One Piece Chapter 229

Cover

Luffy is sitting on a bell tower trying to catch a big bird with a fishing rod and a loaf of bread as bait.

Storyline

Jaya, East Coast: Mont Blanc Cricket tells the Straw Hats everything he knows about Sky Island. At times, a phenomenon occurs where it suddenly goes pitch black. Luffy and Usopp recall their experience, which involved the addition of large giants. Cricket goes on to explain that the darkness comes from the shadow of very large clouds, ‘king clouds’, which pile up into huge mountains so that they block even the sunlight. Cricket suggests they may be petrified clouds that have been passing over the world for millennia. He leaves it to the audience to believe him or not, but if there is Sky-Island, it is on these clouds.

Luffy and Usopp want to leave immediately, but after Nami gives them a bad face, they keep listening. Cricket tells them they need to find a knock-up stream that can take them to the sky. A vertical stream upwards. It’s dangerous, knock-up streams are a natural disaster that are only conjectured to be created because it’s too risky to explore. Cricket explains it by a developing cavity at the bottom of the sea into which cold water enters. The underground heat causes an explosion in which the water shoots up into the sky like a stream for about a minute. This happens about five times a month. If there isn’t a king cloud with a Sky-Island above the explosion, a ship just falls back down. Usopp therefore tries to talk Luffy out of it, but to no avail.

Looking at the rotten The Going Merry, Cricket promises that Masira and Shoujou will fix it, which the two enthusiastically affirm. Nami reminds them of the log port, which will point to another island in a day. They ask Cricket when the next time a king cloud will appear over a knock up stream. He thinks noon tomorrow. Usopp doesn’t believe him and asks him why he’s so trusting when he doesn’t know them. Even Luffy can’t stop him. Usopp accuses Cricket of being a liar just like Noland. The latter calmly replies to him that after the cloud appears in Masira’s territory, there is an event a day later where the knock-up streams become active. This happens south of his cabin. He is pleased to have met the Straw Hats and invites them to dinner, including Usopp.

Usopp is embarrassed and asks Nami if he is being pathetic and cowardly. But she understands his reaction and advises him to just apologize, which he does, with a slightly wet nose. Dinner degenerates into a party, which is chaotic as always with the Straw Hat Pirates. Robin reads Noland’s log on the side. The last words are: “I saw gold in the skull’s right eye.” No one understands this sentence and only blank pages follow. But that is why they dive every day. From the sea, Bellamy’s gang approaches, intent on Cricket’s gold.