National Level Hunters are the five S-rank hunters whose individual power matches the military strength of an entire nation. They are not an official Hunter’s Association rank — the designation was created informally after the Kamish Raid, when five hunters killed a dragon that had destroyed every other response attempt, and has never been formally superseded since. Before Sung Jin-woo, only these five held the title. No one else in the world has joined their ranks.
The table below covers all five before the full breakdown.
| Hunter | Country | World Rank | Rulers Vessel | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thomas Andre | USA | 1st | Yes | Alive — becomes Monarch of Conquest in Ragnarok |
| Liu Zhigang | China | 2nd | Yes | Alive — six-star rating in reset timeline |
| Christopher Reed | USA | 3rd | Yes — also enhanced by Norma Selner | Deceased — killed by Rakan, Querehsha, and Tarnak |
| Siddharth Bachchan | India | 4th | Yes | Alive — limited manhwa coverage |
| Antoine Martinez | Unknown | 5th | No — reached National Level on pure ability | Limited coverage — name confirmed in Ragnarok |
⚠️ Spoiler Warning This page covers events from the Monarchs War arc and the reset timeline including Christopher Reed’s death and Thomas Andre’s role in the final battle. Anime-only viewers who have not read past Chapter 110 will encounter major plot spoilers.
What Makes a Hunter National Level?
National Level is not a rank that can be earned through training or gradual progression — it was created to describe five specific hunters who demonstrated power beyond what any classification system had anticipated.
The designation originated from the Kamish Raid — the first S-rank gate in history, which opened in the United States. Kamish was a dragon whose power destroyed every response attempt before those five hunters finally killed it. Their reward was recognition so significant it rivalled the political and financial influence of entire governments — and the informal title that acknowledged what they were.
Four of the five hold this power because they are Rulers vessels — humans chosen to channel Ruler energy through their bodies. That energy pushes their output far beyond what standard S-rank awakening produces. The fifth, Antoine Martinez, holds no Ruler power at all. He reached the same tier on pure ability, which the manhwa treats as the more remarkable achievement of the two.
Sung Il-hwan’s potential National Level status is worth noting specifically. After the Kamish Raid, a hunter from the Scavenger Guild named Adam White commented that Il-hwan could have been ranked alongside the five if the designation had existed when he was active. He disappeared into a dungeon before the ranking system was ever established, so the comparison is hypothetical — but it is the closest the manhwa comes to benchmarking Il-hwan against the group directly.
The political and financial benefits attached to the National Level designation are substantial. Each of the five received governmental recognition comparable to a head of state in terms of diplomatic access and protection. Their guilds operate with international authority that standard S-rank guilds cannot access. They live comfortably in ways that make most S-rank hunter incomes look modest.
Thomas Andre — World’s Strongest Hunter
Thomas Andre is the number one ranked hunter in the world, master of the American Scavenger Guild, and the largest and most physically imposing human character in the entire series.
He is known as Goliath — a nickname that reflects both his physical scale and his combat reputation. At 196 cm and built in proportion to his power, he generates visible unease in most hunters simply by walking into a room. His approach to combat is the opposite of subtle — maximum physical output, direct engagement, overwhelming force applied without strategic complexity because strategic complexity is rarely necessary when you can simply hit things harder than anything can withstand.
His abilities include:
- Ruler’s Authority — telekinetic force over objects and enemies; Thomas Andre’s version is powerful enough to catch Jin-woo off-guard in their first exchange
- Spiritual Body Manifestation — projects the Ruler body, dramatically increasing all physical output; his version coats his body in golden armour-like energy
- Immense Physical Strength — the highest raw physical output of any human character in the series before Jin-woo’s full Shadow Monarch awakening
- Immense Durability — sustains attacks from opponents far above standard S-rank without structural damage
- Enhancement from Norma Selner — like Hwang Dong-soo, Andre received an ability boost from the Scavenger Guild’s enhancer, pushing him beyond his baseline Ruler vessel output
His fight with Jin-woo during the International Guild Conference arc is one of the manhwa’s most significant combat sequences — not because of its outcome but because of what it establishes. Jin-woo wins. Andre accepts the result without bitterness. He gives Jin-woo Kamish’s Wrath — the most powerful magical weapon in existence, recovered from the dragon’s body after the Kamish Raid — as a gesture of genuine respect. Then he starts looking for ways to be useful.
