Episode 19: The Past of the Three Swords! The Promise Between Zoro and Kuina!
Air Date: 2000-03-22
Opening: We Are! (1st Opening)
Ending: Memories (1st Ending)
Short Summary
As Luffy and Usopp do some target practice with their cannon, Zoro naps onboard the Going Merry. A flashback reveals Zoro's beginnings as a swordsman, how he came across an opponent he could not defeat and made a vow that he would keep for the rest of his life. Afterward, a man comes on board the Going Merry that Zoro seems to know from somewhere...
In-Depth Summary
The episode begins with Luffy marveling over a cannon he found on the deck of the Going Merry. He asks if anyone knows how to operate it, and Usopp steps up to the task. Usopp and Luffy get Nami to move the ship back so they can do some target practice on a large rock. While this is going on, Zoro is napping once again, and so a flashback begins to Zoro's early days, as he arrives at a training dojo, challenging everyone there. The sensei welcomes him, and offers Zoro to face his daughter Kuina in a duel. Zoro is horrified to face a girl, but steps up anyway, loading himself up with many bamboo swords as he and Kuina line up for a duel. The duel begins, and Zoro quickly loses most of his swords, left with only two. When asked if he knows two sword techniques, he responds that this is his first time with a bamboo sword. Kuina promptly knocks him down with one hit, bruising Zoro's ego.
After being defeated, young Zoro joins the dojo, as per his wager before. Zoro trains more than anyone else in the dojo, but still cannot defeat Kuina, who can defeat adults. One time, though, roughly one year after Zoro's arrival at the dojo, Kuina overhears her father talking with another man about how Kuina faces limits as a swordswoman, that she will never be as strong as a man and she cannot be left with the dojo. Kuina is furious and runs out into the night. There she is confronted by Zoro for their 2001st match, this time with real swords. Kuina agrees, and she heads into a storage shed to grab the white sword, Wado Ichimonji. The two then head out into a field, and so a fierce battle begins between them. Zoro manages to keep up with Kuina this time, using two swords against her one, but Zoro quickly becomes tired. Kuina tells him he lacks stamina, and knocks Zoro's swords out of his hands, plunging her sword down beside him for the win.
As Kuina pulls back her sword, she says she is angry that as a female, she will eventually become weaker than Zoro. This makes Zoro angry, saying that Kuina using that as an excuse would make his training worthless. The two make a pledge that one of them will become the world's strongest swordsman. Kuina is inspired by this, and she becomes an even stronger sword-wielder in the dojo, much to her father's delight. Zoro continues to train even harder than before, declaring that if two swords isn't enough to defeat Kuina he'll use three. However, he is surprised to see three boys from the dojo with deathly looks on their faces, and they tell him that Kuina is dead. Zoro is horrified, and he hears that Kuina lost her footing on stairs and died. The sensei then meets with Zoro, and he tells Zoro that with the competition between Zoro and Kuina, Kuina began breaking the barriers of being a swordswoman. It is because of Zoro that she could become the strongest in the world.
Zoro, sobbing, asks for Wado Ichimonji. He pledges to take up Kuina's dreams, and the sensei gives him the sword. Zoro trains for eight more years, until finally he is ready to leave on his journey to become the world's greatest swordsman. The flashback then ends as Zoro wakes up to Usopp's cannonball destroying the boulder, and Luffy is amazed that he did it in one hit. Later, the Straw Hats sit together in the cabin, and they discuss how they need one more crewmember before entering the Grand Line. Nami hints at a chef, but Luffy thinks they need a musician. At that moment, a man with a large sword steps on board and starts breaking barrels, and Nami, Usopp, and Luffy run out to see who it is. Luffy tells the man to stop destroying their ship, and the man attacks but Luffy throws him into the wall. Zoro recognizes the man's voice and calls him Johnny, and the man looks up in amazement to see his long-time friend, Zoro, as the episode draws to a close.
Mumbo230's Notes
Zoro's past is moved from during the Romance Dawn arc to between the Kuro and Don Krieg arcs in the anime. This is most likely due to Zoro's past playing a part in his battle with Mihawk during the Don Krieg arc.