Chapters · Sky Island › Skypiea

Chapter 250: Ball Dragon

Arc: Skypiea (Upper Yard) · Saga: Sky Island · Released: 2002

Summary

The Ordeal of Balls climaxes. In a parallel beat opening the chapter, an unnamed winged Priest hunts fleeing victims through a flooded/forest stretch of Upper Yard — sky-sharks (“PIEE!”), a screaming victim, a sky-shark and a falcon revealed to be Zoan, all dispatched into a river the Priest reveals is not bottomless (“SILENCE… this river does have a bottom”); he wonders aloud “if the three escapees have been captured yet.” Back at Satori’s ordeal, the priest “Ho ho ho!! Heso!!”-laughs that playtime is over and unleashes his ultimate trap, the Ball Dragon — a dragon-shaped serpent of surprise clouds (some hold blades, some explosives, one is a special fire-ball) meant to chain-detonate. Luffy, told the dragon is “controlled with a string,” figures out the trick: rather than fight the balls he yanks the string, dragging a confused, screaming Satori around by his own puppet-line, then severs the wrong rope at the wrong moment and triggers a massive KABOOM that nearly kills them both. Both survive (“You’re alive?!”). Satori vows to do better and not let his rattled mind “interfere with my Mantra.” Usopp, scouting from above, spots the forest’s exit; the explosion’s echo reassures him the others are alive. Sanji — thought downed last chapter — reappears alive, sitting in shadow smoking, and accepts Satori’s “vassal’s challenge” with his own “love challenge” (there are damsels to rescue). The chapter ends with Sanji wrecking Satori: a spinning, twisting “mignonette pepper” monologue (“crush it the right way and the flavors burst into an exquisite taste”) cashed out as Concasser, a brutal aerial axe-kick that smashes Satori down.

New reveals

• Ball Dragon (p. 8-9): Satori’s ultimate trap — a dragon-shaped serpent assembled from his “surprise clouds.” He explains it is “made of surprise clouds — some filled with blades, others with explosives, and one is a special fire ball. Burst the fire ball, and it will set off a fiery chain reaction!” (p. 9-10).
• The surprise balls are string-controlled puppets (p. 10-11): Luffy realizes “this thing’s being controlled with a string!!” Cutting/pulling the string disrupts the trap — the mechanical weakness of the entire ordeal, exploited to drag Satori around and to (over-)trigger the chain reaction.
• An off-screen parallel Priest-ordeal (p. 2-6): an unnamed winged Priest is hunting fleeing victims elsewhere — invokes “the wrath of Almighty Eneru,” dispatches a sky-shark Zoan and a falcon Zoan (“You’re a Zoan too… join your master!!”), and reveals the river he drowns them in is not bottomless (“SILENCE… this river does have a bottom”). He wonders “if the three escapees have been captured yet.” (Conservative: the chapter names neither this Priest nor the ordeal; he is a separate antagonist from Satori.)
• Sanji is alive (p. 13-15): the “One down” from Ch. 247 did not kill him; he reappears unharmed and enters the fight.
• Concasser (p. 17-18): a new Sanji technique — a spinning aerial axe-kick, framed by his cooking-mignonette monologue, that drives Satori into the ground.

Foreshadowing seeds planted

Payoffs (seeds from earlier chapters that resolve here)

Mentions / appearances

• Luffy — fights Satori; deduces the Ball Dragon is string-controlled, yanks Satori around by his own line, triggers the KABOOM
• Satori — priest of the Ordeal of Balls; unleashes the Ball Dragon; rattled, vows his Mantra; defeated by Sanji’s Concasser at chapter’s end
• Sanji — revealed alive (p. 13-15); accepts the “vassal’s challenge” with a “love challenge”; new attack Concasser drops Satori
• Usopp — scouting from a high vantage; spots the forest’s exit; reassured the others survived by the explosion’s echo
• Tony Tony Chopper — caught in the off-screen parallel ordeal early in the chapter (panicking among the sky-shark attack, p. 2-3)
• Conis — appears caught up in the parallel ordeal’s danger (winged-girl panel, p. 3-6); among the “escapees” being hunted (inference)
• Enel — referenced by the unnamed Priest as “Almighty Eneru” whose “wrath” the ordeal serves (p. 3, 17)
• An unnamed Priest — administers the parallel ordeal; dispatches sky-shark and falcon Zoan; not named on-page ([unknown] — likely a different Priest than Satori)
• Pierre — the falcon Zoan dispatched into the river may be a sky-shark/falcon Zoan, NOT Pierre (Pierre is Gan Fall’s steed); listed only as a caution against mis-attribution — do not link unless later confirmed
• Upper Yard · Forest of No Return · the river (now established to have a bottom)
• Wapol’s Omnivorous Rampage cover series (Vol. 13) — Wapol, Robson

Notable panels

• p. 1 — Cover: Wapol’s Omnivorous Rampage, Vol. 13: “My Toys Capture the Hearts of Children” — Wapol (now a toy magnate) and Robson the unicorn parade wind-up toy versions of Chess, Kuromarimo, and a Wapol-faced robot before delighted/wary children in a European-style town square. Cover B-plot continues Wapol’s post-Drum redemption-via-commerce arc.
• p. 2 — “FOOOOM…” opening on the parallel ordeal; Chopper, a sky-shark, and a goggled priest in inset panels.
• p. 3 — “That is the wrath of Almighty Eneru!!” / “Sky Knight!!!” — the victims cry for the Sky Knight as sky-sharks (“PIEE!!!”) swarm.
• p. 5 — “SILENCE… this river does have a bottom” — the bottomless-river inversion; the Priest wonders “if the three escapees have been captured yet.”
• p. 8-9 — Full reveal of the Ball Dragon (“ROOOOAR!!”): a serpent of surprise clouds with a dragon head.
• p. 10-11 — Luffy: “Oh!! I get it… this thing’s being controlled with a string!!” — the ordeal’s mechanical weakness exposed.
• p. 12 — Full-width “KABOOM!!” — Luffy severs the wrong rope and over-triggers the fire-ball chain reaction.
• p. 13 — Satori: “If I let things like this get to me, it will interfere with my Mantra.” — Mantra-composure tell.
• p. 15 — Sanji revealed alive, seated cross-legged in shadow, smoking (“WOO O OO”, “FLIK”); accepts the “vassal’s challenge” with a “love challenge.”
• p. 17-18 — Sanji’s mignonette-pepper cooking monologue resolves into Concasser (“CONCASSER!!”), a spinning aerial axe-kick that smashes Satori down.

Open questions raised

• Who is the unnamed Priest running the parallel ordeal (sky-sharks, the river-with-a-bottom)? Which Ordeal is it?
• Who are “the three escapees” the unnamed Priest is hunting — are they Chopper/Conis/Pagaya’s group?
• Is Satori actually defeated by Concasser, or will his Mantra let him recover?
• What is at the bottom of the (now confirmed not-bottomless) river beneath Upper Yard?