No one can deny that the last few chapters of One Piece have been extremely good. Oda has been dropping bomb after bomb, first with Gear 5 Luffy vs Kizaru, then with Saint Saturn himself descending in his hybrid form, and now finally with the God Valley flashback.

As usual, it is now our task to wrack our brains and come up with some or the other explanation for whatever is going on just to get rid of this excitement of what’s gonna come next. In this article, I have tried to put together whatever we know about Saint Saturn and what his devil fruit might be!

Saint Saturn’s Powers & Pentagram

To start off with, lets take a look at the pentagram. For one, it seems to have appeared on the land out of no where, and further it seems to have acted like a “teleportation point” for Saturn. The second important thing to notice, was that once Saturn transformed, everyone felt that something was off, with Jimbe saying “What is this unearthly presence??”.

After fully “teleporting” to the land, Saturn also says “Ah, the surface!! It has been such a long time”. What does this mean?? One interpretation is that Saturn has not left the “holy land” of Mariejois in a very long time and hence calls normal land “the surface”.

But there are other ways to look at this statement. Is the theory that the Celestial Dragons came from outer moons true? Were they a secret underground race?

Back to the pentagram, some hardcore all-nighter research (on Wikipedia) reveals a few things. A pentagram star with only one corner on the top is a good sign, that generally signifies good health and wellbeing.

A reverse pentagram on the other hand (with two corners at the top) in modern culture generally hints at satanic influence. Taking a look at the only over head shot we get of Saturn coming to land, we see that it is a “reverse pentagram” as the direction he is facing has two corners on top.

Does this represent demonic powers in Saturn? Let me get to that next.

Saint Jaygarcia Saturn’s Devil Fruit:

Ever since the first time the silhouettes of the Five Elders’ beast forms were revealed, the fandom has been speculating that they all have the powers of a mythical zoan devil fruit. And based on whatever we saw in the recent chapters, we can confirm that Saturn’s Devil Fruit is a Mythical Zoan type.

However, what we are trying to find out is which Mythical Zoan fruit could he have eaten. And I guess Oda has left us some hints to speculate on.

What we saw in the chapter was Saturn’s hybrid form, clear by his half human – half beast appearance. If I were to describe it to a stranger, I would says it is halfway between Ultimate Spider Monkey from Ben 10 and the Scorpion King from the Mummy Returns.

Except that he has 6 legs in total, and two horns on his head.

Thankfully for us, Saturn’s devil fruit isn’t actually a completely new creature created by Oda, but instead seems to be heavily inspired from a Japanese Yokai demon, namely the Ushi-Oni.

Ushi-Oni roughly translates to Bull-Demon. The main characteristics of an Ushi-Oni is its cruel and savage personalities, which infact we can see here.

Usually all of the Five Elders are composed even in the most severe situations, like when Gear 5 was used for the first time. But here for the first time, he actually gets aggressive and angry while shouting at the Marines to maintain their formation (and also has sorta glowing eyes if you notice).

The other important trait of an Ushi-Oni is the use of poison. It is said that they breathe poison and bring about curses and disease wherever they go. Initially I thought Saturn employed some sort of paralyzing poison to stop everyone. But there is something else that an Ushi Oni does that perfectly explains his ability.

In Wakayama Prefecture, ushi-oni are mountain-dwelling beasts. Legend says when a hiker or traveler makes eye contact with the ushi-oni, the person cannot avert his or her gaze. The person’s soul or energy is drained and he or she dies. This is called “Kage wo kuu (影を食う)” or sometimes “Kage wo nomu (影を飲む)”, which translates to “eating the shadow” or “drinking the soul”.

Wikipedia Page on Ushi Oni

This extract from Wikipedia, all but confirms that Saturn’s devil fruit is indeed the Ushi-Oni fruit. Infact this also explains why marines who are of commodore rank and below are not allowed to even look at Saint Saturn. (While the official VIZ version says that “they aren’t even allowed to have an audience”, the literal translation is to “avert their gaze”).

Simply put, once a low ranked officer looks at Saturn they can’t look away. And by the nature of his fruit, the person’s “soul” or “energy” is drained.

In chapter 594, it was mentioned that all officers of Vice Admiral rank and above have some form of haki. From what we have seen even some Rear Admirals have it. Also while explaining haki to Luffy, Rayleigh mentions the ability to detect spiritual energy.

