@Greg:

Yep, I realize that. Just pointing out that this is exactly what I've been saying since before Whole Cake Island

You might enjoy this

Us Big Mom apologists must unite lol

@Steven:

Kinda confused by the projection of this incredibly linear "the final battle must be a series of doors opening, revealing a progression of bad guys and therefore WG will be the final one."

Because there has yet to be an example of a main enemy playing that role in two separate arc's, outside of the admirals who did not(for the most part) directly fight the straw hats like we have come to expect. If Luffy needs to become the PK, before setting his sights officially on Mariejoa(due to the true history) then he must defeat teach who is portrayed in a way that suggests he is the final hurdle among pirates for the title. Which suggests we will get a full sclae arc Luffy vs. Blackbeard (11 vs. 11) just before(or perhaps during) the raftel arc. After which Luffy should then read the true history, come to understand the ancient conflict of differing "ideals" between the great kingdom and the 20 kings, and attack mariejoa. He wont do this alone however, as Mihawk points out Luffy has the most dangerous power in the world, he has the power to make allies out of his former enemies. This does not even include his general ability to make nakama in the first place. So we should expect that Luffy will head to mariejoa with the majority of all currently living allies and former enemies. But the point I want to emphasize again is that Oda has yet to feature the same enemy in two arcs. Teach might be there during the final battle, but I seriously doubt he will do so as an enemy.

Luffy's need to overcome the yonkou and admirals, particularly in those strangely literally read panels posted, is more in reference to how far he has to progress to be at the top, it's a total stretch to read into that as some sort of systematic step-by-step guide to the war.

I dont actually take this panels as literally as Aus, because for one I dont believe Luffy will end up having defeat either Big Mom or Shanks. But still, the Yonko need to be defeated either directly or indirectly before Luffy can be allowed to become the pirate king. This has been foreshadowed on numerous occasions. Some might argue that Roger never defeated whitebeard, however, I dont believe he needed to. As we can see before Rogers death, he and whitebeard were friends, and whitebeard did not stand in his way.

(I particularly like how that Fuji panel is suppose to be evidence of BB needing to go before the WG, but hey who cares about the Admirals lol) That post is full of self-evidenced nothings like "the war will be big, and thus the WG is the final boss," and then comedic leaps in reasoning like "WB said that One Piece will be vital to the war, so therefore Teach must be beaten by Luffy before the war."

It is heavily implied that he who finds the one piece will become the pirate king. So, you think Luffy as the pirate king will meet teach who is angry at Luffy for having found the one piece before him… while still having never proven that he is the stronger pirate? I think Blackbeard parallels well with Shiki, and Roger defeated Shiki just BEFORE he was finally able to find Raftel and earn the title of the king of the pirates.

Usually the WG as final villain crowd either hates BB, has a marine fetish (Darth), isn't quite aware of the story (Darth jr.), or whatever, but this read as a fill in your own blank essay.

I have nothing against BB, I just think you are underestimating the scope of the power of the WG.

@Monkey:

Ordinarily I might agree that I'm being harsh. And not care.
But no this is "Case#2: Maybe this is the time Zephos is wrong about someone?".
The garbage sort of debating Austrosemantia uses is a contagion. You'll notice as soon as he enters Whoosh mode I cease debate when I normally don't do that.
If you have the ultimately silly if frustrating OroJackson posting of say…Joy Boy's Will. This is the flip side of aggressive cancerous OroJackson posting that comes with footnotes and citations.
It's like the difference between an illiterate skinhead, and a tenured professor who writes massive notated Holocaust Denial books.
The latter is actually way more dangerous.
So yes please keep hemming and hawing about how poor widdle him is bein' attacked lol.
If you people actually welcome that sort of posting, this is not your forum and good riddance to you.

An illiterate skinhead?

And I wasn't even part of this discussion lol

I find it ironic that you refer to Australopithicus's postings as cancerous xD

To the point of this thread, it is blatantly obvious the fight vs. the WG is the endgame, and the battle vs. Blackbeard will decide who will become the pirate king. There is a clear implication that luffy must first become the PK, before he is allowed to read the true history, and come to understand why the WG must be brought down. It's very simple. You focus too much on your understanding of how to write a story, and not enough on the actual story you are reading.

