The Bloodhound

Training the recruits

While Claude took Marco away from me, my ears are getting chewed out by the fact that I am calling in the dead of the night just to have my door fixed.

"Come on. Some dickhead shoved themselves in. Please? With a cherry on top?" I asked him, well more like begged him.

I heard a sigh on the other side of the phone before he conceded. "Fine! But you're paying me and my men double just so you could have your door fixed in the dead of the night. Next time, don't piss off someone you know is bound to be a dickhead."

He hung up before I could say thank you. I shrugged and prepared a case. For what? He likes being paid in cash. I'm going to have to go all out for this one. I asked Mr. Gregory if he could watch the lab while I get the case of money ready. He gladly obliged and I went to get the case. I was back in front of the lab in ten minutes and was happy to see Mr. Gregory all by himself. I thanked him before dismissing him.

I called the guards to inform them of the arrival of the construction company and to just let them in. I sat in Mr. Gregory's chair and waited for them to arrive. I sighed in an almost comical relief after what just happened. I stood up and went inside the room. I went over to the shelf to check if any one of them was shattered or not.

Thankfully, none of them shattered. That earned a huge sigh of relief from me. I left the shelf and went back to pouring and labeling the contents of the vial on top of the table. I think I need to change my shelf into drawers. Thick-ass steel drawers. One's that even a gorilla like Marco can't bend or open. I really need to have locks on the two rooms that Marco wanted to see. My headquarters and this laboratory.

I kept doing what I was doing until the workers came and replaced the door. I gave the case with my payment and a few envelopes for the worker's tips and the door to the laboratory is as good as new. While they were working on the door, I tinkered with a few things and made an electronic lock to put on the door when the workers were done with it.

When everything is done, I locked the laboratory and went to my room. I didn't even bother changing, I fell onto my bed and I instantly fell asleep. I woke up to the sound of my alarm at 5 am. I groggily got up from my bed and went to the bathroom. I turned on the hot water while I stripped out of my clothes and showered. After I felt clean, I went to get a bath bomb and threw it in the tub full of hot water.

The moment it hit the water, the sweet smell of lavender exploded in my bathroom. That brought a smile to my face. I turned off the faucet and plunged my body into the tub. I sighed contently as I let my tired body soak in all the heat from the water. I stayed in the tub for a good 20 minutes before the water turned ice-cold. I got out and drained the water. I dried my body before putting on lotion all over my body and did all of my other morning rituals in the bathroom before changing into clothes that suit the occasion, training.

When I was done, I did two French braids on my head and proceeded to eat a light breakfast downstairs. I made toast and slathered it in butter before putting a sunny side egg on top of it. I ate that and washed it down with some orange juice and I went to the training grounds to start warming myself up. It is cold this early in the morning.

I was surprised to see the prince on the training grounds. He is the very definition of hot and sexy because he is swinging a freaking sword half-naked in this cold. And he is sweating well. But apart from him being such a scrumptious specimen, his form is nice and not a sore to my eyes. Well, he did learn from the best. Though I sometimes question Henry where he learned everything, he would always just answer me, "A master of the arts doesn't reveal their secrets."

That honestly pissed me to no end whenever he says that to me. I shook my head to clear it of Henry and slowly went to the other side of the arena and start warming up, mainly by doing some stretches and running the oval twice before I decided to take a dummy out and started to pummel it to the ground. I felt a pair of eyes on me and when I looked back, it belonged to the prince.

I stopped what I was doing and stared back at him. I decided to throw the dummy straight at him and as I thought, he was caught off-guard. I had to contain my laughter at the way he reacted when I threw it at him.

His expression was priceless. He just looked at me with a face full of disbelief at what I had done. He did catch the dummy, even though his face was funny.

He picked up the dummy in his left arm while his right hand is holding the sword and stomped his way to me without breaking eye contact. He stopped and stood two feet away from me, dropped the dummy in between us and continued to stare at me for a good minute.

I had to break the silence but someone beat me to it.

"Fancy seeing you this early."

My eyebrows raised themselves at his remark. I folded my arms, popped my hips to the side and made sure that he paid attention to every move I make before I slowly walked up to him and whispered in his ears, "That's 20 laps around the oval for you, Your Highness."

I looked at him one more time before sauntering to the middle of the oval and shouting the same orders to the others on the training ground. I didn't need to look back to know that someone was looking at me.

I ignored it and kept monitoring the recruits. Once I saw everybody on the oval, including the gorilla prince, I walked over to the armory and got several guns out. I placed them on the table near the shooting range. I continued to take out gun after gun until the armory is devoid of guns.

When all of that is done, the recruits are also almost done with their laps. I hurriedly finished putting the guns on the table and started to take out the bow and arrows next. By the time I was done with it, everybody is already behind me, trying to figure out what I am doing. When I was done, I took a step back, admired my work, and turned to face the others.

The moment I turned around, they immediately formed two rows and stood straight. I was taken aback by what they did but I shrugged it off and started to do a head count. When I counted that all the recruits are present, minus the haughty prince, I started my lecture for the day.

"Okay, since you have already warmed up, I'll have you guys do shooting practice. Pair up and while one shoots, one counts the score. Gus is going to hand out pieces of paper and pens, so write your names and scores down on those papers. As well as what weapon you were using during the shooting."

Before I could continue, the prince decided to ask a question while he raised his hand. Glad to see that he decided to play by the rules. I nodded in his direction and he said,

"Exactly what weapon are we using?"

I blinked a few times before spreading my arms and said, "There's every gun possible on this table and then some. There are even simple bows, as well as complicated crossbows. You can choose whatever you like. But I will not tell you what bullets go in what gun. You figure that out by yourselves. You can ask the others, I don't care. Make sure you use the right bullets for the right gun. Or I'm going to charge you for each gun you break."

I turned my back, walked to the side of the table of armaments and sarcastically said, "And don't worry. None of the ammunition are coated in poison, Your Highness."

I glared at him while telling them to start shooting from fifty meters away the targets. I saw some of their eyes going wide at the distance, some even groaned. I chuckled internally. They wouldn't be able to hit the target if they used a hand gun from fifty meters, obviously. That's why they also need to choose their weapons according to their situations.

When everybody has paired up, I saw that the haughty prince is all alone on the side while Claude is paired up with a recruit. He's the odd man out in this activity. Well, too bad for him, I ain't pairing up with him after the stunt he pulled last night. I ignored him and went to where Mr. Gregory is when I saw him enter the training grounds.

I saw him carrying my custom-made gun alongside the bullets I'll be using for it. I got excited when I saw the gun, my baby. I asked him if the bullets would be able to soak up poison and he just smiled, confirming it.