Nightmare Luffy Mode

Nightmare Luffy is a transformation that emerged when Luffy was forced into absorbing about a hundred shadows against his own will. Throughout the series, this form has only appeared once.

Indeed, it happened in the 370th episode of the One Piece anime. The name of the episode is :  « A Secret Strategy to Turn the Tables – Nightmare Luffy Appears »

As for the One Piece manga, it happened in the 479th chapter (Vol. 49).

Nightmare Luffy vs Oz / Nightmare Luffy vs Oars :

As Luffy was rushing to the battlefield, he was tripped by a pirate or rather a pirate crew called the « Rolling Pirates ».

Their goal was also the same as Luffy, they wanted to get their shadows back. To do that they did something unconventional, it gave them the edge they needed to take down Gecko Moria…

But before we get to what happened in that episode let’s talk a little about the Warlord Gecko Moria and his devil fruit.

Gecko Moria

This guy used to be one of the Seven Warlords of the sea. He currently resides on the largest ship in the world « Thriller Bark »

When he was young, his crew called “The Gecko Pirates” came face to face with Kaido of the beasts. This encounter with a Yonko ended in a disgraceful defeat. Moria lost almost all of his crew. Later, he rose again with a new crew named the “Thriller Bark Pirates”.

Even though he used to be one of the seven warlords of the sea. He was stripped off of this title during the great war of Marineford. The one who brought this upon him was another warlord, Doflamingo. However Moria managed to escape from him. It is only 427 episodes later that we see Gecko Moria who came to pick up his faithful companion Absalom on the island of Blackbeard called Hachinosu also known as Pirate Island.

As for his devil fruit, it is a paramecia type called the Kage Kage no Mi. It gives the user the freedom to manifest and control shadows of living creatures, including their own. In a way, the user becomes « The Ruler of Shadows ».

Thriller Bark Arc

During the Thriller Bark arc, the pirates who had been victims of Moria’s shadow controlling abilities saw hope in Luffy. Over the years they had realized that they can inject shadows in themselves to attain the abilities of that specific shadow. Thus, they used Moria’s devil fruit against him.

They injected the shadow of a swordsman into Luffy and suddenly Luffy was a master swordsman, even though he knew nothing about the art of swordsman ship at all. Seeing that their experiment worked. They induced about a 100 shadows in Luffy and just like that, Luffy turns into nightmare Luffy. The only drawback to this form was the time limit, the abilities would last for only about 10 minutes.

Nightmare Luffy Transformation | Luffy Turns into Nightmare Luffy :

However, for Luffy’s nightmare mode, this was plenty.

Nightmare Luffy Mode

In Nightmare Luffy transformation, Luffy grew several times larger than his normal self and his skin also turnes blue, making him look like a Zombie.

We did an article on how tall is Nightmare Luffy, you can check it right here.

So now that Luffy had the necessary strength he needed to face Moria, he enters the battlefield and immediately saves both Usopp and Nami from the ridiculous stomping of Oz, both of them were about to be stopped over by that demon. Oz was ridiculously large in size (67 meters) and possessed Luffy’s abilities.

So if we look at the situation rationally, Oz was certainly not a good opponent for Luffy, was he ?

But Voila !!!

Nightmare Luffy had more than enough strength to beat his own shadow out of Oz. He starts by blocking Oz’s gigantic punch with his single hand and then punches him straight on his chin. The impact of Luffy’s punch makes Oz fall over his head and bewilders Moria, who was piloting Oz from inside his stomach.

As Nightmare Luffy presented this awful display of raw strength. Nami and Usopp, as well as the Zombies, who were watching from the sidelines, were all completely blown away by Luffy’s inhumane strength. The noticeable techniques that Luffy used in his Nightmare form were Gomu Gomu no Pistol and Gomu Gomu no Storm.

Nightmare Luffy vs Oz :

Meanwhile, Moria who happened to be inside Oz’s stomach was getting just as dizzy as Oz. At this point the narration endorsed the moment by saying :

« How the legendary man who was called a Demon 500 years ago is getting beaten so easily ? »

With only three minutes to spare, the Luffy vs Oz battle enters its final phase. Luffy uses Gomu Gomu no Storm and hits Oz with a stupendous amount of random consecutive punches. This barrage results in Oz becoming unable to fight and Luffy, shrinking in size. It seems to be one of the side effects of the Nightmare Luffy form.

