Luffy developed several new and strange abilities during One Piece. He can stretch his body, make his fists hard as iron, knock out weaker opponents with his Haki, and even fly. However, there is one unsung hero in his arsenal that is not often mentioned: his immunity to poison.
Thanks to a near-fatal encounter, Luffy now has the ability to absorb deadly poisons without worry. The worst that can happen to him is to be knocked unconscious. Here’s how Luffy got his immunity and how effective it is.
How did Luffy become immune to poison?
The story begins during Luffy’s stay in Impel Down, a prison for the world’s most dangerous criminals. There, he fought with the prison warden, Magellan. During this long battle, the Headmaster used the powers of his Venom-Venom fruit to inflict all kinds of poison on Luffy. The Straw Hat captain fought well but eventually succumbed to poison.
Due to the presence of such an amount of such a variety of poison in his body, Luffy was deemed virtually incurable. Even the doctors at Impel Down couldn’t concoct an antidote to treat all of these poisons at once. Under these conditions, Luffy seemed doomed to die within the next 24 hours.
Despite the diagnosis, Luffy’s friend Mr. 2 Bon Clay believed there was another way to cure him: Emporio Ivankov. This would-be miracle worker was supposedly being held somewhere in Impel Down. If Bon Clay could find them, they might be able to save Luffy’s life.
The two eventually found Ivankov, but the process to save Luffy wasn’t as easy as they thought. Ivankov was to use the powers of his Horm-Horm fruit to boost Luffy’s natural immune system. Thus, Luffy’s body decays and heals at an accelerated rate in order to fight off the poison. The ordeal lasted 10 hours, cutting the 10-year-old boy’s life short, but he was eventually saved. Additionally, this ordeal gave Luffy strong poison resistance.
Is Luffy immune to all poisons?
As strong as Luffy’s immunity is, it’s not perfect. During his revenge against Magellan, for example, he could not come into direct contact with the director; to do so after his incomplete recovery would have been fatal. The only reason he was able to fight was because Mr. 3 used his wax fruit powers to cover and protect his arms and legs.
Even with Luffy’s protective wax, Magellan defeated him with Kinjite, his strongest toxin yet. This powerful substance poisons absolutely everything and spreads rapidly. It’s possible that even if Luffy had been exposed to this venom with his poison resistance fully developed, it would still have had a profound effect on him.
Two years later, on Fish-Man Island, Luffy’s resistance to poison is further demonstrated. There he faces Hyouzou, an octopus man with blue rings, who can poison his enemies with a simple touch. The toxin is presumably deadly, but Luffy survives it without too much trouble. He attributes this to the immunity he developed after fighting Magellan. Luffy’s immunity to deadly poisons is therefore confirmed to be very effective.
Another demonstration of Luffy’s immunity was made in Punk Hazard. There he fights Caesar Clown, who claims that Magellanic venom is nothing compared to his own poisonous gas. Despite this, Luffy deliberately inhaled the gas surrounding him and quickly got rid of the scientist. He ends up passing out from the gas, but that’s it.
Their second fight didn’t go much better for Caesar, despite his improvement. In this match, Caesar fused with his chemical weapon Land of the Dead to make his gaseous body deadly to the touch. Despite this, Luffy was able to eliminate him instantly with his Gum-Gum Grizzly Magnum. His hands were petrified, but again he suffered no permanent damage.
There’s another moment where Luffy got hit with poison, but his reaction wasn’t good. On the way to Whole Cake Island, the Straw Hat Captain was poisoned after eating an improperly prepared Armored Stonefish. Normally, the skin of this fish would have been enough to kill a man. The fact that Luffy simply passed out before he had to be rescued can be taken as a testament to his immunity.
Overall, Luffy’s immunity to poison is pretty impressive, even by One Piece standards. After his experience with Magellan, he can be exposed to all kinds of deadly toxins and survive. Most of them don’t even have a profound long-term effect on him. It’s not one of Luffy’s flashiest traits, but it’s hard-earned and well-used.