Wanted! (one-shot)

Wanted! is a one-shot manga by Eiichiro Oda, produced during his senior year of high school in 1992. It was submitted - under the pseudonym Tsuki Himizu Kikondo (月火水木金土) - to the 44th Tezuka Awards and won Second Class, earning Oda ¥500,000 and marking his debut in the manga industry.

Per convention at the time, Wanted! was collected with its fellow winners in a single Mezase Mangaka (めざせ漫画家!) volume, published in early 1993. After One Piece brought Oda to new prominence, it was reprinted in the September 1998 issue of Akamaru Jump, followed by a self-titled collection dedicated to one-shots from Oda's early career.

Plot
The story opens with Wild Joe, a bounty hunter, going after the head of the wanted criminal Gill Bastar. It is shown that Gill's huge bounty is due to his killing of many people in self-defense. Ironically the more people he kills, the more he must kill to protect himself. Joe goes in for the kill to claim Gill's bounty, when Gill suddenly points behind Joe in surprise. Joe turns to look, and Gill shoots him in the head, killing him.

At this point, Joe's ghost starts haunting Gill, as he cannot pass on having been killed in such a cowardly manner. Joe explains to Gill that he plans to possess someone's body to duel him properly and that he will pass on if he loses, or the day Gill dies. He then brings up that that will probably be soon, since the cops have hired the number one hitman Sino Phoenix to to take Gill's head, as Gill's murders have gotten out of hand. This enrages Gill, as he exclaims that all of his kills have been self-defense, that the other guy always shot first, and that he shouldn't even be wanted.

Two days pass and Sino Phoenix is seen sitting in a bar. Gill and Joe enter the bar and sit next to him. After a few seconds, Joe realizes who it is and tells Gill, who panics and runs from the bar unnoticed. Joe says that he's not going let this opportunity to kill Gill pass and possesses Gill. He then forces Gill to walk back to the bar and challenge Sino to a fight. As Gill tries to defend himself by saying it's a joke, Sino says that he hates jokes and shoots at him, knocking off Gill's hat and glasses, revealing his identity to the whole bar. Everyone runs from the bar for fear of getting involved. Sino says that he heard that Gill defeated Joe, to which Gill replies that Joe was just an idiot. Sino likes his reply and the fight begins.

They trade a few shots at each other and a couple of the townspeople take shots at Gill as well, until Gill gets hit in the arm and hides. Sino tries to think of Gill's plan and states that whatever Gill does is useless, as Sino has won a gun fight against twenty guerrillas before. He is then surprised and shoots at a cat. Gill realizes that if Sino had started off fighting him seriously, that he would have lost due to Sino's fast reflexive shooting. He takes advantage of the situation and throws a rock. Sino immediately shoots at where the rock landed, then Gill distracts him again by knocking some barrels on a roof with rocks. Sino shoots at the barrels, causing them to fall at him. Gill then calls to Sino and shoots him. The villagers spot Gill on a far away rooftop, and all give up on his bounty, declaring him a monster. Sino then sits up in disbelief that he was shot, at which point Gill shoots another barrel, causing it to fall onto Sino.

Joe then starts passing on, which surprises him. Gill says it's because he's admitted defeat, to which Joe replies that there is no way that he would admit defeat, after all, he was the stronger man. He then disappears, and Gill says that he will see him in the next world, in a hundred years.

Characters

 * Gill Bastar
 * Wild Joe
 * Sino Phoenix

Trivia

 * The font and general layout of the title appear to be conscious influences on the logo Oda would design for One Piece.
 * Gill Bastar and (the ghost of) Wild Joe were given a brief cameo during the credits of One Piece: The Movie — as of 2019, the closest this story has come to an adaptation.
 * As a teenager, Mitsutoshi Shimabukuro (best known for Toriko) read this story in its initial Mezase Manga publication, and was quickly impressed by Oda's talent. He would later cite this as the start of his friendship with Oda.

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