In the Final Battle Arc, Andre fights alongside Beru and Bellion to defeat Tarnak, the Monarch of Iron Body — the only Monarch whose defeat did not involve Jin-woo directly. His contribution is the practical demonstration of what the manhwa has been suggesting about him since his introduction: he is genuinely extraordinary, just not in Jin-woo’s category.
In Ragnarok, Andre becomes the Monarch of Conquest — a new Monarch title created by the conditions of the Itarim invasion for humans with sufficient will and compatible power. His Rulers vessel history made him the natural candidate. His loyalty to Jin-woo’s family made him a natural addition to Su-ho’s force.
He first appears at the International Guild Conference arc in Chapter 140.
Liu Zhigang — Asia’s Strongest Hunter
Liu Zhigang is the second-ranked National Level hunter and the strongest hunter in Asia until Jin-woo surpasses him — a dual-sword specialist whose mana output is sufficient to clear the sky of ant soldiers in a single exchange.
He is physically distinctive — muscular, long black hair worn in a ponytail with several strands loose around it, dark yellow eyes that glow bright when he channels Ruler power. His presentation is quieter than Thomas Andre’s. He does not fill a room the way Andre does. He watches situations develop before responding, which gives him an analytical edge in political settings that complements his combat capability.
His abilities include:
- Dual sword mastery — two swords amplified with mana channelled through Ruler vessel power
- Mana amplification — his sword strikes carry enough concentrated mana to affect large groups of enemies simultaneously
- Ruler’s Authority — telekinetic force consistent with all Ruler vessel hunters
- Spiritual Body Manifestation — Ruler body projection available to all confirmed vessels
The Jeju Island fourth raid is his most significant combat appearance. He cleared the sky of ant soldiers in a sweep that demonstrated the gap between National Level and standard S-rank more clearly than any single moment before Jin-woo’s involvement. His assessment of Goto Ryuji — Japan’s strongest S-rank hunter — was that Goto failed to understand how much weaker he was relative to Liu Zhigang’s actual output.
In the International Guild Conference arc, he approaches Jin-woo personally after Jin-woo defeats Thomas Andre and shakes his hand. No other character with his standing responds to Jin-woo winning by immediately seeking him out to acknowledge it — the gesture reflects that Zhigang understood the result’s significance faster than almost anyone else in the room.
In the reset timeline, he regained his powers as a hunter but without the Rulers vessel enhancement they carried in the original timeline. The Chinese government rated him at six stars rather than the seven-star classification his original timeline power earned — an accurate acknowledgment that what he is in the reset world is exceptional but not what he was.
Christopher Reed — The Hunter Who Was Warned
Christopher Reed is the third-ranked National Level hunter, the second strongest American hunter, and the only National Level figure whose death the manhwa frames as partially avoidable — he was warned it was coming and waited too long to ask for help.
Reed received advance warning that the Monarchs were targeting him before the war’s open phase began. He knew what was coming. He chose to wait rather than reach out for support immediately — an independent streak consistent with how he operated throughout his career. By the time he considered asking for assistance, the window had already closed.
He was killed off-screen by a simultaneous attack from three Monarchs — Rakan, Querehsha, and Tarnak — in what was effectively a coordinated assassination rather than a fair fight. The fact that Jin-woo struggled significantly against just two of those three in direct combat gives context for how overwhelmed Reed must have been.
His final act was a Spiritual Body Manifestation that coated his body in inextinguishable flame and allowed him to keep fighting past the point where his body should have stopped. The fire persisted after his death — at the level of intensity a Spiritual Body Manifestation produces, it required S-rank hunters working together to extinguish it. This is the last thing the manhwa shows of Christopher Reed, and it is consistent with what he was.
