Ohh, well I don't know about you but that's so incredibly unintentionally romantic on Zoro's part, isn't it?

I mean, okay he probably doesn't mean it in the way that I interpret it but staving off your own death to fulfil a promise to a guy you "hate" regardless of context is pretty gay imo. I mean, sure, the promise was to kill him which sounds bad but really, that kind of stuff punches me right in the romance part of my brain. It kinda reminds me of that one DBZ movie where Vegeta saves Goku from being murdered because “he’s mine”. No matter how you look at that, it’s pretty suspicious.

There are a lot of stories about lovers going through hell or escaping hell for their partners, from Greek myths to games like Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice (which is fucking fantastic btw, one of the best games I have ever played). It's a trope that is usually entrenched in love and usually there’s some sort of deal made with the devil (or Hades) in order for that to happen. More often than not it ends in disaster too – someone breaks the contract at some point and everything ends in tragedy.

Do I genuinely think that Zoro did this though? Hmm, not exactly. I think it’s Oda’s way of lightening that topic by turning it into a joke so he doesn’t have to do anything about it. I mean, why else would Sanji’s eyebrow just magically go back to normal? I think he set up something really fascinating and then decided to chicken out of it. There’s a chance he intends to do something with it later but honestly I don’t think he will. I’d like to have faith but Oda has kinda dashed my hopes and screwed with me too many times.

(In case you can’t tell: I am absolutely pissed with the way that this has been handled by him so far lol)