Connecting these two, Saturn drains a person’s spiritual energy or “soul” causing them to die. It feels like its somewhat like Big Mom’s power but different.

The same limitations do seem to apply, as like mentioned before officers of rank Rear Admiral and above generally have enough haki or “will power” to withstand this. This is why the officer that looked at Saturn died, while all the other Vice Admirals, Kizaru and the Straw Hats survived.

Black Cloud around Saturn’s Neck?

Well this is actually quite a new thing in the grand scale of One Piece. With all the details we have seen so far, those cloud like things only appear on awakened Zoan fruit users. Now that brings up a whole new set of questions cuz the specifics are all over the place.

Luffy has a white cloud like thing. Even Saint Saturn , Kaku and Lucci have very similar black flame type things. And to make it even more confusing Yamato has one as well but more blueish, while Kaido has one in his fully Zoan form but that looks like it is a complete flame thing and personally to me feels like its part of his ability.

What is this and how is it important you ask? The cloud like thing is called a Hagoromo and it is a symbolic representation present in the portrayals of the demigods of India, China, Japan and other south Asian countries. They supposedly float around the deity’s head in an arc and represent their divine energy.

As for how its important lets take a look at everyone who has it till now.

1. Luffy – Now Luffy has a mythical fruit of a God. And based on what I’m thinking, it makes sense for Luffy’s hagoromo to be white, as he has tapped into the powers of a god.
2. Kaido – Kaido also has the mythical fruit of an Azure Dragon, a being that is a guardian spirit of Kyoto. Now if we take a look at all his forms only his full Zoan form has it. Why? I think Kaido has not awakened his devil fruit and also that the Azure Dragon is not really a deity. Therefore, Kaido doesn’t really have a hagoromo in his hybrid form.
3. Yamato – Yamato has the mythical fruit of Okuchi no Magami, a wolf deity. In this case it makes sense as Magami is actually a divine being and hence, Yamato has a hagoromo in all her forms.
4. Lucci and Kaku – Both of them have common Zoan fruits, with Lucci getting a carnivore and Kaku getting an herbivore. And both of them have black hagoromo.
5. Saint Saturn – Saturn also has a black hagoromo. The only difference is that we don’t know if his fruit is of a mythical model or not, cuz in the end, it is a “mythological creature” that his fruit is based on.

Taking all of this into account, I have come up with an explanation. Luffy and Yamato, both get powers of a “celestial deity” and hence when they use their powers they go closer to becoming the said deities thereby the white hagoromo.

The other awakened Zoan users have nothing divine about them. Infact one of them (Saturn) is evil/devilish. Therefore it makes sense for their hagoromos to reflect what their powers are and what they come from – “the devil”. I know it sounds tinfoilly cuz the links are very far apart, but it does have some valid connections that might lead to the actual answer.

Is Saturn not a human?

If a random passer-by were to stroll up to Saint Saturn or any Celestial Dragon for that matter and ask them if they were a human, they would be shot, or turned into a slave , but leaving that aside, they would look at you in disgust and go on about how they were a different superior god-like race, i.e. they have a super bad god complex.

That is one way to explain most of how Saturn speaks.

One unlikely possibility is that the Five Elders aren’t from the human race at all. Since the vast World of One Piece has so many different races ranging from Fishmen and Dwarves to Giants and Long Arms, and sub categories within those races as well, it wouldn’t be very surprising to learn that the Five Elders aren’t even from the Human race. We know that the original inhabitants of the Red Line were Lunarians. What if they were wiped out because the Five Elders (or their ancestors) thought that they were of a superior race and therefore deserved to settle there?

But there is also another very different way to look at this. Saturn may not be human at all. Or at least he doesn’t believe so. Like mentioned above, Saturn’s fruit – Ushi Oni is very “devil” like. An evil beast that traps people and curses them, driving them to ruins.

If we go with the belief that Imu has something to do with why the Five Elders are the way they are, then we can maybe see that the Elders have embraced the “devil” in their devil fruit completely.

And again if Imu was the one who somehow had something to do with the (creation/formation) of their devil fruits (hinting at Imu having the “devil” Devil Fruit. more on this some other day), then as the servants of Imu, maybe the Elders have accepted that they aren’t really humans anymore.

Whatever it is, based on the way that One Piece works and the current chapters are going, we will probably get to know the truth about Saint Saturn’s devil fruit and his powers. There are rumours that Egghead will wrap up by the end of 2023 as Oda wants to do something big at the start of 2024.