Irrespective of all the disagreements the fandoms of Naruto and One Piece might have, there’s one thing that will get everyone cheering in unison, the formidable older generation of characters. The old men in both anime are the most powerful fuel for some adrenaline rush. So here’s a match-up between two paragons of coolness, Hashirama from Naruto and Whitebeard from One Piece.
Hashirama was considered the God of Shinobi with the ability to use a wide variety of techniques. He had regenerative abilities and the wood release as his Kekkei Genkai, a bloodline ability exclusive to him. Along with these abilities, he’s also skilled at hand to hand combat and long-ranged fights.
Whitebeard on the other hand, has the Gura Gura no Mi at his disposal, which grants him the ability to generate earthquakes and shockwaves. He’s also a skilled user of all three forms of Haki and his physical strength is unparalleled.
Gura Gura no Mi vs. Hashirama’s Kekkei Genkai
Beginning with their ace weapon in a battle, Gura Gura no Mi has the ability to destroy the world. Against the powers of Gura Gura no Mi, Hashirama’s wood release will prove useless.
As the land out of which the wood will emerge will be shaken up with lots of destruction. While it’s true that trees can withstand the effects of earthquakes, there’s a limit to the extent at which it can happen. If Whitebeard uses his fruit with the maximum force, Hashirama will have no defense against it.
Although he can somewhat soften the blow using the wood release and heal using his regenerative abilities, that’ll require a large amount of chakra on his part. So a fight between their powers will be detrimental to both, slightly more to Hashirama in the end.
A Long-Ranged Battle
In an all-out physical brawl, the fight between the two will go on for days. Whitebeard has Haki at his behest. While Armament and Conqueror’s Haki won’t be as useful against Hashirama, Observation Haki can give him an edge. He can follow a proactive approach to mitigate the damage from the weapons and other attacks from Hashirama.
The multitude of abilities and techniques give Hashirama an upper hand in a long-range battle. He can restrain Whitebeard using the wood release and attack him with clones, although he won’t be able to do that for long. Consequently, he has a trump card in case he needs to defend himself, his regenerative abilities. No matter how much damage he incurs, he can always reverse it at the cost of chakra.
And the winner is…
Naruto has a more grounded power system compared to One Piece. And in that power system, Whitebeard is a beast who stood strong in the face of death. Even while suffering from numerous ailments, he withstood bullets, cannonballs, sword wounds, and even a heart attack. If he can do that as an old man, it’s hard to imagine how much he could’ve endured in his prime. For the countless abilities that Hashirama has, there’s one constraint he will inevitably face.
At some point, Hashirama will run out of chakra as he’ll need to resort to powerful attacks that require enormous amounts of chakra. Any other opponent would be easily defeated but for someone like Whitbeard with physical endurance as his strongest pursuit, the unnaturally huge chakra reserves and the natural energy acquired through Senjutsu will be simply inadequate.
So as godly as Hashirama is and as unimaginable as it is to imagine him ever losing, Oyaji takes the win in this matchup. And a free health check-up from Hashirama as only the First Hokage can save Whitebeard from the near-death condition he’ll land himself in, after all that fighting!
Naruto and One Piece are available to stream on Crunchyroll.
