Wapol is the star of One Piece's magnificent fifth Mini-Arc, "Wapol's Omnivorous Banzai" which began in Chapter 236 (Vol.25) and finished in Chapter 262 (Vol.28). The story clocked in at 23 Chapters making it the shortest Mini-Arc as of this writing (Summer 2006). This particular Mini-Arc is unique in that many of the chapter titles come from Wapol as if he were speaking about himself. Although this has happened in other Mini-Arcs before sporadically, for 15 straight chapters (excluding one side-story chapter) the titles are from Wapol's perspective and then sparsely thereafter. Wapol calls himself 'ore sama' which a great fan of Dragon Ball once humorously compared to calling oneself, "The Honorable Mr. Me" in English. If you do not want to know any of the details of the mini-arc I suggest you stop reading now and go back using the link at the bottom of the page, otherwise highlight the next paragraph and read on.

Wapol's story begins with his romp through a forest chomping down things in his path. Although his location is not clear it most certainly is NOT Drum. There's also no sign of Chessmarimo, Chess or Kuromarimo so it seems we are to believe Luffy either blasted him to another island or he landed somewhere on Drum and made a hasty escape by himself. Please keep in mind that this is neglecting the scenes from the animation which clearly show him blasting far away from Drum.

The first leg of his journey in this new land has him running amok being a general nuisance to town's folk or even animals in the wild. He enjoys eating random objects and seeing how he can mess with everyone for a while by turning into talking benches, giant walking trees and huge lamps but it quickly turns violent when he starts chowing down on the town itself which he considers his rightful snack. However, Wapol discovers that things run a little bit differently in the rest of the Grand Line than in his own former Kingdom when he finds himself in handcuffs (possibly containing Sea Stone) with a gun pointed at his head by a pair of Marines. This doesn't last long as Wapol makes a handy getway at sunset on a beach having somehow managed to loose himself from the cuffs. His Kingdom gone, his title removed, his face known as an escaped criminal, Wapol has nowhere to turn and is only able to live among garbage as a homeless man. Facing ridicule of children and getting peed on by vagrant dogs, Wapol's spirit is finally crushed and he admits that he is no longer a King nor above any sort of laws that he didn't create himself.

Shoeless and freezing from the winter weather, Wapol continues to live out his days miserably attempting to sell match boxes to people on the street. Winter turns to Spring and Wapol finds himself eating trash and living beneath a bridge. To help the time pass Wapol combines some of the trash he consumes and ends up creating all sorts of strange combinations like giant robot teddybears and even a binocular-faced puppy out of the vagrant dog which was perpetually peeing on him. One day Wapol returns to his home 'down by the river' to find children in awe of his creations. With nothing else better to do and nowhere else left to turn, Wapol sets up a makeshift vendor blanket and creates some regular toy-sized combinations, many of which are puns on real Japanese action heroes and dolls. Rikayan is a play on Licca chan which is the Japanese Barbie, Ginro looks like Mazinger, the sumo mecha resembles Gigantor. Some of the combinations are just odd choices for toys like the sunflower face, the oni doll and Kabashinshi or The Gentleman Hippo. Wapol attempts to get rich quick by selling each for 1 Million Belly but seeing as how his clients are kids that quickly fails. He slowly starts chopping zeroes off the end of the price until he finally gives up on that idea and sells them for 50 Belly each.

Still wearing rags and miserable with himself, Wapol saves enough money to buy some crude materials and construct the Wapol Toy Shop in his space under the bridge. He even manages to fashion the top of the shop into his signature crowned hippo formation. The children of the town rejoice the event and mob the store. Before he knows it he's selling out Rikayans and Ginros like mad but the children (and parents) don't stop begging for more. The Ginro figure, brought home by a young boy, catches the attention of one of the town's passionate scientists who is astounded by the means with which the toy was constructed. After examining the toy he discovers the secret to its construction and informs the press of this amazing discovery. Before he knows it, Wapol is discovered, slipped into a tuxedo and celebrated as the creator of a new alloy, Wapometal! With money being thrown at him, Wapol creates the castle-like Wapol Toy Shop (with signature crowned hippo head) and finally has a smile back on his face. Looks like Wapol found out the real important things in life and he's headed for a whole new face...right?

To meet consumer demand a giant corporation is formed, Baku Baku Factory (a crowned hippo head on the HQ building of course). Wapol attends the opening ceremony and modestly smiles during the festivities but it isn't over yet. With its sudden miracle-like success, the Wapol Konzern (a German word for conglomerate) is formed and Wapol is at the center of a remarkably powerful and wealthy organization. And that's pretty much the breaking point for 'ol Wapol. With a massive amount of money and power in his grasp he finds himself in exactly the same place he was before with even less responsibilities, not that he would take them on away. He marries Miss. Universe and winds up back on a hippoed throne with a crown on his head, drinking wine with one hand, picking his nose with the other and smoking a stogey. With the Wapol brand name and logo reaching all corners of the World, Wapol is back in the seat of power he relinquished just a short time ago except this time seemingly more rich than ever before. What will come of this unexpected turn of events? As of this writing (Summer 2006) Wapol brand products have not been seen in the story outside of the Mini-Arc and his name has not come up as any kind of threat. If Oda decides to tie him to the World Government or not will just be something we have to wait to read about. Oh, he does have one little redeeming sparkle though. He keeps the puppy that peed on him all the time.

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