When all of the shadows left Luffy’s body, his size decreased a little more than what it should have. He shrank just enough to be about the same size as that of an elementary school kid 😂. Now that Oz had been defeated. What happened next was something that should’ve been obvious from the very beginning. Moria didn’t give up at all, in fact, he swore to claim everybody’s shadow and then go after the title of Pirate King with his army of undead.

In that moment, he used some technique called Shadows’ Asgard ! He extracted about a 1000 shadows and injected them into his own body, these shadows also included that of Luffy himself. Suddenly, he became exponentially bigger than his normal size. Even bigger than Oz. But Luffy had already had enough of this nonsense, he uses his Gear 2nd and third at the same time !!!

Gecko Moria Shadow’s Asgard

Luffy charges ahead using Giganto Jet Sheel ! The impact becomes too much to handle, even for Moria. And just like that all of the shadows came out of Moria’s body and returned to their owners.

1000 shadows Moria vs Luffy :

What if Luffy absorbs 100 shadows while in Gear 4 ?

Nightmare Luffy Gear 4 has been a center of attention for One Piece fans, ever since gear 4th was revealed. Some resources also say that Gear 4th Bounce Man was created because fans wanted Nightmare Luffy to come back so Oda gave them something different. Which isn’t the case, I mean come on, is it really that simple to sway Oda ?

We know that Nightmare Luffy is a form that can only take place under certain conditions. If those conditions were to be met again and Luffy still lacked the innate strength to beat that specific opponent, there’s no doubt about it, Luffy would have to go further beyond and that premonition alone makes it apparent, Gear 4 Nightmare Luffy isn’t impossible.

Why ?

Let’s take another look at everything we’ve discussed so far. For Gear fourth Nightmare Luffy to be born, there are a few fundamental components that need to come together. These components include :

• Luffy himself

• Moria

• An opponent strong enough that can’t be defeated by any ordinary means

Now who could that opponent be ? Your guess is as good as mine. We already know that if there is one person that Moria hates more than anything else in the world than that person is the world’s strongest beast « Kaido ».

So, it is possible that at some point in the story, all three of these individuals come together. Moria decides to use Luffy to take down Kaido and in order to do that, he might make it possible for Nightmare Gear 4 Luffy to be born. Given what Kaido did to Moria in the past, Moria would also take whatever opportunity he can get to take Kaido down.

Well, rationally speaking. I don’t think if even Gear 4 Nightmare Luffy would be able to take Kaido down, it’s because Kaido is basically immortal. We have seen him do insane things and still come out of them unscathed. Sure Luffy Nightmare Gear 4 is nothing to brag about. It would certainly be able to give Kaido a run for his money but we are forgetting a very importing thing here, there is also going to be a time limit and if Luffy uses gear 4th together with the Nightmare form, then the time limit might decrease even further.

Luffy can quite possibly give major injuries to Kaido but would that be enough to defeat him ? Even if Luffy becomes the strongest character in this Gear 4th Nightmare form, there would still be a major drawback. He would never be able to finish off an entity such as Kaido in a few minutes. Be that as it may, there is an incredible fan made video about Nightmare Luffy Gear 4 vs. Kaido.

Luffy vs Kaido (Fan animation)

The video’s gotten more than 30 millions views ! So there is a chance that even Oda might’ve seen the video. Just saying !

Kudos to the folks who made that video, they did an extraordinary job indeed.

Make sure to subscribe to their Youtube Channel !

• Merimo : https://bit.ly/3binkSL
• Audio Loki : https://bit.ly/2wnuRRy

However, in the end, it’s up to Oda to decide what he wants to do next. It’s his series after all, the possibility isn’t zero. In fact, there’s a high chance that Nightmare Luffy Gear 4th makes its debut. Oda just needs to connect the dots, what if he has been doing all this groundwork just to make Gear 4 Nightmare Luffy possible ?

Or what if he is planning to show us an even more spectacular form ? Something better than anything we have seen before…

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