Aus argued this quite well, with clear logical deductions based on actual evidence from the story of One Piece. I'll repost it so maybe you can have another chance to understand it.

I'll tell you why Blackbeard exists. Blackbeard exist to be Luffy's ultimate rival about becoming the Pirate King. Blackbeard's plan has been to become the Pirate King all along, and he had some incredible luck in such a plan.
Spoiler:

I think Teech and Luffy’s combat will parallel Whitebeard and Roger’s fight. The battle between Luffy and Teech must be the decisive battle about the rightful successor to Roger's throne. That should do him justice.

If the government crumbles before the discovery of One Piece, what purpose would One Piece serve then given that its true nature is highly likely the Real Poneglyph – the Pandora box that the government, for 800 years, has been going to great lengths to keep sealed? (I am talking about the content of One Piece here.)

After Robin read the poneglyph of Skypea, she realized that Roger must have, created for the first time, the Real Poneglyph.
Spoiler:

The biggest hint regarding the true nature of One Piece is when Robin was inquiring about the nature of the Real Poneglyph:
Spoiler:

When Kinemon was revealing to everyone present the reason behind Kaido's pursuit, he said that it was because of the secrets of the world that Oden acquired in his voyage with Roger to Raftel.
Spoiler:

After that, Robin started recalling Rayleigh's words about the Blank Century: ‘we learned about everything that occurred’.

Spoiler:

In other words, in Raftel, the island wherein One Piece is rumored to exist, holds the historical records of the Void Century. These are solid hints to the nature of One Piece: the Real Poneglyph. Ironically in that very chapter, right after Robin finished asking Rayleigh about the ancient history, Usopp consecutively followed her question to Rayleigh with another question about One Piece’s existence in Raftel.

Moments before his death, Whitebeard tied the great war that the World Government dreads ‘directly’ to One Piece.
Spoiler:

The way he said it was clearly suggesting that One Piece will play a crucial role in that war. There is no way around it as the great war was said in the context of a discussion revolving around One Piece.

After Whitebeard publicly announced that the One Piece exists, Sengoku furiously cursed him for that.
Spoiler:

It is therefore evident that One Piece causes the government a Brobdingnagian inconvenience as much as the ancient history does.

Since One Piece will play a vital role in that war, it cannot be reached without Teech's defeat considering that it was clearly stated that Luffy must defeat the four emperors **'before' becoming the pirate king or finding the one piece (since these two phrases are used interchangeably in the story to express the same idea).
Spoiler:

Even Luffy said that if he doesn’t vanquish the four emperors, he won’t become the pirate king.
Spoiler:

The four emperors have already been set as an unavoidable obstacle that Luffy has to break through in order to become the pirate king, and this was indicated also by the ‘red poneglyphs’ that were said to be in possession of some of them and sought by all of them.
Spoiler:

So, Blackbeard must be defeated **‘before’ Luffy finds One Piece, & this will make the government the final villain.

Also, after Rayleigh told Robin that he and his crew mates knew all of the history of the Void Century, he further added to that that even if he told her the history of the Void Century **‘as she is now’, there was nothing she could have done about it.
Spoiler:

In other words, once the history of the void century becomes known to the Straw Hats, that seems to hint to the scenario that such knowledge will compel them to take actions against the World Government.

Moreover, the Straw Hats have already declared an all out war against the World Government.
Spoiler:

It’s only natural for this loose end to be tied in due time, and to do that, the Straw Hats have to take a central role in the direct overthrow of the World Government.

Finally, One Piece (the story) has a pattern in its plotline: the past events of the first half of the story are mirrored later on in its second half in chronological order.
Just as the beginning of the first half of the story had the downfall of a warlord that uses base means to usurp the throne of a country, so did the second half. The author has been creating amazingly & chronologically clear parallels between the two halves of the story, allowing us to predict to a certain degree the future happenings of events. And since the culmination of the first half of the story was a war between the government's forces and pirates, it is reasonable to conclude that the culmination of the second half will be a war that parallels the first one, but on a phenomenal scale, making the WG the final villain.******

@HeartOfDarkness:

So how does the monkey being a traitor changes anything? How does that impact our main cast and the story in general?

