Christian says the Cross Guild shakes up One Piece because Buggy is the flashy face while Mihawk and Crocodile do the heavy lifting. TJ says it is funny and smart at the same time. They talk about how the guild puts bounties on Marines and stirs up big trouble and fear. Christian notes that the move splits the world and makes pirates and marines fight harder. TJ wonders how the Straw Hats will deal with them and says Mihawk might be the real wild card. They keep the chat light and joking, but they also dig into why the guild matters to the story.

Christian Ashley and TJ Blackwell dive hard into the wild idea of the Cross Guild and what it means for One Piece. He points out the weird crew makeup. Crocodile and Mihawk are old, strong types who used to be warlords. Buggy is the clown who somehow ends up as the face. They laugh about how Buggy gets credit for things he did not do. They talk about how Crocodile wants power back and Mihawk keeps his mystery. The trio is strange, but it fits a world that loves odd builds and big reveals.

They break down the Cross Guild plan. The guild puts bounties on Marines and officials. That flips the whole bounty game on its head. Christian thinks it makes the world more split. TJ agrees it is a bold move. They stress how the idea terrifies regular marines and makes pirates think twice. The hosts keep it light. They crack jokes about Buggy running the whole show while the real muscle hides backstage.

Takeaways:

• Christian explains how Cross Guild is led by Buggy, and he notes Crocodile and Mihawk back him up.
• TJ jokes that Buggy is a fraud, yet the world treats him like a big shot, funny but dangerous.
• They explain Cross Guild flips the bounty system by putting bounties on Marines and other government officials.
• Christian discusses how the guild's setup polarizes the world and makes regular Marines obvious targets.
• They point out Buggy as the face is a clever joke that also scares common pirates and folks.
• TJ teases Mihawk still feels mysterious and could be the real muscle to cause future trouble.
• Christian warns the Straw Hats will clash with Cross Guild, and Zoro versus Mihawk feels like a major benchmark.

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Who are the members of Cross Guild?

We're going to be asking this question and a lot more in today's episode of Systematicology.

We are the Priests and the Geeks.

I'm your host, Christian Ashley.

Today here with of course, the greatest pirate Mama Land, the fabled TJ Blackwell.

How's it going, tj?

Wonderful.

Yeah.

Seems like another late nighter of work for my man here.

Went in very early today and is only now coming back to civilization, I'm guessing.

That's right.

It's also my grandpa's birthday.

Oh.

Happy birthday to Grandpa TJ.

Long may he reign.

It's 84.

84.

Excellent.

So today we're going to be discussing the Cross Guild Pirate Group from One Piece.

You can definitely go to the One Piece episodes we've done before.

Probably in the links down below.

But tj, before we head that way, do you have any recommendations?

Think you've been geeking out on recently?

Uh, based on time investment?

No.

The things you want to kick out.

On slay the Spire 2.

Okay.

It's a game a lot of my friends have been playing.

A lot.

I'm not a roguelike person, but it's.

It's pretty fun.

That's never been my thing either.

That's all right.

It's a good time.

In preparation for something that won't be happening for a bit.

The next Geeks on a Roll I'm on, which TJ will actually be on.

So here's a little hint for you.

Before everyone else, I been reading Craven's Last Hunt in preference for part of what might be happening along the way.

Haven't finalized everything yet.

It's a good book.

Yes.

So tj talking about Cross Guild.

Of course we have to talk about One Piece itself.

So they haven't listened to any other episodes we've done.

Could you help explain to me what One Piece is to the good people?

Yeah.

Well, if you never heard of One Piece, wrong episode.

But One Piece is a story about a pirate named Monkey D Luffy whose goal is to become the King of the pirates and whose core ideals we have covered in probably like 80 episodes at this point.

Feels like it.

It's one of the longest running manga of all time.

The story started before I was born, not before Christian.

Before Christian was before you were born.

No, it came out like 96.

I'm 90.

96.

97.

Was it 96.

Okay.

Somewhere around there.

Yeah.

Because the anime came out in like 99.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It got picked up quick because it's the greatest to ever do it.

Yeah.

A thousand some odd chapters ago.

That's what One Piece was about.

Yeah.

