In the world of “Solo Leveling,” inter-dimensional gates regularly open up to “dungeons” crawling with strange and dangerous creatures. The only ones who can kill the creatures are hunters, who have awakened powers that let them take down the big bosses.

And out of all those hunters… Jinwoo is the weakest.

Needless to say, there’s plenty of room for improvement for the protagonist of Chugong’s “Solo Leveling” – and even in the brief space of the first volume, he makes quite a bit of improvement. The story thus far is bloody, harrowing, but also somewhat wryly funny – especially when the System intervenes to make life more complicated for the hero.

As mentioned before, Jinwoo Sung is the weakest of the lowest-ranked hunters, able to tag along on only the least threatening missions – and even then, he gets badly hurt. But he has no choice, because he needs the money for his family. When the party he’s with finds a rare double dungeon, Jin-woo is determined to explore the vast, eerie stone chamber filled with statues – and ends up in a nightmare that leaves him alone and dying.

Which is when the System intervenes, healing his body and saving his life. While he recovers, the System gives Jinwoo daily quests (mostly exercise) and the opportunity to level up and acquire new items. Just like a video game. He’s achieving the impossible: becoming steadily stronger, with apparently no limits.

Unfortunately, he soon discovers that even his increased power won’t keep him safe from potential harm in a dog-eat-dog profession, especially when he and another young hunter, Jinho Yoo, sign up for a freelance job posting. The problem is, the guy who’s hiring them, Dongsuk Hwang, is not the genial figure he pretends to be, and the biggest danger may be the other hunters rather than anything inside the dungeon.

The world of “Solo Leveling” is a pretty standard urban fantasy setting. It’s the modern world as we know it, except some people have magical powers and inter-dimensional gates allow them to hunt goblins, giant spiders and snakes, statue-gods, and so on. The most interesting aspect of it is the System that effectively turns Jinwoo into the protagonist of his own personal video game, with all the problems and benefits of that status.

The writing is pretty standard for a light-novel/webnovel’s style, spare and lean with lots of onomatopeia. It feels like Chugong is still building up the plot threads in this volume, since the majority of the story is just devoted to Jinwoo ending up in a nightmarish and life-threatening situation, and then spending a lot of time grinding (which is a bit tedious) and building up his strength. But Chugong has some talent at depicting the raw, wild, desperate interiors of the dungeons, and the monsters in them.

Jinwoo is kind of a mixed hero – at the story’s beginning, he’s courageous, unselfish and quick-witted, but still petrified of dying and acutely aware of his almost comical weakness. However, he becomes a lot colder and less likable as the first volume winds on, after he comes to the conclusion that all people are cowardly backstabbers. Hopefully the presence of Jinho – a golden retriever of a rich boy who constantly addresses him as “boss” – will mellow him out in subsequent volumes.

“Solo Leveling Volume 1” has some growing pains, but it’s an entertaining foray into a series with plenty of promise, solid writing, and a hero who wobbles on the edge of antihero. At the very least, it inspires me to check out volume two.