In Chapter 1056 Kid and Killer mention a “man with a burn scar” that could be key to the war for the One Piece. The mention of this man “marked by flames” has spurred a lot of interesting discussion amongst Japanese readers, so I thought I’d share some theorised candidates!
In terms of characters with burns, one of the more obvious ones is Kuzan. His whole body is marked by burn scars from his fight against Akainu and the panel with Robin’s reaction after the name was mentioned shows she share a history with the person. Kuzan was there when Ohara was destroyed. It is possible he kept some of the documents on Poneglyphs from there, and he somehow learnt how to read the Poneglyphs. This is why he has always been sympathetic towards Robin and never went all out in trying to capture her. After his defeat from Akainu we learnt he is somehow affiliated with Blackbeard now. No idea what he’s doing with Blackbeard but it’s been shown that Blackbeard Pirates do not trust Kuzan at all. So why does Blackbeard want anything to do with Kuzan? Probably because he can read the Road Poneglyphs.
Another candidate is Sabo, as his facial scar is likely a burn, and he is of course linked heavily to fire.
Another candidate is Mad Monk Urouge. While Urouge doesn’t have a burn mark, he does have tattoos on both his arms of flames making him literally “marked by flames”.
The first time the Supernovas are introduced you see Law smile just before Urouge appears to strike Killer (Episode 392, 20:30), indicating sort of a connection between them, which would explain why Law immediately understood who Killer was talking about.
As Killer said they forced a Big Mom Commander to give up the Road Poneglyph, Urouge probably did too when he defeated Snack, so maybe there is a deeper connection there.
As noted in the chapter, the phrasing used could also indicate a scar in the shape of a flame, which may be a new character or one we’ve seen little of. One such candidate is this character who appears to be old, and is talking to Crocus (a member of Roger’s crew), so it wouldn’t be a stretch to say he may know something about reaching the One Piece.
The man with the burn mark/marked by flames makes me wonder if Ohara would have another survivor. After all, having copies of the Poneglyphs isn’t useful to Kid and Law if neither of them have something to decrypt them. Remember that ship of civilians Akainu destroyed himself in the Ohara flashback? I don’t know how likely it is, but there’s the possibility that one of them was one of the scholars, and ironically was the one survivor (with a burn left by the event). I don’t know if it’s super-likely, but considering the evocation of the burn mark causes that reaction for Robin (the panel where she’s like “?” when hearing about him) I would think that guy is connected to Robin.
