WEBTOON Launches First-Ever Global Debut Of The New Action-Fantasy Manhwa Fans Crave (Exclusive)
An experienced Editor representing Canada via ScreenRant's Team Anime, J.R. has been reading manga since the first printing of Shonen Jump in North America. This passion drove him to write about anime, manga, and manhwa since 2022, having recently served as Lead Anime Editor for ComicBook.com.
His favorite moments in media coverage include reviewing the series premieres of Zom 100 and Bleach: TYBW Part 2 back-to-back and briefly meeting Junji Ito at a VIZ gallery event in 2023.
Naver and LINE WEBTOON's presence in the vertical scroll webcomic scene is so ubiquitous that they handily earn their namesake, as they're the global go-to for official webtoons read around the globe. Their biggest hits are eagerly followed by millions around the globe, and their success as a brand has led to countless impressive collaborations with IPs like Star Trek, Star Wars, Marvel, DC, and more. But for most readers, the biggest singular draw remains to be Korea's original manhwa on the platform. But while one of the biggest gripes for a long time has been the significant delay in localization from Korean into English and other languages, WEBTOON's new Global Drop initiative is debuting its first new manhwa.
The Warrior's Ballad has recently garnered a dedicated, growing following for its action-fantasy premise following Ricky, the reincarnation of his continent's first Sword Master who, upon attaining victory and glory, lost his mind and became an enemy to his empire. It is typically referred to as a hidden gem webnovel by Dodongpa, but ScreenRant was recently given an exclusive preview and early glimpse of its gorgeous manhwa's first chapters, along with a direct quote from Studio REDICE which worked on the series. Featuring art by Street Bard, The Warrior's Ballad's adaptation is helmed by namwoong as it gives Ricky a second chance while retaining his memories, trying to live a kinder life than the broken one he left behind.
WEBTOON Unveils Global Drop For Worldwide Simulpubs Of Hot New Manhwa
Set as the first of many in a new initiative to release WEBTOON's hottest new manhwa worldwide all at once, The Warrior's Ballad will be released alongside this reveal as of Saturday, September 19, 2026 at 9:00 AM ET / 6:00 AM PT. This means fans around the globe can discover brand-new manhwa, and in this case, celebrate the latest deserving webnovel's gorgeous adaptation, with Studio REDICE's work certainly making quite an appealing debut in this case. In fact, ahead of The Warrior's Ballad's global release, REDICE sent along their excitement via a new quote about this new initiative bringing their work instantly to a global audience.
"Knowing that readers everywhere will get to experience The Warrior's Ballad at the exact same moment means so much. Stories don't have borders, and it's incredible that WEBTOON makes it possible for this one to reach fans worldwide, together, from day one."
-REDICE Studios
Given REDICE's work has gone into producing all-timers, including Solo Leveling, Omniscient Reader, and many others, the fact that The Warrior's Ballad bears their name is a massively appealing factor for legions of manhwa fans. It doesn't hurt that its series are also now getting some of the most popular and anticipated anime adaptations in the new generation, so this series may be one to follow.
The Warrior's Ballad Prologue Is A Blood-Soaked Tale Of Reincarnation & Redemption
Marketed as a perfect manhwa experience for fans who love Makoto Yukimura's Vinland Saga series, The Warrior's Ballad's first three "chapters" provided to ScreenRant tell the extended prologue as well as episodes 1 and 2. As readers will immediately notice, it is indeed a REDICE series, given its positively grandiose action-fantasy visuals, featuring Ricky's ascent from a shepherd raised in Heiden Plains not even told the day he was born, into a prodigious swordsman who clinched victory for his empire.
The art of The Warrior's Ballad is naturally the biggest draw, as it is for any manhwa, as its first chapters bring a stark contrast between the meticulously-designed medieval-inspired tactical strongholds and the bleak meat grinder that is the Eastmarch. Ricky's action sequences are shown to be merciless whether against man or beast, his killer instinct even remaining as an idle aura in his reincarnated present-day form, retaining memories of becoming the first Sword Master.
From E-Rank Hunter to Shadow Monarch · Eight Questions How Well Do You Know Solo Leveling? “Arise.”
💻The SystemQuest update
👑Shadow MonarchArise
⚔Hunter AssociationS-Rank ascension
👈Gate DungeonsDouble dungeon
👾IgrisKnight of the Shadow
01
Solo Leveling’s protagonist is a Korean E-Rank hunter widely mocked at the start of the series as “the world’s weakest” — before a near-death experience in a double dungeon transforms him into the Player. Name him (Korean original).
