The haki/logia problem as presented by Monet vs Zoro

weebywitch

So I was thinking about Monet while half asleep for some weird reason the other day and the old issue surrounding her getting cut even though she was a logia came into my head. All of the questions that Yuuzume Jawahib seiryu Marco Polo and I discussed popped into my head. I’ll confess to not remembering the full intricacies of the pages long discussion from OPF but I do recall that the gist was a concern over whether or not the control over the Devil fruit and Haki were automatic or required thought. It came to me last night that the reason she was able to be cut and unable to reform her body, the reason that Haki works at all, is that Haki itself works on and is an embodiment of the soul or spirit. Also a logia isn’t a human person who turns into their element, they’re that element in the shape of a human body. When touched with Haki or kairoseiki, the Devil fruit is Nullified/their true form is revealed. So, in effect, the Devil fruit operations are like your autonomic nervous system’s operation. Thus, what Monet experienced was the definition of a fight or flight response spurred on by the burst of adrenaline and other hormones dumped into her system at the moment she was faced with her seeming extinction. As a physiological response, she was unable to combat it. We’ve seen other examples of emotions/psychological links to Devil fruit form maintenance in Momo and his shape changing with his zoan form so it’s not out of line to imagine that link. I really should’ve written this up when it was fresh in my mind but I was exhausted so I thought that I’d be even less coherent than I am now. I’m going to actually put this in theories now that I think about it. It’s short but more appropriate there. Thanks for reading.

Marco Polo

Interesting discussion point here... So the thing with Monet is that even though she's a Logia, her element (snow) is a solid. This already makes the rules slightly different for her, because she's still made out of an element that can be feasibly cut without Haki. I don't remember if we ever see her go intangible, but not all Logia users can so it might just be that she can't? However I suspect that even if she can't go intangible, she can do something similar to what Katakuri does, where he turns various parts of his body into mochi to avoid attacks. She might be able to do this reflexively, or through the use of Observation Haki (although I can't remember if she was a Haki user), but I suspect it wouldn't work in a situation where she's so scared that she's frozen stiff (haha). All in all I do think it is possible to cut her without Haki, and the label of "Logia" shouldn't automatically mean she can't be cut without it.

weebywitch

Marco Polo Well the situation was that she was cut, but not bleeding, and couldn’t reform her body, her snowy form kept crumbling. He didn’t use Haki at all, I believe was the issue and the questions were why then was she having such issues? So I was pondering the entire situation. Not just her being cut…

Yuuzume

This is a pretty detailed explanation of Monet's situation, and very accurate. But yeah, similar to how fear could render a normal person to be unable to walk / stand properly, it could also render Monet unable to piece herself back together. There's one thing I'm still not clear on though. Are you suggesting that the action of reforming one's body is a conscious action for a logia user, and Monet was unable to perform that action cause her wits were being busy being shivering in fear OR that the action of reforming one's body is an automated action for a logia user and Monet was unable to do so because the fear which took over her caused said automated motor function to go haywire? Based on the context, I think you meant the latter. But since you mention the discussion of the past in general and not which side you're using as a premise for this theory, I'm not quite sure. Well, I'm just asking for clarification though. Personally, I'm in favor of the action of reforming one's body being a conscious action rather than a completely automated one. Though it could be said to be as semi-automated as moving one's limbs due to the high level of mastery. Like a normal person can walk without having to spent much focus on it and think about it, as their body knows what to do, a logia user can also reform their body with little effort. Well, that's just my own opinion though. I just asked yours for clarification, I'm not set on repeating the debate of the past here. Either way, it's nice to have an explanation as to how Monet was unable to reform her body in both scenarios. For the record, since it was mentioned already, I'm with Marco on the notion of certain logia users being "vulnerable" to certain attacks. I don't mean their elemental weakness, I mean that certain logia elements can't avoid the deformation of their bodies after withstandings certain attacks, albeit said attacks may cause zero damage. As an extra example, Croc got his head chopped off during the marinefold war as well.

weebywitch

> Based on the context, I think you meant the latter. I did mean the latter. I brought up the old discussion but I also mentioned not remembering the details of it, if you’ll recall. So my apologies for the confusion. ^_^> For the record, since it was mentioned already, I'm with Marco on the notion of certain logia users being "vulnerable" to certain attacks. I don't mean their elemental weakness, I mean that certain logia elements can't avoid the deformation of their bodies after withstandings certain attacks, albeit said attacks may cause zero damage. As an extra example, Croc got his head chopped off during the marinefold war as well. I’m not in disagreement as this coincides with what I stated about their bodies being not actual physical human bodies but their elements given the appearance of their former human selves. Kuzan has the same issue with his ice. It’s why there’s no issue with him having “lost” body parts since his ice fills them in.