It is a tale of pirate fantasy of going from different islands on this world that's got this large sea.

Very rarely will there be a huge continent or anything like that.

It's basically.

Yeah.

With your island of the Week.

But there's far more to it than that.

A nice crew of people.

Some people who originally hate pirates.

Some have always wanted to be them.

Some who want have other issues.

And yet they all find a central crew to work together and figure out the issues present in their lives.

And that has since caused.

Well, it's always been a part of the world that there are different factions of pirates there.

Would you like to explain briefly, like what some of those are?

How they came to be, why they matter to the story?

There's so many.

There's so many.

Yeah.

We're not doing every single one.

There's so many.

But generally there are a couple of different types of pirate factions.

Of course you have your crews which are led by captains and you know, their crew kind of hand picked.

Hey, they want to do pirate stuff together, garner power, that sort of thing.

We've got like the big mom pirates, which is big moment.

All of her kids, all of their subordinates.

Huge, huge, massive faction that is worthless and stupid.

There are sometimes other factions that spring up out of respect.

Fear.

The Straw Hat Grand Alliance.

It was just kind of like a whole bunch of different crews being like, yeah, Luffy's awesome.

We're part of the Straw Hat grand alliance now.

The government will sometimes exert their power on the world to make factions of pirates like the Shichibukai or the Warlords.

I don't know if that do that count.

That kind of counts.

Kind of counts.

That kind of counts.

It's more like a classification.

But the Shichibukai were definitely the Warlords.

Privateers to an extent.

Yeah.

But it goes all over the place.

Factions are from crew level to like multi crew level.

Nothing.

Nothing too crazy.

We're talking about one of the more recent ones in this episode.

Which is why if you're not at least a little bit familiar with One Piece, you should probably not listen to this episode.

Yeah, Go check out One Pace that might.

That might help you get here eventually.

Yeah, One Pace.

Come back in two months or three.

So yeah, as part of the world of One Piece, you know, pirates aren't always what you would think of as pirates.

There are definitely those who act like the way we think pirates do, but they're multifaceted in the sense of like, our main crew are pirates, in a sense that they're adventurers.

They're ne' er do wells, like according to the world government and its rules and like, wanting freedom for a lot of people.

But then you'll have other pirates who are way more on the pillaging and raiding side of things, who are actually the bad guys who discriminate based on race or on location or stuff like that.

So that brings us to our topic for today, which is discussing a specific pirate faction.

Now that we've kind of talked broadly about what they are, we come to Cross Guild.

Now, of course, before we actually explain what Cross Guild is, we might help to actually go into the different members of Cross Guild who have appeared all across one piece in various ways.

So tj, first one.

On the docket, we have good old Crocodile.

Who is Crocodile?

Crocodile is one of the Shichibukai, the warlords that we mentioned previously.

But he was just a really strong pirate in the East Blue.

Built all of his power there.

He was actually.

All of the members of the Cross Guild are really early characters that we got to know in like the first arc or two or three.

Surprising when you think about it.

Yeah, Yeah.

I never thought about it until like just now.

I was like, wow, literally all of these guys are from the East Blue.

But Crocodile was like Luffy's first big roadblock.

He was the first Logia Fruit user that we were introduced to in the series.

He has the sand.

Sand Fruit or whatever that is in Japanese.

Not one that I know off the top of my head.

Sandu.

Sandu.

Yeah, probably that's pretty likely, but that's more or less who he is.

I mean, he gets ousted pretty handily not too long after we meet him, at least comparatively.

And he's back.

He's back.

He was never like, completely irrelevant, and he definitely wasn't very relevant for a long time.

He was one of the earliest.

Not really a starter villain.

I mean, pace of one piece kind of a starter villain, given how many chapters it took to get to him.

It's like establishing threats.

Like how someone like this could exist in the world and like be a threat, but also not be like a higher tier one.

It just looks like one.

Especially as a guy who worked in a desert country as like pretty much a physical God.

He picked kind of the best place for him to be the most effective,.

But it's like a smoker, worked in a cigar lounge,.

I mean, pretty much.

But it gets to the point of Luffy eventually takes him down after suffering crucial defeat there.

Eventually finds his way, takes him down, but Crocodile remains.

