"Romance Dawn" is the first story arc of the manga and anime series, One Piece written by Eiichiro Oda. It is also the first arc in the East Blue saga.
The first episode starts off with Gold Roger, the pirate king, announcing to the world that he has left wealth, fame, power: everything the world has to offer in form of a treasure at a certain place - causing the world to enter the "Great Age of Piracy". The scene then shifts to the ship of the pirate, Alvida who has recently looted some other ships including a certain barrel . Koby, a young chore boy who has been trying to find a way to escape tyrannical Alvida's ship comes across the barrel in the ship's kitchen where he finds our seventeen year old protagonist, Monkey D. Luffy. Luffy and Koby have a talk regarding their situation with the latter expressing his wish to flee from the ship and join the ranks of the Marines. With the news of an intruder on the ship, a battle ensures on the ship with Luffy easily defeating all the hostile pirates with his mysterious rubber like powers. He explains that he ate the Gomu Gomu no Mi ( which stands for rubber rubber fruit in japanese) a devil fruit. Taking another raft with them , they escape to a town called Shell's town which was nearby.
Luffy demonstrate his rubber-like powers
The second part of the arc takes place in Shell's town - a somewhat small town with a Marine base led by Captain "Axe Hand" Morgan. We see an infamous bounty hunter(someone who hunts down people who have bounty on their head for the money), Roronoa Zoro who is well known by his alias "Pirate Hunter" , wounded and roped to a wooden cross. It will be come to be known that it was due to a whim of the son of the marine captain, Helmeppo. A small girl called Rika tries to offers some rice balls to the tied Zoro but Helmeppo enters the field and throws the rice balls away and it falls on the ground. Helmeppo reminds him off their deal and leaves. Zoro still offers to eat the dirty rice balls and even eats it and thanks Rika for kindness. Outside the marine base field , Rika reveals what the deal between Helmeppo and Zoro was, She starts off by saying that he town was run by a tyrannical Captain Morgan, who allowed his son, Helmeppo, to regularly abuse his citizens. One day, Helmeppo brought a hostile wolf into a bar which attacked the customers and ate their food. When Zoro attacked Helmeppo for his cruelty, Helmeppo threatened to execute all customers in the bar unless Zoro turned himself into the Marines, where he would be crucified for one month.
A crucified Zoro
Later, Helmeppo reveals that he intended to execute Zoro, violating the deal he had struck with him. Luffy assaults him for his dishonesty, then heads towards the Marine base to locate Zoro's confiscated katanas. As Morgan orders his men to erect a large statue of himself on the base's rooftop, Luffy launches himself towards the rooftop, accidentally destroying the statue in the process. Luffy grabs Helmeppo and flees, searching the building and locating the katanas. Meanwhile, Koby attempts to free Zoro from the cross, but is spotted by Morgan, who orders his men to open fire on them both. They are stopped by Luffy, who deflects the bullets with his rubber body. Luffy asks Zoro to join his crew while returning his katanas who uses them to free himself and repel the Marines' attacks. He agrees to join Luffy's crew should he survive. Despite being clearly overpowered by Luffy's Devil Fruit power and Zoro's Three Sword Style, Morgan orders his men to attack them.
Despite Luffy overpowering Morgan, Helmeppo holds Koby hostage, threatening to shoot him. Meanwhile, as Luffy is distracted, Morgan attempts to attack him from behind. Luffy punches Helmeppo in the face and Zoro cuts Morgan down, preventing him from harming Luffy, saying that he has an ambition - "To become the world's greatest swordsman" and even goes as far to state that he won't flinch to cut down even Luffy if he was in the way of his ambition. The Marines, who were aware of Morgan's numerous abuses of power, decide not to continue the battle, instead dishonorably discharging and arresting their own captain.
Zoro becomes Luffy's first crewmate
Luffy, Zoro and Koby go to a restaurant to celebrate their victory. Koby explains how the world is divided. The world is divided into west and east by a continent called the Red Line, and the Grand Line is a linear sea perpendicular to the Red Line. Legendary pirate, Gold Roger claimed he had hidden his treasure at the very end of the Grand Line. Ripper, the Marine who had succeeded Morgan as the new base commander, confronts Luffy. He agrees to accept Koby into the Marines upon his request. However, due to Luffy and Zoro's statuses as pirates, he orders them both to leave the town, only promising not to inform headquarters as a gesture of gratitude. Luffy and Zoro agree, and they both continue their travels.
The third part of the arc shows a part of Luffy's backstory while explaining the significance if his signature Straw-Hat which was entrusted to him by his idol , "Red-Haired" Shanks. Luffy and Zoro sail towards their next destination, but Luffy loses his signature straw hat when the boat jostles. Zoro recovers the hat, and its significance to Luffy is explained. In his childhood, Luffy befriended Shanks, a pirate captain residing in his home village , the Foosha village. While Luffy and the Shanks' pirates were at a bar, Luffy unknowingly ate the Gomu Gomu no Mi, a Devil Fruit Shanks had acquired during his travels , in a fit of anger when the pirate group refused to let him on board . Upon eating the fruit, Luffy's body immediately gained rubber-like properties, but he had permanently lost the ability to swim.However, Luffy was terrorized and threatened by Higuma and his group of mountain bandits. Although Shanks and his pirates came to his aid, Higuma escaped, abducting Luffy. Higuma sailed out to sea on a small rowboat and threw Luffy into the sea for him to drown. However, a Sea King, a carnivorous sea monster, appeared and devoured Higuma whole, threatening to target Luffy next. Shanks rescued Luffy, from the monster. Shanks thanks Luffy for being brave and standing up to the mountain bandits for them to stop crying as he is a man to which Luffy says , "but your arm" while we see one of Shanks' arms being bitten off. Shanks tells Luffy not to worry as it is just an arm and that he is glad that Luffy is safe. Eventually, the Red Hair Pirates departed from Foosha Village and set sail for the Grand Line. Just before he left, Shanks entrusted Luffy with his straw hat for him to protect as it was dear to him. He told Luffy to take good care of it and return it to him when he becomes an excellent pirate. Throughout the years, Luffy cherished his hat to remind him of his idol. Back to the present day, Luffy is abducted by a bird and sent flying away and with which the first arc of the series concludes.
(I do not own any of the pictures used in this blog. All the rights go to Eiichiro Oda and Toei Animation )
