 Hello and welcome to the Grand Line Review, your source for everything one piece. Today we have a review of chapter 942, the Daimyo of Hakumai, Shimozuki Yasui. And just, wow. So this chapter presented me with an awful lot of emotion that I just plain wasn't ready for. Which is odd because this is exactly the sort of thing I was expecting to go into after the last chapter, but with the break in between I just kind of forgotten the exact severity of the situation and yeah, what an experience this was as a result. Yasu's final speech and thoughts had me quite genuinely tearing up, I mean Oda just has such a fantastic way of pulling at those heartstrings as much as possible when depicting a death in the series. And I think a lot of it for me has to do with the brilliant artwork showing Yasu all broken and beaten, but still smiling brightly through everything. He doesn't seem scared, just a bit regretful that he wasn't able to do more. Which is utter madness because Yasu's sacrifice has more or less entirely saved the rebellion building up on Wano. I think that we are certainly going to look back on Wano and go, whoa, without this guy everything would have gone just entirely wrong. And not in the chaotic great straw hat kind of wrong way. I mean, the proper kind of wrong. But I think it would also be a mistake to think that Yasu has merely given the rebellion its platform back. I feel like he has done so much more than that. Because we have that little scene of the prison guards discussing how much they despise Orochi's cowardice and that is surely a hint for an even greater uprising even amongst Orochi's supposed supporters. Especially since the whole thing was televised as well. I mean imagine watching your benevolent ruler becoming frustrated like a child and firing relentlessly into an individual who holds seemingly no power whatsoever to wield against him. It's just not the reaction of a true leader who believes in themselves. Rather, it's the calling card of a highly insecure person, entirely unworthy of the status bestowed upon them. So having the whole nation view this moment can only be considered a victory for the rebellion. Of course, we also learned this chapter that there may be a lot more to Yasu's smile than just a general lifestyle choice, which was a bit of a shock. I mean, it's all very vague right now, but the fact that all of the citizens of Abisu village can't do anything but smile and laugh seems to be connected to the artificial smile devil fruits. And it's going to be just plain fascinating to see how this connection is explored because I highly doubt that Yasu and everyone else have eaten smile fruits, unless they were some of Caesar's very, very early prototypes that failed to do anything but give their users the unnatural curse of permanent smiling. And hence how the fruits got their names, I guess. If so, perhaps they could have been used as something of a torture device by Orachi and the beast pirates. Or maybe it has something to do with the handling of the fruits rather than the consumption. Like if you spend too long in the presence of a large quantity of smile fruits, you become infected. And once again, that's how they would have gotten their name. But then again, if that were the case, then a ton of the Tontata tribe should also be affected by this curse because they were working as slaves in the Smile Factory on Dressrosa, so who knows? At the moment, I do prefer those two ideas, though, as opposed to an explanation involving smile users having some sort of innate ability to curse others as a result of eating their fruits. But I do really appreciate the little twist involving the smile fruits because for the first time since their introduction, I'm really starting to become quite invested in investigating them further. There were a couple of other things that took my interest this chapter as well. And this next one may or may not have been pointed out at some stage before during this arc. But there is a segment of the Yasu flashback where there is a character wearing a garment with the same cross swords emblem as depicted on Zoro's old master, Koshiro. And with that, you'd think that his association to Wano is now pretty damn solidified. In fact, this emblem is not even the only connection made to Koshiro during this chapter, but the other one being in Yasu's full name, Shimotsuki Yasuie. And where does Koshiro's dojo just happen to be? In Shimotsuki Village in East Blue. But to be perfectly honest, I'm not sure how huge the significance of the Shimotsuki name is, but it feels like an awfully big coincidence for this sword's master character who already has many hints of being connected to Wano to be very coincidentally tied to Yasu's name as well. So you know, Q, the theory is about how Koshiro may be one of the other three Daimyo or famed samurai from the pre-Kaido times who was forced to flee and ended up in East Blue. The only thing that really gives me pause for thought is Koshiro's entry in the One Piece Viviacard data book, which states that he was not originally from Shimotsuki Village, but he was from somewhere else in East Blue, which is confusing because unless he was the son of a citizen of Wano who left the country even before Kaido arrived and was raised in East Blue, which I suppose is possible, then I'm not really sure how he lines up with anything. I mean, surely Odin isn't the only samurai whoever dreamt of leaving the country to explore the world. So someone from the generation before Odin doing the same thing shouldn't be too out of the question. At the same time, we should also bear in mind that Viviacards have also been known to lie in order to cover up future revelations. So this could be one of those occasions. Whatever the case, his connection to Wano is in some way guaranteed at this point and every new hint makes me more and more curious to discover his history as well as the impact this will have on Zoro. And another thing that this chapter has made me very eager to see is more of Odin. While still silhouetted, there was a decent amount of his character on display in the flashback this week, portraying him very much as a fun, loving goofball, very much in the style of Luffy or what we've seen of Roger so far. I really enjoyed his line about an isolationist country being too cramped for him and his more delinquent nature in general. So it's going to be really interesting to finally see the story of how Odin grew into a man worthy of taking charge of the Kozuki clan. But that essentially wraps up this week, a very powerful chapter with a strong focus on a surprisingly strong character. One that I'm very much going to miss going forward into the story. However, with his departure, I feel like the stage has set more so than ever for the upcoming madness on Wano. And yet I still feel like there's so much left to explore in regards to these island-specific characters past and present for we even get into that full swing of the rebellion. And that's why having another break next week becomes slightly more painful than usual to bear because this chapter just got me excited about so many things. But by the time another chapter comes around in two weeks, that will have died down and I'll need to rebuild momentum again. But you know, what can you do? That's manga. And that pretty much does it for chapter 942. If you enjoyed this video and the content this channel produced in general, then please do consider donating to the Grand Line Review Patreon because the support of all of your amazing people is what continues to make this channel possible. 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