Chapters · Alabasta › Reverse Mountain to Alabasta (Alabasta voyage)

Chapter 157: Ace Arrives

Summary

Cover (p. 1): Django’s Dance Heaven, Vol. 24: “The Hostage Girl” — Django and Miss Goldenweek face off around a chained captive girl.

In-story, the Going Merry crosses into the Alabastan climate zone marked by a sighting of the Sea Cat — a giant cat-shaped sea-monster sacred to Alabasta (pp. 2-4). Luffy tries to eat it; Vivi knocks him out. The crew is starving — ‘Our first meal in four days!!!’ — and quickly distracted by a wider threat.

Roughly 200 Baroque Works ships sail past on parallel courses (pp. 6-7). Vivi identifies them as the Billions — the officer agents’ underlings — and warns ‘This won’t be like Whisky Peak!!’ Inside the Going Merry (pp. 8-9), she briefs the crew on a Baroque Works agent with the Clone-Clone Fruit (Mane Mane no Mi) who can perfectly impersonate anyone — they need a recognition system the impersonator can’t fake.

The X-mark fellowship-sign installs (pp. 10-11): the crew bandages their left arms, draws an X on each, and bumps fists. Luffy: ‘No matter what happens from here on out… our left arms will bear… the sign of our fellowship!’ This is the first instance of the iconography that will anchor the entire Alabasta saga.

They anchor in a cove and walk into the Port of Nanohana, Alabasta Kingdom (p. 13) — first on-page Alabasta city. A man has collapsed face-down in his food at the Spice Bean tavern; the crowd diagnoses Desert Strawberry poisoning (pp. 13-15) — an Alabasta spider that mimics a strawberry. Meanwhile Captain Smoker is in the same square — he beat the Strawhats to Alabasta (p. 13, pays off Ch. 128’s pursuit-lock).

Luffy reflexively shakes the ‘dead’ man (p. 15) — and the man wakes up (GASP!!). It was just narcolepsy. He’d fallen asleep mid-meal with his fork still in his hand (pp. 16-17). The Strawhats laugh with him; he asks if they’ve seen a man in a straw hat (p. 18). Smoker recognizes him: ’…Portgaz D. Ace?’ The crowd reacts: ‘What’s Whitebeard’s Second Division Commander doing here?’ — first on-page utterances of Whitebeard, the Whitebeard Pirates, and Portgaz D. Ace, and the fourth named D. in the series (after Roger, Luffy, Dragon).

Outside, Luffy bursts through a wall chasing food (‘A restaurant!!!!’). Ace, in close-up under his skull-twin hat, says: ‘I’m just… looking for my kid brother.’ (p. 20) — cliffhanger. The caption identifies him: Portgaz D. Ace — Second Division Commander — Whitebeard’s Pirates.

Back-matter (p. 21): Usopp’s Pirate Gallery fan-art feature.

