He rubbed his chin and said, "As for Level 3 Dao Status, it costs 100 grade 3 merit points. This will be a little trickier to get. But it is feasible. It will just take a lot of time."
Level 3 Dao Status seemed to be within reach for him. But when he thought of Level 4 Dao Status, he smiled to himself and said, "However, Level 4 Dao Status is currently beyond my means. I will consider it when I achieve level 3 Dao Status in the future."
"In the meantime, I should continue growing stronger with any opportunity I get. I should continue to refine my body and help Shifting Armor grow stronger. I also shouldn’t forget about fusing my energy threads to form my Mind Palace."
After considering what he should do and making future plans, he began to inspect his new brothers-in-arms. He used the Power Identification Ability on them, so he was able to notice that five of them had level 2 Dao Status.
This made him chuckle to himself and say, "So I am not the only one who doesn’t have level 2 Dao Status. According to Jane, these people without Dao Status and I will be considered to be in over our heads."
Then he turned sideways to one of his new partners and said to himself, "Speaking of Jane. It looks like we are stuck together for the near future."
As he glanced at her, he thought to himself, "I wonder why she didn’t get pissed at Greg like the others. Is she such a magnanimous person?"
But he shook his head and said, "I doubt it. After all, she got very angry with me very quickly on the airship just because I didn’t know something. So she should have exploded in anger because of everything Greg said."
Jane also glanced at him. When she caught him looking, she smiled at him and said, "I hope we can work well together."
This was the same thing she said to him earlier when they first met. He hadn’t believed her when she said it the first time, so there was no way that he was going to believe her now that she was saying it again after she said he was a waste of her time.
He wasn’t even willing to deign to acknowledge what she said. So he ignored her and looked away instead of responding to her.
His behavior displeased her, and she pursed her lips in indignation. Her recruited lackeys also glared at Loki as if he had stolen something precious from them.
The interaction between Loki and Jane’s group of four was just one of the many interactions that were happening between the group. Everyone was checking each other out, either with curiosity or because of wariness.
As Loki inspected them, they inspected him too. While he could tell what pathway they were on and what Life Ability they possessed at a glance, the best that they could do was tell that he was a forger. This was because all they could see about him was his metallic skin and body.
They did this while Greg continued to talk their ears off from the front. He continued to talk nonstop as he led them to the airship.
On the way to the airship, everyone else was silent as they observed each other. But even though the distance to the airship was short, someone finally couldn’t take Greg’s incessant chatter anymore and had to speak up.
The person who spoke was a lady. Her face was contorted into a grimace as she said, "Reminds me of the psychological warfare training in the initiation program. I would rather cut myself than listen to anymore of this torture."
Her words caused the group to chuckle in amusement. Someone even said, "I am nearly at my limit. Anymore, and I will block my ears."
A third person added to the chatter, saying, "On the bright side, the longer we spend with him, the faster our Dao Heart will be refined."
More people joined in the conversation. But even though Loki was willing to court death, he decided that he wasn’t ready to die this way, so he didn’t join in making fun of Greg.
What happened next was that Greg became silent. His silence was so deafening that everyone else stopped talking and waited for him to say something.
But Greg didn’t say anything. He just looked ahead and smiled as if there was no problem. But Loki saw his eyes and saw that his smile didn’t reach his eyes, so he knew that there was a problem.
When he saw the chilling light at the depth of Greg’s eyes, he thought to himself in amusement, "You have done it now. Greg will let loose on you."
Greg still didn’t say anything for the few tens of meters that it took them to get to the airship. This airship was smaller than the one that brought him here. It looked more like a dirigible than a ship or boat.
There was a large cylindrical balloon attached to the top of a cabin. There were also sails attached to the cabin in a manner akin to the wings of birds.
When they arrived at the destination, Greg silently unlatched the lock on the door of the cabin of the airship. Then, he entered while leaving the door open for them.
Everyone glanced at each other with uncertainty in their eyes. They didn’t know what, so they looked at each other for guidance.
To be more accurate, they knew what to do. They just weren’t sure it was the right thing to do, seeing as Greg was in a bad mood and anything could set him off.
Eventually, Jane took the first step to approach the airship. She entered the door, and her three lackeys immediately went in after her.
Once they saw that someone had entered and nothing bad had happened, everyone decided to enter the cabin. They entered in a single file, and the last person closed the door behind them.