Straw Hat Pirates, under the promise that they would not be dealt with. But Luffy continues to chase onward, perched on the Rocket-Man’s tip, and battling everything in order to get to the government island that nobody had ever penetrated before—

And Rocket-Man penetrates it.

Though they had gone over the plan very carefully, Luffy still recklessly goes in first and jumps over the walls, while Rocket-Man has to barge through later and go through all the proper procedures to actually open the gates for the rest. Luffy takes out Blueno, a government agent who had formerly beaten him, and with something he calls “Gears,” he manages to take him out. He calls upon Second Gear, and Blueno is defeated. Luffy says that he must become stronger because some of his crew members could not take care of themselves, so he must do it for them.

His entire crew manages to come together to face Franky and Nico Robin in their captured state, and in a row, they ask Nico Robin to come back. She continues to refuse them tearfully, despite Luffy’s sheer determination and saying that he would drag her back alive, until finally she tearfully tells that she actually wants to live after all, before being dragged away. His determination fired up, Luffy gives chase to recover his newest crew member.

He continues onward to the underground route where they had taken Nico Robin, despite the fact that she refuses to be rescued. He battles the jaguar-user using his Second Gear while Franky goes on ahead, as his crew goes through the house of dangerous government members behind him. But through difficult battling, he continues to fight the jaguar-man until he is forced to use even more dangerous gears that leave him in a temporary child state. But after Usopp shouts encouragement (they had not realized it was Usopp on Rocket-Man, since he had pretended to be the Soge-King of Shooter Island, and simple-minded Luffy had fallen for it) and takes off his mask, Luffy manages to defeat him at last and can no longer move. Just when they are surrounded because of the Busier Call, a voice tells them to jump in the water. They all do so, to be caught by none other than the Going Merry, who escapes from the Navy ships and flies away back to Water 7.

There, the Going Merry finally breaks apart when it reaches the Galley-La ship. Finally, they burn the Going Merry, for Luffy says it would be a cold journey otherwise. The Going Merry speaks to them one last time, and Luffy tearfully says that he was a bad owner and that he himself had broken her mast and everything many times over, but she says that she had a fun time, and then burns away. The entire crew is depressed.

At their return of Water 7, the citizens love them once more, and Iceberg welcomes them warmly. There, Franky would eventually join their crew for his dream, after rebuilding the new ship. But while doing so, Monkey D. Garp comes along, or Luffy’s grandfather, who has a large position in the Navy and refuses to capture his own grandson. There, it is learned that Luffy’s father is actually the revolutionary. They also meet the little boy that Luffy had escorted to the Navy, who is extremely impressed by Luffy. After, Luffy and crew take Franky and try to leave—however, the Navy fires at them. They linger behind, however, until Usopp, on land, finally breaks down his pretense and apologizes—which was the only thing the Straw Hat Pirates were listening for, and they take him back warmly (Luffy sobs) and then use their newfound power in their ship to fly away, due to Franky’s genius.

They enter into haunted waters, where they meet Boone, a skeletal musician with an afro. Though at first they are frightened, Luffy is not scared at all and laughs and dances with the pirate, and even offers for him to become nakama, or friends, which the pirate accepts. The skeleton enjoys making jokes about his own skeletal features, but he is also missing his shadow—a completely different story that he seems unwilling to tell. They reach upon an island, Thriller Bark, where Boone suddenly leaves them on their own.

Nami, Usopp, and Chopper accidentally go on the island first, and are terrozied by a three-headed dogs, zombies, and the typical statue monsters in the mansion. Luffy and the rest, following behind, easily take care of all of them (and Luffy wishes to capture a ghost, and train the three-headed dog by bashing him over the head and then telling him to sit. He also mistakes the zombies for old men.) Luffy is then taken along the way and his shadow is removed, and given to a monster who was buried in ice, a ginormous monster who is like Luffy, but obeys the monster in command instead. But he still wishes to become pirate king, and barges in and out of the island while searching for pirate hats and the like.

Luffy is placed back on the ship, but is woken up by the word ‘meat,’ in where he then tries to take on the island once more. However, without his shadow, he would die if exposed to sunlight, explaining why Boone was wandering in the haunted waters and could not remove himself. Boone himself manages to defeat his own shadow and is returned to himself. Luffy is then stuffed with shadows from the other zombies, and bulked with all different sorts of abilities, he tries to battle the evil monster, and eventually does succeed, just in time as half his friends were disappearing with the sun. They continued to stand there, for they believed in Luffy.