And he'll eventually become someone important enough to start the Cross Guild.

But then we come to our next member out of our main trio here for this.

Merely a duo.

But you know what it is?

What it is.

Mihawk Dracule.

Mihawk, Potential man.

Fraud Man.

The.

The featless extraordinaire.

Existing off of aura exclusively.

Really?

Aura alone?

Word of mouth purely.

I mean, it's.

What do we even say he was?

Also, all three of these characters were warlords and they're, you know, kind of.

I guess we'll talk about it later.

But yeah, that might have something to do with them.

But Mihawk is like, widely purported to be like the greatest swordsman on the seas.

That's pretty much who he is.

And we've seen pretty much nothing to back that up.

The last thing that we saw was him fighting Zorro with like a pocket knife.

But I mean, winning handily easily.

Didn't break a sweat.

Swung that thing once.

But he.

He gave Zoro his big cool scarlet.

But that was so long ago.

Anyone could do that.

Could have done that to that Zora.

Anyone introduced in this arc could have done that to Zorro at the time.

Yeah.

It's so funny because like, we first see him, it's like, oh man, this is obviously one of the coolest guys ever.

Look how easily he took down Zorro.

And he's done things since then, but he's never like been in a legitimate fight.

He's kind of like.

I mean, we haven't seen Dragon really do anything either.

You know, Luffy's dad.

Sorry, spoilers.

Once again, not the episode you'd be going for your first time like, but there's so much about them.

It's like there's a mystique of like, I believe they could be one of the greatest out there.

But I. I've still yet to see the actual evidence for.

Yeah, yeah.

The only.

Honestly, the best evidence we get is him training Zorro.

Yeah.

During a time skip and we don't even see him do anything.

Zoro just comes back stronger.

Which.

Which, yeah, yeah, he's probably still stronger than Zoro.

We know he has one of the only one of the 21 supreme grade swords in the.

In the verse.

Or you've seen him use it twice.

I mean, it's one of those things when you actually look behind who the members are, why they're important.

It's also, there's a lot of like, Hope as in, like, I hope to see more in this story.

And I think we'll definitely see it along the way.

How that will actually happen is another thing of its own.

But you could definitely call this like the potential guild at this point in time.

Because we've seen some.

Some feats and the like from.

From.

Well, most of them here outside of him.

But it's also like there's still a lot more that could be given in the story which we'll see along the way and actually speculate on what could happen too.

But of course, you know, we've gotten the two weakest members out of the way.

We have to talk about the true mastermind.

The one who everyone respects.

And that of course, is Buggy the Clown.

Who is Buggy the Clown?

Buggy the Clown is the leader of the Cross Guild?

Yes.

The de facto president of the Cross Guild.

Featless the Clown.

He does.

Out of the three, he has the most feats we've seen him do the most.

Which is insane.

We've seen his Devil Fruit in action.

We've seen him use techniques beyond that.

Like he's.

He's like if.

If we're doing like list of people who might have already awakened to their fruit.

He's there.

He's there.

Bucky the Clown is just that.

He is a clown.

He's a captain.

Was on Gold Rogers Crew as a kid.

What there's.

See the problem with all these characters is they don't have like really long histories that just aren't important.

They're just not particularly relevant.

But that's almost all we know about them.

Buggy.

The least we do know the most about Buggy.

He was running his own.

He had his own crew.

They started their own company called Buggy's Delivery.

And that's how they got tied up in this.

Mihawk and Crocodile got together and were like, we're gonna form our guild.

We're gonna like be a true counter to the world government.

And Buggy.

You owe us so much money.

We're absorbing your company.

And then Buggy's crewmates.

Buggy's crew was just a little excited and started promoting Cross Guild.

That's how Buggy ended up as the president of the Cross Guild is because his whole crew told everyone that that was the case.

Let's wait for one second for that finish on Buggy.

He is definitely a bigger starter villain.

As in, like the first people you fight against.

Then Crocodile would be.

Crocodile is more like your more serious starter villain.

But he has an amazing ability of Being able to detach himself and have the body parts act independently of himself and have the willpower to be able to utilize that in the fight, which at the same time as we have this guy who's very rubbery and that's supposed to bring some comedy into the series.

