One Piece Teases Luffy's Intense Training to Fight Kaido

The country of Wano has not been kind to the Monkey D. Luffy and the Straw Hat Pirates. Jumping from one fight to another, it seems like the feudalistic, isolationist nation is hardly giving our favorite swashbucklers a time to breathe. Now however, with the briefest of respites before the next big push against Kaido and his forces, the Straw Hats are working on improving their skills, learning more about the country itself, acquiring new "artillery" and in Luffy's case, training in unique ways for the upcoming battle royale. The most recent chapter has revealed a unique way in which Monkey is getting ready to battle against the Beast Pirates' leader, Kaido.

Following being injected with a biological weapon by one of the Beast Pirates, Luffy went from the verge of death to spry and healthy in an extremely quick turnaround time. Now, led by one of the samurai he met in his attempt to free Wano's prisoners, Luffy is undertaking a brand new level of training by slamming his fists into a rather giant piece of steel, again and again. Whether or not this particular type of training will be enough to net Monkey the "W" is yet to be seen, but as is the case with most everything Luffy does, the leader of the Straw Hat Pirates is giving it his all.

As the samurai barks at Luffy, hitting the steel slab will be akin to hitting Kaido, as the Beast Pirates' leader has skin that holds similar properties to the nigh impenetrable substance. Should Monkey manage to hit his way through something as hard as steel, he'll have a good chance of managing to finally take down Kaido.

So what is Kaido up to while Luffy trains? Well he is also growing stronger, though not directly physically. Having struck an arrangement with Big Mom, both Big Mom's pirates and the Beast Pirates have joined forces to create the Pirate Alliance, spelling out even bigger problems for the Straw Hats and the innocent citizens of Wano Country. Will Luffy's training be enough to foil this new partnership?

What do you think of Luffy's new training? Do you expect him to unveil a new transformation against Kaido? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly on Twitter @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the Straw Hat Pirates!

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.