Meeting Your Idols Is Often Disappointing

That means he's a godless Commie. Any real American will tell you the only proper way to hunt is with the biggest weapon possible.

The One Piece manga is up to about volume 95 here in the U.S. This is volume 6, the first and thus far only volume I own, since I'm planning to grab whichever ones happen to interest me. There's a lot going on in this, since we're still a long way from the kinds of story arcs where a single battle drags on for multiple volumes.

Case in point, this volume is partially about defending a floating restaurant from pirates. Luffy's trying to recruit one of the cooks for his crew, the cook (Sanji) keeps refusing. A starving and battered pirate crew shows up, asking for food. And once they get it - because Sanji and his boss both refuse to let anyone starve - declare they'll be commandeering this ship. And as Luffy gets ready to help the cooks defend their home, he finds out his navigator (Nami) stole his ship and all his treasure and just bailed.

I picked this one up because, as with most shonen manga, the best friend of the main character is my favorite. In One Piece, that's Zoro, the first person Luffy recruits. And today, he's getting to face the World's Greatest Swordsman, Dracule "Hawk-Eyes" Mihawk. Zoro intends to take the title, and figures there's no time like the present. As you might guess from his chosen weapon, Mihawk isn't too impressed by the East Blue's best swordsman.

Or maybe he's just naturally dramatic. I mean, seriously, just look at him:

The guy travels the sea alone, on a tiny little sailboat shaped like a coffin, with a couple of torches on it so you can tell he's coming even at night or in the fog. He just happened across this pirate crew of 50 ships and 1,000 men one day, and decided to reduce them to one battered ship and less than 100 men, just for the hell of it. Then went ahead and chased the rest of them down. But setting all that aside, I bet he's just a lot of talk.

Er. . .

Zoro gets his ass absolutely kicked, Mihawk casually deflecting all his attacks with that little knife. But he also shows a complete unwillingness to surrender or retreat, even in the face of certain death. Which impresses Mihawk enough he draws the freaking boat oar on his back as a show of respect. Zoro's best attack isn't enough, and he gets a scar across his torso and Mihawk telling him to survive and get strong enough to actually take Mihawk's title (which hasn't happened yet, 90 volumes later, and doesn't seem likely to any time soon). 

Then Mihawk just leaves. He definitely knows how to put on a show.