Gecko Moria

Gecko Moria (ゲッコー･モリア, Gekkō Moria) was a member of the Seven Warlords of the Sea who resided on the floating island, Thriller Bark, when he was first introduced. He is the main antagonist of the Thriller Bark arc who stole Brook's and various other beings' shadows with the use of the Shadow-Shadow Fruit. He took part to the Whitebeard War and sided with the Marines like all the other loyal Seven Warlords. Upon the war's end, he was stripped of his title and was to be eliminated by Don Quixote Doflamingo, but managed to escape before he was killed, leaving Moria's overall status unknown. His former bounty was 320,000,000 berries.

Appearance

 * Voice Actor: Not Known (English), Katsuhisa Hōki (Japanese)

Moria is a gargantuan person with very distinct devil-like features. Standing at 692cm (22'7") in height, he is the tallest among the Seven Warlords of the Sea. His animal theme is that of a gecko based off his name, general appearance and the collar of his shirt bearing a resemblance to a lizard's frilled neck. His overall design resembles a giant leek.

He has two horns protruding from the sides of his forehead and stitches running down vertically from the top of his face and down his neck, which is rather long and thick in comparison to his body. His ears and teeth are both pointed, while his lower body is relatively fat and stubby in comparison.

Moria's hair is red and his skin is a pale blue of which his lips, armbands and the edges of his gloves share in color. His coat and gloves are black whilst his pants are bright orange with pale window shapes imprinted on them. He wears a fishnet shirt. He also wears a cravat, necklace and a blue crucifix-like ornament with claw-like appendages sprouting out from three of the cross' points. During the meeting of the Seven Warlords at the Marine Headquarters, Moria added a fur-laced cape to his attire.

24 years before the current storyline, Moria looked much thinner and had a pointed chin.

Personality
Though he once claimed that he would rely on his own powers to achieve his goals, Moriah is incredibly lazy; his motto is relying upon others for one's own objective and his favorite phrase is "You do it!!" Like other characters in One Piece, he has a distinct laughter (Ki shi shi shi) that he often cackles. He apparently wanted to be the new King of the Pirates and believed that if he has strong underlings, he could achieve his goal. He is almost always seen grinning maniacally and only seems to change expression when something bad happens to him. He maintains a relaxed and laid-back stance at all times, seemingly appearing to believe he cannot lose.

The loss of his crew to Kaido changed his outlook on life substantially, making him believe that subordinates are better off as zombies, as, due to their undead status, they cannot be harmed by any physical damage. They can only be "purified" by the sea or elements of the sea. Even if they were purified, he could easily find other shadows to reanimate them. He feels that a true pirate should fear nothing, not even death.

Friends/Allies

 * his old crew
 * Thriller Bark Pirates

Neutral

 * Marines
 * Seven Warlords of the Sea
 * Bartholomew Kuma

Rivals

 * Jimbei
 * Kaido

Enemies

 * Kaido
 * Straw Hat Pirates
 * Monkey D. Luffy
 * Roronoa Zoro
 * Nami
 * Usopp
 * Sanji
 * Tony Tony Chopper
 * Nico Robin
 * Don Quixote Doflamingo

Abilities and Powers
Gecko Moria is a former Warlord, as well as one of the most experienced pirates in the entire Grand Line.

Physically, he was capable of getting up, about ten minutes, after a Gum-Gum Pistol and a Gum-Gum Storm by Nightmare Luffy that toppled Oars over. Also, he didn't seem to be damaged when Nami's thunder-attack struck Oars. Due to his size, he can easily carry a normal human with a single hand. He was back on his feet and still fighting after taking a full power impact from Jimbei (though the blow left him out of the battle for a while).

Unfortunately, his tendency to heavily rely on underlings (or his own shadow) to fight for him in the battlefield may have contributed to his diminished prowess in single combat; often, Moria would run away from an adversary if he deems the battle as "pointless", as seen when he dismissed Luffy's challenge during the Thriller Bark Arc, since he has already extracted the Straw Hat's shadow from him. Jimbei claimed that Moria's dependence on absorbing other people's shadow does not actually make himself stronger. He apparently knows of the mechanics behind Kuma's ability to transport people elsewhere instantly; something that most people are not even aware of, and generally dismisses the sudden vanishing into thin air that Kuma does to his victims as an instant annihilation.

