He said with a melancholic sigh, "To think that just one year ago, you lot were clueless and naive. Now you've turned into grown men and women that I can be proud of."
"You disgusted me when I first saw you. It wasn't because you were still weak. Your state of mind was just too loose. But that has changed now, thanks to my hard work and dedication."
Then he shed a fake tear and wiped his eyes with a handkerchief as he said, "You're still weak, but I am proud to call you the junior brothers and sisters of my sect. I am proud to have you as members of my sect because I know that I don't dare to turn my back on you."
"With what you've become, I can expect you to stab me in the back at the earliest opportunity and raid my corpse for benefits. It makes me feel so emotional just thinking about it. It is like watching my children all grown up. I feel like a father who has raised his children well."
He shed more fake tears before dabbing his eyes one last time and saying, "I'll miss you."
If anyone had any doubt about Muni before, his current pretense was enough to confirm that he was a sociopath.
No one present could be fooled by his show of emotions after they experienced him torturing and selling them every week. Muni must know this. But for some reason, he still chose to pretend that he cared about them.
After shedding crocodile tears for a while, he ended his act. Then he smiled at them and said, "I have nothing left to teach you. What is left is the end of the program competition. Then we will call it a day."
"Throughout the initiation program, I have only tested your Dao Heart, Skill, and Cultivation. I have never tested your fighting prowess. That was because it wasn't important in raising your value."
"It didn't matter all along that you could fight because I couldn't sell your fighting prowess. Only your skill with energy manipulation, the strength of your Dao Heart, and the refinement progress of your energy well were valuable and could be sold. But that's changed now that you're going into the world."
He patted his chest and said, "Frankly, your fighting prowess has nothing to do with me. In fact, the weaker you are, the easier it will be for me to kill you when we meet outside the sect. So I won't encourage you to be good at it."
"But your fighting prowess is important as it will determine which society in the sect you can join. Take it from me, someone who failed to enter a society, societies are very important as they will expand your connections and make it easier for you to acquire resources."
"If you want, be laid back about this competition. But if you want to achieve something great and don't want to turn out like me in the future, where you will need to raise a bunch of noobs and sell them for profit, make sure to do well in the competition and catch the eye of powerful societies."
"At the very least, your society will help you get the special and rare Branch Metacs that you need. Plus, they can help you gain access to the restricted materials that you need to upgrade your Core Metacs. So joining a society is very important."
Then he began to tell them about the different kinds of societies that they could join. He spoke of the strongest and the most suitable societies for various pathways.
He said a lot of things about societies that enlightened them. One thing that he didn't tell them about was how the societies had paid him to advertise their societies and make them look good to the recruits.
But his selfish motives aside, what he said about societies was insightful. At the very least, they got to know that societies are groups of people who band together with the goal of helping each other grow stronger.
They were able to learn that societies control nearly every aspect of the sect. So if they don't join a society, they will forever be outer sect disciples of the sect without access to the inner workings and privileges of the sect.
After he was done advertising, he said, "That is all I have to say about societies. As for the competition, it will be held in one week, so you have seven days to prepare."
"If you win the competition or come in the top three, even if you don't want to join a society, you will be rewarded with energy stones and Branch Metacs. That is a tangible benefit that you can fight for. I wish you good luck."
With that said, he sent them back to their lodgings.
Along the way, Loki was thinking about how to get a rank 2 Core Metac. This is because he needs the rank 2 Core Metac in order to advance to rank 2.
He has a lot of money and can buy any rank 2 Branch Metac. Unfortunately, he can't buy the rank 2 Core Metacs that he wants because no one is selling them.
As for using the normal process to advance his Core Metac to rank 2, he has already paid for the secret method of advancement and has brought the materials needed to upgrade his Core Metacs. The problem is that those methods don't work for Fenrir at all.
The method to upgrade the Telekinesis Metac is to fuse a special stone called magnetite to it and raw iron metal with it. When the Core Metac reaches its limit, he is to fuse it with another Branch Metac called the Living Armor Metac.
He paid 1,000 energy stones to acquire this information. As for the material and Metacs that he needs for the upgrade, they go for 2,000 energy stones. He also paid for them.