How Did Sung Jinwoo Become the Shadow Monarch in Solo Leveling?

Solo Leveling Season 1’s finale blew everyone’s minds by revealing the true power of Sung Jinwoo. The quest for a job change was a riveting ride, pitting Jinwoo against the mystifying red knight, i.e. Igris. For anime-only fans, the ending was something you didn’t think of, right? It also astonished me when I was reading the arc in the Solo Leveling manhwa for the first time.

After Season 1, a lot of fans are now picking up the manhwa to witness the rise of Sung Jinwoo’s powers as a hunter. Before you start the manhwa after Season 1’s ending, if you are curious about Jinwoo’s true powers, you are in the right place. So, keep reading to learn about the Monarch of Shadow’s powers and abilities in Solo Leveling.

Spoilers Warning: This article contains heavy spoilers about Sung Jinwoo’s powers. Thus, we highly recommend you to read the manhwa or watch the anime beforehand in order to avoid ruining your intended experience.

How Did Jinwoo Change His Title to Shadow Monarch?

Sung Jinwoo received an unexpected job change quest from the System after he crossed level 40 during the previous raid with Yoo Jinho. To his surprise, he was directed to a new instant dungeon where he encountered a set of mighty knights and sorcerer-type enemies.

After clearing them out, Sung Jinwoo was tasked with defeating the enigmatic red knight “Blood-Red Commander Igris” who was guarding an empty throne for an unknown time.

Now like every other arc, the only option for Jinwoo was to defeat this final boss. With every ounce of his power, Jinwoo fought Igris and finally emerged as the victor in one of the most spellbinding battles we’ve seen until this point.

When we thought the quest was finally over, the story introduced a twist and a quest began where Jinwoo had to stay alive as long as possible by defeating a swarm of enemies. As expected, Jinwoo fought tooth and nail and was successful in clearing the job change quest. Then, he got an alert to change his job title from Assassin to “Necromancer.”

Initially, Jinwoo thought of declining the request, however, when he found that this was a special mage class, he went forth with it. Hence, Jinwoo switched to the title of Necromancer. As Jinwoo had accumulated a massive amount of points, thanks to his grinding, he was able to quickly level up to the top of the necromancer class.

This is when Jinwoo became the “Shadow Monarch” who has the ultimate power to reanimate any being back from the dead, and you guessed it right, he can make an army out of them easily.

Heavy Spoilers Warning:

The section below contains heavy spoilers about Sung Jinwoo’s powers which will be revealed in the upcoming seasons. Thus, we highly recommend you to read the manhwa beforehand in order to avoid ruining your intended experience.

Sung Jinwoo: Powers and Abilities of the New Shadow Monarch

When Sung Jinwoo became the shadow monarch he was bestowed with the power to bring back the dead (even his enemies) and make them his loyal soldier. This supreme power can be broken down into a plethora of skills for better understanding such as:

• Shadow Extraction: Jinwoo can draw shadows from the remains of his enemies or allies and incorporate them into his shadow army as his fighters.
• Shadow Preservation: After successfully extracting the shadows, he can store and take care of them inside of him, which acts as a storage. In addition, he can keep an eye on every single one of his shadows as he can sense the feelings of his shadows.
• Shadow Exchange: This is one of Sung Jinwoo’s coolest abilities with which he can instantly travel anywhere by using his shadows as portals. For example, if he is in the US and his shadow is in Korea, he can switch places with them to instantly visit Korea.

Ranking System of Shadows Used in Solo Leveling

The main highlight of Jinwoo’s shadows is that they can also level up like him, thus, making the necromancer a truly powerful and one of its kind class. After the shadows go through a variety of battle experiences, they gain XP to level up their powers. So, these shadows are classified into the following grades (from lowest to highest) based on how powerful they are:

• Basic Grade (lowest rank)
• Normal Grade
• Elite Grade
• Knight Grade
• Elite Knight Grade
• Commander/General Grade
• Marshal/Commander Grade
• Grand Marshal Grade (highest rank)

Fun Fact: Shadows drawn from extremely strong beings can already begin at a higher grade the moment they are reanimated by the Shadow Monarch. However, if a low ranking shadow wants to go even further to the top tier grades, they have to come forth to Shadow Monarch i.e. Sung Jinwoo, and ask for his permission to do so.

With his newfound powers, Sung Jinwoo will continue to rise to the top with the most loyal shadow army by his side. If you are curious about who is the most powerful shadow in Jinwoo’s army, check out our list of strongest shadows of Sung Jinwoo. Be it the manhwa fans or the anime fans, we never saw this coming.

However, I assure you that Sung Jinwoo will continue to amuse you as the Shadow Monarch in the upcoming seasons. That said, do tell us about your experience of watching Jinwoo switch his power class in the comments below.