Stolen Freedom! The Nobles' Trap Draws Near the Three Brothers

A fierce windstorm wrecks the brothers' hideout, scattering their belongings and prompting a salvage run to Gray Terminal for rebuilding scraps. Luffy wants a telescope, though Ace doubts the dump holds anything worthwhile. Unseen watchers track them through the trees, and while Sabo is rummaging he finds himself ringed by Bluejam's crew. Bluejam is stunned to discover that one of the three notorious boys is actually noble-born. Ace and Luffy burst from a barrel to help, and the trio fights well until a drawn gun ends the scuffle and all three are seized.

Sabo's father, Outlook III, arrives and reveals he hired the pirates to retrieve his son, recoiling in disgust when the captured boys' blood stains him. Terrified that Bluejam will kill his brothers, Sabo agrees to return home, weeping as the telescope Luffy wanted slips from his hands and shatters. Ace and Luffy are instead untied and recruited into Bluejam's crew, tasked with hauling mysterious barrels to set locations. At home, Sabo meets Sterry, a promising boy his parents adopted as a replacement heir. Sterry warns him that he escaped certain death, hinting that a fire in Gray Terminal would soon cleanse the country. Realizing the danger, Sabo flees and overhears that Bluejam's men will set the blaze. Spotted by his father's guards, he races toward the terminal screaming for Ace and Luffy to run.

The anime expands on the manga by staging a brief brawl between the brothers and Bluejam's men before Outlook III appears, and by adding a High Town resident who voices sympathy over Gray Terminal's coming destruction. The next-episode preview is unusually short, giving only the title. Sterry makes his first appearance here. Funimation marked the broadcast by posting every dubbed episode at the time, numbers one through two hundred and two, on its site for a single week.