One of the things Oda always wanted to do is no matter how serious things got, there was always going to be the guy with the rubbery powers who would do all these weird, fantastical things.

And Buggy is an early indication of that too.

And yeah, he's doing very serious, seriously evil things against people with protection rackets and beating up people who aren't paying and causing mischief and mayhem in the town that he's in.

But there's something so goofy about obviously being a clown.

Yeah.

Like, that helps to solidify this is a legitimate threat.

But he's also not going to be the final Big Bad.

Yeah, yeah, he could be.

I mean, could the ancient legends be true?

Is Buggy D Clown actually part of the D?

No, because that is not how the language works.

But you know what?

It's still be funny if it was true.

It's a pun that only really works in English.

Oh, it'd be funny, though.

I wouldn't be upset.

I would.

Not if it happened.

No, not at all.

Because, like, I wouldn't even necessarily say that Buggy doesn't belong to the Will of D. I got.

If you.

If Oda was like, yeah, he's got it, I'd be like, you know, okay, sure, I believe that.

Show me.

So, tj, you kind of touched on it a bit, but to go in for the depth, like, Cross Guild occurs way late on in One Piece.

We're talking over a thousand chapters essentially from the beginning.

Like, why does Cross Guild exist?

What's so important about it?

Why should we care?

Why is there an entire episode built around this if someone hasn't gotten it yet?

The Cross Guild is.

It's really funny, actually.

The reason that they made the Cross Guild just feels like the same reason that they're in the manga again at this point, which is like chapter 1,050 something.

Sure.

It's just they were tired of not being relevant.

They wanted to, like, be real contenders for the One Piece.

And Oda was sitting at his desk one day and was like, I kind of miss writing about Crocodile and Mihawk.

I'm gonna start again.

I'm gonna do the Cross Guild.

That's why the Cross Guild exists.

That's the true reason.

Now, the In Story region,.

Basically, that Basically that Crocodile wanted to pursue the One Piece and be seen as legitimate and was aware of the fact that he really just couldn't, not on his own.

So he conscripted Mihawk, who felt the same, and they were both kind of miffed that the World Government was like, hey, no more warlords.

You guys are just pirates and you're kind of losers.

So they joined together.

They're big pools of power because they are still pirates with a great amount of influence.

And they made the Cross Guild and then they absorbed Buggy's company and Buggy became president of the Cross Guild.

Buggy.

Buggy's just here accidentally, and they both hate it.

Oh yes.

In case you are still unfamiliar, they cannot stand Buggy the Clown.

They want him dead, but they can't kill him.

It's one of those things.

A very funny serendipity, because when we're introduced originally to Crocodile, once again, he is a physical God in the realm he's in.

But as the manga is going on, if you learn more about the world, that can be negated by the proper hockey against them, or a different Devil Fruit user who has something you can combat against him.

So what does a man do like that?

Well, could he level up?

Or does he find a way to ally with people who have differing ideals?

But at the same time, there's that one thing that brings them together, and that is of course, being the one who could obtain the One Piece, who can be the king of the pirates and establish their authority over the entire A world all over the seas.

And so it brings disparate people like this together in an amusing fashion.

But also, what makes sense to their characters.

Like, well, outside of Mihawk, as someone, like, we know a little bit about him, but not enough to be like, okay, why?

Why is he like, he is.

He's definitely the most mysterious out of them.

Like, Crocodile is more blatant.

And of course Buggy is like, well, I can't get out of this now.

They'll kill me if I do.

Or.

And my crew will know that I'm actually a fraud.

And they've supported me this whole time, ever since we've broken out of info down.

So he's got to be the face.

So outside of stuff like that, like, what makes them so very different than the other pirate crews that they're also vying for the same thing that they are?

Well, we mentioned it a little bit.

They.

They did have a pretty long tenure as she, you know, the privateers of the world government that let them build A lot of wealth, a lot of power.

And combining their efforts, they're able to use that power to place bounties on Marines.

They're like, you know what?

We're tired of pirate bounties.

100 Million berries to whoever kills Kobe.

I don't remember what Kobe's was.

Surely it was higher than something like that.

