RETURN OF JINBE

This is my first theory, so I want to begin with one about One Piece near future. One that should be stated as true or false in the next few chapters:

Almost 150 chapters before now, Jimbei agreed to join the strawhats.
Almost 50 chapters before now, started the Jimbei solo adventure.
Now, I think Jimbei may come back and join the crew at the end of Dressrosa arc.

There are some hints that make me think of this possibility in Jimbei’s cover story, so let’s examine them one by one.

– Look at the cover story first page title:

“Back to my friends”. I know Jimbei, as a fishman, is friend with all fishes in this cover page, but I think the word “friends” here definitly refers to Luffy and the others.
This first page might show us Jimbei has finished what he had to do and now heads toward the strawhats, hinting he might appear soon.

– Later in his solo voyage, jimbei has been able to read a newspaper. Not a random newspaper, this one in particular:

Why is it important? Because Jimbei, as an intelligent character, can guess from this article that Luffy and Law are after Doflamingo and he can also deduce their actual position: Dressrosa. We know the strawhats and Law will move a lot, from island to island, in the near future and it will be more difficult for Jimbei to localize them later.

If he is willing to retrieve them as soon as possible, he will want to get to Dressrosa before they leave. Moreover, I don’t see the point for Oda letting Jimbei know about Luffy/Law alliance and drawing it for us, if it’s not to give him useful information.

– Before the last chapter (794), most people, including me, was thinking Luffy and the others should sail aboard revolutionaries’ ship to go to Zou, where Sunny is with the rest of the crew. But Sabo has left like a thief, without even a “goodbye kiss” on Luffy’s cheek. So, how are they supposed to go to Zou now? Answer in this picture:

What? You don’t have a boat? No problem, climb up on Wadatsumi!
This is what made me think Jimbei might show up in the next chapters at first. Wadatsumi is big enough to take everyone on his back (or his head, like Jimbei in this picture) and easily swim from Dressrosa to Zou.
I know they could also “borrow” a ship in Dressrosa, but:
Firstly, I don’t know if there still are available ships since the whole city has been destroyed
Secondly, there must be a reason why Wadatsumi is with Jimbei and I think this one is perfect. They don’t even need to be introduced to Wadatsumi since they already know him.
Thirdly, we are talking about Luffy’s crew, they don’t do things like others. When they aren’t in Merry or Sunny, they’re on giant ducks, little crow boat, Rocket Man, mini-shark submarine, … Being on a regular boat would be so boring for them.

– If you believe (as I do) there will be 4 recruits in the New World, each one sharing similarities with two other crewmates in order, then if Jinbei is one of them, he must be the first one. I want to say: considering Jimbei being the first recruit of the New World, no other character can join until he does. So making him join the Strawhats as soon as possible is better to not bring closer other recuitments in the future.

Hi Pholoris, i’m the voice of the Other You in your head, the annoying one. I’m sorry to interrupt your wonderful listing, but I want you to know that your theory is stupid. Let me explain why:
Jinbei is currently too strong to fit in the crew.

I don’t think so. We can’t really deduce anything from the little fight between him and Luffy in Fishman Island. I mean it kind of remind me the little fight between Zoro and Luffy in Whiskey Peak: stopped by a girl at the most interesting moment. But what we know is that Jimbei doesn’t seem to have progressed in fighting in two years and was impressed by Luffy Conqueror Haki.

Knowing Luffy’s strengh in Gear 4th mode we can say Jimbei is below. In fact, he fought at the same level as Sanji against Wadatsumi (not a good opponent to calculate strengh, I know), therefore I don’t think him much stronger than Zoro or Sanji and he wouldn’t be too overpowered in the crew.

You may be right, but it’s not the only problem: Jinbei’s bounty too high! Over the monster trio!

In fact we don’t really know Jinbei’s bounty. A pirate said it was around 400M in Fishman Island

but we didn’t see any official bounty (or wanted poster) higher than 250M for him.

But admitting he is around 400M, just Luffy bounty getting up to 500M (after what happened in Dressrosa) would be fine for Jinbei to join. Remember Robin was for a time higher than zoro, still have higher bounty than Sanji nowadays and for a short time, in MockTown before Black Beard showed them their new bounties, Straw Hats believed Robin had higher one than Luffy.
If Jinbei joins the crew with a huge bounty, it only means it won’t increase as much as the others’ in the future.

Hmm ok, let’s say he fits in strengh and bounty even now and let’s get back on the cover story first page title. “Back to my friends” could also mean Jinbei hasn’t done what he has to do yet and “friends”, in that case, might be the sun pirates he is heading to.

You’re right, this title is ambiguous, but we don’t know if his cover story starts right after he let Caribou at G5 (in the previous cover story) or if he had time to do something between. In fact, all points of the Jimbei’s solo adventure was to show us that Jinbei was on its way to somewhere and while traveling he found a poneglyph and Wadatsumi who decided go with him.

Moreover, it looks like the poneglyph is wrapped up and taken as a gift on Wadatsumi’s head in the last page. If Jimbei doesn’t go to luffy’s position right know and still has to deal with Big Mom or whatever he has to do, those gifts (as well as Wadatsumi) will burden him much more than necessary. And this cover story would be useless as Wadatsumi and this poneglyph probably won’t travel half New World with him until he reaches Luffy.
You know, I wasn’t expecting a cover story of jimbei this early after fishman island arc, there must be a reason. If Jinbei comes back in two or three islands after Dressrosa and without Wadatsumi (or the Poneglyph) because he left him in another adventure he had after, then this cover story would have no purpose.

Not bad but I have a last point: even if Jimbei goes to Dressrosa, it is much more probable for him to encounter Sanji and the others first. He would be able to help them.

If you remember chapter 730, Nami spoke about the importance of keeping C.Clown and Momonosuke away from Big Mom. At the same time, Franky asked her to escape from Dressrosa the fastest they could so Big Mom doesn’t come in Doffy’s country. I think that’s what they did.
Sanji wanted to fire back at Big Mom and I know that a lot of theories exist about someone appearing to save Sunny from Big Mom, but Nami was pretty confident about escaping and Sanji (who had already met Pekoms and Baron Tamago) wouldn’t put nami in danger if he wasn’t sure he could protect her while attacking big mom. I don’t think they’re around Dressrosa anymore and they probably won’t be shown before Zou.

*Theory by Pholoris