Jang “Dubu” Sung-rak, the artist of the popular Korean webtoon Solo Leveling and CEO of Redice Studio, has died.

Redice Studio announced the news today on its official Twitter account, stating that Dubu passed on July 23. The illustrator’s cause of death was a cerebral hemorrhage while suffering from a chronic illness.

Solo Leveling artist and Redice Studio CEO Jang Sung-rak dies

Sung Jinwoo in Solo Leveling game
Credit: Netmarble

Redice shared that Dubu’s funeral was kept private according to the wishes of the bereaved family, with only family members and acquaintances in attendance.

Dubu began his career by drawing for various series in Japan and South Korea. Some of his earlier titles include Space Dandy, The Island of Giant Insects, and Beautiful Legends, where he is credited as both artist and author.

In 2018, Dubu became the illustrator for the webtoon adaptation of Chu-gong’s web novel, Solo Leveling. As of the time of writing, the webtoon’s Kakao page has accumulated over 48 million views.



Status of the Solo Leveling webtoon and anime

The webtoon published its final chapter on December 29, 2021, closing out the series with a total of 179 chapters.

A-1 Pictures, known for its animation work in Sword Art Online and Erased, will be producing the anime with Shunsuke Nakashige as the director and Noboru Kimura as the head writer. Tomoko Sudo will be the head of character design.

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READ MORE: Solo Leveling anime: Release date, VA, studio, trailer, status of manhwa