The Awakening of the Ancient Mammoth Zoan
I think Awakening is a topic Oda will bring more and more forward to us, based on two enemies Luffy fought in the New World, with the conclusion of Luffy obtaining the awakening ability for himself.
Also devil fruit are a fascinating topic, we basically learn new informations in every arc. Based on this assumption two things need to be uncovered:
The awakening of Logias, which was foreshadowed throughout the series, if we consider Crocodile a credible supply of informations and if that what happened on Punk Hazard is caused by devil fruits.
Secondly the awakening Zoans, which was foreshadowed in Impel Down, and I believe this will be a refurbished topic in the Wano arc.
It is interesting to build up the arc with smiles and O-Tama’s devil fruit power, but Oda showed us something significant in chapter 921! – Kaido gaining whole respect for his title as Emperor and Strongest Creature alive.
With that I start my theory, backing up slowly with evidences!
Kaido is an Awakened Mythical Zoan!
First of all my next theory will be about Kaido being an Ancient Oni who wants to take revenge on the world for a certain reason, but for me it is simple to answer your current question rising…why is Kaido a mythical dragon user?
This is all reasoned and defined by portayal, Kaido as other characters obtained his power over the curse of their career, as with that Kaido executed a plan 20 years ago and succeeded, which has many factors to bring with.
For once Kaido is worshipped since probably that amount of time, so the dragon worship theory comes into play for Kaido for 20 years.
On the other side if Kaido had an humanoid oni fruit power, then the previous portrayal of his oni state is not that powerful for a devil fruit aswell as this would rise the question, how would Kaido’s full potential look like as Oni?
So the decision over the dragon fruit makes more sense once we explain Kaido being awakened.
Awakened hence is just a state, not the ultimate form, as Katakuri showed us that beyond awakening, he still has other capabilities, so there must be a reason for why Kaido decides on showing himself awakened and this could easily be reasoned by 2 points:
- Mastering the devil fruit to an extend that Awakening doesn’t affect his stamina
- Usage of the inhuman abilities
A huge point that also needs to be mentioned is that if Kaido would be a dragon living for atleast 40 years, then why were dragons still considered mythical creatures?
At this point this question would develop into the point, saying Kaido is ancient or might even be from the past, and here I talk about centuries up to a millenium.
And the biggest twist is: The exact same could be considered for the theory of Kaido simply being an Oni.
But besides that I still would like to touch another topic, underlining Kaido is a dragon fruit user:
Upon Kaido arriving from the sky, we first see Momonosuke behind Luffy, but after his appearance Momo turned into his dragon form.
This clearly signifies dominance over Momonosukes powers, hence I think Kaido’s dragon form dominates Momonosuke’s dragon form.
Now let’s head back to Punk Hazard, Oda especially told us that Momonosuke’s is a dragon-fruit replica, which was considered a fail by Vegapunk.
Also other than Vinsmoke Judge or Ceasar Clown, Vegapunk directly digged into devil-fruits lineage on humans, which resulted into the Pacifistas, and this all thanks to Kizaru who gave himself up for this experiment, that’s how you could see it more or less.
While Ceasar more, went into just devil-fruits and Judge more into human lineage.
This lets us question how Vegapunk and dragons could be connected and the only logically answer I can find is that Kaido in the past has been captured and this ties in to the times Kaido was younger. If you want any bet from my side…before Kaido took over Wano and after he left his partnership with Big Mom, as most people assume…under the Rox 20-40 years ago.
Once being captured, maybe even for getting his hands on that fruit, Kaido was experimented on, but the experiments were not enough, resulting into a fail replica and leaving Vegapunk with some studies open, which in the end turned out into replicating fruits into the Pacifista.
Hence this explains how Kaido could have a fruit power of a Dragon, because Vegapunk needed this fruit powers based on his devil fruit experiments.
Still this puts the chance higher than Vegapunk just focussing on replicating true dragons existed previously. Because again dragons have to be mythical in the world of One Piece which just makes it harder for Vegapunk to replicate them until he has research material from the ancient past.
In the end the question arises: Why is the world aware of Kaido for 20-40 years? Because that is the time Kaido possesses the mythical dragon devil-fruit.
What exactly could “Zoan Awakening” mean?
Again coincidence Crocodile speaks?
Anyway we get to know that the Impel Down mino guards are the only awakened Zoans we know about right now, so this is the only material to dig into.
First of all they are confirmed devil fruit users, but why this got so heavily questioned in the speech bubble to the left? Because at first glance this was not considered a possibility, because those “users” seemingly have lost all their human capabilities.
