Solo Leveling Episode 8 Review

Five Major Guilds

Solo Leveling Episode 5 explains the role the Hunter guilds play in society. And, this was kind of the most interesting part of the episode. This series is extremely slow. It feels like nothing much happens in the majority of the episodes.

Anyway, the top five guilds in Korea are the Hunters Guild, the Fame Guild, the White Tiger Guild, the Reaper Guild, and the Knights Guild. As far as I know, this is their ranking, with the Hunters Guild being the largest. But, regardless of ranking, they’re all large.

From my understanding, these five pretty much have a monopoly. There are smaller guilds around. But, if you want to be a successful Hunter, you should join one of these five. They have all the money and wield all the political power.

The government manages access to the gates that appear throughout the country. So, the large guilds are able to use their money and influence to lobby for that access. And, once a guild gets the rights to a particular gate, they’re the ones who choose which Hunters can enter. This is why it’s beneficial to be part of a large guild.

Let’s also not forget how important the resources found within the gates are. This is the reason the guilds want access to the gates. They can extract the resources, sell them, and turn a profit. And, this is why a company like Yoojin Construction wants to launch a guild of its own.

Why let the current top guilds continue their monopoly? With its current resources, Yoojin Construction hopes to form a guild that can rival the best. And once they do, they’ll be able to make even more money – because the rich always want to get richer.

Returning to Jeju Island

Way back in Episode 1, we saw a failed raid on Jeju Island, where a high-ranked gate opened up. The fact that this raid was a failure is pretty surprising considering who was involved. There were a lot of Hunters, including many high-ranking Hunters from the top guilds.

Jongin Choi, the guild master of the Hunters Guild, is one of the Hunters who was on the island that day. And, he plans to return with an even larger, better-prepared force. But, to do that, he needs the five major guilds to agree to work together.

This is where Yoojin Construction’s new guild comes in. It’s threatening this goal by trying to poach high-ranking Hunters from the top guilds. If these Hunters join Yoojin Construction, it’s less likely that they’ll take part in the raid. There’s no guarantee that this new guild will want to work with the old guard.

The whole point of Yuujin Construction’s guild is to steal profit from the other guilds. Working with the other guilds kind of goes against that. And, since profit is most important, Jeju Island’s gate might not be worth it.

Why would Yoojin Construction bother with such a dangerous gate? If they fail to conquer it, it’s a waste of money and manpower. The other guilds, however, have an incentive to clear the Jeju Island gate — revenge. They have their pride as Hunters. They can’t leave that gate alone because it’s a reminder of their previous failure.

But, how dangerous do you think the Jeju Island gate is compared to the Demon Castle dungeon? Do you think it’s even more dangerous? If that’s the case, I guess the Demon Castle dungeon won’t be the final dungeon of the series. I wonder what the reward for clearing Jeju Island is.

Dungeon Raiding with Convicts

At the end of Episode 8, most of the survivors of the double dungeon reunite. They’ve answered an emergency summons to take on a D-Rank dungeon. But, there are only five of them. So, who will the other three Hunters in their squad be? Convicts.

I don’t know about you, but, to me, that seems like a pretty bad idea. I’m not saying that convicts shouldn’t be able to work with non-convicts. But, there are certain situations in which this feels like an unnecessary risk. For example, this exact situation.

We already know that “what happens in the gates stays in the gates.” So, why is the government sending convicts into a gate with law-abiding citizens? Well, the reason is that there’s currently a shortage of Hunters. And, the government believes that these convicts won’t pose a risk to the others for two reasons.

First, these are C-Rank convicts with a B-Rank handler, Taeshik Kang. If anything goes wrong, the idea is that the handler should be able to take care of all three of them. But, the government doesn’t expect that the handler will have to intervene. Why? Because it’s in the best interest of the convicts to not cause problems.

These convicts are working as Hunters in order to earn early release. If they complete their jobs without incident, they’ll get out of prison earlier. So, why would they cause problems? Well, that’s nice thinking. But, these particular convicts don’t exactly seem like stand-up guys.

On top of that, I’m not sure why it’s even necessary to use the convicts in this situation. I get that you need a team of 8 to enter a dungeon. But, if the B-Rank handler is stronger than all three C-Rank convicts combined — why not just send the handler?

Final Thoughts

What do you think of Solo Leveling Episode 8? Do you agree that the pacing of this series is too slow — especially with a recap episode last week? Do you think the Jeju Island gate or the Demon Castle dungeon is more dangerous? And, would you want to raid a gate with convicts?

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My review of Episode 9 is available now.