User blog comment:Godisme/The Golden Plains/@comment-60.53.102.237-20130629174021/@comment-7418318-20130629174527

This, along with neither the Dragon parents nor Acnologia turning up, made many of us believe that this wasn't the actual Dragon King Festival (how can it be the Dragon KING Festival, without the Dragon King being present) and that the King was simply mistaken.

Since Igneel said that their time will soon come, I think that the Eclipse incident was just the herald of the actual festival.