'One Piece' Manga to end with over 100 volumes

One Piece manga creator Eiichiro Oda revealed during his appearance in Fuji TV's Honma dekka!? program on Wednesday that the ending of the manga is "near" and that the manga will have "just over 100 volumes." Oda noted that he had thought about the manga's ending since he was still in college. In addition, the show's host Sanma Akashiya also asked Oda what would happen if a fan managed to guess the same ending that Oda is writing. Oda replied that he would change the ending. 

 (An Image from the Interview at Oda's house, 2019)

 
Akashiya also asked Oda about the goal of the main characters in the story, the titular "One Piece" treasure. Akashiya asked if the treasure was "family bonds," and Oda replied, "No, I hate that kind of thing." Oda elaborated, saying, "That's like the ending of The Wizard of Oz, which I watched when I was a kid. Adventuring that long, and having the adventure itself be the treasure, is really dissatisfying. Those kinds of stories are impossible. It feels like, 'I've gone on this long adventure, so give me the treasure!'" 

Oda said in an interview in July 2016 that he had finished around 65% of the manga.

(One Piece manga Volume 91 Cover)

One Piece has come a long way over its lifetime, and it has the accolades to prove it. After more than 20 years, Eiichiro Oda’s shonen has become the top-selling manga ever, leaving millions terrified of the day One Piece comes to a close. However, according to a new interview, that end is still a ways off.

Of course, fans are happy to hear that One Piece has plans to carry on past 100 volumes. Currently, the manga has pushed out 91 volumes total which contain a total of 900-plus chapters. One Piece is certainly thick enough to keep new fans occupied for some time, but longtime followers have been on edge with Oda for awhile. After all, the idea of ending the manga on an even 1,000 chapters is a hard one to ignore, and the manga’s current arc is said to be a massive one.

When it comes to scale, the "Wano" arc has been touted as being the next "Marineford War", but it shouldn’t be the last one on Oda’s agenda. It looks like the creator has ideas yet for Luffy, so fans can keep sailing with the captain until he really does become the King of the Pirates.

Oda began serializing the manga in Weekly Shonen Jump in 1997, and the manga has been published in more than 30 countries. Shueisha released the manga's 91st compiled book volume on December 4, and Viz Media released the 88th volume on November 6.

The manga has even set a Guinness World Record for the most copies published for the same comic book by a single author, and is the best-selling manga series worldwide with over 430 million copies sold. The series still ranked number one in manga sales in 2018, which surprised fans of major new entries.