Well, Bariete is still on Zou, and Kaido's interest in Raizo seemed to relate to Raizo's connection to Momonosuke. Basically, Kaido wants Momo. Momo also decided to stay on Zou in order to better understand his "powers' that he has over Zunisha. It's also stated that Inuarashi and Wanda suspect Jack will return.

So, I think its possible Bariete will witness and reveal to Kaido whatever transpires between Zunisha and Momo(and also inform him that Momo is still there), furthering Kaido's desire to capture him leading to Jack arriving on Zou again and a save Momo arc within Wano.

–- Update From New Post Merge ---

@Arlong:

I basically just made an account to get somepeople thoughts on this theory, because I love this site and stalk it daily, so
I saw it on my dash today on tumblr and
really I wouldnt have come here if I didnt find it amusing and not worth making an account for lol
http://minopp.tumblr.com/post/146883332640/bbs-df-powers-revealed

Very farstreched but i it possible? :wassat:

This was a very interesting read dude, glad you shared it.

@Bartholemew:

No, that's definitely not enough. What did he do explicitly during the days when Jack was there? Is there any evidence that he did anything to help Jack?

So, even though Jack never would have been on Zou to look for Raizo in the first place without a traitor… thats not enough for you?? xD

But to answer your question. Nope, Bariete was not shown one time after ringing the bell and again was not shown at all after the swirly hats arrived to save the day! WHAT WAS HE DOING!? He wasn't helping the minks it seems...

It's possible he went to look for Raizo, which is why we dont get to see what he is up to.

@Bartholemew:

Okay, let's ignore all the storytelling aspects and the lack of any emotional impact, and furthermore let's ignore all the evidence speaking against him being the traitor…

Assuming he was and is the traitor, how exactly is that what he did effective in any way? Like is there any evidence of him doing something to actually help Jack during his presence besides not looking harmed enough?

And the emotional impact of Lucci's betrayal was more? XD the pigeon guy, whos' sole shining moment was briefly helping the SH get their money back? I think you are remembering how that arc played out wrong. What made it so impactful was that he was supposed to be an ally, yet he betrayed galley-la. The minks are ALL portrayed as loyal, and betrayal would be a huge plot twist everyone would enjoy…

What is the evidence that he is not the traitor? That he rang the bell? I haven't ignored that, I have explained why it wouldn't matter if he did ring the correct bell.

You seem to think i'm ignoring things, I have responded to every point.

But to your last point, assuming he is the traitor, he would have had informed Kaido that Raizo arrived to Zou, and perhaps provided the vivre card that allowed JAck to find Zou. What else does he need to do besides that? Thats more than enough. Kaido seems to want Momonosuke badly, he was of great assistance to Kaido. I'm not sure you read my initial theory post...

How come you can believe Bariete could play phony in a battle but not them?

Dont twist my stance, I do think it's possible they are traitors(although I think it less likely than Bariete). My argument was, if you think they are possible traitors, than Bariete should be on your list. However, you seem as though you are arguing that there is no reason to suspect Bariete, which I cant agree with at all.

Limited fighting against grunts isn't breaking any double agents roles. Its not like they played a hugely decisive role as far as we saw or anything.

I agree, and neither did Bariete and his bell, so using your logic here he could have done that and not broken his double agent role. The role of the bell was insignificant, because Jack wasn't planning on sneaking in and killing the minks in their sleep, but rather he asked them first to give him Raizo.

A fair amount of Minks were shown not poisoned. And also not tortured. Remember the Squirrel Mink?
It was said I think that ones deep in the woods and on the edges didn't get poisoned, and it was literally shown to be the case that the edges of Zou weren't in the toxic cloud.
Bariete is a watchman who is constantly shown on the edges of Zou, of course he wasn't poisoned. And why would he even have been tortured when only a few Minks were shown tortured. Most had been left to die on the ground where they had fallen.

Agreed, there were minks that hid within the fortress, but how many of those were named, prominent characters? Of the characters we should focus on, the only two with no hint of being poisoned are Carrot and Bariete. The squirrel was being chased by the remaining Kaido pirates, which removes the majority of the suspicion surrounding her IMO. The fact that Bariete was a watchman should have no relevance on whether he was poisoned. He should not have been performing his duties while Jack trashed the place.

