Dragon King
The Dragon King, also called Antares and the Monarch of Destruction, is the strongest of the Monarchs and commander of the Army of Destruction. He is Jinwoo Sung's final opponent because his purpose is not conquest or survival but the eradication of creation itself; intelligence and respect for strength only make that purpose more dangerous.
Biography
The Monarch War Begins
The Dragon King is created as the most powerful instrument of destruction among the Monarchs. In Ashborn's memories, he imposes order after the Monarchs suffer defeats and prevents resentment from dissolving their alliance while they rebuild beyond the Rulers' reach. He recognizes Ashborn as a dangerous rival long before Jinwoo inherits that power (Chapter 65).
The method used by other Monarchs to descend through human vessels does not work for him: no human body can contain his power. That limitation delays his physical arrival on Earth, but also signals that his full manifestation will exceed opponents already capable of killing national-level hunters (Chapters 65, 69–70).
After Jinwoo inherits the full power of the Shadow Monarch, the Dragon King orders the forces of Chaos to prepare. Ancient dragons, dragonfolk, and other armies answer a hierarchy built around his overwhelming personal strength. He also watches for Jinwoo's presence, treating the emergence of a complete Shadow Monarch as both a strategic threat and the return of a battle worthy of him (Chapters 67, 70–71).
War with the Dragon King and the Rewritten World
The Dragon King emerges from the Canadian gate and destroys the assembled defensive line almost instantly. His breath wipes away soldiers, machines, and even the shadow Jinwoo placed on Adam White. He revels in the sound of destruction and orders the Army of Destruction to erase everything, using mass death both as purpose and as a means of forcing Jinwoo to reveal himself (Chapters 70–71).
Jinwoo answers by striking the army and withdrawing between battlefields. The Dragon King pursues with close to a million soldiers, aware that the movement is probably strategic but unwilling to surrender the chance to destroy his rival. Jinwoo exploits that appetite by separating him from forces needed elsewhere (Chapters 71–73).
Even surrounded by shadows, the Monarch of Destruction remains delighted by the quality of the battle. He offers Jinwoo an alliance against the Rulers and promises to spare Jinwoo's family and world. The proposal is tactically rational but insincere: his killing intent betrays that destruction remains his governing desire, and Jinwoo rejects it (Chapter 74).
In his true form, the Dragon King becomes an immense dragon radiating molten heat. He withstands the shadow army, permanently erases soldiers with the Breath of Destruction, and meets Jinwoo's giant spiritual body with comparable force. Jinwoo's army and transformations exhaust him but do not secure a clean victory (Chapter 74).
The Dragon King appears to gain the advantage in their final duel, only to discover that Jinwoo's deeper plan was to create enough dimensional disturbance for the Rulers to enter Earth. Surrounded by the enemies who defeated the Monarchs in earlier cycles, he recognizes the trap and accepts the approaching end without pleading. The Rulers' spears impale him after Jinwoo's strategy succeeds where direct force alone could not (Chapters 74–75).
The Cup of Reincarnation restores the world to a point before the invasion, allowing the Dragon King to exist again beyond Earth. Jinwoo spends decades destroying the Monarchs and their armies in the dimensional gap, eventually defeating Antares a second time before he can bring the Army of Destruction into human history (Chapter 75).
Appearance and personality
In humanoid form, the Dragon King has cold reptilian eyes and an oppressive presence perceptible even through a memory. His intermediate form takes on dragonlike armor and physical traits, while his true body resembles a living mountain of scales and molten-lava heat (Chapters 65, 74).
He is proud, calculating, and capable of admiring clever tactics. He identifies traps, proposes alliances, and acknowledges when an opponent has outmaneuvered him. None of that moderates his nature: bloodshed, fear, and ruined cities bring him genuine pleasure. His respect for Jinwoo is therefore not moral recognition but the excitement of finally meeting destruction that can answer his own (Chapters 71–75).
Abilities, skills, and rank
Physical power and forms
The Dragon King possesses the greatest direct physical power among the Monarchs. He can fight in a compact humanoid shape, a heavily transformed dragonfolk body, or a colossal dragon form suited to destroying armies. Each form retains extreme speed, perception, durability, and heat; the larger forms increase reach and destructive scale at the cost of presenting a larger target (Chapters 71, 74).
Breath of Destruction
His signature breath is not ordinary fire. It annihilates physical targets and can permanently erase shadow soldiers that would otherwise regenerate from mana. The attack sweeps broad areas, follows aerial targets, and forces Jinwoo to treat every direct line of fire as potentially irreversible. Its enormous output does not guarantee a hit against a comparably fast opponent, and repeated combat still contributes to the Dragon King's exhaustion (Chapters 70–74).
Dragon’s Fear and magical pressure
Dragon's Fear projects the authority of the King of Dragons through a roar, paralyzing or disorienting weaker beings and disrupting the surrounding space. His ordinary mana pressure is itself enough to shake terrain and announce his presence across a battlefield. Jinwoo can resist and answer the fear with his own authority, so it is overwhelming control rather than an absolute command over equals (Chapters 71, 74).
Weapons, gates, and command
Antares wields a sword in humanoid combat, communicates across his forces, opens or crosses dimensional passages, and commands a vast multi-species army. He recognizes army composition and strategic deception, but his desire for decisive personal battle can be manipulated: Jinwoo repeatedly uses provocation and retreat to determine where the Dragon King fights (Chapters 71–74).
Power progression
| Stage / Realm / Ability | Chapter(s) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Monarch of Destruction / King of Dragons | Before Chapter 65; revealed in 65 | Is created as the Monarchs' supreme instrument of destruction and already commands the Army of Destruction; the chapter reveals this established primordial state rather than a new attainment. |
| Death and loss of manifested power | 74 | The Rulers' spears kill him after Jinwoo's dimensional trap, ending his first-timeline manifestation and command. |
| Restored by time reversal, then defeated again | 75 | The Cup restores him beyond Earth at the earlier point in history, but Jinwoo later kills him during the twenty-seven-year dimensional war before he can invade the rewritten world. |
Relationships
- Jinwoo Sung: Jinwoo is his principal rival and the only complete Monarch capable of matching him directly. Antares respects Jinwoo's growth while repeatedly underestimating the human judgment behind his tactics.
- Ashborn: The former Shadow Monarch is an earlier rival whose power the Dragon King recognizes in Jinwoo.
- Bellion, Igris, Beru, and Fang: The Shadow Army's senior soldiers oppose him collectively, but his annihilating breath prevents them from treating regeneration as safety.
- The Rulers: They are his ancient enemies and the force Jinwoo ultimately brings through the dimensional disturbance to complete his first defeat.
Items
The Dragon King wields a sword in humanoid combat, but no separately named personal artifact is identified in the supplied corpus.