Antares

**Antares** (안타레스) was the King of Dragons and the Monarch of Destruction. He was also both the strongest and the oldest Monarch, as well as the final antagonist of Solo Leveling.

## Appearance

Antares was a handsome and muscular man with long red hair, a neatly trimmed red beard, and glowing red eyes. He also wore silver-red armor with a high collar and a reddish-brown tailcoat.

## Personality

Due to having been created to destroy all of existence, Antares revealed in the devastation that he caused with his powers. He also had a very disdainful attitude towards humans and had no qualms with slaughtering them by the millions in order to lure out the Shadow Monarch to face him in battle.

However, despite his love for destruction and death, Antares had a sense of honor and was willing to negotiate with those who were strong enough to impress him in battle, as displayed when he offered to withdraw his forces and spare mankind as long as Jinwoo promised to fight alongside him against the Rulers.

## History

Eons ago, Antares fought alongside the other Monarchs, including the Shadow Monarch Ashborn, in a devastating war with the Rulers at the behest of their creator, the Absolute Being. As the war progressed, Antares grew fearful of Ashborn's powers and ordered Rakan and Baran to take him out. However, this proved to be a big mistake, as not only did Ashborn easily defeat them both, but he also killed Baran as punishment for his betrayal. Shortly after this battle, Ashborn suddenly disappeared, allowing the Rulers to finally win the war and forcing the surviving Monarchs all into hiding.

At some point after this, Ashborn returned and asked Antares if he could rejoin his forces. As two of the Monarchs were lost and the rest were still greatly weakened from their defeat against the Rulers, Antares gladly granted his request.

Centuries later, when the war with the Rulers started up again in the human world, Antares discovered himself to be in the same pickle that Ashborn was in and could not find a human vessel strong enough to withstand his powers. As a result, while the other Monarchs found vessels for themselves without much trouble and move about in the human world however they pleased, Antares was forced to remain behind until a proper vessel for himself could be found.

### Final Battle Arc

Shortly after Jinwoo killed the three Monarchs who came after him in Korea, Antares learned from Yogumunt that the Shadow Monarch had turned against them and annihilated most of their forces. Undaunted, Antares decided to deal with Ashborn's vessel himself and ordered his army of dragons to prepare for battle.

Several days later, Antares descended into the human world through a gigantic gate in Canada and was met by the Canadian S-Rank Hunter Jay Mills. Realizing that Jinwoo was not present, Antares effortlessly burned Jay to cinders with his breath attack and gleefully unleashed his army onto the landscape, cutting a wide path of destruction across the country and massacring millions of people, including Adam White. However, even with all the desolation that Antares left in his wake, the Shadow Monarch still failed to show up. As a result, Antares eventually grew bored and started to wonder if he would show up to fight at all.

When Jinwoo finally appeared on the eastern front of the battlefield, Antares walked out to confront him and ordered his army of ten million to corner him, believing that even the Shadow Monarch couldn't handle so many enemies at once. Much to his surprise, however, Jinwoo used **Dragon's Fear** in response to his attack, immobilizing every single one of his minions, including Yogumunt, and then proceeded to drag Antares with him to an remote island in Japan using **Shadow Exchange**. The two then began to fight and despite Jinwoo's efforts, Antares easily countered his attacks one after another

Although Jinwoo's attacks simply bounced off his skin, Antares was still impressed by his sense of strategy. As a result, he halted his attacks and offered to spare humanity from extinction as long as Jinwoo helped him defeat the Rulers. However, Jinwoo refused to accept the offer and mocked him for pretending to play nice, prompting the battle to resume. As the fighting continued, Antares grew more and more annoyed with Jinwoo's refusal to submit, especially since the latter's attacks still had no effect on him, and eventually lost his temper entirely, threatening to rip him to shreds and turn him into drake food. However, in his anger and his arrogance, Antares failed to notice that Jinwoo wasn't just attacking blindly and accidentally left himself wide open, enabling the latter to slice him almost completely in half using his father's dagger.

Surprised that the Shadow Monarch had actually been able to hurt him, Antares suddenly noticed the Rulers' armies in the skies and finally understood that Jinwoo had been aiming for this from the very beginning, as their battle had distorted space to such an extent that it allowed the Rulers to enter the human world in their raw forms. Now completely cornered, Antares attempted to attack the Jinwoo one last time, but was thwarted by the Rulers, who fatally stabbed him with their spears. Realizing that he had lost and that the Rulers were victorious once again, Antares admitted that he never had a chance of winning from the start right before he succumbed to his wounds and died, leaving his body to break up into pieces and float away in the wind.

### Epilogue

After the Rulers used the Cup of Reincarnation one last time at Jinwoo's request, Antares was revived with his memories of the original timeline intact. As he was the strongest Monarch, Jinwoo decided to save him for last and went after the other Monarchs first, massacring them all with little trouble. Although Antares was aware of their deaths, he did nothing to help them and waited patiently for the Shadow Monarch to arrive at his doorstep.

27 years later, when Antares was the only Monarch left, Jinwoo finally appeared inside his palace, intent on killing him and finishing what he'd started. Delighted that he'd been given the chance to fight Jinwoo again, Antares decided to hold nothing back and activated his **Spiritual Body Manifestation** as soon as their clash began. However, despite his best efforts, Jinwoo killed him in the ensuing battle with little trouble, only suffering a severe burn on his left hand in the aftermath.

## Abilities

As the strongest Monarch, Antares was one of the most powerful individuals in existence, with only Ashborn holding a candle to him in strength, and even then he was still superior to the Shadow Monarch in raw power.

* **Immense Strength:** Antares possessed tremendous physical strength and was even stronger than the Shadow Monarch himself, as shown by how he was able to easily hold his own against Jinwoo in their battle and eventually overpower him.
* **Nigh-Invulnerability:** Antares possessed almost unparalleled durability and was virtually invulnerable to physical trauma. As a testament to this, he was completed unfazed by most of Jinwoo's attacks and was able to continue fighting back as if nothing had happened even after Jinwoo nearly bifurcated him.
* **Dragon's Fear:** Antares was able to release a mana-infused shout from his soul that would drive those weaker than him into a state of intense despair and panic.
* **Breath of Destruction:** Antares was able to spit devastating torrents of fire from his mouth. The power behind this attack was so great that it was able to instantly reduce S-Rank Hunters to ash, easily negate most of Jinwoo's attacks, and even erase shadow soldiers from existence.
* **Spiritual Body Manifestation:** Antares was able to transform into an enormous red dragon.
* **Telepathy:** Antares was able to communicate telepathically with his fellow Monarchs.

## References

1. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 163
2. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 167
3. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 171
4. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 173
5. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 176
6. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 177
7. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 178
8. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 181
9. ↑ Solo Leveling Webtoon: Chapter 174