The events of chapters 1087 and 1088 have been some of the most exciting as well as the most gruesome chapters in a bit. What started off as a rescue mission by Vice Admiral Garp might have possibly ended up causing his demise at the hands of filthy and infamous Blackbeard Pirates.

What happens next nobody knows for now and we can only cope hard pretending Garp will make it out of this situation all fine. But what we can do is analyze what Garp’s death would mean for the world he spent his whole life trying to protect. Here are some key questions that people might have about the whole Garp situation and without further ado let’s start off with a brief recollection of how the current scenario evolved.

The events preceding “Garp’s Death”

Towards the starting of Chapter 1088 aptly titled the final lesson, Garp asks a group of young Marines a question. If you have a boat that can hold only two people , who would you pick between an old man and a baby?

Koby chooses to think outside the box and say that he would allow the old man and the baby on the boat and get off himself. Garp responds by calling him a fool and the baby is obviously the right answer, as the child has infinite potential ahead of him , whereas the old man is at the end of his lifespan. He is then shouted at by a Marine Instructor claiming all lives are equal. 

Fast forward to later in the chapter, when due to the underhanded tactics of the Blackbeard Pirates, Garp is severely injured yet tries to stop Pizarro’s island hand from falling on the retreating Marine ship, we see Garp only trying to serve as a distraction leaving the destruction of the hand to Koby, Grus and Helmeppo. 

This brings back the whole point of the new generation taking over the old one. Garp’s belief that the youth have infinite potential was proven due to his faith in them resulting in Koby replicating and converting one of Garp’s powerful attacks into his own – “Honesty Impact”.

This chain of events finally leads to Koby and the others getting on the ship without the looming danger of a giant island hand trying to smash it to bits, and Garp being surrounded by the Titanic Captains, with what looks to be a fatal icicle attack through his lower body.

If you carefully think about Garp’s initial question at the beginning of the chapter you will notice something. By doing what he did Garp is effectively using both his and Koby’s answers. 

By sacrificing himself so the everyone else can escape he is living upto Koby’s ideals and by being the old man left behind so the youth with infinite potential can one day grow up and surpass them, Garp also used his own answer to the question. 

But is Garp really dead?

This is a very hard question to answer as no one knows what is going on in that genius head of Oda. What he can do is list out the fors and againsts of Garp’s death to see where this may be headed.

For one we have to consider the fact that Blackbeard took Koby hostage in the first place to negotiate with the World Government to become a ruler himself.Who better to use as a bargaining chip than the original Hero of the Marines. 

It also has to be noted that Oda has a bad history with killing off characters with many such as Pell, Sabo and Kinemon seemingly dying only to return later in the unlikeliest of ways. In short, unless explicitly shown dying and confirmed to be death, it would be hard to accept what is being shown and we can take the character’s death with a grain of salt.

Another reason to think of is Kuzan doesn’t actually want to kill Garp? Just like he froze Jaguar D. Saul all those years back, what if he freezes his former friend and mentor and make it seem like Garp has died? Maybe this faking of Garp’s death would finally allow the old man to give up on his heavy responsibility that he gave up his family over. It isn’t hard to imagine Garp chilling on some island somewhere just like Crocus.

On the other side we have arguments such as Oda going ahead and killing off Ace, despite multiple requests from both his editors and his fans. So brutal was that death, that Oda himself later seemed to regret the way Ace died. What this means is when Oda has something in mind he doesn’t bother doing it and if Garp is one of key figures who dies in Oda’s master plan he certainly wouldn’t hesitate to kill him.

Being prepared to accept Garp’s death in case it happens , I personally believe Garp isn’t dead yet. He’s just way too important of a player in game both for Blackbeard and the Navy that it almost feels like something bigger is going to happen to get Garp out of this dire situation. A few things I can think of at the moment are Garp’s fellow marines like Sengoku , Tsuru or maybe being Kong catching wind of the situation and maybe coming into help out.

An even better turn of events to see would be for Dragon to come and rescue Garp. Since we don’t know much about their relationship, I would assume its very similar to the one between Garp and Luffy, with Dragon also being pushed by Garp to become a marine , but after seeing the injustice caused by the higher-ups Dragon decided to go his own way.

Another thing to remember is that Dragon has a bone to pick with the Blackbeard Pirates for destroying their base in Baltigo. What better way to take revenge than to destroy his base when he is out, and freeing his biggest bargaining chip who just so happens to be his father.

What would Garp’s death mean to the world?

After the Paramount War, many veterans like Garp and Sengoku wanted to retire, but were instead given odd roles like Marine Instructor just to show the world that the old heroes were still there for them. 

If Garp indeed does die then it means a cornerstone of the Marines has been destroyed. Garp was beloved by the citizens of the world, and  his death will also serve to increase the notoriety of the Blackbeard Pirates.

Garp’s death would shake the imbalance of the world powers even more as it was already unstable after the defeat of Kaido and Big Mom. With so many of the old generation who ruled for decades gone, it would only encourage younger pirates to pillage and plunder, throwing the world into a disarray. 

How would Luffy react to Garp’s death?

If Garp dies, it would definitely be a while before Luffy hears of it due to his ongoing journey on Egghead Island. While I cannot say for certain how Luffy would react, it would definitely shake him to the core as it would mean the death of another one of his family members after Ace.

From there a likely scenario would be an enraged Luffy pushing ahead to fight the Blackbeard Pirates, with maybe some resistance from the brains of the crew like Robin and Nami, but since this is a personal matter it’s hard to see Luffy backing down at all.

Such a war between two of the new Yonkos would give the World Government the perfect opportunity to intervene and try to eliminate both just like they tried in Wano. 

Thus the resulting chaos from Garp’s death would further destabilize the World Government and in fact might even be the first domino to fall before the whole castle comes crashing after.