Luffy himself is completely beaten, and everything seems still for a while—until Paw-Paw man shows up. Of an unknown organization, he seems intent on killing Luffy—but Zoro instead offers his head. Luffy himself never learned about it, just that his wounds miraculously disappears while Zoro is deathly injured. In the meanwhile, his crew had learned about the true nature of the Gears—that they wore away at his life. Luffy rubberizied his interal organs, wearing away at his life. His crew grows worried, but nothing happens yet. Instead, Luffy once again offers Boone to be nakama, especially after learning Boone was a musician—who Luffy had wanted as a pirate member all along—who had taken care of Laboon. They sing and dance all night long before setting off to the halfway point, where the meet mermaids.

Personality: Luffy is extremely simple-minded and focused on a few important things in life. Despite the fact that he could not swim, he wished to become a pirate. He is often insanely focused on meat as well, always hunting for the next food, and, upon his first meeting with Chopper, tried to eat him. He also considers his friends extremely important to him, and wished for a bigger crew before he entered the Grand Line, his dream destination. He does not seemed to be phased by the things that matter, and instead always doing ridiculous things that gather his crew’s rage and attention. He does what he wants to do, like sitting at the head of the Going Merry, despite that he could easily tip over and swim. And indeed, though it is extremely dangerous for him to fight mermen when he cannot swim, he still does so for his precious friends. He even becomes stronger with the Gears in order to protect the members on his crew that could not protect themselves.

He is also oblivious to everything around him, and seems honestly well-wishing to all good people. Though he gains a reputation as a bad pirate in several towns, this does not stop him from helping other people. He seems delighted at his own bounty, though he does not seem to be keeping intense track of it. No matter what, he decides to fight on for the things that matter to him, like staying behind to get the gold though the ship would leave in the early morning. He is very frank about his opinions—if he likes someone, he says it, but if he doesn’t, he says it as well. He insults his opponents in the simplest fashion with whatever is on his mind. Similarily, he is oblivious to his line, and is otherwise unconcerned about how fancy or strong his bloodline is. His main concern, as always, was food and friends.

He is also curious and loves island. His dedication to his dream of becoming the Pirate King continues stronger and stronger, and he loves to explore the different types of islands. He also has a sense of true manliness within him, especially while seeing the giants fight each other on the island. Though Nami had claimed it was senseless, Luffy not only endorsed it, but also did it with shimmering eyes. But he also has a sensitivity to his friends and his crew, especially concerning their delicate moments. He is first to let Nico Robin to stay, though the others were suspicious, and he was the one most determined to get back Robin, though she continued to claim that she no longer wanted to live. He also considers other friendships honorable as well, even going up to Skypeia not only to explore new lands, but also to honor Norton’s friendship to the chief tribal leader. His firm belief in his friends are also undying, refusing to listen to Nami’s backstory, and instead, simply belieiving that Nami could do no wrong. He is also extremely defensive of them as well.

He treasures his straw hat above all else because Shanks gave it to him, urging him to continue onwards and get a larger and better pirate crew to defeat the older generation. He also cannot try. His first attempt at his Jolly Roger looked horrible. Future depictions of wanted members for his crew looked horrid. The current Jolly Roger was drawn by Usopp. Luffy also will not allow anyone to harm his straw hat, either, going mad if anyone dares to do so.

Luffy is also almost reckless with danger. He continues to be a pirate despite being unable to swim, and challenges the World Government, who own a large amount of countries, just for a member of his crew who repeatedly said that she wished to die. Though he is not above playing petty tricks on his friends, or getting fooled by them into foolish situations, or throwing them all in danger and forcefully drawing them back out again, he is overall a brave-hearted simple person who understands what is truly important to his life, and continues to maintain his dream and grows more and more powerful by the day. Though he bears a lot of responsibility, he is, as he tells other people, a rubber man, and he continues to be resilient and strong. His simple-mindedness may have cost him some things—invoking anger from enemies, from his friends—but overall, because of it, he is someone who is extremely focused to his task and does not diverge for his pathway (even when his shadow was in the monster, the monster still simple-mindedly pulled the island off-course into the sunlight—and Luffy won his shadow back by sheer willpower, dragging him back, saying that he was going to be the Pirate King, and would need his shadow.) In doing so, he gains immense respect from his crew. Nami, the thief who hates pirates, eventually joined him, and the straightforward Zoro dedicates his life to him, though he has a task of his own. Luffy is mostly oblivious to the loyalty he wins, except that he has fierce determination to protect them as well. He is also well-respected in other towns as well because of it. Lastly, Luffy is represented by the color red, and usually smells like meat.

Item Lost: Of Shanks, the man who inspired him to become a pirate.

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