Yeah, had to be higher than him.

100 Million.

But that's, that's like the big threat in the world.

Government size, like, oh, these guys, like have the resources to combat us and make us more unsafe in the field.

Like, we're gonna get hunted now.

We gotta, we gotta solve that.

But they also are more than just a pirate crew.

They're a legitimate crime syndicate.

You know, you mentioned a little bit they were doing the racketeering, protection rackets, like mod mercenary work, bodyguard stuff.

They're really doing it all.

They're really doing it all.

They're just a big stinking, filthy rich organization led by Buggy the Clown.

And that's one of the things that causes as much conflict as it does in this organization.

Because they're not friends by any stretch of the imagination.

What binds them together is nothing pure.

It is this desire to be number one.

But it's also two people who are obviously outclassing the guy everyone thinks is in charge of them, which of course is part of Otis, you know, comedic tendencies.

But there's also something really fun there.

And that as Buggy continues, way beyond where he ever should have been, because he's got the trust of people who shouldn't trust him.

And yet, because of circumstance, because of things, how they've turned out, he looks like he is among the greatest.

He looks like he should be the one who should become the next Pirate King.

Because of all the feats that have happened around him, he's kind of almost like King to an extent, except, you know, Buggy's actually capable King from One Punch man.

From those who don't know King is capable.

He is, he is learning, yes.

But all these feats are attributed to him that other people have done.

But like, he's like, well, I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

I make them think I did those things.

It's going to increase their confidence in me, which can only lead to a fall later on when the truth comes out.

Unless the twist is they always knew and they still supported him anyways, which I think would be really funny.

They went that way.

So far, though, I love we're going to talk about One Punch man, now.

Yes.

King's reputation is so powerful that actual, like high rank monsters will run into King and be like, oh man, I gotta get out of here.

I can hear the King Engine right now.

It's over.

The King Engine's so loud.

I'm gonna die.

So funny.

It's so.

King's just a guy.

Just a regular dude.

Yeah.

Great writing.

Phenomenal.

Don't watch the anime, just read the webcomic and the manga.

Yeah, you can watch the first season of the anime.

After that.

It dips seconds.

Okay.

Yeah, it's fine.

3.

I don't know how they could do something.

It's something that should have made them so much money.

So simple could be so simple.

That was.

But give it to Mappa.

They don't need to see their families that bad.

Anyways.

So a huge part of this, of course, is he is, as I said earlier, the face of Cross Guild, which is a lot of people don't know how to handle in story because, like, what do you mean?

Crocodile and Mihawk are subordinate to him.

Are those stories actually true?

So, like, in your opinion, tj, like, in story out of story, does it ruin or enhance the credibility of Cross Guild?

That Buggy the Clown is the face of their organization out of story.

It makes them a joke in universe.

The.

The way that things have shaken out for Buggy and because of the world government being like, hey, two warlords are dead.

The new ones are Buggy the Clown and Luffy.

That's hilarious.

That's so funny.

And then Cross Guild in universe, they're like the average pirates.

Like, I can't believe they made Buggy an emperor.

That's so stupid.

And then he has the Cross Guild and like, oh my God.

Crocodile and Mihawk are both working for Buggy the Clown.

Maybe I need to be afraid of Buggy the Clown.

Right?

So it's just.

His story just keeps stacking on itself and building his reputation higher and higher and higher.

And at this point, I think the average pirate might just think that Buggy is a. Y'.

All.

He's legit.

Yeah.

He's the real deal.

We know that's not true, but they don't.

And yeah, I agree with you.

Like, out of universe.

Yes.

Obvious.

What the joke is is that there's two very competent people who are now forced into a situation where they have to be subordinate, where they're not actually subordinate to the guy who has no business being in the top job.

He's not the head honcho.

But yeah, in universe, it's Almost like scary to the common pirate or the common marine of like, this guy.

This guy is the face.

He's the guy in charge.

He got them to work together that there's no way this shouldn't work.

So no wonder they're so panicky about it.

Especially when we get into the next part you mentioned earlier.

But we'll actually get a little more into what they're doing to target the world government and the Navy and everyone there.

It's like, oh, maybe he is a legitimate threat.

Yeah.