New reveals

• Title — Ace Arrives (p. 1). Names Ace before he is shown — title-as-forward-promise.
• Sea Cat — Sandy Island sea-monster fauna debut (pp. 2-4). Caption-named, sacred animal of Alabasta. First on-page utterance of Sandy Island — kingdom-level alternate name for Alabasta the island.
• Alabastan climate zone — Sea Cat as waypoint-indicator (p. 5). Nami canonizes the fauna-as-climate-zone-indicator navigation doctrine.
• The Billions — Baroque Works underling-tier roster (p. 7). Vivi names the ~200-strong officer-agents’-underlings tier — first scale-reveal of the organization’s foot-soldiers.
• Clone-Clone Fruit (Mane Mane no Mi) name-dropped pre-debut (p. 8). VIZ rendering: clone-clone fruit transformations. The Mr. 2 / Bon Clay defining fruit is named before the user appears on-page — the chapter pre-installs the impersonator-Officer-Agent threat.
• X-mark / left-arm fellowship sign (pp. 9-11). The iconic Straw Hat solidarity-mark is installed for the first time in-story as a tactical anti-Clone-Fruit countermeasure. Recurs at the arc’s emotional climax.
• Port of Nanohana — first on-page Alabasta city (p. 13). Mediterranean/Arab-coded coastal port; first on-page Alabasta-kingdom interior.
• Captain Smoker is already in Alabasta (p. 13). Pays off Smoker Sets Course For Alabasta Pursuit-Lock from Ch. 128. White Hunter beat the Strawhats to the kingdom.
• Desert Strawberry — poisonous spider that mimics a strawberry (pp. 14-15). First Alabasta-ecology beat — ignorance kills desert-doctrine.
• Ace — first on-page appearance (pp. 15-20). Black-haired, freckled, shirtless, beaded necklace, skull-twin cowboy hat, knee-high boots. Sleeps in his food (narcolepsy gag).
• Ace’s full name — Portgaz D. Ace — spoken on-page (p. 18, caption p. 20). Fourth canonized D. in the series. The D. middle initial pre-loads the Will-of-D. lineage tie.
• Whitebeard and the Whitebeard Pirates — first on-page mentions (p. 18). Crowd reaction-line: ‘Whitebeard!!? He’s one of Whitebeard’s pirates!!?’ / ‘What’s Whitebeard’s Second Division Commander doing here?’ — first naming of one of the Four Emperors in the series.
• Ace’s rank — Second Division Commander, Whitebeard Pirates (p. 18, p. 20 caption). First on-page Whitebeard-Pirates rank-structure tell — implies multiple Divisions.
• Ace’s hat — twin-skull iconography (one smiling, one frowning) (p. 18, p. 20). Ace’s signature hat is canonized on debut. The two skull-faces become a recurring icon attached to Ace’s grave and Luffy’s hat in forward-canon.
• Ace’s quest — looking for my kid brother (p. 20). First on-page utterance of the Ace-as-Luffy’s-brother premise. Ace knows Luffy is in a straw hat; Luffy doesn’t yet know Ace is in town.
• Cover-story — Django’s Dance Heaven, Vol. 24: ‘The Hostage Girl’ (p. 1). Goldenweek installs into the Django cover-serial.

Payoffs (seeds from earlier chapters that resolve here)

