Why Joy Boy Was A Former Slave, Explained

Joy Boy is one of the most important characters in the entirety of One Piece, and at the same time, an individual that fans know very little about at this point in time. Having first been mentioned in the post-timeskip of One Piece around the Fishman Island arc, fans knew that Joy Boy had massive connections to the Void Century and held tremendous overall importance.

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However, it wasn’t until much later in the story that more bits and pieces from Joy Boy’s story were made clear to the fans. Undoubtedly, Joy Boy was a brave warrior who stood up to the 20 Kings of the world long ago and fought against them with all his might, all in the name of freedom. However, little is known about Joy Boy’s life itself. Oda has not dropped too many clues about Joy Boy and his life, but what little he has revealed seems to suggest that long ago, Joy Boy could’ve been a slave.

Joy Boy’s Past So Far And Connection To The Buccaneers

• Joy Boy May Have Been A Buccaneer
• Joy Boy Was The Former User Of The Nika Fruit

As stated previously, Oda has not revealed too many bits of information about Nika and Joy Boy in the story yet, but what Egghead Island confirmed to the fans for sure was that Joy Boy was the former user of the Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika before Luffy. This was about 800 years ago. It was also stated that the original Nika had his legends come from the land of Giants, Elbaf. But, Joy Boy was born in the bountiful Ancient Kingdom, not Elbaf. This is very important, as Oda draws a distinction between Joy Boy and the Giants, clearly telling the fans that they’re not the same. Yet, looking at Joy Boy’s Straw Hat which is already confirmed to have been stored in Marijoa in the chamber of ice, fans know that Joy Boy most certainly wasn’t a normal-sized human. He most definitely was absolutely massive, yet also not a giant.

This is a clear indication of the fact that Joy Boy was, indeed, a Buccaneer. Oda recently introduced the Buccaneers in the One Piece world and fans were told that they are a special hybrid race that are like humans, only larger, with the blood of the Giants flowing in their veins. The Buccaneers are extremely powerful, as they have Giants blood and their size is much larger compared to an average human. Given the size of the Marijoa hat, Joy Boy being a Buccaneer is perfectly possible.

While this is evidence enough, there’s certainly more. Oda also confirmed recently in One Piece that the Buccaneers are a hunted tribe. They’re a very special people who have been systematically exterminated over the years. This is because the Buccaneers are considered to be downright evil. According to Saturn, even being born a Buccaneer is a sin and the Buccaneers have no right to exist. In the case of Kuma, fans saw that upon the mere knowledge of Kuma’s family being Buccaneers, they were enslaved right away until the release of death offered respite to his suffering parents.

More than that, the lore of Nika the Sun God is passed down the Buccaneers race specifically. The Buccaneers hold a tremendous amount of information about Nika, perhaps the most of all. Even the Giants don’t seem to know as much, and that’s truly telling. The Buccaneers believe that one day, Nika will come and free them all from their misery as he liberates the world.

Was Joy Boy A Former Slave?

The Buccaneers Being Slaves Suggests Joy Boy Was A Slave

It is difficult to say for sure whether Joy Boy was originally a slave or not. However, the idea isn’t too far-fetched. Slavery isn’t something new in the One Piece world. Many fans are of the opinion that slaves existed because of the World Government’s creation. However, that’s not true at all. Slaves have existed since ancient times, long before the Second World. Slaves have been depicted in the First World of One Piece, and they continued to exist in the second world as well.

Joy Boy could easily have been one of the slaves, and most certainly the most important one as well.

Two things are important to note here. The first thing to note is that Joy Boy wanted freedom and liberation, which is why the Nika fruit came to him. This clearly suggests that Joy Boy himself was deprived of freedom at a young age. The second thing to note is that Devil Fruits are not canonically confirmed to have been created during the Second World, thanks to the Harley texts, which specifically state that the Forest God created the demons in the Second World. This means some. Now, Nika existed long ago in the world of One Piece during the First World, and the Buccaneers are known to hold a close connection to him.

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Putting this aside, fans need to focus on the concept of Devil Fruits themselves. The Devil Fruits are created by the hopes, dreams, desires, and wishes of people. This is what Vegapunk believes. As such, someone gave birth to the Nika Devil Fruit in the One Piece world. Oda confirmed himself that those who possess Devil Fruit abilities exist in a different dimension with powers that were dreamed up by someone before them. So if the fruits came to life in the Second World, who created the Nika fruit? The answer can only lead one to the oppressed and enslaved.

Given that the fruit went to the one who desired it the most, one can come to the conclusion that it was Joy Boy himself who gave birth to the Nika fruit from his own imagination, specifically because he was a slave and yearned for freedom, wanting Nika to come to save him. In fact, it wouldn’t be a stretch to say that the Nika fruit was the very first one to be created in history and that all the other Devil Fruits came after. Joy Boy Became the Sun God and a symbol for the other slaves. He freed people from their misery and eventually, fought against the World Government, losing his life in the process, but not before entrusting everything to the next generation, who he believed would come 800 years later and fulfill the Will of D. completely.

Although this is just a bunch of clues pieced together, it definitely makes a lot of sense for Joy Boy to be the creator of the Nika fruit and a slave who earned not just his own freedom, but that of many others along with him, just as Kuma did on God Valley, 38 years ago.

One Piece is available to read via Viz Media. The series can be read by the fans officially and for free on the Shonen Jump and the Manga Plus apps. The release date for the next chapter of One Piece, One Piece 1143, is set to be March 23, 2025.

One Piece

Release Date

October 20, 1999

Network

Fuji TV

Directors

Hiroaki Miyamoto, Konosuke Uda, Junji Shimizu, Satoshi Itō, Munehisa Sakai, Katsumi Tokoro, Yutaka Nakajima, Yoshihiro Ueda, Kenichi Takeshita, Yoko Ikeda, Ryota Nakamura, Hiroyuki Kakudou, Takahiro Imamura, Toshihiro Maeya, Yûji Endô, Nozomu Shishido, Hidehiko Kadota, Sumio Watanabe, Harume Kosaka, Yasuhiro Tanabe, Yukihiko Nakao, Keisuke Onishi, Junichi Fujise, Hiroyuki Satou

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  Mayumi Tanaka

  Monkey D. Luffy (voice)

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  Kazuya Nakai

  Roronoa Zoro (voice)