And even.

Even at the time, like, this is the same thing that happened when he was a Shichibu guy.

We were like, wow, Buggy, Warlord of the Sea.

Really interesting.

He must be the real deal.

Quick question.

It's been a while.

His original crew from when Luffy and the gang fight them.

Are they around right now?

Did they make it out of Impel down, or.

Yeah, they went.

They came with him.

I'm pretty sure they're like part of Buggy's delivery, maybe.

That's what I thought, but once again, it's been so long.

However many chapters of one piece, I don't think they died.

Are they all still in Impel then?

No, I'm pretty sure they came with them.

I'm always open to correction.

It just.

It struck me as like, are they still around?

Because they would know Buggy better than anyone.

Yeah.

If the thread were to unravel, it'd probably be because of them.

I mean, at this point, they're profiting just as much.

That is true.

Like, no matter what happens to Buggy, they're in a good spot.

If Buggy dies, their resume looks great.

I mean, yeah, Once again, it's that perception of things without the full story, without seeing a story as we do.

Like, to the world, this guy was some nobody who did some harm, but like, grew up in the ranks somehow.

Now has broken out of the Unbreakable prison, along with other people who participated in this prison break, and now has become the head of this pirate organization, where once again, his subordinates, as far as they're aware of Mihawk and Crocodile.

I.

Maybe he is who he says he does.

Maybe he is.

It's like, it's like putting a really, like, nice Circuit City job on your resume.

What was it?

Yeah.

Put that on your resume.

It was pretty funny.

You should do one of your CVs today.

Yeah.

So a huge part of what they're doing as you said earlier, Is that the way things work in the world?

You're either your own independent pirate organization doing whatever you want, however you want it, or you are a privateer working for the world government to still do pirate things, but like, more against other pirates or people government hate and pay your taxes and stuff like that.

So, like, you're a pirate, but you're not free.

But then comes cross guild.

And their idea is.

Well, the whole thing is they offer bounties on pirates, even people that work with them to be like, hey, this is how great they are as a threat.

Like, try and go after them at your own peril.

But what if we did that back at them?

What if we put, you know, bounties on the marines, on people in the world government, and they're like, so, like, what do you.

What do we think of their counter proposal to do this?

Great idea?

And honestly, better than the bounty system because they streamlined the process.

They were like, hey, we're not gonna name every Marine.

If you kill a captain, that's a hundred.

That's a hundred million.

Yeah.

If you kill a, like an admiral, that's a billion, you know.

And they're like, for special pirates, like, I looked it up.

Kobe's is 500 million.

Okay.

But they'll like, you know, they'll adjust it.

You know, you can get adjusted, but they make it real, real easy.

Vice admirals are worth the most.

I think they go all the way down to like a hundred thousand for warrant officers.

And below 100,000, any officer, any officer Marine, 100,000 berries.

And then if you kill Fleet Admiral, that's 500 or 5 billion berries.

Gosh.

So, like, yeah, I guess if you roll up with who's the fleet admiral right now?

Kizaru sounds right.

I don't remember.

We.

Perfectly honest.

I think it's no Akainu.

It's kind of.

Oh, it's kind of duh.

Yeah.

I don't know.

I just.

I kind of.

We watched the show, we read the snack.

I promise, I promise.

It's been so long.

It's been so long since we've seen him.

Yes, but, you know, 5 billion for Akainu's head.

Yeah.

I'm motivated.

I'm already.

I was motivated before that I'd do it for free.

But it's a good idea, and I think it's a great way to villainize yourself in the world government's eyes and also motivate people to do your job for you.

Yeah, I'm with you 100% like, this is a brilliant strategy.

It could easily backfire on you, but if it doesn't, it could be raking in, like, the people's goodwill, but also, like, making a name for yourself.

Like, yeah, we weren't the ones who actually killed the guy, but we paid the guy who did.

And if you do it well, the money's there.

We're still doing pirate things.

If you take them down, like, not only are you doing us a service, you're doing yourself a service.

And so it's one of those things that kind of perpetuates over.

Yeah, would I really want to go up against a Kainu?

Nope.

But it's kind of tempting now.

Five billion berries, if I get a.

Crew together, we search them out, try and kill him.

