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Ace promised Luffy that he was never going to die, but that was a promise that he wouldn't be able to keep.
The moment Luffy saw Ace use himself as a shield to protect him from Akainu's attack, Luffy felt like everything was going in slow motion. He couldn't believe that it was possible. It was Ace, he wasn't suppose to die.
He had just saved Ace from his execution.
They were suppose to leave Marineford together and even moments before Luffy couldn't have been happier to be fighting side by side with his brother and then the next moment Ace was sacrificing himself to save him. That wasn't suppose to happen.
Luffy never felt so weak in his life the moment Ace died in his arms. He felt numb, that nothing would be the same ever again, a nightmare he would never wake up from. He couldn't move and no longer cared what happened to himself.
Even though Ace told Luffy before he died that he believed Luffy would undoubtedly become the Pirate King, Luffy refused to believe him. The past few weeks have been hell for the Straw Hat Captain. In Sabaody Archipelago, he watched his nakama disappear one after another and there was nothing he could do to stop it.
What was the point of becoming the Pirate King if he couldn't even protect his most precious treasure... His brother and his nakama. They believed in him and Luffy felt like he had failed them.
Was he always that weak? Pirate King? Who was he kidding, anyway. He could never become the Pirate King! He was weak! Not capable of saving anyone. Luffy felt like a joke. So how could Ace have so much faith in him even in his dying breath?
Luffy was certain at that moment that he would never see Shanks again since they promised to meet when Luffy was a great pirate and now, that was never going to happen.
He felt that he let Shanks down.
Luffy couldn't help but think how naive he was to think that he was definitively going to save Ace in the first place. The battle at Marineford was on a whole other level to anything Luffy had ever faced before and yet he so recklessly charged in without even thinking of his actions, even though he was already injured from Impel Down. He only had one goal in sight, and that was to save Ace.
Maybe if he wasn't so ignorant things would've turned out different, maybe he shouldn't have been so confident in his abilities.
Luffy knew that if it wasn't for the Whitebeard Pirates and Trafalgar Law he probably wouldn't be alive today. There was even a part inside Luffy that wished he did die that day and that Ace was the one who survived. Ace died protecting him and if he wasn't so weak in the first place it wouldn't have happened.
Luffy was never one to quit, but when he woke up after the war he felt something inside him changed. He felt ashamed of himself for failing to save his own brother. The Straw Hat felt like he couldn't protect anyone any more and that he was foolish to ever think he could become the Pirate King.
The young Captain was certain that if Jinbe didn't follow him into the forest after he woke up and literally knocked some sense into him that he mightn't have been here today. Jinbe reminded him that he hadn't lost everything.
That he shouldn't let his beliefs be shattered because he had lost so much. Yes, Luffy was hurting and that was understandable, but instead of just focusing on what he had lost, he should ask himself what remains, and not let the darkness of regret and self blame consume him.
When Jinbe's words reached Luffy, he realized that he hadn't lost everything. He still had his nakama and they were counting on him.
He remembered the first time he met each of his nakama: Zoro, Nami, Usopp, Sanji, Chopper, Robin, Franky and Brook. The amazing adventures that they had been on. The Captain knew that they still have many adventures to go on. It was then that Luffy realized that he had been so focused on everything bad that had happened to him recently that he forgot he still had his crew... His nakama and they were waiting for him.
Even if he couldn't protect them right now Luffy promised himself to get stronger so he could protect them. So when Rayleigh offered to train him for two years, Luffy didn't even have to think twice about the offer. He had to get stronger if he wanted to protect his nakama, so he wouldn't have to go through the pain of losing someone ever again.
He would protect them and that was a promise and he would eventually meet up with Shanks in the New World and give him back his hat.
With the help of his nakama he would become the Pirate King not just because it was his dream but also for Ace.
His dream would become reality, so he could protect all his nakama.