He was once an equal to Kaido, one of the Four Emperors. However, after the war against Whitebeard, Doflamingo claims that the government has deemed Moria too weak to continue to bear the title of Seven Warlords, and is better off to be eliminated.

Devil Fruit
Moria ate the Shadow-Shadow Fruit, a Paramecia type Devil Fruit that allows him to manifest and control shadows as physical beings. It is this fruit that allowed him to build his zombie army, by depriving living beings of their shadows and implanting them in dead bodies.

In general, he prefers to avoid fighting altogether, or at least fighting his enemy indirectly, either making his shadow fight or ordering one of his zombies to do so.

His own shadow can fight for him, while he does nothing but watch. The shadow is mostly solid, and can easily change its form into things like tiny bats. The shadow cannot be destroyed and will continue to reform. Moria is able to switch his location with his shadow's location, which can also be used to dodge attacks.

Even if he has no zombies to do his fighting for him or shadows to increase his own strength, he is an ample enough fighter with just his own shadow, as seen when he used it to impale Little Oz Jr. in the chest.

Moria is able to steal a person's shadow with the Shadow-Shadow Fruit. The loss of that person's shadow causes them to be vaporized if they come in contact with sunlight. Moria is also able to create various zombies by implanting a stolen shadow into a lifeless corpse. People who have their shadow stolen are left in comas for two days. If they die, the zombie with their shadow loses the shadow.

Moria can place someone's shadow inside of someone's living body, increasing both physical strength and possibly gaining a fighting technique (for example using the shadow of a swordsman). Usually he can pick up a bunch of shadows to insert in his own body. At the end of the Thriller Bark arc he used the desperate attack "Shadow Asgard", which consist of taking every shadow from every zombie on Thriller Bark (around 1000 shadows) and absorb them. This form increases his mass to the size of a giant, as well as giving him a monstrous boost in physical strength enough to cut the Thriller Bark ship in half with one punch.

While Luffy could barely withstand 100 shadows (which was known as "Nightmare Luffy"), Moria was able to maintain 1000 shadows in his own body with the superior control his Shadow-Shadow Fruit granted him, although this was still over his limit as strikes from Luffy's Gear second caused him to gradually throw up the absorbed shadows, and Zoro noted it as more of a desperate move than a trump card.

Weapons
Moriah wields a giant pair of scissors, which he uses in conjuncture with his Shadow-Shadow Fruit, to sever people's shadows. He carries these with him all the time, so he can steal shadows even during battle, as shown when he took Robin's shadow.

The scissors are also shown to be able to disconnect at the joint, becoming two inverted swords for Moria. With shadows of capable swordsmen implanted into himself, Moria can become a swordsman with dual swords.

Early Years
Moria was present at the execution of Gol D. Roger and witnessed his famous speech. This probably contributed to Moria's old dream of becoming the new Pirate King. After the execution he, like many others, raised his flag and started to make a name for himself in the New World.

Life as a Pirate
Moria became a pirate whose powers could rival that of Kaido, one of the Four Emperors, and also became a Warlord. While in the New World, his entire crew was apparently killed. Their deaths affected his entire outlook about subordinates. After the loss of his crew, Moriah set about trying to gain enough power to beat even Kaido.

Ten years before the current storyline, Moria, along with Absalom and Perona, sought out a man named Hogback. Upon meeting the doctor, Moria offered him a way to bring his deceased love, Victoria Cindry, back to life. Through the use of his Devil Fruit powers, Moria implanted a stolen shadow into the corpse and gained the doctor's allegiance in return.

Together with the doctor and Moria's two associates, they set up the ship "Thriller Bark" and traveled to the Florian Triangle. There they began to ambush anyone who entered, looking for those with strong shadows, such as pirates with high bounties. Moria then started making zombie minions with shadows stolen from his victims and creations supplied by Hogback.

Five years ago, a skeleton named Brook came to Thriller Bark in hopes of fixing the rudder to his ship. He was captured and Moria implanted his shadow into the corpse of Ryuuma. The skeleton then returned to Thriller Bark and purified several of Moria's zombie minions in an attempt to retrieve his shadow. Though the skeleton was defeated by Ryuuma, Moria was forced to rebuild his army from the mess he left behind.