Yuuzume

> I did mean the latter. I brought up the old discussion but I also mentioned not remembering the details of it, if you’ll recall. So my apologies for the confusion. ^_^ No worries at all, I asked to clear it up, you answered, easy peasy. The answer certainly covered me. > I’m not in disagreement as this coincides with what I stated about their bodies being not actual physical human bodies but their elements given the appearance of their former human selves. Kuzan has the same issue with his ice. It’s why there’s no issue with him having “lost” body parts since his ice fills them in. Kuzan's example is a nice one indeed. I wasn't suggesting you disagreed with the notion though. Since it came up, I just thought I'd throw my two cents in and say that I agree with it personally, that's all.

weebywitch

> Kuzan's example is a nice one indeed. I wasn't suggesting you disagreed with the notion though. Since it came up, I just thought I'd throw my two cents in and say that I agree with it personally, that's all. Yeah sorry, was just clarifying my position on that one so that we’re all on the same page. ^_^

jawahib

Honestly the only Zoro-Monet interaction that ever interested me was Zoro's air slash hurting her, since that proved that Haki could be imbued into air slashes. I think at this point that's been proven a few more times, but it was quite the point of debate back in the day. I do disagree with you about Logias being just their element in human form, because it seems to suggest they have no genuinely human form left. I think, especially given how Haki affects them, their physical human form gets mapped in some sense to their element, so even if Enel turns himself into a giant electric monster, punching the monster's face still hurts Enel in the corresponding location of his own face. It's not that Enel lost his human form and it became all electricity, but that even as he turns into his element, it's always possible to find an arm or leg mapped in some way to however they've transformed. I think there is a distinction within Logias between transformed element and just created element. Created elements have no connection to the original user, and harming them doesn't harm the user. However, transformed element is the elemental extension of the user which is susceptible to harm. Put a different way, it is the part of the user that has transformed into the element. A good example of this is Vergo vs Smoker - when Vergo grabs his smoke-arms, he is grabbing a part of the element that maps to Smoker's real arm, which is why Smoker feels it and can be flipped over, rather than it just being smoke he created that couldn't be grabbed. Similarly, Monet's face when she was cut wasn't just a snow creation of her face that she controlled, but her real face was present there, and thus she was susceptible to damage. I don't think anyone would suggest that if Zoro started laying into the snow on the ground next to him that she created that she would be wounded, since that snow was created, and is not her human form transformed into snow. The reason I belabour this is because I think that your definition sounds like there is no distinction between the created element and the transformed element, since everything is just "element" and the "human form" in your definition seems more like an arbitrary decision of the user to retain that form rather than the ultimate truth of that person. But, I would reject such a definition, because I think a distinction must be made between the element that can be hurt, vs the element that can't, and similarly why Logias appear to retain a fully human anatomy (e.g. they still bleed when wounded). Maybe there's an elaboration of your definition that can reconcile these things?

weebywitch

> Honestly the only Zoro-Monet interaction that ever interested me was Zoro's air slash hurting her, since that proved that Haki could be imbued into air slashes. I think at this point that's been proven a few more times, but it was quite the point of debate back in the day. That’s the interaction of which I was speaking but if he’d slashed with Haki, she’d have been dead. So we’re going to have to disagree. > I do disagree with you about Logias being just their element in human form, They have their mind still. So long as there’s a mental/spiritual link, they can conjure their physical bodies when necessary for those functions. If they’re forced to manifest it via Haki or kairoseiki which reaches the spirit, then damage is done. Or if they need to eat, etc their minds link to those organs for those functions but otherwise, it’s just their element. That’s how I’ve envisioned it. Understanding that all levels of existence are linked at all times is necessary but that they aren’t all manifested at all times is what I’m trying to say. I wasn’t speaking of created versus transformed and you’re being esoteric. I’m talking about one’s body and self period. Not the element outside of oneself that one can control. Simply oneself. This discussion sounds like it can get into the “where does a person end and the universe begin” type track and I’m not into that. It’s entirely too esoteric for what I was trying to express. I mean you can have fun with it by all means but do you see why it’s along those lines? ^_^ I’m only talking about the boundaries of a person, not the fact that they can control and create an element outside the limits of their person. Now if their actual sense of self is destroyed and they’re dispersed super thin, that’s an entirely different issue, I suppose. *shrug*

jawahib

> That’s the interaction of which I was speaking but if he’d slashed with Haki, she’d have been dead. So we’re going to have to disagree. LOL this happened almost every single time I tried making this point back then, too. I'm not talking about the "big" slash that did not use Haki, I'm talking about the little one that cut her cheek. That one is far more interesting to me in terms of Haki mechanics. > They have their mind still. So long as there’s a mental/spiritual link, they can conjure their physical bodies when necessary for those functions. If they’re forced to manifest it via Haki or kairoseiki which reaches the spirit, then damage is done. Or if they need to eat, etc their minds link to those organs for those functions but otherwise, it’s just their element. That’s how I’ve envisioned it. Understanding that all levels of existence are linked at all times is necessary but that they aren’t all manifested at all times is what I’m trying to say. I'm still not sure I understand the way you're envisioning Logias to work. By your definition, do Logias still need to eat? If so, then you're right and we probably have the same basic understanding. If not (since they're just elements in human form), then our understanding would be quite different.

seiryu

So this has soooooooo many tangents that are astronomically sloppier than they appear. Some of the main ones have been brought up and probably best not to bring up the others that came up with discussing with Yuz. There is more than enough context for the consciousness confirmation of all fruit abilities. But yes, I'm in 100% agreement on the physiological explanation as to why Zoro's winning "attack" had the displayed mechanics and fully matches the mechanics of both haki and fruit abilities.