I’ve been rereading chapter 1000 and several things just started clicking for me. Let me know what you think.
1. The straw hat was the traditional crown of the Ancient Kingdom
Someone pointed out that in this panel Luffy looks a lot like Shanks did when he passed on the straw hat. And the pose actually struck me like something really important, it reminded me of Napoleon crowning himself. Now what if that’s exactly what Shanks was doing?
What if kingship of the Ancient Kingdom has been passed down to descendants of the old royal family through the straw hat?
It would be the covert way to do it, and would explain why the World Government has a giant strawhat locked away (perhaps the original crown!). Yet the real king would be hard to find because lots of people wear straw hats.
2. The D are Descendants of the royal family of the Ancient Kingdom
Plenty of people suspect that Shanks was the little brother of Portgas D. Rouge, because they both have red hair and similar features, and that would explain how Roger knew Rouge. If that’s true then the last three people to wear the “crown” have all been Ds: Gol D Roger, Portgas D Shanks, Monkey D Luffy. Moreover, why was Shanks interested in Luffy? Coincidence? Doesn’t it seem just a bit too strange that he would hang around some random kid on an East Blue island? In fact, why would Roger keep Shanks (and yes, Buggy) as kids on his boat?
What if Shanks was watching over Luffy because the descendants of the royal family, the D., keep an eye on each other so they can pass down the crown when the time comes?
If the preceding two theories are true, then that would make Luffy the legitimate heir of the kingship of the Ancient Kingdom.
3. The One Piece is a prophecy on which Descendant will reclaim the throne and resurrect the Ancient Kingdom.
We have already seen in Fishman Island that prophecies are real (Madame Shirley accurately predicted Luffy destroying Noah). Now there was a very interesting panel in Chapter 1000, this one:
Which means Oden knew about a future in which the son of the pirate king would have a brother that would be somehow significant.
As everyone knows, Roger named the island of One Piece “Laugh Tale” because it harbored a very amusing story. And he also said “they were too early”. Now wouldn’t it make sense, if the One Piece was a prophecy documenting the heir of the Ancient Kingdom reclaiming the throne, involving Roger’s son and that son’s brother, that the World Government would go through such insane lengths (killing every infant 9 months after Roger’s capture) if they were trying to prevent this prophecy?
Whitebeard spoke of a war engulfing the world, one that Sengoku knew about but couldn’t stop. Doesn’t that point to a prophecy?
Finally, there is a certain poetic beauty in this theory. If the One Piece is the story of Luffy, the covert heir of the Ancient Kingdom, making a name for himself and becoming the figurehead in a great war, then we have all been reading that story.
The One Piece is literally… One Piece itself.
*Theory by divinesleeper
