Cover
Zoro sits on a lily pad holding a barrel together with his hands, which is in the process of being nailed together by a frog with a hammer. In the background, Luffy moves unsteadily toward them with a larger hammer on the lily pads. Nami stands facing away from the action on land.
Storyline
Nami, Luffy, and Zoro are sailing along comfortably when Nami remarks that without a proper ship, they would have little chance on the Grand Line. Luffy and Zoro say only that they need meat and rum. Nami suggests they sail to the island south of them to look for what they need.
On this island, a man from the village named Usopp is standing on a cliff by the sea looking at the beautiful weather when suddenly he runs to the village and shouts loudly over and over that the pirates are coming. Once in the village, he laughs loudly and yells that he was just kidding. The villagers, however, do not find this funny and come out of their houses armed with brooms and rakes. Usopp runs away from the angry mob, who even throw pots at him. He hides in a tree near the path and amuses himself there with his joke. The villagers, after a brief and futile search, make their way home in annoyance.
Usopp jumps down from the tree when Piiman and Carrot, two boys from the village, make themselves known below. They salute him and say that Usopp’s pirate gang is now at hand. Suddenly, Onion, the third member of the pirate gang, also comes running screaming. He announces that the pirates are coming. The three don’t believe this at first. Only when he mentions that he saw Buggy’s flag, Usopp is the first to get scared and wants to run away. Onion, however, explains that there are only two small boats to be seen. Then Usopp sees a supposed chance for glory and announces that Usopp’s pirate band is now fighting for the village.
Luffy, Nami and Zoro, who are the pirates spotted by Onion, arrive on the island and go ashore. Zoro is the first to spot the pirate gang lying in wait behind bushes. He points at them, whereupon Peppers, Carrot, and Onion are seized by fear and quickly run away screaming. Usopp comes out of the bushes and boasts that he has the most powerful band of pirates in the world and that the three of them should just leave. If they attacked the village, he would send his 80,000 men after them. Nami, however, debunks his lie, whereupon he literally breaks down and asks himself how she could possibly have found out. Luffy can only laugh at this.
The four are in a village pub and come to the conclusion that the three still need people for the crew and a real ship. Usopp tells them that only one person here owns such a big ship. She is the loneliest person far and wide and she owns the giant mansion. When her parents died about a year ago, she inherited the whole mansion with the servants and the money. The girl is not much older than her, but has been sick in bed for a long time.
Nami wants to give up and sail on, since there is no ship on the island, but Luffy says that he finds it quite nice here and that they could stay a little longer. Usopp makes a suggestion: since they are still looking for people for their crew, he would make captain. However, the three of them unanimously deny this.
Meanwhile, in the giant mansion, the girl demands that her butler, Beauregard, please send her Usopp.
| Manga volumes | Kuro Arc (Manga) |