I mean, it's up there now, and it's in people's minds in a way it wasn't beforehand.

Yeah.

Everyone was angry at the world government and the Navy and the Marines and blah, blah, blah, for all that they do and the oppression and the way that the laws aren't handled as well as they should.

But now you've given incentive to want them gone.

And I'd say it's a master stroke.

Yeah.

And it's.

Honestly, it's a lot worse for the guys who are, like, you know, just petty officers, warrant officers, guys that are worth, like, 100,000 berries all of a sudden that really aren't doing anything but their jobs.

They're just, like, experienced, normal people like Kobe Garp, Sengoku, Akainu, Kizaru.

They can handle themselves.

Yeah.

Like, they.

They deserve to have a big bounty.

You're going to have to work to get it.

Like, you're very few exceptions.

You're not getting that.

Yeah, but the rank is doable.

Yeah.

Not for anyone who cares to work for the Cross Guild.

This is.

It instills fear in the lower ranks of the.

The Navy and the like, because it could be me next.

And there are people like, yeah, the world government itself is corrupt, but there are people who are actually doing their jobs and looking after people inside of the Navy proper, like, are doing this not because they want to control people, but to look after people.

So these people are in the crosshairs now.

And all they were doing was, like you said, their jobs.

It's rough.

It's got to be rough.

But it also.

What it's doing is it's, like, ramping up the polarization.

It's like Oda watched, like, American politics for a little while and then came up with the Cross guilds.

How do I get the One Piece world this divided?

Sorry, Polarization was last year.

Teacher.

This is the faces behind us.

The faces behind that was last year is behind me.

There you go.

It's relevant.

You're right.

It does create heavily polarized heavy polarization.

Sorry, I can't speak today.

Any idea of making them all the enemy?

All I have to do is say, well, if I pay you for it.

Well, my morals go out the window if I'm a pirate here.

Hundred thousand.

A hundred thousand?

Yeah.

And you don't have to be a pirate to collect that bounty.

Also true.

Just saying.

The common man could do it.

The warrant officer.

That's just a trained dude.

You and like 15 year buddies with a stick.

Maybe.

There's mountain bandits in one piece.

But they were there.

They could do it.

They've been established.

They're part of the world.

Classic characters.

Vintage characters.

90S.

90S are vintage now.

Yeah.

Yeah they are.

I was born in the 90s.

The tail end.

But you were there.

I was there.

All right.

So one of the last things we're going to talk about here is of course this is setting up obviously for friction along the way to happen with them and our main crew in some way shape form.

These are former villains and former mentors of past characters.

They're not going to go down without a fight.

Like, how do we.

What are we.

How are we expecting them to interact with the Straw Hats later on?

I don't know.

I don't know.

Like, I feel like it'll be soon, but I don't know.

Other than Zoro and Mihawk fighting, we'll have that as like a benchmark for Zoro's growth.

I assume that will happen.

I cannot imagine Crocodile doing anything to Luffy.

Not right now.

He'd have to level up extensively.

But the fact that I can't imagine it for Mihawk means that Oda's doing something right?

Yeah.

Because in my head I'm like, man, Mihawk might still be stronger than Zora.

That would be the big thing though for him is like the whole thing with him.

Losing that fight is one of the things.

Well, I'm never gonna let it happen to me again.

I'm never gonna have my back cucked like that.

Like, if it happens again, what does that do do to Zorro?

He might fall down some stairs.

Which is the only way to kill the character in one piece outside of donate them.

So who knows?

I don't know what bug is going to do run, Hide, Scream, cry.

Get the credit for winning.

That'll probably happen.

Realistically.

Yeah.

Now that I really think about it.

I have no idea how we're going to get out of the situation the Straw Hats are in right now.

Brightness every second.

Maybe it's just going to time out.

I don't know.

Maybe he's only project himself so far.

It's spoilers for the current manga, by the way.

Yeah.

Sorry guys.

Seriously shouldn't be listening to this.

I don't know.

They're kind of just screwed.

Unless Imu's manifestation time runs out.

That has to be what's gonna happen.

I can't picture it going well for the Cross Guild in any way.

Unless Mihawk really is that guy.