Notable panels

• Page 1 — Title splash Chapter 157: Ace Arrives. Below: cover Django’s Dance Heaven, Vol. 24: “The Hostage Girl” — Django (left, with what looks like a chakram and head-piece) and Miss Goldenweek (right, in jester-stripes pose) flank a chained captive girl tied to a post; flower-petal flourishes; church spire and town crowd in background.
• Page 2 — DOOM!! / SPLOOSH!! — Sea Cat splash-debut. Giant white cat-faced creature with paws and feathered-scale body breaches over the Going Merry. Caption box: ‘SEA CAT — (sea monster) — Territory: The Coast of Sandy Island.’ Vivi: ‘GASP!!’ Sanji (offscreen): ‘What is it!!?’ Lower panels: Nami: ‘It’s a sea cat!!!’ / Luffy: ‘A sea monster!!!’ / Sea Cat: ‘GWAAAH!!!’
• Page 3 — DOOM!! — Luffy and Zoro charge with utensils raised: ‘Our first meal in four days!!!’ / ‘Food!!’ Nami in foreground: ‘The course is set. We should be there pretty soon.’ Lower: ‘Don’t let it get away!! We have to catch it!!!’ Sea Cat retreats — ‘Huh!? He retreated?’ / ‘Go back!! Put the ship in reverse!! …I don’t know how!!’
• Page 4 — KA-WHAM!!! — Vivi smashes Luffy from above. ‘Stop that!!!!’ / ’!!?’ Vivi (teeth-bared rage): ‘You can’t eat it!!’ Sanji: ‘Geez, Vivi! Wha’re you doing!!?’ Luffy (dazed, lump): ‘H-how come!?’ Final big panel: Vivi (gentler), Karoo-ish duck silhouette: ‘In Alabasta, the sea cat… …is a sacred animal.’
• Page 5 — Top row: Luffy and Sanji watching the Sea Cat swim away — ‘Our lunch got away…’ / ‘Did I ever tell you about the time I fought a sea monster in the Calm Belt? Yeah, a huge one!!’ / ‘You did!?’ Right: Chopper in his pink-and-cross hat being patted (SHAKE SHAKE): ‘H-hmm… if you think that was strange… you ain’t seen nothing yet. The ocean’s full of strange creatures.’ Middle: Nami in cleavage-baring desert wardrobe pointing into the distance: ‘We’ve entered the Alabastan climate zone. The weather seems to be stabilizing.’ / ‘The appearance of the sea cat proves it.’ Vivi: ‘Vivi! Cheer up. You’ll have plenty to eat soon.’ / ‘Really!? What kind of cat’s gonna appear next!?’ Big bottom panel: Zoro, sharp-jawed close-up, smirking: ‘So do those things behind us, right?’
• Page 6 — DOOM!!! — Distant horizon-spread: about a dozen Baroque Works ships in line silhouette. Lower three-panel band: ‘Hey, they’re all Baroque Works ships!!!’ / ‘Where’d they all come from!!?’ / ‘The agents are gathering!!’ Bottom panel: Vivi (ponytail, X-strap top): ‘There must be at least 200 men out there.’ Nami (centerframe): ‘They’re the officer agents’ underlings…’ / ‘Those must be the Billions.’ Vivi: ‘They’re the elite of Baroque Works. This won’t be like Whisky Peak!!’
• Page 7 — DA-DOOM!! / SHIPS!!! — wider horizon-spread, more ships counted out — at least 8-9 visible. Lower row: Sanji at left, smirking: ‘Fools. Forget these little fish.’ / Luffy: ‘No, wait!! Let’s eat first!!’ / ‘Yeah, let’s just blow them up!’ / Vivi: ‘Y-yikes!! Let’s blast them all right now!!!’ / Sanji: ‘There are only eight of us.’ / Zoro (right): ‘Yeah! Don’t lose sight of the real target.’
• Page 8 — Inside the Going Merry. Top: Zoro tying bandages (KRK KRK): ‘Tie them on tight.’ / ‘This enemy has too many secrets.’ Speech-bubble cluster: Vivi (smiling, left) + Nami (right, doing each other’s left-arm bandages): ‘With these on, we’ll be able to tell who’s who.’ / ‘Good idea.’ Middle band: Zoro (continuing): ‘They’re not just good… …they’re perfect! You should’ve seen him!’ (Vivi quote inset) / ‘Sounds like a freak to me.’ Big bottom band: Sanji (close-up, tying his bandage): ‘Are they really that good? These… clone-clone fruit transformations?’ / Vivi (off-panel): ‘He was great!! We couldn’t help cheering!’
• Page 9 — READ THIS WAY arrow inset. Top: Chopper (puzzled): ‘But what am I supposed to do?’ / Sanji: ‘We have to plan our moves carefully.’ / Zoro (slap-fist): ‘Now that we know what we’re up against…’ (WHAP). Middle: Chopper: ‘Whatever I can do? Okay!!’ / ‘Quack!!!’ / Usopp: ‘That’s your motto, eh, Usopp?’ / Sanji: ‘Just do whatever you can. If you can’t win, it’s okay to run!! Just do your best!!’ Bottom band: Luffy (close-up, big grin, WHUP…): ‘Right! No matter what happens from here on out… …our left arms will bear…’ Final panel: Going Merry approaches the Nanohana harbor: ‘We’re nearing the harbor.’ / ‘Let’s anchor in the cove to the west. We have to hide the ship.’
• Page 10 — SPLASH PAGE (full-page). The crew puts their bandaged left fists into the center, X-marks visible on each: ‘…the sign of our fellowship!’ — caption from Luffy (top-left). Frame composition: Luffy and Zoro at top (Luffy beams, Zoro smirks), Sanji’s elbow upper-right, Chopper’s tiny X-marked arm dead-center, Usopp and Vivi at bottom. The crew’s fists form an X-knuckle-circle — first on-page rendering of the X-mark-on-left-arm fellowship-sign that anchors the Alabasta arc.
• Page 11 — Continues the X-fist composition. Top: Luffy (full-grin, profile): ‘All right.’ / ‘OO’ SFX background. Right column: Nami (X-mark on left arm visible, smiling); Sanji (suit, hand in pocket, smirking); Usopp (saddled-pack, kneeling-pose, X-marked left arm); Chopper (kicking up sand, X-marked). Bottom-left bubble: ‘Let’s go ashore!!!’