Aside from him ringing the Raid Bell under duress and fear. This is also a dumb question, because only someone already convinced he's guilty would be saying this. You're supposed to be providing proof of guilt, not the other way around.

Correction, only someone certain that there will be a traitorous Mink would use this as evidence of a traitor. I am not as baised as you want me to be…

Jack's troops were still on the island and terrorizing the Minks who were un-poisoned able to move, again Sanji's group's first Mink encounter is the Squirrel Mink running for her life from the Jack troops. Basically you're expecting that Bariete should have been on guard duty on the island when the Minks didn't have control of the island and were fugitives on their own turf. It doesn't make any sense.

Actually, I am saying that Bariete, as one of the major Mink characters, who was shown to be mostly unhurt from Jacks assault should have been present like every other major suspect(except perhaps Carrot) in helping the remaining minks survive after their near death experience. Its Odd that Oda decided to not include him..

As someone who spends ridiculous amounts of time making overly complex and substance lite theory posts I'm not sure I understand your issue with length and added challenge.

Because I stay on topic, while you broaden the scope of the argument to the point that it's impossible(or very nearly) to respond back to you xD

None of those are suspicious at all. That much is proven.
It is not suspicious for a watchman to be watching.
It is not suspicious for one person not be worrying, when no one is shown worrying.
And a bit of light harmless sneakery does not indicate a completely corrupt and amoral depraved person lol.

In fact its almost as if the whole meaning of suspicious revolves around something standing out! And objectively speaking none of those things stand out!

Given the relatively subjective nature of what might or might not be suspicious, I'll just disagree here. But if you really want to I could explain (probably again) why exactly these things arouse my suspicions.

–- Update From New Post Merge ---

@Monkey:

Its from a guy whose main method of theory building is playing six degrees of separation to get something related to ninjas.

–- Update From New Post Merge ---

List of Racism Shown Toward Minks:

How can we see this specific situation when the race has hidden themselves on the back of an elephant that cant be found easily for 1000 years???

My response to this is… See: Fishmen

See: Reason for Totlands existance

See: Dwarves history with the Donquixote family

@BeariousJones:

1. The Road Poneglyph's protection is the duty of the Night Minkmen. So the top Night Minkmen (Nekomamushi, Pedro, Blackback, Rody, etc.) should know that Raizo was in the Whale Tree.

2. Duke Inuarashi being the king also would know which eliminates him being the traitor.

3. Carrot seems a bit too inexperienced to be a double agent traitor. Plus she has NEVER left Zou until now…so she says.

IF there is a traitor I think it's between Bariete, Wanda, Sicilian, or other 2 Inuarashi Musketeers. And there could be more to this "situation" that makes the others still suspects. Even then what is the motivation for anyone of them to betray their fellow Minkmen? What is there for anyone to gain? Bananas can't be enough of a bribery. Maybe revenge...but who seems...spiteful? :blink:

I agree with your points!!! Finally, some hint of agreement xD I might cry haha

But, I would also cross Wanda off the list personally. At least put her a rung below Bariete, because she seems pretty clearly not a subordinate of Kaido, based on her reaction to the possibility that the swirlyhats were Beast Pirates. "What do you have against our people!?!? What good comes from killing us??"

She also shows sincere surprise at the powers and abilities of Kaido's men, suggesting no prior experience seeing this. She was additionally shown fighting against Jack and poisoned, which could be reasonably explained even if she were to be a traitor, but makes it less likely in my eyes.

There is also no hint that Wanda has ever left Zou, although it's possible she has and we are just not aware.

It could be possible the Wanda was coerced to betray Zou, but didnt actually want to, but this seems counter to her character. She is portrayed as a very brave Warrior. Whereas in this possible situation for Bariete, he is portrayed as a timid character perhaps even cowardly, so it would make much more sense if he chose to save his own skin at the expense of Zou. Basically here: Kaido - "become my subordinate or die".

Any non-human that travels outside of their home is susceptible to the rampant racism that exists within the world. This could be the case with Bariete, if he has ever left and thus make him hate regular humans. He is also shown always saying "De Gosaru" which seems derived off of what the Samurai say(De Gozaru), perhaps implying he has specifically been to Wano before. It's possible he had something bad occur to him there, and thats why he seems so fearful of the Samurai and decided to rat them out on Zou.