Because I know Crocodile can't do it.

Because Rav Lucci, you know, he tried again very recently and just got obliterated.

Body wholeheartedly bodied, really hard.

And he awakened his fruit.

That also true.

We have not seen proof that Crocodile has done that.

Yeah.

If they're able to him and Buggy in some way shape or form, maybe it make him for a threat for a little bit longer.

But yeah, it's got to be Mihawk right now.

Is the one who can actually do something.

Because if after all this time it jobs say, oh, okay.

That would be really funny though.

That would be so funny.

Oh, it'd be so funny.

But Mihawk is the one who like still has that air of mystery about him.

And he still has like his swords.

Not number one, is it?

It's like number three or four from like the greatest.

But say yes for right now he has it.

That's on paper.

That's one of the strongest guys on the planet.

Yeah.

As far as most people know.

And to be fair to Crocodile.

Go ahead.

Crocodile is not like a slouch.

Crocodile is still probably like top 60 strongest people on this planet.

Problem is, he is trying to be heavily involved with the other 59 people.

He stayed in his lane to be fine.

Yeah.

Which is what he was doing when we met him.

Yes.

He was like, man, I'm not going to the Grand Line.

I don't belong over there.

I can take Alabaster.

And that's as far as I'm going to.

Yeah.

And he couldn't even do that because here comes Luffy.

Speaking of, do you think that there's an inevitable clash, a final clash between him and Buggy as the leaders of their respective pirate guilds?

I feel like Buggy will probably get the one piece.

Okay.

That's what's gonna happen.

Be the true Pirate King after all this time, as Oda intended from the very beginning.

And once Buggy becomes the Pirate King, Luffy will finally know what true freedom feels like when he no longer has that expectation of performance for himself.

Okay, we'll keep that in mind.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's it.

One Piece is having like the big existential like bad ending.

We're going like eternal sunshine ending for.

One Piece with that in mind.

Do you have anything else you want to say about Cross Guild before we wrap up today?

Great.

Super funny concept.

Oda did it again.

Well done, Oda Sensei.

Hi guys.

We will also be having a bonus question today that of course we'll be asking ourselves a question.

Who would we add as another member of the Guild if given the chance?

So that interests you?

You can always find our bonus questions and bonus material on that fourth wall.

Throw a little money our way if that's something that interests you.

If not, don't worry about it.

You can just listen to regular episodes.

So, tj, do we have you have a recommendation for the audience to check out today?

Nope.

I'm lying.

None.

I don't.

I don't get much time to do many things anymore, but I still have to drive to and from work.

So I listened to Best Buds by Mom Jeans.

The album just.

Man, one of the.

One of the best albums ever made.

I really believe that.

Definitely in the genre for sure.

In the genre.

If you want to argue with me about the genre itself, that's fine.

I'm amenable to that.

Dude, it's definitely not for everyone.

Midwest Emo, it takes a certain kind.

But man, what a phenomenal project.

Check it out.

If you've never listened to Midwest Emo, not many better places to start than Best Buds by Mom Jeans.

Yeah, I don't think you guys understand how much work this man does that is forced upon him day by day.

So to actually have time to enjoy something at all or to even record it all is a heavy feat.

So claps for tj.

He deserves it.

Thank you.

Please don't.

My recommendation.

Going another way.

I rewatched the original the Disney movie A Little Mermaid and I really enjoyed it.

Once again, it is.

She's one of my favorite Disney princess I despise because I also saw the live action Little Mermaid not too long after that and it is an absolute travesty.

Not as bad as the Snow White one was, but still bad and soulless for a different reason.

So that's my anti recommendation in the midst of my recommendation.

All right, all right.

So thank you guys for all you do.

Please get a chance to flash our review and your podcasting platform of choice help help us find more people.

Feel free to suggest future episode topics to us.

We have an email at systematic ecology gmail.com if you have any questions, just concerns.

Like to shout out some supporters.

Thank you very much to Ethan Overcash, Austin Nance, Amber Riley, and Jonathan.

Excuse me, Jonathan Augustine, Gunner Burgum, and Frank Troglauer.

You guys are the best.

Remember, we are all the chosen people.

The Heatum of Priests.