• Page 12 — Top spread: WOOOO… TO EAT!!!! — Going Merry sailing toward Nanohana skyline (minarets, domes, palm-trees, sail-boats). Caption: ‘…then on to Alabasta.’ / ‘Alabasta’s an afterthought!!?’ Lower row: Vivi (smiling close-up, SWF SFX, X-mark on left arm visible): bottom-left panel. Right: Vivi pumping her fist (X-strap top, X-mark visible): ‘We have to control our desires! Understand? Okay.’ / ‘We’re up against a ring of assassins, Luffy.’ / ’…’
• Page 13 — BLAB BLAB / YACK YACK — Nanohana bazaar establishing shot: stone arches, striped awnings, palms, crowd in turbans/robes. Caption box (top-right): ‘THE PORT OF NANOHANA — ALABASTA KINGDOM.’ Middle right-band: ‘YACK YACK / Spice Bean’ — close-up on the Spice Bean tavern sign. Lower panels: Marine officer’s profile (‘JUSTICE’ on his back-jacket per editor footnote): ‘What’s going on?’ / ‘There’s a crowd gathering over there.’ / ‘One of the customers suddenly dropped dead.’ / ‘Oh, look.’ Bottom panel: Marine subordinate (panicked, running): ‘Captain Smoker!!! There’s a bad man in town!!!’
• Page 14 — Inside the Spice Bean. WUZZ WUZZ — close-up on a black-bandanna’d man face-down at the table, fork upright in his hand, snoring (beads visible). Crowd voice-over: ‘He was talking to the proprietor and suddenly dropped dead.’ / ‘He was a traveler. Some of the people think… he may have unknowingly eaten a desert strawberry. That’s what people are saying.’ DOOM!! — wider shot of the man slumped face-first into stacked plates: ‘And for several hours after that, its contagious poison… spreads throughout your body.’ / ‘“Desert strawberry”? It’s a poisonous spider that looks just like a strawberry. But if you accidentally eat it, a few days later you suddenly collapse.’
• Page 15 — Top spread: continued ambient YACK YACK. Crowd: ‘In the desert, ignorance can kill you.’ / ‘That’s why no one wants to go near him.’ Middle band: Strawhats enter (Luffy, Sanji, Vivi all in shadow at door), Luffy reaches out: ‘The desert strawberry… …kills you that quick.’ / ‘Poor devil, he’s still clutching his fork.’ / ‘His body has stiffened in that position.’ Bottom panels: WIP / WIP — Luffy grabs the slumped man by the shoulder and shakes: ‘Aagh!! …Linda…’ / ‘Are you all right?’ Big bottom-right: man’s head jerks up suddenly with food in his cheeks (WUBBA!!?) — Luffy: ‘Wah!! He’s alive!!!’ / GASP!! / TO-NK!!
• Page 16 — Top band: Smoker outside watches through the door — ‘Well… Huh…’ Middle row: Luffy + Sanji (jaw-dropped, GACK!!): ‘Fell asleep!!? I fell asleep.’ / ‘Whadda ya know?’ / Big bottom panel: the man — Ace — eating CHOMP CHOMP with both hands, freckles visible, black undershirt and beaded necklace: ‘With food in his mouth!? He fell asleep in the middle of a conversation!? While eating!?’ / ‘What’s the big deal?’ (Ace shrugs, mid-chew).
• Page 17 — Top three panels: Spice Bean proprietor (relieved): ‘No, er… we’re just glad you’re all right.’ / ‘You hire these comedians?’ / Strawhat crowd reaction (Luffy + Sanji + Usopp leaning in): ‘We were worried about you!!! GRAAH!!’ Middle band: GRA AR!! — Ace turns angry on Luffy: ‘Why, you!!!’ — Luffy is still face-deep in stolen food (ZNRH), drool dangling. PLOP / THUMP. Bottom row: Smoker through the doorway, watching. Subordinate: ‘A false alarm.’ / Smoker: ’…What? He’s not dead?’
• Page 18 — Top band: Smoker enters the Spice Bean (WOO) and confronts Ace: ‘You got a lot of nerve showing your face around here.’ Ace, mid-chew: ‘Have you seen this guy around? He wears a straw hat.’ (holds up a wanted poster off-frame; Smoker: ‘Yeah?’ / ‘By the way, mister…’) Middle big panel: Smoker close-up (two-cigars-in-mouth, exhaling smoke, hat-shadow over eyes): ’…Portgaz D. Ace?’ Speech-bubble caption right-side: ‘What’s Whitebeard’s Second Division Commander doing here…’ Bottom row: crowd reaction-band — ‘MURMUR / HUBBUB!!’ — ‘It’s true! I recognize that tattoo on his back!’ / ‘Whitebeard!!? He’s one of Whitebeard’s pirates!!?’ / ‘What’s he doing here!!?’ Ace (deadpan, half-shadowed in middle): ‘Huh!!?’
• Page 19 — Top big panel: DO … OM!! — Luffy bursts out the side of a building (SHOOM!!), wall-shards flying, mouth full: ‘Luffy, wait!!!’ / ‘A restaurant!!!!’ Going Merry sail visible in the distance. Bottom panel: Ace’s close-up under the twin-skull hat (one mask smiling, one frowning, DO OM! background): ‘I’m just…’
• Page 20 — Full-page Ace splash. Wide-brim hat with twin skull-faces (smile/frown), beaded necklace, freckles, half-shadowed face, exhaling: ‘…looking for my kid brother.’ Caption-box bottom-right: ‘PORTGAZ D. ACE — SECOND DIVISION COMMANDER — WHITEBEARD’S PIRATES.’ DOOM! background SFX. Cliffhanger.
• Page 21 — USOPP’S PIRATE GALLERY!! (back-matter). Fan-art panels: We’re gonna win next year’s dance contest!! (Robin and Chopper in tango — I think I broke my fan! — Doyin, 14); Arrrgh!! Feed me!!! (Monkey D. Luffy crayon portrait — Chris C.); I got your back! (Zolo standing over ZOLO lettering, Pirate Hunter — Tiffany, 13); I’m after you, Straw Hats!! (Smoker portrait — Kayleigh).