✓ Correct! Sung Jinwoo — the “world’s weakest hunter” who supports his ailing mother and younger sister Jinah on D-Rank gate raids until a near-fatal raid in the Cartenon Temple double dungeon makes him the Player. The Japanese-localised anime adaptation renames him Shun Mizushino, but the original Korean novel/webtoon name is Sung Jinwoo.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Sung Jinwoo. Cha Hae-In is the South Korean Hunter Association vice-guildmaster and S-Rank swordswoman (and Jinwoo’s eventual love interest). Yoo Jinho is his loyal best-friend chaebol-heir teammate. Baek Yoonho is the White Tiger Guild’s S-Rank guildmaster. The protagonist is Sung Jinwoo.
02
Solo Leveling didn’t start as Japanese manga or anime. It originated in 2016 as a Korean web novel on KakaoPage, was adapted into a colourful vertical-scrolling webtoon (drawn by Jang Sung-rak / Dubu) and only later became an A-1 Pictures anime in 2024. What term describes its native Korean comic format?
✓ Correct! Manhwa — Korean comics — specifically a webtoon, the vertical-scroll, full-colour mobile-first format dominated by KakaoPage and Naver. Solo Leveling’s webtoon adaptation began in 2018 and concluded in 2021; its breakout success internationally helped establish the broader “Korean tower-climber/hunter LitRPG” pipeline that now feeds shows like Tower of God, The Beginning After the End and Eleceed.
✗ Wrong. The answer is manhwa (webtoon). Manhua is the Chinese equivalent. Doujinshi is Japanese fan-comic self-publishing. Manga is the Japanese term. Solo Leveling is Korean — manhwa, specifically a vertical-scroll webtoon adaptation of a 2016 web novel.
03
The original Solo Leveling web novel ran from 2016 to 2018 on KakaoPage and was written under a single mononymous pen name. The author is famously private, with very little known about him — but he’s widely credited with single-handedly resetting global expectations for what Korean web fiction could be. Name him.
✓ Correct! Chugong (추공) — a deliberately mononymous Korean web novelist whose real identity has never been publicly confirmed. His original 2016–18 novel ran 270 chapters and was translated into English, Japanese, Chinese and Spanish via KakaoPage’s international expansion. The webtoon adaptation by Jang Sung-rak (better known as Dubu) was the version that broke through globally; Dubu’s death from cerebral hemorrhage in 2022 was a high-profile loss for the medium.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Chugong. SIU is the creator of Tower of God. TurtleMe is the author of The Beginning After the End. Singshong is the author of Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint. The Solo Leveling novel is Chugong’s.
04
In Solo Leveling’s world, mysterious gates have appeared on Earth and only awakened “hunters” can enter the dungeons inside them. Hunters are evaluated by the Korean Hunter Association on a letter-grade scale from the lowest to the strongest. What rank does Sung Jinwoo start with, before becoming the Player?
✓ Correct! E-Rank — the lowest assigned tier in the Hunter Association’s grading scale (E-D-C-B-A-S, with S as the absolute peak). At E-Rank, Jinwoo barely earns more from a raid than the medical bills the raid produces, which is why he keeps going on dungeon runs despite being the “world’s weakest hunter”: he’s funding his mother’s medical care and his sister Jinah’s tuition. The Player System fast-tracks him from E-Rank to S-Rank-and-beyond over the course of the series.
✗ Wrong. The answer is E-Rank. F-Rank doesn’t exist in Solo Leveling’s scale (E is the lowest). D-Rank is one tier up — where Jinwoo’s teammate Yoo Jinho sits. “Unranked” isn’t a category. Jinwoo starts the series as an E-Rank, the bottom of the recognised ladder.
05
After the Cartenon Temple double-dungeon massacre, Jinwoo wakes up in a hospital and begins seeing a personal RPG-style HUD that nobody else can see — daily quests, stat windows, level-ups, Notices written in glowing blue text. The franchise calls Jinwoo’s unique designation what?
✓ Correct! The Player. Sung Jinwoo is the only individual in his world who has access to the System — the personal RPG-style interface offering quests, stat allocations and level-ups. Late in the series it’s revealed that the System was given to him by the Architect (a tool of the Rulers) specifically to forge him into a vessel for the dying Shadow Monarch Ashborn. Becoming the Player is the prelude to becoming the new Shadow Monarch.
✗ Wrong. The answer is the Player. “The Awakened” is the general term for any human with hunter abilities — not unique to Jinwoo. “The Vessel” and “The Heir” aren’t official labels. Jinwoo’s unique status as the System’s sole user is named the Player.
06
The Solo Leveling anime adaptation premiered in January 2024 to record streaming numbers on Crunchyroll — the most-watched debut in the platform’s history. The animation studio is the same Aniplex-affiliated house behind Sword Art Online, 86 and Lycoris Recoil. Name it.
