One Piece Reveals Ace's Big Wano Connection

When One Piece began its Wano Country arc in the anime, fans were excited to see all of the shake ups coming to the series and its characters. With new designs, and new direction, fans have already seen how the series has changed with the first couple of episodes. But what fans didn't expect was a major return to the series as the latest episode featured a look back at a never-before-seen Ace adventure.

In the latest episode of the series, it was revealed that Luffy's brother Ace actually had a pretty deep connection with the Wano Country as he arrived there long before and had promised the newest young addition to the anime, Otama, that he would return and save her village.

Episode 894 of the series explores a never-before-seen part of Ace's past as it revealed that he actually shipwrecked onto the Wano Country long before Luffy arrived. Otama's former home of Amigasa village was destroyed by X. Drake, who has since joined Kaido's forces, a year prior and thus fell to ruin as Wano Country was wrought with drought and pollution.

When Ace and his crew shipwrecked there, Otama and the other villagers took their supplies and food, but upon seeing this Ace naturally wasn't angry at all. He instead spent several weeks living there with Otama and the villagers, and Otama grew the most attached to him in that time.

Otama has been waiting in the ruins of the village alone with her master, and has thus been victim to starvation the most. She's been waiting all of this time for Ace to make his grand return, but unfortunately for her, Ace has died. Luffy broke the news to her in a pretty blunt way, and it broke Otama's heart for sure. But this explains why Otama seemed drawn to Luffy pretty quickly.

Sensing something in Luffy, she began to call him "Big Bro," and even noted that a "Big Bro is a Big Bro" because she's been waiting for Ace to make his return to Wano. It makes her situation all the more heartbreaking, yet also reveals why Ace was such an effective pirate even though he spent so much time traveling alone. Hearing this story about Ace has indeed inspired Luffy, and gave him another example of just how great his brother was.

How did you feel about seeing Ace in One Piece again? Wasn't it bittersweet? Let us know your thoughts in the comments!

Eiichiro Oda's One Piece first began serialization in Shueisha's Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997. It has since been collected into over 80 volumes, and has been a critical and commercial success worldwide with many of the volumes breaking printing records in Japan. The manga has even set a Guinness World Record for the most copies published for the same comic book by a single author, and is the best-selling manga series worldwide with over 430 million copies sold. The series still ranked number one in manga sales in 2018, which surprised fans of major new entries.