His abilities include:
- Spiritual Body Manifestation — the most visually dramatic of all the National Level hunters; his manifestation produces full-body inextinguishable flame
- Fire manipulation — fire-type ability amplified by Ruler vessel power and Norma Selner enhancement
- Norma Selner enhancement — like Thomas Andre, Reed received an ability boost from the Scavenger Guild’s enhancer in addition to his Ruler vessel power
He is the only National Level hunter whose death is confirmed in the manhwa and whose loss is treated as a meaningful reduction in humanity’s defensive capacity.
Siddharth Bachchan — The Strongest Hunter in India
Siddharth Bachchan is the fourth-ranked National Level hunter and the strongest hunter in India — and the manhwa provides the least information about any of the five regarding him.
He appears during the International Guild Conference arc and is present for the major events of that period, but the manhwa does not give him significant dialogue or personal story development. His abilities are confirmed as Ruler vessel powers — Ruler’s Authority and Spiritual Body Manifestation — but the specific form or character of his manifestation is never depicted in detail.
He survived the Monarchs War. Beyond that, the manhwa treats him primarily as a present-but-background figure in the global hunter landscape. The Arise game has given him slightly more visual characterisation than the manhwa, but his story remains the most underdeveloped of the five.
The one confirmed character detail is that he is described as ambitious — the manhwa uses this word specifically in reference to him, suggesting that unlike the more settled postures of Andre and Liu Zhigang, Bachchan still has things he is working toward. What those things are is never specified.
Antoine Martinez — The One Who Did It Without the Rulers
Antoine Martinez is the fifth National Level hunter and the only one who is not a Rulers vessel — he reached National Level through pure ability, making him the most technically remarkable of the five by the standard the others cannot share.
His name was not revealed in the original manhwa. He was referred to throughout the main story only as the unnamed healer who participated in the Kamish Raid. Solo Leveling: Ragnarok eventually confirmed his name as Antoine Martinez — the only new information the sequel adds about him.
What makes his position significant is the implication of reaching the same tier as four Rulers vessels without any divine empowerment. The other four were chosen specifically because the Rulers believed they could handle power beyond human standard. Martinez arrived at the same destination by a different route entirely — which means his baseline human capacity was already extraordinary before the Kamish Raid added the National Level title to it.
His healing abilities allowed the other four to survive Kamish in conditions that would have killed standard hunter parties outright. His specific healing capability is not detailed in the manhwa beyond its functional effect in that context.
His fate after the Kamish Raid, his involvement in the Monarchs War, and his status in the reset timeline are all unaddressed in the original manhwa. Ragnarok confirms his name and nothing further.
How Do the Five Compare to Each Other?
The ranking among the five National Level hunters is supported by both direct statements in the manhwa and indirect evidence from combat outcomes and comparative assessments.
The table below presents the ranking with the basis for each position.
| Rank | Hunter | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Thomas Andre | Stated as world’s strongest hunter; fights Jin-woo more competitively than any other human |
| 2 | Liu Zhigang | Second by consensus; Goto Ryuji explicitly fails to grasp the gap between his level and Zhigang’s |
| 3 | Christopher Reed | Third by consensus; Norma Selner enhancement may account for his ranking above Bachchan |
| 4 | Siddharth Bachchan | Fourth by consensus; minimal combat data available |
| 5 | Antoine Martinez | Healer type; National Level by contribution and ability rather than combat output ranking |
Thomas Andre’s gap over the others is significant. His fight with Jin-woo — which Jin-woo wins — is also the fight that establishes how far above standard National Level Jin-woo operates. Andre could not win. He came closer than anyone else without the Shadow Monarch’s power. The distinction between those two things is what the manhwa uses to establish where Jin-woo actually sits relative to the group.
For context on how National Level compares to the hunter ranking system overall, the Hunter Ranks article covers the full classification structure from E-rank upward.
Read Thomas Andre’s first appearance and the International Guild Conference arc from Chapter 140 at readsololevelingmanga.us.