At this point we can say they lost control of their human senses and the “animal spirit” has fully overcome them.
This explains why Crocodile uses the term “natural” in here, as this users seem to have gained the instincts and natural behaviour of animals, with this they gained their physical abilities enhanced and lost physical properties of humans.
The only human remainings are the parts below their torso, which could mean several things:
They are still in the process to change, or their fruit is that low tier, that it simply isn’t able to change more, which could also open the possibility of the user himself being so lowtier, that he couldn’t awaken into more than that.
Back to Kaido…
If he would be Awakened, why didn’t he lost control over his human form?
This signifies that Zoan awakening can be mastered and this reasons the introduction of the mino-guardians, because back then the following question could have arised:
“How could an Awakening of other more powerful Zoan users be?”
And because of this question, we all awaited our answers in Wano, against an enemy that particulary resolves around Zoan fruits.
Unlike the guardians, Kaido seems to have control over turning back at will. Still Kaido has control over all properties a dragon of his type could have, especially flying and elemental control.
With that in mind Kaido uses this form because of it properties, but this let’s us say that Kaido controls also the hybrid forms, aswell a simple unenhanced dragon form, same as Lucci had an unenhanced leopard form.
What is beyond that? Beyond that is enhancing with all kinds of Haki.
Also Kaido could go into a contract with himself, losing bounds to all his human senses to unleash hidden powers of the dragon itself.
In some other case Kaido could transfer all his dragon powers into his human form, as this is seemingly possible with someone like Marco, who is simply using the Phoenix flames in a full human form.
Also Kaido’s other forms, probably different hybrid forms could be that versatile, that whenever you face a new form you have to change your strategy.
This is where I see Zoan Awaking being right now, which let’s arise a further topic to discuss:
How does this initiate transformation into the awakened Zoan state look like?
The mino guardians failed in controlling and Kaido mastered it already.
For this we need a candidate who is not awakened!
I think Jack will be this one!
Jack is not Awakened – But he will be in future!
Jack has been direspected by Shutenmaru, which is throwing up alot of questions regarding those two characters.
Who is profitting and who is losing in this portrayal?
I think to answer this question we have to go through the halfpoints of Jack.
- Jack was overwhelmed by Zunisha.
- Jack was held back by Sengoku and Fujitora
- Jack was portayed lower than a real Samurai of Wano
What I think is that Jack always has been portrayed below the scenario he was opposing.
We know he posses a full mammoth form, but it is not enhanced not signifying he is Awakened.
Yet still at he end of the chapter Kaido still orders Jack to continue, which lets me conclude, that whatever Jack’s state right now is, Kaido still puts hope in him.
This can be considered great for Jack as he shows potential, not right now, but in the future.
Hence it is a big feat, that Jack himself stood up against a Samurai.
What is significant in this fight?
– It was a true sword fight, which signalizes Jack having enough raw power to confront the powerhouse swordsmanship of Shutenmaru.
Shutenmaru himself, who seems to be Ashura Douji or related to him, is a name for himself, as Luffy, Zoro and others, were considered as his underlings by Holdem.
Oda shows he likes power scaling in this arc, that’s why we got this dramatic clash, showing that Jack is close to Shutenmarus level, being a big feat for Jack.
But now the question arising next would be: “When will the promised W of Jack come?”
We know his powers resolve around brute force, together with fighting with his swords.
It is most likely that based on Jacks personality, the pressure he’s is put in by Kaido and a potential will of becomming stronger due achieving Kaido’s wish, will lead into Jack obtaining a power up that will make him look stronger than previously portrayed.
This power up would be the Awakening and Oda could use Jack as first character ever, to:
- Unlock Awakening on panel
- A full scaled Zoan Awakening with previously discussed conflict of losing humanity
As Jack has previously show signs of inhumanity, but only personalitywise, then it is easy assumeable that Jack within his Awakening transformation might lose every sense of humanity and turn out into a much much stronger and more enhanced version of those “awakened users” we have seen in Impel Down.
I think Jack’s will and personality might not be strong enough to let him master this fruit to an extend Kaido did.
A success during the Awakening hence is depending on the fruit powers and tier, the will of the person, probably the personality and the property of your body.
This can be underlined by the fact, how scared Jack is by Kaido, because Jack is aware of Kaido opening up his personality and powers to an extend Jack could only dream of.
I imagine Jack will lose the control over himself turning into an enhanced mammoth destroying his district, maybe other parts of Wano and forcing several people to fight him to even out the brute force Jack might errupt.
*Theory by Rej