@Monkey:

Nothing you're listing doesn't also apply to Bariete. Your really awkward awful twisting non-logic for explaining why he would still be "acting undercover" when no one else was around is apparently a-OK in your mind. But Pedro or Wanda saying loyal things to people means there's no way they could be double agents? You're completely inconsistent.

But you are wrong, was Bariete shown in the actual battle vs. Jack at all? No. He was shown before the battle, with a little damage, but the cause for this isn't specifically shown as him valiantly trying to escape from Jack. So this leaves open the possibility that he did this to himself, or fighting a now dead mink. Whereas Pedro, Wanda, Carrot, Dukes were all shown with no room for imagination.

Bariete was not shown poisoned, or tortured. Bariete has not shown any sympathy for what Jack has done to Zou. Bariete was conspicuously absent again when the swirly hats arrived in order to save the minks. You seem to believe their might be a traitor, please explain how Pedro(or other) could be the traitor without twisting any scenes to fit the theory xD

It organizes it so that I'm not just vomiting words at your vomit of words and playing guess the response in terms of what's being addressed.
Also good job not responding to any of that at all I guess.

Actually, it makes a relatively simple conversation much longer, because instead of debating one or two major point, it then becomes a situation in which I have to defend every last thing I said important or not, sometimes while have to rejoin a thought with its following sentence(or following 2nd half of the same sentence) to explain why it matters xD

–- Update From New Post Merge ---

@Monkey:

Aside from quoting dialogue that didn't exist, saying we should be surprised that a lookout was looking out at a ship, saying that a harmless case of bribery indicates a person who will "do anything", saying that him not being worried about Carrot when no one was worried about Carrot was suspicious….

No holes at all.

going back to that debate, regardless of whether i'm looking to much into it, I have stated that the premise of the argument as it pertains to the theory is not sufficient enough to discredit the idea.

Those things are suspicious, given the context that there might indeed be a traitorous mink…

--- Update From New Post Merge ---

@Monkey:

Aside from quoting dialogue that didn't exist, saying we should be surprised that a lookout was looking out at a ship, saying that a harmless case of bribery indicates a person who will "do anything", saying that him not being worried about Carrot when no one was worried about Carrot was suspicious….

No holes at all.

Also, as a side note, I consider a "hole" in a theory as a problem that can not be reasonably overcame.

So for the Dukes to potentially be the traitors, we must explain why Jack didnt find Raizo, despite the Dukes both knowing for a fact where Raizo was. In the case of Bariete, we can reasonably say its possible he did not know where Raizo was being kept. In the case of the Dukes, we can not say this because they were later shown leading the SH's to Raizo. So then, why would the Dukes lead Jack to Zou in order to find Raizo, but not tell him where Raizo was being hidden at the possible expense of the entire population of Zou?

This can not be reasonable argued, therefore its not even worth speculating the Dukes as traitors(despite your assertion that they are plausible traitors lol xD). This is what I would define as a "hole". Bariete as a traitor has no holes.

@Don:

@joy_boys_will
Sticking to a theory like glue isn´t helping your case.
Thinking about something and finally finding a solution, while interpreting here and there scenes that back it up is great.
Non the less people here have shown certain flaws that render your theory as highly unlikely, however long you may wanna defend it.
You put some effort into it, so it might be especially hard to let go of your "mind-baby", but it´s the way it is.

Seeing the minks as loyal as a society could possibly be, i think the traitor must have seen a bit of this world to abandon this thinking.
Also the traitor must have made contact with the Kaidou crew before, so that they were able to blackmail him and get a vivre card^^
This leaves only Pedro,Inuarashi and Nekomamushi as far as we know, because no other character have left the island long enough.
Maybe the guardians, but they´re also way to unimportant as characters to have an impact with a betrayal.

You can view the debate however you would like to and I have argued my point in a way that I am satisfied with. There are no "holes" in this theory, if you also consider Pedro, wanda, Carrot and the dukes to be suspects.

If you think there are no traitors, because its been shown on numerous occasions that the minks are loyal to a fault, I cant really argue against it. In this case we can agree to disagree. But if you consider Pedro and Wanda to be a suspect in the traitorous mink theory, but not Bariete… I have an issue with that.