✓ Correct! A-1 Pictures — the Aniplex-owned studio behind Sword Art Online, Fairy Tail (later seasons), 86, Lycoris Recoil, KonoSuba (S1–2), Kaguya-sama and 7 Deadly Sins. Director Shunsuke Nakashige and a Hiroyuki Sawano-led score made the action centerpieces (the Cartenon Temple double dungeon, the Igris fight, the S-Rank arena duel) some of the most-discussed sequences of any 2024 anime.
✗ Wrong. The answer is A-1 Pictures. MAPPA does Jujutsu Kaisen and Chainsaw Man. Studio Bind does Mushoku Tensei. Madhouse did the original Hunter x Hunter (1999) and One Punch Man S1. A-1 Pictures is the SAO/Lycoris-Recoil studio that adapted Solo Leveling.
07
As Jinwoo levels up he unlocks the Shadow Extraction skill, which lets him raise the corpses of defeated foes as loyal shadow soldiers. The first major shadow soldier he raises — a red-armored knight extracted from the Job Change dungeon Knight Captain — becomes one of his signature fighters. Name him.
✓ Correct! Igris (sometimes Igrit) — the Knight Captain Jinwoo defeats and raises during the Job Change quest. Igris is one of the highest-ranked named shadows in Jinwoo’s army (an Elite Knight tier) and personally serves as his bodyguard during the Jeju Island arc and the Monarchs War. Other named shadow soldiers in the army include Iron (orc warrior), Tank (steel-fanged Lycan), Tusk (Lycan mage), Beru (Ant King) and Bellion (the Grand Marshal).
✗ Wrong. The answer is Igris. Iron is the orc warrior raised from the Demon Castle quest. Beru is the Ant King raised at the end of the Jeju Island arc — one of the most powerful shadows. Tank is the Lycan from the same arc. The first major named shadow knight Jinwoo extracts is Igris.
08
Late in the series, the System reveals that Jinwoo isn’t merely the Player — he’s the chosen successor of the dying ninth Monarch of the Shadows, who sided with the Rulers against the other eight Monarchs. Jinwoo inherits his title and his power. Name this previous Shadow Monarch whose mantle Jinwoo takes up.
✓ Correct! Ashborn, the Monarch of Shadows. He betrayed his fellow Monarchs of Destruction in the ancient war and aligned with the Rulers, but at the cost of being mortally crippled. Working with the Rulers’ tool the Architect, he engineered the System over centuries to find a worthy human vessel — ultimately Sung Jinwoo — to inherit his throne. By the series’ end, Jinwoo wields the full power of the Shadow Monarch and uses it to rewrite the timeline.
✗ Wrong. The answer is Ashborn. Antares is the Monarch of Destruction (the King of Dragons) and the series’ final-fight antagonist. Bellion is Ashborn’s Grand Marshal — one of Jinwoo’s strongest shadows but not a Monarch. Querehsha is the Monarch of Plagues. Jinwoo’s predecessor as Shadow Monarch is Ashborn.
System Notification · Final Tally Your Hunter Standing
👑
/ 8
Shadow Monarch — or still E-Rank?
But those memories also include puzzling times, like the bizarre horse-mounted nobleman who foretold his future. Ricky also bears the horrible memory of returning home the conquering hero only to find his wife used the money he sent home to raise a new family with a new partner. The prologue lays out Ricky's descent into a nihilistic abyss as he's consumed by hatred, suspecting his village rigged the conscription lottery that forced him to war in the first place, slaughtering everyone, presumably even his wife, and burning his village to the ground.
Hurt and deranged, this Ricky of the past became an enemy to the Empire, killing virtually everyone before his body finally gave in, with the mysterious nobleman visiting one more time before Ricky dies, given only more cryptic advice.
This is all in the prologue, with Ricky's future ahead of him as he reincarnates as the son of a humbler lord alongside older brothers Grount and Vilter in the next chapters. Still retaining his combat instincts not unlike in The Swordmaster's Youngest Son, Ricky is still traumatized by his past deeds, questioning whether he even deserves this second chance. But with a family behind him this time, Ricky must find his path forward, while carrying the wounded heart of a deadly warrior from 100 years ago.
Street Bard clearly pulls out all the stops with the visuals on Ricky, whether he's setting his sword ablaze against his ferocious opponents in the past, or coated in the blood of a rampaging boar in the present. The Warrior's Ballad is an aggressive, visually-arresting bid for reader attention, so it'll be interesting to see new chapters uploaded worldwide as it leads the charge for WEBTOON.
KioskNews shows a cleaned-up reading view extracted from the publisher’s page — the original always lives on their site, not ours.