Open questions raised

• Is Ace’s kid brother really Luffy? The chapter sets the bind but refuses to close it. Strong pre-load — Ace is hunting a straw hat and Luffy is a straw hat. Forward-canon-known: confirmed.
• What is Ace’s relationship to Whitebeard? First-mentioned. Whitebeard is named but not characterized; Whitebeard’s Pirates are implied to be a notorious enough name that civilian crowds gasp at the affiliation. Forward-canon: Whitebeard is one of the Four Emperors.
• What is the Mane Mane no Mi / Clone-Clone Fruit user (Mr. 2)‘s full mechanic? Vivi says perfect impersonation; the touch-to-copy trigger isn’t yet on-page. The X-mark countermeasure suggests there is something the Clone-Fruit can’t duplicate.
• Why is Smoker already in Alabasta? He set course Ch. 128 — but he beat the Going Merry by enough time to be already on patrol in Nanohana. Marine HQ Eternal Pose gave him a shorter route.
• Will Ace and Luffy meet this arc? The cliffhanger is structurally designed to force the meeting. Forward-canon: yes, next chapter.
• What is Portgaz — and why is the D. middle initial in the name? Portgaz D. Ace is the fourth named D. The reader has had no on-page explanation of the D-pattern yet (Dr. Kureha’s Will of D will come later in this arc). Forward-canon: Portgaz is his mother Rouge’s surname; he was born Gol D. Ace (Roger’s son) and took her name to hide the lineage.
• What other Alabasta fauna mimic dangerous flora? Desert Strawberry is the first; the arc later canonizes the Kung-Fu Dugong, Sandora Catfish, Sandora Lizards, Super-Spot-Billed Duck Troop, etc.